After enduring weeks of pressure from the darkest, slimiest, most megalomaniacal corners of the community to comment on the issue of online versus offline play, I've finally acquiesced. Don't expect a simplistic "offline good, online bad, stfu scrub" treatment here, though--we're going in-depth. Why? Because Hate Speech is about not only stepping up your game and making you think, but also about peace, brotherhood, and all kinds of other new-age hippie crap. You will learn to love your online brothers or there will be consequences. Am I understood?
Of course, every journey of goodwill and understanding requires, by definition, a journey, so today we're going on a field trip. Let's all hop in the DeLorean and travel to the backward, medieval year of 1983.
Know Your Roots
1983 was, in some respects, a landmark year: unofficial Hate Speech mascot Ronald Reagan was president, the Redskins and Dolphins were the two best teams in the NFL, and your intrepid columnist was only one year old. More importantly for our purposes, '83 saw the publication of Geoffrey and Elizabeth Loftus' Mind at Play: The Psychology of Video Games (The book can be found HERE), one of the earliest attempts to think about games and gaming in a scholarly fashion. The gaming landscape Loftus & Loftus describe is quite different from today's, but it's nevertheless pertinent thanks to a chapter called "The Arcade Subculture." Much of their audience, pointy-headed psychologist types, didn't really know what arcades were, so the Loftuses endeavored to create a genealogy of sorts to describe them that essentially claimed arcades were most closely related to dive bars. Awesome! The claim actually holds water, too. The earliest "arcade" cabinet games like Pong, SpaceWar, and so on appeared in bars before anywhere else. Over time, more and more games collected in these spaces until the drinks were marginalized or pushed out entirely, giving us the first arcades.
This is important because it reminds us that the DNA of arcades and bars are closely related. They're social spaces first and foremost. Fighting games, with their frenetic head to head action that's brief enough to churn through your quarters very quickly, were literally tailor made for this environment. As such, the earliest social norms for fighting game communities were created in and reflect an environment that's fundamentally face-to-face social in nature, and anyone who got his start in the arcade scene absorbed a code of behavior that essentially took direct personal interaction as a given.
Online play, by contrast, developed much later and is far more closely related to the sort of behaviors and interactions we were seeing in the mid-90's heyday of AOL. I still fondly remember the feeling of unmitigated joy I experienced when I first logged into Battle.net for Diablo and realized that, no matter what I said to people, they wouldn't be able to punch me in the face for it. It was pure bliss for a while, but soon enough the level of discourse degenerated to the point at which I (and everyone else) had to come up with vulgarity of unspeakable creativity to even get an eyebrow raise from others, let alone adequately make the point that they were trash. It was a race to the bottom, and the general barometer for what was acceptable and unacceptable adjusted accordingly.
To be clear, it's not necessary that a person have actually been there in the early days of the arcade or of networked gaming in order for these norms to affect him or her. Modes of interaction change, but the circumstances of their birth affect everyone who comes later. This is why the main difference between online and offline players isn't a skill gap or a maturity gap, as is sometimes asserted, but instead a complete structural difference in terms of acceptable modes of interaction. We don't know how to talk to each other, so we all come off looking like assholes.
Quit it.
Now.
Offline players, next time an online player says something indefensibly over-the-top, remember where it's coming from. Online players, stop writing such egregious checks with your mouths unless you intend to show up in person in order to get them cashed, which brings us to the real bone of contention here:
Offline Play is Better Than Online Play, End of Story
This argument needs to be put to bed, and I'm certainly going to try, but first let's look back at my assertion. Note that I said "offline play" and not "offline players." In point of fact, I don't care about which group of players are "better" because it's impossible to measure and ultimately irrelevant due to the fact that online and offline are so different. I simply say offline play is better because the game itself dictates that. Think for a moment: fighting games are about consistency. Random number generation is all but absent, and moves maintain consistent properties. Lag works against this, adding a fluctuating element to every move based on the whims of the Internet gods. More importantly, Soul Calibur games are balanced for offline play. Move properties don't change when online play is selected** In fact, the entire purpose of the net code is to minimize lag and create an experience truer to offline play. Bearing that in mind, the game itself privileges offline play, so it makes sense that we as a community do, too. For those of you whose experience doesn't extend into the offline realm, I highly recommend trying to find a gathering or traveling to a tournament. Put a little Vick's VapoRub in each nostril to fend off the stench and have a blast playing the game the way it's meant to be played.
**(Editors note: In some games, like VF4 and DOA, online play actually does alter the properties. In VF4's case it was great. DOA4 didn't work out quite as well.)
Settling the Score
So how do we reconcile the worlds of online and offline players? First, as I intimated earlier, shut up about which crop of players is better. You're playing different games. Just as importantly, Calibur veterans and the online new blood alike need to realize that each group has radically different implicit assumptions regarding how to deal with fellow gamers. Vets, be a little patient. Don't validate or engage in the shouting match, as nothing good can possibly come from it. Online players, open your minds a little. If you can't travel and compete regularly, we understand, but don't be so damn insecure about it that you feel the need to rip on those of us who do.
Homework:
How is online play potentially useful when it comes to improving? Is playing online against skilled opponents more useful than playing offline against inferior ones? How can oldschool players socialize newschool ones into the community, or is that impossible? Why am I completely wrong about everything I just said because xX_SephirothMerlin_666 would totally kill me online with Mitsu 1A spam? Lay it on me.
