The Online Cheese Factory

The current state of online gaming- Cheesing.


Since the advent of a running kill-to-death ratio, tracking of levels, win to loss ratios, total points, etc., online multiplayer gaming has taken a depressing turn for the worse. The problem begins with the players, who seem to all have an obsessive desire for a status symbol of some sort. Game companies quickly noticed this growing trend and started to tailor their games to this addictive wave that is crashing onto the shores of contemporary gaming. The days of simply joining a server and playing games without any tracking mechanism of kills, deaths, wins, or losses are long gone. Like previously mentioned, there are droves of players who would applaud the departure of pure, anonymous gaming... yet I stand firmly in the opposition of this. I would submit that games become disturbingly trimmed down, so that only the “competitive” weapons, characters, players, items, builds, units, etc. find their way to the forefront (which is fine for the strictly competitive leagues, not for the general population). In this scramble of metagaming and competition, the game loses its' original, true form and is stripped down to the bones. I will look at a variety of examples where I find this frustratingly true while continuing my discussion.

By genre, let's take a look:


First person shooters-

Around the introduction of the original Xbox, (Note: As Chilly P has mentioned before, this is Xbox-leaning blog, sorry Playstationers) console players were introduced to a flood of new games that were all revolutionary and exceptional in their own ways. Gamers were delighted to get running riots in Halo 1, snipe off heads in Unreal Championship with the lightning rifle, slink around the brush in Ghost Recon, or even leave the keyboard and dabble with Counterstrike on the sticks. Those days were glorious in my mind, because the gaming was seemingly innocent and pure. There was little attention given to any running statistic, and people generally played what they enjoyed playing... because it was fun. Hell, even if you drop back a generation, how many games of “Slappers only!” or “throwing knives” did you and your friends play because it was fucking hilarious and entertaining? Many, I would guess.

Somewhere around the release of Halo 2, I seemed to notice a trend in players that I had failed to see prior. People were absolutely obsessed with leveling up, and would do almost anything to do it. Boosting, cheesing, etc. were all strategies employed so that people could get their level up so people could see their apparent ability. I think anyone who played Halo 2 can fondly remember the days of “standby” and the like. All for a little number quaintly placed in some geometric shape to signify questionable progress and ability.

In the more modern gaming climate, each game seems to introduce new ways for players to become addicted to their stats or relative level. Halo 3 seemed to lure in their players with different ranks and level achievements that people would beat small children for (like super bouncing, standby again, etc.). When players were discussing whether or not people enjoyed the game, the inevitable question of, “What level are you?” always flew forth as if to create a hierarchy of those who were and were not worthy of speaking about the game. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare continued the trend and also took it to new levels by introducing a system of “prestiging” that players would pursue. Players would do almost anything to move up the prestige ladder as quickly as possible, so it seemed as if only a handful of the “awesome/insane” guns were used to ensure fast leveling. (For those of you about to say, “I used other guns to get more points” that is fine, but we all know where your bread was buttered...P90, M16, etc.)

Recently, Modern Warfare 2 was dropped on the world, and the masses devoured it like a fat kid with cake. Infinity ward laced this little beauty with constant achievements and status symbols (all of the little funny sayings), as well as tracking almost all of each player's stats. What did this do for the game? Well, it began with a variety of broken items being discovered rather quickly so that people would advance through their prestiges as fast ( and annoyingly) as possible. The javelin glitch, a handful of akimbo problems (fuck the 1887), the “one man army” bullshit, the “care package” problems, getting out of maps, etc. were all annoying as hell, and caused flocks of players to leave the MW2 bandwagon. Assholes would join opposing teams to assist each others quest for some pointless title or getting a certain kill-streak. Why? To experience the nuke firsthand? No, so that they could “achieve” the title and have it so they could display it for all to see. Complete nonsense.


