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It’s a staple of the recent generations of console. The Xbox 360 and Playstation 3 have dedicated and connected online services (Xbox Live and Playstation Network, respectively), and with recent games often concentrating the efforts of development on creating a more comprehensive and enjoyable multiplayer experience at the expense of the single player, some might say that online gaming is the future.
Not for me. Not yet. It’s no secret that I’m not a huge fan of online. There are so many things that ruin a gaming experience, but I’ll get to that in a minute. Let us discuss the main types of online play that we see.
Cooperative online play is probably the sort of gameplay that invokes the least number of issues from players online. Working together towards a common goal, against computer-generated opponents, or against puzzles, is something that doesn’t tend to bring out the worst in people. Sure, there can be moments of friction due to miscommunication, but that’s to be expected from the territory.
The main problem from cooperative play is the killjoy: a person who gets their enjoyment from detracting the enjoyment of others. It’s not a huge problem, sometimes it is fun to mess around with your partner (hell, Portal 2 has some achievements for it), but some people take it to stupid extremes in an attempt to cause frustration. But you can attempt to avoid players like that. Generally, cooperative play isn’t an issue.
Then there’s the semi-cooperative play; a sort of team vs. team affair. You find this in some sporting games but the main port of call for this type of gameplay is the shooters. Again, generally this isn’t too bad as most gamers online can get into a team mentality, but there are problems.
Firstly, you have the over-competitives. These people will scream obscenities at their team-mates if things aren’t going as well as they might not be able to, often even if they’re the ones to blame, and generally just make the experience unpleasant for all those involved. Then comes the traitors: these spineless buffoons gain their pleasure from abusing the friendly-fire or damage from explosion mechanics in the game to make life as difficult for their team as possible, and generally just be irritating to both teams.
Next up on the online games is the free-for-all. Shooters are another good example of this, but I’m going to go more with my personal experiences and talk about racing games instead. In the majority of cases, free-for-alls work fine. Yeah, you’ll get some incredibly talented or incredibly cheap players taking top spots by huge margins, but if they want to get that good, then so be it.
What you do find with these sometimes are, again, those who find enjoyment in ruining the experiences of others, aiming for the most part to partake in head-on collisions with those leading the pack, generally heading intentionally in the wrong direction.
There are also some issues that go across all modes of play. In many cases, still nowadays with the better quality internet connections, latency issues still occur. Now, for me, lag can be an experience killing issue, especially if it detracts from my ability to be competitive in the gaming environment. Less common nowadays, but very common back playing online on the PS2 at least, were bandwidth throttlers: opening torrents and high stress internet applications to limit the speed at which the two players could connect, generally leading to very laggy play, mainly effecting the opponents side to the point where many things had happened before you could see that they had.
There are also the cheaters and hackers, those who can’t bear to enter the online arena to do battle with everyone else on level ground, and have to give themselves advantages to assert their ‘supremacy’. Either part of those who find enjoyment in killing the enjoyment of others, or those so insecure that guaranteed success is the ego boost they need.
Nowadays, the main problems come from headsets, and people who can’t follow an etiquette whilst using them, either understanding that having the TV on loud is irritating to other players, or that the player themselves is irritating to other players. Whilst the mute option is there in most instances, it’s still an annoyance.
Okay, we’ll get onto my main gripe with online play: competitive one-on-one versus play. This is found across many genres but I’ll concentrate on the sports titles (which is personally where I spend most of my online time). Sports titles have very definitive versus modes, and in most cases there is an outright winner. The very nature of sports can showcase the talent of one gamer above another over the period of time of the game. And this is where my major issue with online gamers lies.
Ragequitters. The people who insist on leaving before a given match has reached its conclusion. If you’re going to play online, then you should deal with the consequences of playing someone superior to you. You’d expect it from someone else, so have the common decency to do it yourself. It’s a problem that is ruining my personal online experience in FIFA 11, that’s for sure.
But it wouldn’t be so much of a problem if the game accounted for it. At the moment there is so much to be lost playing in a match that is disconnected and very little to be lost to be the disconnector. (Talking of my experiences, and using FIFA 11 as an example) The match, following disconnection, is given to the player that did not disconnect as a forfeit, 3-0 result. However, the match is not counted as a match played, or a match won in official stats, it is counted as void. There is no ranking point shift and any winning streak that the “winning” team may have had is broken.
