True Coop

Is true cooperative multiplayer becoming a staple in our gaming future or is it just whistling Dixie?

Those who have been lucky enough to pc game in the early to mid 90’s know this is a refreshing and longed for return to the complete multiplayer experience. For those who have only been gaming the last couple of years, true cooperative will add a new dimension to your pc multiplayer experience.

What is true cooperative multiplayer you ask? Let’s first determine what it’s not.

Contrary to some developers mislabeling their products in recent years; cooperative multiplayer or coop as we’ll refer to it, is not team deathmatch, team king of the hill, attack and defend, team flagball, or any of the other multiplayer games. If you’re adding bots or anything to a map then it’s not true coop. For example, if someone says Unreal Tournament 2004 has coop multiplayer, they are incorrect.

The only exception to this would be adding AI players in real-time strategy games. Real time strategy games use what they call a skirmish mode. In skirmish mode, you can pick AI players to team up against with your friends. Although, this is similar to true coop it is not considered true coop as you can not play through the single player campaigns. Not at the beginning of this article anyway!

True coop multiplayer occurs when you and some friends join together to play through a mission or preferably the entire single player campaign against the computer. This is usually done on a local area network (LAN) in a home or business.

Now that we have the ground rules defined, let’s find out where coop went the last several years.

History

In the early to mid 1990’s, coop was prevalent in the multiplayer experience. Popular games like Doom, Shadow Warrior, Duke Nukem, and Quake all had coop modes. During this time, the internet was just learning to walk. Internet connection speeds were very slow at best (28.8k and less). Modems and LAN’s were the primary means for multiplayer. This suited true coop very well and increased the replay value of the game. Usually, only in a business environment could people get together to play deathmatch type games on a large scale (4 or more people). Home networks were relatively uncommon and expensive.

Then in the late 1990’s to early 2000’s, the internet was stretching its legs and learning to run. Internet connection speeds were increasing and high speed was beginning to soar. This drove the newly developed multiplayer experience of unknown human vs. unknown human throughout the internet. Now the world was connected and you could play against someone in another country without having to host, coordinate a group of people locally or even….take a shower!

It seems in all this excitement, true coop was no longer needed nor was it even wanted. No one cried out when it was removed from the latest games. Very few pc game reviewers even noticed it was gone! The internet was the future they said! Why would you want to setup a LAN at home when you can just access the internet and play against hundreds of others whenever you like! Why go up against computer players when you can fight real humans who think cleverly, irrationally and sometimes ridiculously!

And yes, they were right! That’s right, I said they were right! At that time, not many wanted to play against computer controlled opponents. Why would they, when all they did was run straight at you so then you could mow them down like Star Wars droids?

Alas, all is not lost, a very few developers did keep adding coop to their games. One such developer is the venerable Novalogic. Their highly acclaimed Delta Force series and the extremely popular Comanche 4 kept a breath of life in the coop multiplayer experience. Even today, coop maps are being planned, implemented, and executed with extreme prejudice in basements and game rooms across this great land! Henceforth coming from games that were released prior to 2001 and 2001 respectively.

I must mention, lest we forget, those brave souls in the modding community that realized the value of traversing the single player campaign side-by-side with your best buddies. Dishing out retribution like a candy store dishes out sugar. They kept coop modding even when it wasn’t cool! The coop Rune mod, Alien vs. Predator mod, and the Mech Warrior 4: Black Knight mod just to name a few. You guys are Heroes of the Multiplayer Experience!


Conclusion

Now we’re in the mid 2000’s.

Many players now yearn for more, more, more from the multiplayer experience. What do we see popping up in some recent games……true coop! Wow! What a novel idea!

In a simple study I worked on while writing this article, I asked 25 people which multiplayer game they liked and didn’t like from a list of twelve types: Deathmatch, Team Deathmatch, Deathmatch against Bots, Attack and Defend, Search and Destroy, King of the Hill, Team King of the Hill, Flagball, Team Flagball, Capture the Flag, True Coop, and the Lucas arts classic Kill the Fool with the Chicken.

The results were quite amazing! At least three people in each category didn’t like that type of multiplayer except for one category. That was……you guessed it, true coop mode! All 25 people who participated enjoyed this multiplayer experience.
It’s incredible that it was almost stamped out even with so much support. We’re very thankful it wasn’t!

So, why are game developers now bringing back coop? Several reasons it seems.

Improved Artificial Intelligence, AI is vastly improved from just a few years ago. Today’s computer controlled enemy advance, retreat, regroup and take countermeasures based on your attack approach. This can easily be seen in Creative Assembly’s epic Total War series of games.

Home networks are much more common; less expensive than previous years, run much faster, and usually 100 megabits or more.

Home PCs have caught up with the previously superior servers. Home pc’s now can achieve state-of-the-art speed, processing power, and graphics. Although servers are still faster. This is achieved by multiple processors. Rarely by CPUs inaccessible to the average consumer.

True coop has many advantages over internet play. Downtime is cut to merely the load time of the game. No waiting for enough players to start the game. No time trying to find a game available to join. No cheaters causing havoc in your game. Increased re-playability without modifying the entire game by installing a specific mod thus losing the playability of the original missions.

The available pc power consumers now have, combined with intelligent AI, and the advantages of coop, make true coop a truly unique multiplayer experience.

Finally, here is a list of some recent games that support true coop mode!

Joint Operations: Typhoon Rising.......................Novalogic............ ..............FPS
Ground Control 2: Operation Exodus.................Massive.................... .........RTS
Soldiers: Heroes of World War II.......................Codemasters.............. .......RTS
Codename: Panzers..........................................C DV....................................RTS
Heroes of the Pacific..........................................I R Gurus.............................Flight Sim
Splinter Cell 3................................................. ...Eidos..................................FPS

Breaking new ground in the Real Time Strategy genre is the addition of true coop in the previously mentioned games. This has never been done before. It’s fantastic to see developers taking risks and pushing new boundaries. Players should support and reward these companies who show courage and boldness in developing this untapped arena.

The future certainly looks bright for true coop! If developers will embrace, add, and expand on cooping through the single player campaign, coop can become a mainstay in their multiplayer selling point!

True cooperative multiplayer, in this writer’s humble opinion, should be and is the next addition for the continually expanding multiplayer experience.

Try Coop some time , my guess is you'll like it... >Doorway< :waving.gif: