Last Monday when we talked about Network Games, Professor Jagoda asked the class, “What kinds of research discussion questions can we ask of a networked coop game?” While I did not say my questions to the rest of the class, the biggest one that I could come up with was: “Is a co-op game worth the frustration that could possibly [read: will inevitably] come with it?” This is a question stuck out that to me because while I do like to play certain co-op games, there are times when I feel incredibly irritated with those that I am playing with—something I have had to accept when it comes to this genre of games.
When you play network/co-op games, you sometimes end up playing with people that could have personalities very different than your own. This means that these other players could also have different strategies of play when it comes to the game that you are all are playing together. This can be very frustrating especially if everyone has a specific goal that they want to reach. For example, let’s think about the Stardew Valley Co-op game that we played for our discussion section. In this game, you (and three other people) take on the role of farmers that have traded the hustle and bustle of the city for the calmness of the countryside. As a player, you have a multitude of things you can do including farming, fishing, mining, foraging, and getting to know the NPCs that live in the area. While this is all fine and dandy, the frustration begins to start when the players start to do their own thing. During my section, some players farmed for the entirety of the game, some fished, and some explored the area and the people within it. While that wasn’t a problem because we were exploring the game, I started to wonder what would happen if this occurred during a “serious” session the game where people are trying to carry out objectives. Now I’ve never played Stardew Valley before, but I am going to assume that, based on how time works in the game, farming all of your land can be very time-consuming. So, time-consuming, that the co-op feature is probably very useful, but what happens if the other people playing don’t farm with you. At that point, aren’t you virtually playing by yourself?
Another example comes from one of my all-time favorite games: DC Universe Online. In this game, can create your own superhero (or supervillain) and create peace (or mayhem) on the streets of Metropolis and Gotham with other online players. For the first 30 levels of your character’s life, you can play several solo missions and still reach the same conclusion that happens at level 30. However, after level 30, to get better gear and a higher combat rating, you must play group instances and raids that require 4 and 8 players respectively. While there are solo missions that you can still play, you have to use these solo missions in conjunction with the raids and group instances to power-up your character. At this point in the game, you have to rely on other players to get your character to a better place in the game. This becomes increasingly difficult and frustrating because as you queue up these group missions, you find that getting enough people to play is not an easy task—especially for raids. I know this struggle all too well because I’ve been stuck at the same combat rating for about 3 months.
What both these games have in common, is that there is an inherent reliance on other people that resides with the game. This is one reason why I prefer single-player games. In these types of games, the only person that can hold you back is yourself, something I prefer a lot more. However, these co-op games are fun. As a result, I’ve had to grapple with this problem to enjoy my time with the game’s features which sometimes outweigh its problems.