It’s this sort of thing that irritates me. The disconnectee is penalised for having played in a match that is voided by the opponent, whilst the disconnector feels very few repercussions, as well as allowing them to continue as if they hadn’t lost.
In my personal opinion, the ramifications for quitting, especially for consistently quitting from losing positions need to be a lot harsher if this problem is to be solved adequately, as well as not punishing those who haven’t disconnected. Maybe a snap-shot of the result on disconnect for the “winner”, minus a rankings penalty (or temporary online ban for persistent offenders) for the disconnector.
Call of Duty may have increased the popularity of online gaming amongst the ‘general public’ and thrust it toward the most important end of recent game releases, but until the issues surrounding it have been sorted, I don’t think I’ll ever fully enjoy online play…
…or maybe it’s just me?
Not for me. Not yet. It’s no secret that I’m not a huge fan of online. There are so many things that ruin a gaming experience, but I’ll get to that in a minute. Let us discuss the main types of online play that we see.
Cooperative online play is probably the sort of gameplay that invokes the least number of issues from players online. Working together towards a common goal, against computer-generated opponents, or against puzzles, is something that doesn’t tend to bring out the worst in people. Sure, there can be moments of friction due to miscommunication, but that’s to be expected from the territory.
The main problem from cooperative play is the killjoy: a person who gets their enjoyment from detracting the enjoyment of others. It’s not a huge problem, sometimes it is fun to mess around with your partner (hell, Portal 2 has some achievements for it), but some people take it to stupid extremes in an attempt to cause frustration. But you can attempt to avoid players like that. Generally, cooperative play isn’t an issue.
Then there’s the semi-cooperative play; a sort of team vs. team affair. You find this in some sporting games but the main port of call for this type of gameplay is the shooters. Again, generally this isn’t too bad as most gamers online can get into a team mentality, but there are problems.
Firstly, you have the over-competitives. These people will scream obscenities at their team-mates if things aren’t going as well as they might not be able to, often even if they’re the ones to blame, and generally just make the experience unpleasant for all those involved. Then comes the traitors: these spineless buffoons gain their pleasure from abusing the friendly-fire or damage from explosion mechanics in the game to make life as difficult for their team as possible, and generally just be irritating to both teams.
Next up on the online games is the free-for-all. Shooters are another good example of this, but I’m going to go more with my personal experiences and talk about racing games instead. In the majority of cases, free-for-alls work fine. Yeah, you’ll get some incredibly talented or incredibly cheap players taking top spots by huge margins, but if they want to get that good, then so be it.
What you do find with these sometimes are, again, those who find enjoyment in ruining the experiences of others, aiming for the most part to partake in head-on collisions with those leading the pack, generally heading intentionally in the wrong direction.
There are also some issues that go across all modes of play. In many cases, still nowadays with the better quality internet connections, latency issues still occur. Now, for me, lag can be an experience killing issue, especially if it detracts from my ability to be competitive in the gaming environment. Less common nowadays, but very common back playing online on the PS2 at least, were bandwidth throttlers: opening torrents and high stress internet applications to limit the speed at which the two players could connect, generally leading to very laggy play, mainly effecting the opponents side to the point where many things had happened before you could see that they had.
There are also the cheaters and hackers, those who can’t bear to enter the online arena to do battle with everyone else on level ground, and have to give themselves advantages to assert their ‘supremacy’. Either part of those who find enjoyment in killing the enjoyment of others, or those so insecure that guaranteed success is the ego boost they need.
Nowadays, the main problems come from headsets, and people who can’t follow an etiquette whilst using them, either understanding that having the TV on loud is irritating to other players, or that the player themselves is irritating to other players. Whilst the mute option is there in most instances, it’s still an annoyance.
Okay, we’ll get onto my main gripe with online play: competitive one-on-one versus play. This is found across many genres but I’ll concentrate on the sports titles (which is personally where I spend most of my online time). Sports titles have very definitive versus modes, and in most cases there is an outright winner. The very nature of sports can showcase the talent of one gamer above another over the period of time of the game. And this is where my major issue with online gamers lies.
