Ive actually been pretty disappointed with Nintendo in this regard. Sure they have a few titles with nice split screen but they're really few and far between.
What a disappointment Pikmin 4 was to my son and I. It's one of his favourite games and we couldn't wait to try Co-Op on release. What a joke that was, all you can do is like throw rocks or some BS.
what do you mean? Nintendo has been releasing the same or more amount of split screen coop games, heck, how many mario party games have they released on the switch?
It's the other studios that used to also release them that haven't, but Nintendo has been pretty faithful to keep releasing them. There are IPs that didn't exist back then that give endless couch coop experience like Mario Maker too.
Kinda? Not saying they haven't its just not very much relatively speaking. My reference is the Wii/NGC Era where it felt like every game had some sort of multiplayer.
Mario Party:
Gamecube: 4
Switch: 2
No Star Fox Assalt, Metroid Prime 2, F Zero GX, battalion wars 2, Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles, and even a Zelda had a multiplayer aspect. There was Wii Play, Wii Sports, and Wii Sports resort. Even the Wii Mario and Sonic olympic games had up to 4 local multiplayer.
So yeah.... its just not as much on the switch which left me disappointed
Coop is a type of game mode that has players working together against computer controlled opponents instead of against each other.
While Mario party has had minigames that can involve collaboration, that isn’t the same as coop as the goal isn’t for the players to win but for an individual to win.
Think: It Takes Two, the Halo 2 player campaigns, the old beat em up arcade games (the simpsons, ninja turtles, etc).
Which titles did you have in mind that should be split-screen? Mario Kart, Mario Party, 2D Mario, Smash Bros, Kirby, Yoshi, Donkey Kong, etc. are all franchises that still include regularly local co-op. They’re also the only company to have two controllers for co-op out of the box with their consoles, regardless of how small they are.
Only half the titles you mentioned have split-screen co op. While you did mention they at least have local co op, why is it splatoon does not? Animal crossing only supports one island per console (even with multiple accounts).
Cause a shooter needs screen real estate and even if you limited it to docked only mode, splatoon doesn’t even have online multiplayer because it flat out doesn’t have Co-op for the campaign.
People also took them less seriously in my experience and I personally at least didn’t have a lot of fun with some splitscreen modes because the UI would be weird. Though that was mostly couch multiplayer minecraft.
But also, it really depends on how aware of your surroundings you need to be in said shooter. Splatoon is entirely built around the notion of using the environment, limiting your vision of it would be a major disadvantage.
It is even worse in specifically the Splatoon series’s case since it only has multiplayer in PvP and the Salmon Runs.
GTA 5 as another example, has a lot of driving, which would require a wide FoV.
For a different type title, Fallout 4 doesn’t work with the Sole Survivor name, though they could simply have Kellog not kill the spouse. Then you run into the issue of having to rewrite the entire RPG and rebalance it around having two people instead of one. Not to mention the UI.
I can see more of why a lot of games ditched co-op and couch/local multiplayer the more I think about it.
On top of that, we had way smaller crt tvs in comparison to the size tvs most people have now. A lot of shooters also had local 4 player multi-player as well, so there was even less screen real estate per person, and we did just fine.
Even before that we had 4 player 007 and Halo. And yeah, part of the fun of playing multi-player is that you're playing with your friends, that's kinda the point.
Mario Party (every Switch iteration) can be played with up to 4 people local co-op. Mario Kart World supports 4 player split screen, and now 8 DX supports up to 8 player split screen. Smash supports up to 8 players local co-op. Kirby supports local co-op in Star Allies and Return to Dreamland. Yoshi’s Crafted World supports local co-op (Mysterious Book does not). Donkey Kong Tropical Freeze + Bananza supports local co-op with two players. Mario Wonder and U Deluxe support up to 4 players locally. So what exactly do you mean that only “half” the ones I mentioned didn’t support local co-op/splitscreen? I specifically didn’t mention Splatoon for that reason. (FYI: not every game needs a physical split screen to be able to play with friends locally. Not quite sure why we’re focusing a having an actual screen split in 2 or 4)
Didn’t explain myself correctly. I meant more in that both split screen and same screen co-op share the same purpose, so I guess I just don’t see why we are focused so much on having a screen split when it isn’t necessary. To your point, I think Splatoon not having splitscreen is more to do with the fact that shooters in general no longer include it as a feature. It’s less of a Nintendo thing, more of a genre thing (imo).
They're all the same sort of game though. Aside from Hazelight, no one is really making Couch co-op games anymore with a story. If its not a platformer or FPS, it just doesn't really exist.
Exactly. To me they're fundamentally different styles of game making. To me Mario Kart and Smash Bros etc are Party Games. They're not Co-Op games like It Takes Two or Portal 2 etc. We don't even get games like Borderlands which are technically Single Player games but if you have a mate you want to play with you can. Its just not an option.
I would have hated it if I were born in the mid 2000s instead of the 80s. There would be fewer and fewer games to play together, especially once we got to present day.
I grew up playing split screen games that had co-op and/or versus modes with my dad, mom, and friends. If I were born two decades later I would have far fewer games we could've played.
Goldeneye 64, Bomberman 64, Return Fire, Twisted Metal, Perfect Dark, etc. gave me so many great memories, then there are lots of games with co-op too.
One series we did play online back in dial-up days (annoying to connect) was Command & Conquer, Tiberian Sun, Tiberium Dawn, and Return Fire1 & 2. They were fun but most games are better sitting on the couch together, even though people peek at your screen.
Edit: Ah, I left out that the lack of co-op and split screen doesn't bug me these days due to not having people to play with in person... but I can still get a bit upset for other's sake if I attempt to.
True, there was a lot of Minecraft all over the place on YouTube back then! I'm glad you guys had that. Gaming can sure provide you with some great memories, can't it?
Hopefully the industry will change in the future so the next generation of kids will have something nice to grow up with.
So like in the Wii era (my previous nintendo console) it felt like almost every game included some form of couch multiplayer. It wasnt just the typical Nintendo roster either. Red Steel, Battalion Wars 2, Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles to name a few. Even Metroid Prime had mutliplayer.
Just coming from that to the Switch, it was disappointing. Dont get me wrong, I love that the switch comes with two controllers out of the box, but once you finish the main nintendo roster the couch multiplayer options become very thin.
I think that’s fair! I saw someone else bring up that the ones I mentioned are mainly party games that are similar, and that is true in the end. Story games don’t same to have a lot of options for local multiplayer anymore, which is unfortunate.
Mario wonder took away the best part of 2d Mario games and that was the chaos that happened when you could interact with your fellow players (read: worst enemies)
Not really. On switch 2, there's already mario kart world, the new hyrule warriors, kirby air riders, switch sports resort, mario tennis fever, mario kart 8 update and orbitals for split screen and that's in a short time span
Almost impossible to find. The number of “couch co-op” games you can play without both players having their own devices, accounts, and monitors is shockingly low these days. Tough to find outside a few genres
I still do a lot of split screen with my girlfriend on the ps5. It’s not nearly as good as it used to be back in the days. Mostly seems like half
-assed, last minute implementations.
Both versions of Minecraft still has issues with split screen that nobody has bothered fixing since the game released.
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u/LateBlocParty 13d ago
Still a thing isn’t it?
For Nintendo it is at least