How does multiplayer gaming fit into your life?

It doesn't fit well into my life. With work, the kids and all the responsibilities that comes with it I can't afford to sink a lot of time into it, so if I get a game I'll focus on single-player games, or I'll go with multiplayer games with a co-op to at least enjoy the game without it being a competition.

Any game that requires regular playtime is a nope for me now. I switched to games that you can put off easily - games that are playable under a fixed amount of hours and that do not require dedication.

Typically right now i am playing Dark Souls on twitch - I can turn it on, play a bit (even just 30 minutes) then put it down easily.

I also switched to board games - my SO is not into video games but she is into board games so we can enjoy that together. We are playing Gloomhaven Jaws of the Lion right now it's a blast

I've given up on multiplayer. Too many kids that apparently had relations with my mom.

Cooperative games! Games where you work with many people. Games where you talk to people in the game. Great way to meet people, and also bring your friends along. Social aspects of gaming are more engaging than gaming by itself.

The only multiplayer game I really play is Team Fortress 2. I learnt the mechanics over a decade ago and I understand it. My reflexes aren't amazing, but I "get it". I can't be bothered to learn any new multiplayer game mechanics, so when I want to get online and play a shooter I go for TF2.

Coop games are another matter, but yeah, TF2. My desire to play it comes and goes, but it's always there waiting for me.

i enjoy playing couch co-op with my partner. that’s all for me and multiplayer. 🙃

I'm baffled how people can constantly find new games to play. If I find myself enjoying a multiplayer game I'll stick with it for years to come

Overwatch 2. The casual matches are fast enough (10~20min?), and I like the teamwork in game

The only game I'll play with strangers is FFXIV.

I'm lucky to have a friend group who all get together semi-frequently on Discord to try out any new games we've found and enjoy. We all have pretty similar tastes in games, sometimes a few of us will be playing something others might not enjoy and vice versa, but in those instances we'll still hang out and chat but just play our separate games instead.

I would agree that one roadblock is that we all have less time now as adults with careers (and other responsibilities) than we did when we were students, but we do our best to make time all the same.

In terms of public multiplayer with randoms - not for me, tbh.

The only multiplayer game I play is Borderlands 2 with my girlfriend, and that is very once and then... So yeah, MP games are not the same for me anymore.

Well except for Jump Ultimate Stars, I always make time to play that shit whenever possible.

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It kind of doesn't. Me and my brothers will play some Rocket League on a Monday night (assuming our kids are in bed) but aside from that my gaming is exclusively single-player.

Never been a big online gamer, but since having kids that's basically become a non-starter.

I wrote a Matrix bot that can be used for my community to schedule gaming events. I just pick a time to play a particular game, and play with whoever shows up.

I love games, but even when I was playing a lot of multiplayer, it was never really a strong competitive thing for me. We hit our stride right after school because we were all spread out across the country, but nobody had too serious of a job or relationship to devote much time to. We would all lobby up, and just use the voice chat to bust chops and generally chat while the game was happening in the background.

Now, most of the people I played with don't really have games in their life anymore, so they're all at least 1 console generation behind. I'm married with 2 tiny children. I still play a bit, but it's not organized, scheduled time.. It's basically whenever I can squeeze in an hour or so (usually either after everybody goes to sleep, or before anybody else wakes up). For this reason, I usually play single-player games, or if I'm playing multiplayer, it's online with randos.

Now that you mention it I would REALLY like to get some of my friends playing Deep Rock. I've had nothing but good times playing with randos, but MAN it would be good to mess around with good friends.

I've always had some competitive multiplayer game. I'm competitive and it gives that energy an easy outlet. In order those games have been:

• TagPro - great browser-based game with a strong competitive community
• CS:GO - I got tired of the long games and potential for bad teammates to ruin the experience
• Smash Ultimate - love the game to death but the online experience eventually forced me to only play offline
• Street Fighter 5 - got into it during the pandemic
• Street Fighter 6 - my current everyday game. tons of fun.

I don't really. Exception is Tape to Tape, best game this year no contest. Fast to pick up and play and super fun with friends. Also has couch coop so I just bring a controller over to a buddy.

I played Watch Dogs 2 back when there were enough players to make it interesting, then Watch Dogs Legion but didn't enjoy as much as the previous one. Played a couple single-player video games since.

I used to play competitive FPS like CS, but can't stand competitive games, or more specially the behaviour of people in competitive games these days.

PvE is usually my preference. Starship Troopers Extermination is/was great while it lasted and I'm hoping it has some tidal resurgence with subsequent releases.

Otherwise I play mostly soulsborne games and avoid most of the PvP aspects even with the absence of voice comms, but do prefer that style over anything else.