Ragequitters. The people who insist on leaving before a given match has reached its conclusion. If you’re going to play online, then you should deal with the consequences of playing someone superior to you. You’d expect it from someone else, so have the common decency to do it yourself. It’s a problem that is ruining my personal online experience in FIFA 11, that’s for sure.
But it wouldn’t be so much of a problem if the game accounted for it. At the moment there is so much to be lost playing in a match that is disconnected and very little to be lost to be the disconnector. (Talking of my experiences, and using FIFA 11 as an example) The match, following disconnection, is given to the player that did not disconnect as a forfeit, 3-0 result. However, the match is not counted as a match played, or a match won in official stats, it is counted as void. There is no ranking point shift and any winning streak that the “winning” team may have had is broken.
It’s this sort of thing that irritates me. The disconnectee is penalised for having played in a match that is voided by the opponent, whilst the disconnector feels very few repercussions, as well as allowing them to continue as if they hadn’t lost.
In my personal opinion, the ramifications for quitting, especially for consistently quitting from losing positions need to be a lot harsher if this problem is to be solved adequately, as well as not punishing those who haven’t disconnected. Maybe a snap-shot of the result on disconnect for the “winner”, minus a rankings penalty (or temporary online ban for persistent offenders) for the disconnector.
Call of Duty may have increased the popularity of online gaming amongst the ‘general public’ and thrust it toward the most important end of recent game releases, but until the issues surrounding it have been sorted, I don’t think I’ll ever fully enjoy online play…
…or maybe it’s just me?
True. I've taken 5-1 losses on FIFA myself. In my opinion, if they're that much better than me at the time, then fair enough (although it wasn't that, Cech had a nightmare, got replaced by Turnbull at 0-4). I think the main problem lies at a lack of moderation and a lack of consequence.
Unfortunately, you'd also be hitting people with dodgy connections, but I'm sure that there would be some way of distinguishing. e.g. Someone who quits at 2-0 up probably isn't ragequitting, someone who quits when they concede their third probably is.
Unfortunately, you'd also be hitting people with dodgy connections, but I'm sure that there would be some way of distinguishing. e.g. Someone who quits at 2-0 up probably isn't ragequitting, someone who quits when they concede their third probably is.
At the end of the day, the root of the problem lies in the gamers themselves. Most people can't stand losing online, but somebody has to be a loser. If anything I have more respect for people who play the game properly and lose than people who are top of rankings or have great percentages etc. because no doubts that a lot of those people have cheated or quitted their way to success.
It’s a staple of the recent generations of console. The Xbox 360 and Playstation 3 have dedicated and connected online services (Xbox Live and Playstation Network, respectively), and with recent games often concentrating the efforts of development on creating a more comprehensive and enjoyable multiplayer experience at the expense of the single player, some might say that online gaming is the future.
Not for me. Not yet. It’s no secret that I’m not a huge fan of online. There are so many things that ruin a gaming experience, but I’ll get to that in a minute. Let us discuss the main types of online play that we see.
Cooperative online play is probably the sort of gameplay that invokes the least number of issues from players online. Working together towards a common goal, against computer-generated opponents, or against puzzles, is something that doesn’t tend to bring out the worst in people. Sure, there can be moments of friction due to miscommunication, but that’s to be expected from the territory.
The main problem from cooperative play is the killjoy: a person who gets their enjoyment from detracting the enjoyment of others. It’s not a huge problem, sometimes it is fun to mess around with your partner (hell, Portal 2 has some achievements for it), but some people take it to stupid extremes in an attempt to cause frustration. But you can attempt to avoid players like that. Generally, cooperative play isn’t an issue.
Then there’s the semi-cooperative play; a sort of team vs. team affair. You find this in some sporting games but the main port of call for this type of gameplay is the shooters. Again, generally this isn’t too bad as most gamers online can get into a team mentality, but there are problems.
Firstly, you have the over-competitives. These people will scream obscenities at their team-mates if things aren’t going as well as they might not be able to, often even if they’re the ones to blame, and generally just make the experience unpleasant for all those involved. Then comes the traitors: these spineless buffoons gain their pleasure from abusing the friendly-fire or damage from explosion mechanics in the game to make life as difficult for their team as possible, and generally just be irritating to both teams.
