By Harper Skrzypczak, Editor-in-Chief.
I’ve never been a “serious” gamer. I’m the kind of person who will explore all the caves in “Skyrim” before ever getting to the main quest. I don’t care about achievements or scores; all I really want is to have fun. And the most fun I have when gaming is when I get to share a couch with a friend and play alongside them.
Video games that give you the option to play co-operatively in person seem to have fallen out of style over the years in lieu of online gaming. Don’t get me wrong, online gaming has it’s merits. Online co-op is great when you and your friend have a busy schedule and meeting up in person is difficult—even better if your friend doesn’t live near you. With online gaming, you don’t even have to know the people you’re playing with or against.
The biggest downside of online co-op, though, is that if you want to play online with your friend, both you and your friend have to purchase the game. Then, if the game is an XBOX exclusive, you both have to pay for XBOX Live in order to game online.
Couch co-op games can be an awesome experience, whether you’re playing against your friend, or with them cooperatively. There’s just something special about sitting down next to a real, live person and helping each other to defeat a slew of mutated humans infected by the t-Phobos Virus. Sharing a couch with a fellow gamer allows you to see each other’s screens (which makes it easier to have each other’s backs), and to listen to real-time reactions without lag when your friend’s character gets a chainsaw to the face.
Another reason couch co-ops are great is that only one person has to purchase the game—you can even go in on it together. Although some couch co-ops require that you be online to play, others do not.
The downside of couch co-op gaming for many, though, is that in order to use two player mode most games split the screen. This reduces the area your character can see, and therefore makes you more vulnerable and sometimes inaccurate within a game. Although, this won’t be much of a problem for those playing on large TVs.
If console gaming accommodate, and if video game developers don’t fill the void, I’ll be left to play cooperative board games with my friends. Because the best part about playing games is playing them with other humans.
