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Two-Player Games for Mixed Skill Level Players?
koreth asks: "What are some good two-player games that a newbie can successfully play with a more seasoned gamer? I want to find a good console or PC game I can play with my girlfriend, who has only recently started gaming. Something cooperative would be great, but head-to-head is fine too. All the games we've tried are made for players of roughly the same skill level -- so either I end up dumbing my gameplay way down (no fun for me) or blowing her out of the water without much effort (no fun for her). Is there any game out there that gives two players tasks of varying difficulty to keep both of them engrossed, at the same time?"
You're probably best off going coop games. If you're going PC games, any MMOG would probably do the trick. There's a decently steep learning curve, but you can help each other out quite effectively. WoW is a really easy game to teach newbies: as a very casual gamer, my wife picked up on it pretty quickly.
If you're not limiting yourself to PC, a Gamecube would be a good place to go. There are plenty of games for the veteran and the hardcore alike. Of course all I can think of is the NES days with coop games like Guerrilla War, the Double Dragon series, TMNT games, etc etc. Classic NES games are hard to beat. Easy to learn, but still a whole lot of fun! When I game with my wife, the NES probably gets used the most.
Your task will be killing her and her tasks will be running away, struggling with the keyboard and dying.
Most fighting games have a handicap system that essentially alters the damage dealt. Turn your damage way down, and hers way up, and then tweak them as she learns the system. I can particularly recommend Super Smash Brothers Melee for this, as it even has an auto-handicap system.
Theres this game I play with my girlfriend, but it's not a video game.... try it
Purple, because ice cream has no bones.
Another one, though I haven't played for years, that I would suggest would be Super Bomber Man or a sequel - easy to pick up and fun.
And the person above who suggested a MMO has an excellent point, though depends how casual you want the gaming to be as they generally require a large investment of time.
I can't stress enough the sheer multiplayer bliss that can be found in the first Super Monkey Ball. It's a game that gets played a lot whenever my family gets together.
Particularly the minigame "Monkey Target." No matter your skill level, you can have loads of fun; the game is competitive, but in a way that doesn't make it less fun if you get completely obliterated by your opponent. The sounds, colors, and animations make it easy to laugh about doing poorly, to the point where you don't even care who wins or loses. It's a lot of fun, either way.
Plus, the cute graphics will probably make it easy for your girlfriend to get into.
My wife and I are currently playing Dungeon Siege together. It is simple enough that any one with point and click experience and basic math skills can excel at it, but entertaining enough to keep you clicking forward.
-Rick
"Most people in the U.S. wouldn't know they live in a tyrannical state if it walked up and grabbed their junk." - MyFirs
the ancient oriental game of Go has has an excellent handicap system that keeps the game interesting, no matter how wide the skill difference.
need a free COBOL editor for Windows?
'Cause if it does, I feel I should quote C-3P0:
I suggest a new strategy, R2: let the wookie win.
Seriously though, if you are up for 'lets work together', and don't mind sharing the controller/keyboard, I would recommend something more puzzle & adventure oriented. Could be a point 'n click, but it doesn't have to be. I mean, some of the older Tomb Raiders were good in this respect (puzzles); just remember to look at other parts of the screen once in a while or your plan may backfire. Let's face it, FPS' are more reaction time and fine motor control -- which can be fun -- but I have a sneaking suspicion your better half will appreciate something more cerebral.
If you really do want a truly 2 player game, I would recommend something coop. If you have Half Life and more than one computer (and what self-respecting geek doesn't?), then give Sven Co-op a try. Play through Half Life co-operatively. There is also a huge map pack avaliable with decent maps; not all of which are quick-blast-everything-that-moves. Other choices include other coop games, such as Halo 2. I'm sure you can think of others without too much effort; eg sports games, racing games usually have > 1 player mode built-in, at least for consoles.
Personally, I'd go for the one that gets you the most thanks-for-thinking-of-me-honey... points.
If all you have is a grenade, pretty soon every problem looks like a foxhole -- MightyYar
LEGO Star Wars is a very fun co-op game . . . it even allows you to drop in/out at any point, which is great if the phone rings, the oven timer goes off, etc. It's not terribly long, but the sequel will be out soon. :-)
On the PC side, WarCraft III might be a good idea -- you can play against AI opponants, and select various handicaps for each player if desired.
Puzzle games are a lot of fun to play together, too -- my wife and I have played Bookworm together and had quite the good time.
...beating each other with live cats.
It's a little tricky setting up a game, but if you put about three ounces of rum in waterdish, they're easy to catch. That said, it's more fun to do it with sober cats... their claws have a higher chance of being extended at any given point in time.
Now, if you start to get the knack of the game before she does, just drug her cat more. Her cat won't be as painful, but she'll be able to swing it harder without it trying to claw her eyes out.
After a few rounds, you'll both be laughing, exhausted, and covered in each others' blood.
Oh, and if you're both knocked unconcious, the cats will eat you. They'll start with with your tongues, btw.
My wife and I play a lot of Mario Party together. It has some tweakable handicapping anda pretty short learning curve. We usually play against 2 other computer controlled players. That sets up a nice dynamic where we can be competitive with each other but cooperative in screwing over the computer controlled players.
