Is online really a must ?

[Discord]

Playing online can be fun, but generally it isn't as pleasant as SP and LAN.

Real-time strategy games and ego-shooters sure are fun, but the implementations of RPGs and so forth have been pretty miserable so far, in my opinion, of course. While WC3 and SC go into a totally different dimension while played on the net and Battlefield games actually become fun, things like NWN become a disaster.

I can't say that I don't like MMOs or online games in general, but in 99% of them you can forget about one of the most important aspects of the game: atmosphere. You simply can't compare the quality of quests, the feeling of the world and so forth of Oblivion and WoW. Alone the fact that everybody runs like an idiot, or even worse, bunny-hops around the fountain in a full-plate simply takes away the whole pleasure of the world. Then you get the nifty little thing known as "the chat" with priests saying "OMFG! U n00b!". That just doesn't work out for me.

On the matter of language. A couple of month ago, I jump from server to server in WoW too see if it was the same mess on the realms with other languages and frankly enough the French and the Germans seem to have quite a bit less trouble with n00b-speak and people calling each other niggers. Of course it's not perfect, but it's definitely quite a bit better. I've spend quite some time there before quitting my subscription. So if you have the ability to understand what those guys are saying and the game supports language-based servers, I'd suggest you giving it a go.

Now back to the topic. The problem with most online gaming seems to be that you're not really playing with other people, but with a bunch of high-quality bots and a very high-end spam function that one can't turn off. It just becomes more challenging and messy, but that's it. When I load BF2 my adrenaline levels hardly double from the "tremendous feeling of competition" the game install between the players. This is of course becomes a totally different story once you switch from the 64 player server to a passworded 8er with only your friends present.

To conclude, I think some games should just remain SP or low number of players MP to keep their quality.

PS: Yep, AI didn't get much smarter since Doom 2. As long as the game allows you to move freely and doesn't have stupid limitations, escaping the combat in WoW, you generally need about 5 minutes to find a way of beating them without losing a single HP.