I'm not going to say which side is which. You figure it out.
Of course, every journey of goodwill and understanding requires, by definition, a journey, so today we're going on a field trip. Let's all hop in the DeLorean and travel to the backward, medieval year of 1983.
Know Your Roots
1983 was, in some respects, a landmark year: unofficial Hate Speech mascot Ronald Reagan was president, the Redskins and Dolphins were the two best teams in the NFL, and your intrepid columnist was only one year old. More importantly for our purposes, '83 saw the publication of Geoffrey and Elizabeth Loftus' Mind at Play: The Psychology of Video Games (The book can be found HERE), one of the earliest attempts to think about games and gaming in a scholarly fashion. The gaming landscape Loftus & Loftus describe is quite different from today's, but it's nevertheless pertinent thanks to a chapter called "The Arcade Subculture." Much of their audience, pointy-headed psychologist types, didn't really know what arcades were, so the Loftuses endeavored to create a genealogy of sorts to describe them that essentially claimed arcades were most closely related to dive bars. Awesome! The claim actually holds water, too. The earliest "arcade" cabinet games like Pong, SpaceWar, and so on appeared in bars before anywhere else. Over time, more and more games collected in these spaces until the drinks were marginalized or pushed out entirely, giving us the first arcades.
This is important because it reminds us that the DNA of arcades and bars are closely related. They're social spaces first and foremost. Fighting games, with their frenetic head to head action that's brief enough to churn through your quarters very quickly, were literally tailor made for this environment. As such, the earliest social norms for fighting game communities were created in and reflect an environment that's fundamentally face-to-face social in nature, and anyone who got his start in the arcade scene absorbed a code of behavior that essentially took direct personal interaction as a given.
Not this kind of interaction, either..this comes later. Later as in the next paragraph.
Online play, by contrast, developed much later and is far more closely related to the sort of behaviors and interactions we were seeing in the mid-90's heyday of AOL. I still fondly remember the feeling of unmitigated joy I experienced when I first logged into Battle.net for Diablo and realized that, no matter what I said to people, they wouldn't be able to punch me in the face for it. It was pure bliss for a while, but soon enough the level of discourse degenerated to the point at which I (and everyone else) had to come up with vulgarity of unspeakable creativity to even get an eyebrow raise from others, let alone adequately make the point that they were trash. It was a race to the bottom, and the general barometer for what was acceptable and unacceptable adjusted accordingly.
To be clear, it's not necessary that a person have actually been there in the early days of the arcade or of networked gaming in order for these norms to affect him or her. Modes of interaction change, but the circumstances of their birth affect everyone who comes later. This is why the main difference between online and offline players isn't a skill gap or a maturity gap, as is sometimes asserted, but instead a complete structural difference in terms of acceptable modes of interaction. We don't know how to talk to each other, so we all come off looking like assholes.
Quit it.
Now.
Offline players, next time an online player says something indefensibly over-the-top, remember where it's coming from. Online players, stop writing such egregious checks with your mouths unless you intend to show up in person in order to get them cashed, which brings us to the real bone of contention here:
Offline Play is Better Than Online Play, End of Story
This argument needs to be put to bed, and I'm certainly going to try, but first let's look back at my assertion. Note that I said "offline play" and not "offline players." In point of fact, I don't care about which group of players are "better" because it's impossible to measure and ultimately irrelevant due to the fact that online and offline are so different. I simply say offline play is better because the game itself dictates that. Think for a moment: fighting games are about consistency. Random number generation is all but absent, and moves maintain consistent properties. Lag works against this, adding a fluctuating element to every move based on the whims of the Internet gods. More importantly, Soul Calibur games are balanced for offline play. Move properties don't change when online play is selected** In fact, the entire purpose of the net code is to minimize lag and create an experience truer to offline play. Bearing that in mind, the game itself privileges offline play, so it makes sense that we as a community do, too. For those of you whose experience doesn't extend into the offline realm, I highly recommend trying to find a gathering or traveling to a tournament. Put a little Vick's VapoRub in each nostril to fend off the stench and have a blast playing the game the way it's meant to be played.
**(Editors note: In some games, like VF4 and DOA, online play actually does alter the properties. In VF4's case it was great. DOA4 didn't work out quite as well.)
This is a realistic portrayal of a problem faced by many tournaments. Especially in the south.
Settling the Score
So how do we reconcile the worlds of online and offline players? First, as I intimated earlier, shut up about which crop of players is better. You're playing different games. Just as importantly, Calibur veterans and the online new blood alike need to realize that each group has radically different implicit assumptions regarding how to deal with fellow gamers. Vets, be a little patient. Don't validate or engage in the shouting match, as nothing good can possibly come from it. Online players, open your minds a little. If you can't travel and compete regularly, we understand, but don't be so damn insecure about it that you feel the need to rip on those of us who do.
Homework:
How is online play potentially useful when it comes to improving? Is playing online against skilled opponents more useful than playing offline against inferior ones? How can oldschool players socialize newschool ones into the community, or is that impossible? Why am I completely wrong about everything I just said because xX_SephirothMerlin_666 would totally kill me online with Mitsu 1A spam? Lay it on me.
