Bored of Single-player Games?

Image from rpgcodex.net

Contrary to popular belief held by large video game companies such as EA and Activision, the market for single-player games is still an attractive avenue of play for gamers. Many people are still attracted to the experiences that a single-player game can provide such as the exploration, environments, characters, gameplay and most importantly the story.

By now you're probably wondering what this has to do with being bored of single-player games.

Single-player games for me has always been about the perfect mixture of gameplay and story. Without good gameplay you cannot have an enjoyable game. Without a good story you cannot have an immersive experience. With the huge availability of video games in both the mobile and home console markets, there are MANY difference games that are available for consumers at a click of a button.

With these wide choices of games to play I find myself getting enamoured by single-player games whilst at the same time getting bored of them due to the pull of other games being available. Why is this you may ask? I believe the reason is a mixture of both the story losing its focus and the gameplay becoming too repetitive. A good story can carry a single-player game. However, the actual gameplay of the game can make me bored after experiencing 30+ hours of it. 

Take Persona 5 for instance. The intrigue of the story and its gameplay are amazing! However due to the combat never evolving past a simple turned based RPG, the game can get very repetitive due to its long filler-filled story and the repetitiveness of doing the same thing over and over without too many optional paths or mini-quests to do. That's not to say that Persona 5 is a bad game, it's actually the opposite! It's just that sometimes I get bored doing the same style despite its wonderful narrative.

At the end of the day, Single-player games require a good mix of story and gameplay in order to keep my attention and play all the way through or be compelled to collect all its collectables. A game that does this well is Metal Gear Solid V, where the game adapts to your play-style and tries to counter it by adding helmets if you head shot too often, or more dogs if you stealth and do close quarters combat, etc. This forces the player to change their play-style and keeps them engaged. It's this mix between good gameplay design and story that keeps me engaged and makes me forget that other games are an option within a click of a button.

Written by: Stevie Alexander