I mostly play fighting games, which can be alienating with a large group of friends who don't grind them as much as you do, because then you reach a point where you win every match against them, and they're not having fun. If you go to locals, and I do, you make fighting game friends, which is some kind of solution, though not ideal. Perhaps the 2v2 mode of Project L will help that problem, but I don't trust Riot to make that game work without an internet connection, and online-only games are a deal-breaker for me at this point.

Baldur's Gate 3 is a game a lot of my friends and even my brothers are interested in playing co-op, but I know from experience with Divinity: Original Sin and attempts to co-op long games like Factorio and Starbound that eventually adults' schedules will not align to be able to finish the game you started. For BG3 in particular, I think I'm going to play it solo for the first time, and then I'll try co-op with one of my brothers and maybe a separate game with another friend of mine where I play a character in their worlds; that way I can try different builds and strategies, and if our schedules diverge, they can keep going in their game with the character I was playing.

Unfortunately, most other co-op games are online-only these days, and I think we're going to start seeing a swing back to allowing LAN and split-screen again, not the least of which is Baldur's Gate 3, but it's going to be slow going for a while. FPS games in particular have dried up immensely, at least for the style of game I'm looking for. Competitive FPS games have become live service, second job, battle royale or extraction shooters; and the campaigns, when they happen at all, have become open world checklists. So in the meantime, my favorite co-op games have been session-based games like roguelikes. Things like Vagante, 30XX, Streets of Rogue, and such. The one exception for FPS games is that cross play, split screen, controller support, all that good stuff added to the Quake remasters has myself and a friend of mine eyeing finally playing those games co-op, because we're not going to get anything like it for a long time.

I play a LOT of ESO; I have three nights a week that I group with others to do PvP in Cyrodiil. Beyond that, I help out with a large trials Discord that runs ~3-5 trials a week, depending on schedules. I can sign up for those as needed.

Even with only doing PvP 3 nights a week, we generally only run ~2-3 hours, and there are enough people that if someone misses, it isn't a big deal, and a sub can usually be pulled into the role. If not? We just deal with it. People have lives, they're gonna miss. I routinely take breaks from the scheduled stuff, because I don't like having things planned out. With football and basketball season coming up, I'll likely step away for a bit to do other things I like.

ESO is nice, in that once you're at level cap, you're done doing that grind. New sets aren't too hard to get once you get sorted, and non-meta builds are viable through most end-game content. Being in the large trials discords makes it really easy to slot in when I want. Additionally, the Discords themselves makes it easy to stay connected without the commitment of the game required.

As for friends that don't play, anytime I'm playing Rocket League or CoD or whatever other games, I'll send something in the group chat to see if others wanna join. Most the time I don't get any takers, but putting the invite out there is enough. It's hard to stay connected through the years, an invite at least let's friends know you are thinking of them in the moment.

Point 1 is always such a killer, isn't it? I still try to get into games with friends and wife whenever possible. It's like any activity, we just try our best to schedule it, and make a commitment to trying to find said schedule when we can.

I group up with strangers for group content in World of Warcraft, but not very often. I mostly play the game (and others) solo.

Dota 2 and it doesn't. I just force it in. Playing with friends is a thing of the past as everyone has a job with a different schedule, has a spouse and so on...

It doesn't. I'm not really interested in multi-player games of any kind. Partly because I don't have the time to git gud, and partly because my gaming interest is primarily getting lost in a narrative world.

I use to play multiplayer games in the office with co-workers many many years ago. Then when everybody scattered to the four corners of the earth, I've mainly just been jumping into single player games that I can pick up and drop easily. I then started getting back into multiplayer sessions with my kids, but they soon transitioned through that period where their studies or other hobbies take precedence to our occasional DRG sessions. So I've now been going on Deep Rock runs with strangers. On the one hand, it's a nice quick fix, but as most users seem to use the text chat if at all, it's not as much of a social event as it was when I was playing with my kids and we all had open mics. You can get on the DRG Discord to try to team up with regular players, and I may try that some day to see if there are older players who don't mind shooting the breeze while riding Doretta. But for now, I'll have to make do with jamming that V key.

I play usually with my spouse, and occasionally my brothers. With the former, we usually get pretty into ARPGs (PoE, Titan Quest, Van Helsing, older Diablo) or Don't Starve Together. With my siblings it's usually random stuff they suggest that's not too complicated so we can catch up while we play.

I used to do Overwatch, but the time commitment to stay good is just too much, and the games end up sucking more often than not. Haven't touched OW2. TF2 is still fun, and I've been doing a bit of Sea of Thieves solo but occasionally interacting with other crews. Basically anything that involves playing with strangers is usually not worth the effort for me.