Next up on the online games is the free-for-all. Shooters are another good example of this, but I’m going to go more with my personal experiences and talk about racing games instead. In the majority of cases, free-for-alls work fine. Yeah, you’ll get some incredibly talented or incredibly cheap players taking top spots by huge margins, but if they want to get that good, then so be it.
What you do find with these sometimes are, again, those who find enjoyment in ruining the experiences of others, aiming for the most part to partake in head-on collisions with those leading the pack, generally heading intentionally in the wrong direction.
There are also some issues that go across all modes of play. In many cases, still nowadays with the better quality internet connections, latency issues still occur. Now, for me, lag can be an experience killing issue, especially if it detracts from my ability to be competitive in the gaming environment. Less common nowadays, but very common back playing online on the PS2 at least, were bandwidth throttlers: opening torrents and high stress internet applications to limit the speed at which the two players could connect, generally leading to very laggy play, mainly effecting the opponents side to the point where many things had happened before you could see that they had.
There are also the cheaters and hackers, those who can’t bear to enter the online arena to do battle with everyone else on level ground, and have to give themselves advantages to assert their ‘supremacy’. Either part of those who find enjoyment in killing the enjoyment of others, or those so insecure that guaranteed success is the ego boost they need.
Nowadays, the main problems come from headsets, and people who can’t follow an etiquette whilst using them, either understanding that having the TV on loud is irritating to other players, or that the player themselves is irritating to other players. Whilst the mute option is there in most instances, it’s still an annoyance.
Okay, we’ll get onto my main gripe with online play: competitive one-on-one versus play. This is found across many genres but I’ll concentrate on the sports titles (which is personally where I spend most of my online time). Sports titles have very definitive versus modes, and in most cases there is an outright winner. The very nature of sports can showcase the talent of one gamer above another over the period of time of the game. And this is where my major issue with online gamers lies.
Ragequitters. The people who insist on leaving before a given match has reached its conclusion. If you’re going to play online, then you should deal with the consequences of playing someone superior to you. You’d expect it from someone else, so have the common decency to do it yourself. It’s a problem that is ruining my personal online experience in FIFA 11, that’s for sure.
But it wouldn’t be so much of a problem if the game accounted for it. At the moment there is so much to be lost playing in a match that is disconnected and very little to be lost to be the disconnector. (Talking of my experiences, and using FIFA 11 as an example) The match, following disconnection, is given to the player that did not disconnect as a forfeit, 3-0 result. However, the match is not counted as a match played, or a match won in official stats, it is counted as void. There is no ranking point shift and any winning streak that the “winning” team may have had is broken.
It’s this sort of thing that irritates me. The disconnectee is penalised for having played in a match that is voided by the opponent, whilst the disconnector feels very few repercussions, as well as allowing them to continue as if they hadn’t lost.
In my personal opinion, the ramifications for quitting, especially for consistently quitting from losing positions need to be a lot harsher if this problem is to be solved adequately, as well as not punishing those who haven’t disconnected. Maybe a snap-shot of the result on disconnect for the “winner”, minus a rankings penalty (or temporary online ban for persistent offenders) for the disconnector.
Call of Duty may have increased the popularity of online gaming amongst the ‘general public’ and thrust it toward the most important end of recent game releases, but until the issues surrounding it have been sorted, I don’t think I’ll ever fully enjoy online play…
…or maybe it’s just me?
Not for me. Not yet. It’s no secret that I’m not a huge fan of online. There are so many things that ruin a gaming experience, but I’ll get to that in a minute. Let us discuss the main types of online play that we see.
Cooperative online play is probably the sort of gameplay that invokes the least number of issues from players online. Working together towards a common goal, against computer-generated opponents, or against puzzles, is something that doesn’t tend to bring out the worst in people. Sure, there can be moments of friction due to miscommunication, but that’s to be expected from the territory.
