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Overwatch not having a single player campaign is such a missed & wasted opportunity.

Sounds like a good way to spend a lot of time and development costs on something completely superfluous. It takes no more than one match with any given hero to fully learn their moveset.

No.

Maybe to players that play multiplayer shooters regularly. But they've made a game here that features a cast that has crossover appeal to players that normally would skip such a title.

The game could have cast a much wider net.
 

LiQuid!

I proudly and openly admit to wishing death upon the mothers of people I don't like
Not light on content, are you serious? The game has 2 game modes and 12 maps, yes it is very light on content.

Dota has 1 game mode and 1 map. So light on content Valve has to let people play it for free!
 
I guess to me all of the characters seem like they were made ahead of time without any story whatsoever and then they kinda made it up. I like the character designs, don't get me wrong, but I haven't really found the story as engrossing as many others here.
 

Korigama

Member
Individual character tutorials helping to adapt to some of the finer mechanics of the combat AND introduce the characters further into the overarching lore and mythology is a serious missed opportunity. A full campaign isn't entirely necessary.
This is a very good idea. I wouldn't mind seeing something like that as an alternative.
 

eloxx

Member
I do not agree. Telling the lore through the shorts and character descriptions is exactly what makes the story interesting. It is a new and good way to learn more about the world.
 
No.

Maybe to players that play multiplayer shooters regularly. But they've made a game here that features a cast that has crossover appeal to players that normally would skip such a title.

The game could have cast a much wider net.
And if blizzard put time and money into SP that would have taken away from the multi or even delayed the game. Anyone who doesn't like multiplayer shooters should suck it up and play overwatch. You don't even have to be good at shooting anything to be good at the game and contribute to the team.
 

LiQuid!

I proudly and openly admit to wishing death upon the mothers of people I don't like
No.

Maybe to players that play multiplayer shooters regularly. But they've made a game here that features a cast that has crossover appeal to players that normally would skip such a title.

The game could have cast a much wider net.
I'm certain Overwatch is going to do very well for itself without casting that net.
 

IvanJ

Banned
I really don't care about lack of single player in Overwatch.
I am perfectly comfortable paying $60 for multiplayer only, it is damn fun and I see hundreds of hours spent on it in my future. Where as the SP component would have probably lasted me 5-6 hours of linear bot shooting.

People who see value in multiplayer only will buy this.
People who think a multiplayer focused game needs single player to succeed can always buy Battleborn.
 

sflufan

Banned
You all should be applauding Blizzard for finally recognizing the lack of talent present in their writing staff and making them do something more productive within their limited capabilities rather than embarrassing themselves with developing actual single-player content.

In fact, we all should be encouraging DICE to move in this direction as well.
 

Xav

Member
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Nickle

Cool Facts: Game of War has been a hit since July 2013
I'm glad there's no single player so it didn't take an extra 18 months to release.
 
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Deleted member 752119

Unconfirmed Member
I agree, but honestly I'd play it two or three times at most, and then put hundreds of hours into PvP. So, can't say I care too much.

Yep. Games with both SP and MP almost always end up with one or the other half baked anyway.

I wouldn't have been opposed to some PVE co-op stuff ala Battleborne though.
 
Blizzard is can be great at characters and world-building, but especially recently their actual writing is pretty awful. With Overwatch we get the characters and the world and none of the plot so it's pretty much playing to all of their strengths and none of their weaknesses.

In a perfect world, sure, there would be a 10 hour single player experience to compliment the core multiplayer. But in the real world, what this would end up being is a tacked-on, half-baked mode with cheesy dialogue and predictable plot that would be at best a minor distraction and a huge waste of resources for the developer.

LoL and Dota 2 do the same thing. Both of those games, especially League, have well established lore and character relationships that make absolutely no sense in the context of the actual game, and I think that's okay. Overwatch seems to be following their lead.
 

TheYanger

Member
No.

Maybe to players that play multiplayer shooters regularly. But they've made a game here that features a cast that has crossover appeal to players that normally would skip such a title.

The game could have cast a much wider net.

What kind of logic is that, every game could have a wider net cast by including everything under the sun. The ACTUAL reality is that doing everything else means they get to do the things they were already doing less. You can't just be like "Ey game should have SP" and not expect that to diminish, greatly, the stuff we did get.
 

Garlador

Member
Just give me more Overwatch CG videos. A movie. A cartoon series. Comics. The cast is charming, the story set-ups are great, and I'm loving what lore and story I can find.

Yeah, I wish there was an actual story campaign, but if they do it well enough out of the game, I may not mind too much.

... But I wouldn't have minded one bit.
 
