Social gaming, where is it?

Marketing executives owuld have you believe that social gaming is at an all time high and everything these days is connected via twitter, FB, YouTube and so on with multiplayer bringing not only big bucks but major changed to just about every gaming IP.

Yet, as a child of the 90s who was lucky enough to grow up in the PS1/N64//PS2 era and experience my college and university years with the PS3 (throw in the PC at various stages throughout) I can't help but think gaming has become ever more lonely. In the bygone age of the mid to late 90s and much of the last decade, the internet was not as big a factor, so if you wanted to know how to complete a tricky level or beat a seriously difficult boss, you actually had to...you know, talk to people. There were plenty of sessions where a bunch of kids would gather round the living of that one class mate who had completed said level/boss just to see how he'd do it.

If you needed more info, you would have to actually leave the house and go buy a magazine or cheat book. On top of all that and the single most important aspect - multiplayer gaming. First off, you didn't have to pay extra for multiplayer modes or be bogged down by connection speeds and server issues. You gathered a group of friends (real friends, not ticks on a website) and some controllers and you just had a blast. Mario Kart, FIFA, PES, Tekken, Crash Kart, various FPS games...it was fun, there was banter, there were even tantrums and above all else, it was social.

With the advent of the internet and almost every aspect of the gaming industry becoming digitised and monotised, the social aspect is not truly social, it is just a way for gaming companies to make a quick buck. I feel sad for thsoe kids growing up in the modern age of gaming. They can't reminisce about witnessin a friends hissy fit at losing on penalties or the joy of working with a friend sitting in the same room as you as he helps you a tricky platforming sequence.

What do you guys think?

I grew up during the NES and SNES days. I remember back in those days, Final Fantasy VI was hard for us but full of wonder. I remember playing various fighting games with my friends and figure out what style of moves the caracters was ... like is it more like Street Fighter or Mortal Kombat ?

Or again in Mortal Kombat, they didn't give the move set nor the fatalities back then ... it was all a secret. A secret that added to this mystic very violent game. If someone knew a fatality no one else knew we hid the controler or did way more stuff just to mess with the other haha.

Or going into Zelda with friends and trying to map out the place and figure out a way to get around and complete the game ...

PS1 and N64 it was either about RPG like Final Fantasy and Final Fantasy Tactics, or we played survival horror like the first Resident Evil, Parasite Eve ... then on n64 it was Mario Kart, Super Mario, Golden Eye ...

Yeah, I miss that element of hiding things from friends in a competitive game, like Tekken for instance and back then, you couldnt just log into your internet account and look up the instructions. It was just generally more fun.

Gathering to play with friends was fun back in the day. Either at the arcade or in the living room. It was far more social back then. During the nes days it was fun to gather with friends and take turns playing techmo bowl or mario. Had a lot of fun with mario kart on the snes and n64. On the snes I was the king of Motarl Kombat 1,2,3. It got to a point no one would play me. I had to coerce my friends into playing by telling them I'll pick the worse character.

@jdc6305: Lol it was the same with me and Tekken

This makes me remember back of those time when i was playing DMC 3 with my friend. It is single player and only one PC there so we take turns. We were competing on who will be the one pass the stage boss. (The time was very difficult to beat every boss as we played without any guides)

I hate it, I don't want it, I don't want to know where it is.

It's just another disguise for DRM and "always-online" bullshit.

reading this thread reminded me of this i saw earlier today

@soul_starter: I remember playing and talking for hours back when SOCOM II was one of THE games to play. There were some nights where the team you were on was horrible but didn't matter because you enjoyed the overall experience. I have actually muted the talk feature because I got tired of 12 year olds maming inappropriate comments to impress the "adults" and others playing music the whole round. It is what it is.

@Macutchi: @TheDarkWolf86:I neverg ot into Socom 2 although I always wantedt o. Didnt have online on my ps2 :( But yeah, I mute games these days too lol

and very good cartooon lol

You'll be glad to hear that Mario Kart and Mortal Kombat still exist and it's perfectly possible to *gasp* play them together in the living room. If you stopped getting friends together to play it's your fault and not the one of the games.

@Macutchi: hahaha that was amazing and so true

I'm 40 years old most of my friends no longer have time for video games. They work a lot and when they're not working they like to do stuff that don't involve sitting on the couch like hunting fishing going to the bar or casino. Me I have a lot of time on my hands I'm retired.

Isn't Nintendo brimming with social gaming opportunities?

Yeah because so many people bought the Wii U ....

I've never thought about it that way. Then again, I don't play a lot of social games such as Farmville, Battle Beach, Class of Clans etc, but you do bring up a good point that as people get connected, some parts of the social fabric gets lost. However, I think a different kind of social event can still take place. One with comment sections, posts, tweets and all the "Sharing" going on. It's not physical, but the social aspect is still there.

You're right though. Gathering four of your favorite friends to play Smash Bros. and seeing all of that friendship go out the window as one player spams down+b as Pikachu, the other spams the Ray Gun, and the Fox player constantly using Side+B is so much fun. Trying to 1-up each other in arcade games to see who can do better who simply watching each other play is a precious moment. My favorite moments when I was a kid when my neighbor and I would play MGS2 and we didn't know what to do because we didn't understand English very well. Complaining about horrible aiming controls, what the conversation was about, questioning are life about reality and the lack of it. Glorious.

Okay! I got into a tangent there...

I will give you that gaming has in someway become more lonely if you only look at being social as something that happens if you are actually present with other people.

If you on the other hand look at our time and look at the amount of time people spend on social media, in social gaming sessions either has a spectator or participant , it´s actually become a lot more social and instead of maybe having 1-2 people to play or interact with, you now have 20-30+ or whole communities.

Also it has become a lot more global and instead of being forced to look in your close area , you can now have friends all over the world which is by a long standard a good thing.

So i do not feel sad for todays kids , i in some areas feel they are much more lucky than most of us growing up in the 90´s or 00´s.

Because the Wii U is Nintendo's only platform ....