If you only wanna play by default rules, then matchmaking is probably great for you.
Otherwise, hard disagree with that. I always like playing with community rules. Like, for instance, back on the first CoDs (1, UO, and 2) my favorite way was to play with only bolt action guns (got those not in the know, they mostly had small clips (5 shots (10 in 2 loaded clips on the British gun)), and each shot was fired singularly, and had to be manually rechambered, meaning there was a delay between shots as well. So it wasn’t just run in and hold down the trigger and hope everyone was dead before you gun stopped shooting kinda game (felt super lame), but actually required aim and accuracy.
That was never a default rule, and while I could still pick that gun on almost any server, the bullet spam (especially against players on the Russian team, og CoD players know exactly what I’m talking about) made it a voluntary nerf unless they were really bad.
So everyone playing with those guns was highly preferable IMO, and that couldn’t happen with matchmaking.
Or for a different example, while “gun game” is a fairly popular mod now (the one where everyone starts with the same gun, and when you get a kill you move on to a new gun, and have to complete a set list of kills first, and usually the last few weapons are harder to get a kill with, and getting a melee kill would set the victim back a weapon), but back during Counter Strike: Source’s era, it was fairly new (not sure where it actually started, but that was the first game I experienced it) and was only available on community servers.
Maybe you’re fine with the “default” experience, but even with a browser list, most servers run default (or very close to), but I like seeing what mods get traction and seeing if any of them are something I like.
But everything has a battle pass now, and lots of battle pass progress is tied to it.
I wanna go back to a world with zero overall progression and battle pass stuff. Hell, I don’t even want achievements. They can release skins, but should probably be just all free, it maaaaybe tied to playing and doing a version number of things that you would commonly do, maybe with a time window. But really, all DLC should be free extra content. Absolute zero cost to all DLC.
Games should not be put out with intent to continue profiting from MTX. There shouldn’t be any MTX.
I can rant all day, but zoomers will never know the peak of online gaming. It’s already history.
My experience was, 99 times out of 100, the default rules were the default for a reason and tended to be more fun, yes. Battlefield with maximum tickets was a slog. Counter-Strike with 20v20 is utter chaos. When they give you the ability to change the rules (which I’m totally in favor of!), the average person, and the servers you’re able to find, tend to be the ones with the numbers and sliders all set to max. You also end up with people coming and going mid-match, meaning the teams at the end of a round are rarely the ones you started with, and it makes me question what the point of that match was. Just my perspective.
I wanna go back to a world with zero overall progression and battle pass stuff.
Same, but that stuff tends to go hand in hand with live service, since they try to keep you hooked with extrinsic rewards. If the multiplayer game is released as a product that you own and isn’t expected to be a money printer with long-term additional content, there’s rarely a need for any kind of progression mechanic.
I can rant all day, but zoomers will never know the peak of online gaming. It’s already history.
Nah, it’s worse in some genres than others, but you can still find good old-fashioned multiplayer without the nonsense. And this article is a sign of the hunger for it, so there will be more. Plus, those old games have a tendency to still work to this day.
If you only wanna play by default rules, then matchmaking is probably great for you.
Otherwise, hard disagree with that. I always like playing with community rules. Like, for instance, back on the first CoDs (1, UO, and 2) my favorite way was to play with only bolt action guns (got those not in the know, they mostly had small clips (5 shots (10 in 2 loaded clips on the British gun)), and each shot was fired singularly, and had to be manually rechambered, meaning there was a delay between shots as well. So it wasn’t just run in and hold down the trigger and hope everyone was dead before you gun stopped shooting kinda game (felt super lame), but actually required aim and accuracy.
That was never a default rule, and while I could still pick that gun on almost any server, the bullet spam (especially against players on the Russian team, og CoD players know exactly what I’m talking about) made it a voluntary nerf unless they were really bad.
So everyone playing with those guns was highly preferable IMO, and that couldn’t happen with matchmaking.
Or for a different example, while “gun game” is a fairly popular mod now (the one where everyone starts with the same gun, and when you get a kill you move on to a new gun, and have to complete a set list of kills first, and usually the last few weapons are harder to get a kill with, and getting a melee kill would set the victim back a weapon), but back during Counter Strike: Source’s era, it was fairly new (not sure where it actually started, but that was the first game I experienced it) and was only available on community servers.
Maybe you’re fine with the “default” experience, but even with a browser list, most servers run default (or very close to), but I like seeing what mods get traction and seeing if any of them are something I like.
But everything has a battle pass now, and lots of battle pass progress is tied to it.
I wanna go back to a world with zero overall progression and battle pass stuff. Hell, I don’t even want achievements. They can release skins, but should probably be just all free, it maaaaybe tied to playing and doing a version number of things that you would commonly do, maybe with a time window. But really, all DLC should be free extra content. Absolute zero cost to all DLC.
Games should not be put out with intent to continue profiting from MTX. There shouldn’t be any MTX.
I can rant all day, but zoomers will never know the peak of online gaming. It’s already history.
My experience was, 99 times out of 100, the default rules were the default for a reason and tended to be more fun, yes. Battlefield with maximum tickets was a slog. Counter-Strike with 20v20 is utter chaos. When they give you the ability to change the rules (which I’m totally in favor of!), the average person, and the servers you’re able to find, tend to be the ones with the numbers and sliders all set to max. You also end up with people coming and going mid-match, meaning the teams at the end of a round are rarely the ones you started with, and it makes me question what the point of that match was. Just my perspective.
Same, but that stuff tends to go hand in hand with live service, since they try to keep you hooked with extrinsic rewards. If the multiplayer game is released as a product that you own and isn’t expected to be a money printer with long-term additional content, there’s rarely a need for any kind of progression mechanic.
Nah, it’s worse in some genres than others, but you can still find good old-fashioned multiplayer without the nonsense. And this article is a sign of the hunger for it, so there will be more. Plus, those old games have a tendency to still work to this day.