I agree 100%. Said the same thing before. With all this lore and the characters, you'd think some sort of story-driven mode would be included, but as it stands all of that is wasted on a multiplayer shooter.
 

exfatal

Member
Would have been nice to have a single player mode even if its a short one like splatoon, especially for consoles
can see the trophies being easy to get lol.
But at the same time this is a multiplayer focused game with free support for years to come. So the 60$ price tag is fair, i'll personally wait a bit, jealous of the people who get to play right away though.
 

dark10x

Digital Foundry pixel pusher
I don't really play multiplayer so I'm skipping the game entirely. I liked aspects of the beta and wish it were a SP game instead but, hey, not every game needs to be for everyone and most are seemingly loving it.
 

Ferrio

Banned
I agree 100%. Said the same thing before. With all this lore and the characters, you'd think some sort of story-driven mode would be included, but as it stands all of that is wasted on a multiplayer shooter.

But it's not wasted, the amount of love the game is getting shows that.
 

sflufan

Banned
My God, the way some of you are going on, you'd think these characters were drawn from a Nabokov novel or something.

You guys did see the animated shorts/read the comics, right? These characters are delightfully paper-thin which is EXACTLY how they should be. Any further exploration of them other than what we've gotten and you'd see just how ineptly Blizzard will "develop" them.

This is why Valve never bothered to "develop" the TF2 characters (who I personally find more engaging than the Overwatch ones anyway) beyond what we got in their animated shorts/comics - Valve just knew that there really wasn't anything to develop.
 

LiQuid!

I proudly and openly admit to wishing death upon the mothers of people I don't like
I don't think it's a secret that there is a segment of the gaming community that shits their pants at the idea of playing a competitive multiplayer game. Seems like those people see the following this game's characters has been receiving and feel left out. Guess what guys, Blizzard didn't make a game for you. There's nothing wrong with that. Time to face reality and move on with your life. For someone that enjoys competitive shooters, this game is an insane value proposition at $40-60 because it's a Blizzard game and it's guaranteed to be supported for years and years.

This thread's making me want to go throw $40 at some hat boxes just so Blizzard knows how much I appreciate them not trying to be everything to everyone.
 
What kind of logic is that, every game could have a wider net cast by including everything under the sun. The ACTUAL reality is that doing everything else means they get to do the things they were already doing less. You can't just be like "Ey game should have SP" and not expect that to diminish, greatly, the stuff we did get.

Except the reality is we already have a really fun and compelling cast and world here. Way more so than other multiplayer focused games. It's just a shame to not get to experience them in a more fleshed out narrative driven mode.

This isn't like other multilayer games that lack SP.
 

aeolist

Banned
I guess to me all of the characters seem like they were made ahead of time without any story whatsoever and then they kinda made it up. I like the character designs, don't get me wrong, but I haven't really found the story as engrossing as many others here.

you are not alone. i love the game but the lore is generic trash and the videos they've put out are all technical skill with nothing creatively interesting at all.

as expected from blizzard though.
 

Vire

Member
OP clearly hasn't played Starcraft 2 if he is wishing for more story based games from Blizzard...

It's probably for the best.
 

Phu

Banned
I don't really see how Overwatch in its final form would work for SP. There's so many characters they'd have to make important to the story. Do they make the story very general so any character could play the role that needs to be played or do they go for a tightly written story which would demand special attention for each hero individually?

But aside from that, the shorts so far are so cringey I don't know if any story they came up with would actually be worth it.
 
I don't need a single player to enjoy multiplayer games but I don't find myself giving a damn about any of these characters that Blizzard so clearly invested time into. It's a shame we don't get to see them in a proper narrative driven campaign.
 
Did Team fortress classic or Team fortress 2 have campaigns?

This was being compared to that the most so I expected it to not have a campaign. The fact people might have still kinda baffles me
 

Ein Bear

Member
I disagree.

From a gameplay standpoint, Overwatch is a fantastically built FPS game. It's an absolute joy to play.

But all the characters and 'lore' stuff is just so cringey it hurts. Every time I have to listen to Tracer say 'ALLO LOVES OIM BRITISH AND QUIRKY OI AM. RECKON YOU SHOULD ALL COSPLAY AS ME OI DO.' I die a little bit inside. It feels very forced and manufactured.
 

E-flux

Member
Yep. Games with both SP and MP almost always end up with one or the other half baked anyway.

I wouldn't have been opposed to some PVE co-op stuff ala Battleborne though.

That's really no reason not to do both though. I think that in a case of Overwatch even a mediocre campaign would have pleased people since the game just oozes out personality and style, it could have easily patched up the holes left by an meh campaign.

Did Team fortress classic or Team fortress 2 have campaigns?