The main problem from cooperative play is the killjoy: a person who gets their enjoyment from detracting the enjoyment of others. It’s not a huge problem, sometimes it is fun to mess around with your partner (hell, Portal 2 has some achievements for it), but some people take it to stupid extremes in an attempt to cause frustration. But you can attempt to avoid players like that. Generally, cooperative play isn’t an issue.
Then there’s the semi-cooperative play; a sort of team vs. team affair. You find this in some sporting games but the main port of call for this type of gameplay is the shooters. Again, generally this isn’t too bad as most gamers online can get into a team mentality, but there are problems.
Firstly, you have the over-competitives. These people will scream obscenities at their team-mates if things aren’t going as well as they might not be able to, often even if they’re the ones to blame, and generally just make the experience unpleasant for all those involved. Then comes the traitors: these spineless buffoons gain their pleasure from abusing the friendly-fire or damage from explosion mechanics in the game to make life as difficult for their team as possible, and generally just be irritating to both teams.
Next up on the online games is the free-for-all. Shooters are another good example of this, but I’m going to go more with my personal experiences and talk about racing games instead. In the majority of cases, free-for-alls work fine. Yeah, you’ll get some incredibly talented or incredibly cheap players taking top spots by huge margins, but if they want to get that good, then so be it.
What you do find with these sometimes are, again, those who find enjoyment in ruining the experiences of others, aiming for the most part to partake in head-on collisions with those leading the pack, generally heading intentionally in the wrong direction.
There are also some issues that go across all modes of play. In many cases, still nowadays with the better quality internet connections, latency issues still occur. Now, for me, lag can be an experience killing issue, especially if it detracts from my ability to be competitive in the gaming environment. Less common nowadays, but very common back playing online on the PS2 at least, were bandwidth throttlers: opening torrents and high stress internet applications to limit the speed at which the two players could connect, generally leading to very laggy play, mainly effecting the opponents side to the point where many things had happened before you could see that they had.
There are also the cheaters and hackers, those who can’t bear to enter the online arena to do battle with everyone else on level ground, and have to give themselves advantages to assert their ‘supremacy’. Either part of those who find enjoyment in killing the enjoyment of others, or those so insecure that guaranteed success is the ego boost they need.
Nowadays, the main problems come from headsets, and people who can’t follow an etiquette whilst using them, either understanding that having the TV on loud is irritating to other players, or that the player themselves is irritating to other players. Whilst the mute option is there in most instances, it’s still an annoyance.
Okay, we’ll get onto my main gripe with online play: competitive one-on-one versus play. This is found across many genres but I’ll concentrate on the sports titles (which is personally where I spend most of my online time). Sports titles have very definitive versus modes, and in most cases there is an outright winner. The very nature of sports can showcase the talent of one gamer above another over the period of time of the game. And this is where my major issue with online gamers lies.
Ragequitters. The people who insist on leaving before a given match has reached its conclusion. If you’re going to play online, then you should deal with the consequences of playing someone superior to you. You’d expect it from someone else, so have the common decency to do it yourself. It’s a problem that is ruining my personal online experience in FIFA 11, that’s for sure.
But it wouldn’t be so much of a problem if the game accounted for it. At the moment there is so much to be lost playing in a match that is disconnected and very little to be lost to be the disconnector. (Talking of my experiences, and using FIFA 11 as an example) The match, following disconnection, is given to the player that did not disconnect as a forfeit, 3-0 result. However, the match is not counted as a match played, or a match won in official stats, it is counted as void. There is no ranking point shift and any winning streak that the “winning” team may have had is broken.
It’s this sort of thing that irritates me. The disconnectee is penalised for having played in a match that is voided by the opponent, whilst the disconnector feels very few repercussions, as well as allowing them to continue as if they hadn’t lost.
In my personal opinion, the ramifications for quitting, especially for consistently quitting from losing positions need to be a lot harsher if this problem is to be solved adequately, as well as not punishing those who haven’t disconnected. Maybe a snap-shot of the result on disconnect for the “winner”, minus a rankings penalty (or temporary online ban for persistent offenders) for the disconnector.
Call of Duty may have increased the popularity of online gaming amongst the ‘general public’ and thrust it toward the most important end of recent game releases, but until the issues surrounding it have been sorted, I don’t think I’ll ever fully enjoy online play…
…or maybe it’s just me?