Real Time Strats-

In order to keep this post reasonable in size, I will go with one popular game to discuss here. Warcraft 3 had a system of leveling up which brought in crowds for years (still does), but unfortunately if you want to enjoy the game nowadays, you better know which heroes aren't “broken” and which are. You really cannot just hop onto Battle.net to enjoy a fun game anymore. There are a select few of functional “first heroes” that you need to use, or you are putting yourself at a serious disadvantage. Why is this important here, you might ask: People are almost forced to use around 5 of over 20 heroes because they want to win more than their desire for ingenuity and their own cleverness. Not to knock those desiring to win, but the days of playing the game to have fun and thinking of your own strategies seem to be gone. Death Knight, Fiends, Lich, Stats, destros, and wyrms please! Demon hunter and mass talons baby ! Blade master and tech! Yada yada...


Sports-

Want to play NCAA online these days? Great, make sure you choose one of about 3-4 top 10 teams that have an extremely unfair player! If not, be prepared to severely alter a realistic game plan in order to stop the bullshit that is about to come your way. I think the best example of this would be last year's NCAA, where the university of florida was the ultimate cheese factory. Want insane speed? Great, Percy Harvin, demps or whoever else in the backfield, and one of their DEs had sufficient amounts of it to run about 3 plays in order to win. Awesome! Football at its finest. Go back three years in NCAA, and there were broken plays that snapped the ball directly to the wide receiver, or a blitz that always allowed the middle linebacker to penetrate the O-line. The running trend here? You will find these problems almost always hanging around the “ranked” games. Regardless of the year, these football games leave you wanting more... much more.

Well, what about FIFA you might inquire. Certainly the “Beautiful Game” cannot be tainted by the cheesefest that infects most sports gaming. Wrong. Here again people will only use the teams that have the fastest, most unfair player in order to win. Never mind the fact that game makers and designers took the time to put loads of teams into the game, make sure you stick to Real Madrid, Manchester United, Chelsea, and Barcelona. Screw those other teams! This type of attitude plagues online Fifa, and you will be hard-pressed to find an opponent that won't immediately select one of the powerhouses because they refuse to play any other team (even if they have a favorite team that is different from their powerhouse.)

Moral of the story here: People, once again, want to win (in order to up their level or ranking) bad enough to completely bypass hoards of entertaining teams because they are blind.

Online RPGS/MMORPGS-

Haha, assholes. I don't delve into these.

Conclusion:

How would I go about fixing most of this? Well, I would first get rid of most of the online stats for games. If people want to win, great, allow them to do it without rewarding them like a needy five year old with an achievement, title, or rank to satisfy this OCD like obsession for verification. For clarification, I don't actually mean you do away with the stats permanently; I think they do serve a crucial purpose by allowing the game to fit opponents together semi-appropriately. Rather, hide these stats from the players so they have absolutely no idea what their kill to death ratio is, or what their win to loss percentage is. I think you would quickly see players breaking the mold and using guns they enjoy because the game would become remarkably less life and death, and more fun. Losses wouldn't seem so bad, and wins wouldn't be such a big deal. Game types like “Slappers only!” or “throwing knives” would emerge once again, and people would loosen up.

I think this post has gone on long enough, but the list of nonsense could go on for a while. This type of playing, if allowed to continue, will produce a generation of rank-hungry assholes, who will do anything for a cheap victory. If that means using the imbalanced guns or accessories, units and builds, players and teams, plays or personnel packages, etc. then so be it. If there is a way for players to experience success by doing very little and relying on unfair aspects to games... then they will be on it like flies on poop.

A final thought- Some of you might think: “It sounds like you are just bitter because you are losing to these superior (sic) strategies!!!!!!!111oneone1!” or “ You must suck at competitive games and are taking it out on all of these heroes who play to win the game!”. Wrong, on both accounts. I rarely am consistently outclassed in the competitive video game realm, and I don't bring that up to beat my own chest, only to show how petty and trivial the opposition is to these sorts of discussions.

So go forth my tan faced children, use the FAL in MW2, proudly select the Richmond Spiders in NCAA, get lost in the magic that is the Seattle Sounders in FIFA, and by all means, have fun with the damn games.

SC