This was being compared to that the most so I expected it to not have a campaign. The fact people might have still kinda baffles me

Team fortress classic was a mod and the second game was originally bundled with HL2 and portal, i don't think it's the best thing to compare, and TF2 was never full price anyway.
 

Parham

Banned
All of the shorts so far have been pretty cringeworthy, as far as writing is concerned, so I would rather they didn't focus any energy on making a single player campaign.
 
I disagree.

From a gameplay standpoint, Overwatch is a fantastically built FPS game. It's an absolute joy to play.

But all the characters and 'lore' stuff is just so cringey it hurts. Every time I have to listen to Tracer say 'ALLO LOVES OIM BRITISH AND QUIRKY OI AM. RECKON YOU SHOULD ALL COSPLAY AS ME OI DO.' I die a little bit inside. It feels very forced and manufactured.

I think maybe if we got an SP campaign maybe I would appreciate them more. I do agree though, a lot of it makes me cringe. It's not particularly appealing. I do appreciate the investment Blizzard put into them though.
 

khaaan

Member
Surely you guys don't think the designers at Blizzard would come to the conclusion that a single player implementation of the game would be to create a corridor shooter, right?

Has anyone bothered to look what the gameplay options in Overwatch are? You can control maps, hero/role selection, and gameplay stats. There's even a gameplay mode that rotates through various custom settings like that and it's completely optional. Hell, if you read the data-mined Weekly Brawl modes then there's already at least one that facilitates some of the story that they've already laid down. Would it be so bad if there was a cutscene or MGS comic book style scene at the end of a match that added more to the story?

Or what if instead of custom multiplayer matches, you could systemically unlock cutscenes/comics/story for the character you were playing? It could be done through bots or through multiplayer with the point being to expand the characters in some way.
 
That's really no reason not to do both though. I think that in a case of Overwatch even a mediocre campaign would have pleased people since the game just oozes out personality and style, it could have easily patched up the holes left by an meh campaign.

But having that meh campaign takes away time and resources from the multiplayer component. It also tarnishes the overall package from being just "An amazing multiplayer experience!" to "A great multiplayer experience with a lackluster campaign."
 

Skilotonn

xbot xbot xbot xbot xbot
Developers can choose to make their games MP-only, just like how devs choose to make games campaign-only you know.

There are people like us that play certain games for their campaign fix, and certain games for their multiplayer fix.

If anything, they've gone above and beyond what they needed to do with these shorts and comics, and the best part is that everyone can see them for backstory, they don't need to buy the game.
 

J 0 E

Member
The game have the potential and character / setting quality for a decent campaign indeed but I'm not sure of Blizzard's capability of creating such a thing, I think the game is better without it then.
 

Mik317

Member
yeah. I wish there was because I am too free at FPS...but man I enjoy the character designs.

also I found all of the shorts to be amazing, so if that is "cringy" (got I hate this word as it reads as "I don't like this thing so let me belittle it") then more of that please.

however not everything needs to appeal to me and if people are enjoying it then let them. No need for Blizzard to take time away from making the multiplayer aspects even better for people like me, who may still not buy the game anyway. Focus on the group that will always be there.
 
Surely you guys don't think the designers at Blizzard would come to the conclusion that a single player implementation of the game would be to create a corridor shooter, right?

Has anyone bothered to look what the gameplay options in Overwatch are? You can control maps, hero/role selection, and gameplay stats. There's even a gameplay mode that rotates through various custom settings like that and it's completely optional. Hell, if you read the data-mined Weekly Brawl modes then there's already at least one that facilitates some of the story that they've already laid down. Would it be so bad if there was a cutscene or MGS comic book style scene at the end of a match that added more to the story?

Or what if instead of custom multiplayer matches, you could systemically unlock cutscenes/comics/story for the character you were playing? It could be done through bots or through multiplayer with the point being to expand the characters in some way.
This is what Battleborn did in a way. When you leveled up characters you get small story pieces about them.
 
D

Deleted member 752119

Unconfirmed Member
That's really no reason not to do both though. I think that in a case of Overwatch even a mediocre campaign would have pleased people since the game just oozes out personality and style, it could have easily patched up the holes left by an meh campaign.

Well, that's assuming that the resources that would have gone to that meh campaign:

1. Didn't lessen the quality/polish of the MP.
2. Delay the game, making those who only want to play MP wait longer.
 

kinoki

Illness is the doctor to whom we pay most heed; to kindness, to knowledge, we make promise only; pain we obey.
The animated cutscenes are really juxtaposed against the gameplay. When the gorilla says he needs us to resume the Overwatch he basically means "fight amongst yourself". There is nothing bigger at stake.
 
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