Another great Japanese game is "Ribbit King"- http://www.ribbitking.com/about.htm sort of a weird golf game where you launch frogs off of a catapult to ultimately get the frog into the hole. You score points for getting teh frog to cover larger distances and interact with the dense kooky environment. It has a lot of charm goofiness and just the right amount of skill to be fun and never frustrating.
deathmatch or Coop- I think it's great for this..
if you REALLY KNOW YOUR MAPS, find some custom ones,
if you really need to, restrict yourself to weapons BELOW 5, give here whataver she can locate to use...
my wife really warmed up to it kinda quickly....
every day http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Random
Guild Wars can give you the best of both online and offline gaming. Just you and your GF (plus AI henchmen) as you don't want other players to intrude on the two of you, no subscription fees, and none of the griefing you get in other MMOGs.
... on other things. :P
Plus, a huge and wonderfully detailed world for the two of you to explore and to battle against, with no xp grinding, nor any of the other traditional MMOG timesinks that make some other popular worlds so tedious. The time saved can then be used
Recommended.
"The question of whether machines can think is no more interesting than [] whether submarines can swim" - Dijkstra
Look no further than:
.html) if you can find it for the old original PlayStation. That game had very interesting cooperative properties where certain shots would change characteristics and trajectory if they hit your friend's ship so sometimes it would be strategic to try to stay vertically aligned together (or overlay each other) to benefit from these special shots.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Puzzle_Fighter
This game strikes an amazing balance by being both compelling for serious competition and entertaining for casual play. David Sirlin has a relevant article (http://sirlin.net/archive/slippery-slope-and-perp etual-comeback/) describing "perpetual comeback" as it pertains to Puzzle Fighter and why it makes that game so very fun.
Are you still looking further?
Well then...
Another example of perpetual comeback is the fighting system in Battle Arena Toshinden (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_Arena_Toshind en) where each character has usually two special moves (in addition to their normal repertoire) that they can only perform once their health gets very low (i.e., they are about to be knocked-out). These moves (sometimes referred to as "desperation moves") usually do a great deal of damage and can easily turn the tide of a round or just win the round outright so they add cool intensity to the conclusion of many matches (even when one player is notably superior because they need to be extra careful to avoid getting hit by one or more of these "come-back" moves). These moves can be difficult to perform for those uninitiated to the common fireball and yoga-flame joystick movements they typically require but they totally have the best risk-vs.-reward benefit when a player is learning the game. I'd recommend studying and practicing the execution of those moves first to new players. Additionally, some characters have very easy ones like (if I remember correctly) Ellis and Sophia only need to press back, forward, back, forward + Triangle to do theirs. Choose an easy and fast character to start with until you learn enough to venture out.
Of course there are some fun cooperative experiences (like Halo or MMOs) but if your partner shows an affinity for, and appreciation of, games requiring increasing reflexive (a.k.a. "twitch") skill, I would highly recommend the plethora of http://shmups.com/ out there. Ikaruga (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ikaruga) must be mentioned as one of the greatest here. All threatening bullets and beams are either white (with blue highlights) or black (with red highlights). Similarly, each players' ship can flip over to alternate between those colors as well. When you're the same color as bullets, you absorb them into your shield and they store in a meter which can be unleashed as homing shots. When you are the opposite color of enemy ships, your shots do double-damage (but you're vulnerable to their bullets because they are the same color as them). It makes for awesome tension because the whole screen can be completely covered in bullets but at least half of it is always survivable space if you're the same color as the bullets occupying that space. Check out "bullet-eater" mode too. You can beat lots of levels without firing a shot (i.e., by just alternating to the right colors and dodging terrain features).
Another great one is Raiden Project (http://gamespot.com/ps/action/raidenproject/index
There are lots of great cooperative Shmups but the only directly competitive one I have yet encountered is astonishingly fun. It is called Twinkle Star Sprites (http://en.wiki
It's got a great co-op mode, doesn't rely on both players being skilled, but has some parts that need you to work together and communicate on...
It's available for consoles and the PC, and is a really fun game. (:
Whoever stated that signature sizes should be limited to one hundred and twenty characters can just go ahead and kiss my
"You don't want to frag your significant other, you want to frag the NPC that layed a hand on her."
:) If I'd managed to get my Horde rogue to 60 while I was still with my last boyfriend, his Alliance priest would have been going down.
Speak for yourself
I've ganked/fragged previous boyfriends in online games too, and been ganked/fragged by them too -- I find it more fun than cooperating, actually, because I get to show off, be as vicious as I want, and ideally become a better player while I'm at it.
It's great :)
Any version of Tekken.
You can learn all the moves, and get uber good at it, and have really high end matches that feel intellectual and thought out ... and then still get ur ass whipped by an unpredictable button masher.
Why not play a card or board game or something else altogether?
It is very easy to "mod" a RL game so that you can even the playing field. Examples follow:
- "Risk" like games: Different distribution levels of armies.
- "Go" like games: One player starts with more pieces on the board.
- "Monopoly" like games: Start one player with a few properties.
I could go on, but you get the point (I hope.)There are also some games that lend themselves better to n00bs like Cribbage... I can't count the number of times I've been beaten by people who just started playing, and I've been playing it for almost 20 years.
There are two types of people in the world: those who divide people into two types and those who don't.
City of Heroes has a very nice system that basically makes it nearly impossible for you to not be able to team with one other person. ;)
And it is so genre relevant that it isn't funny.
After all, what would Batman be without his Robin or Batgirl? A sidekick is your friend indeed!
No! It's a *SIG*. Keep the Special Interest Groups away! (Con joke!)
I think you might want to reconsider your premise: your girlfriend, if she is unwilling to immerse herself in the games, might just not be that interested in video games. You may also ask yourself whether your girlfriend really wants to play, or if she is just acquiescing to your hobbies. If the latter is the case, you might find that her ardor wears off and the games become a burden on your relationship. Finding activities that are genuinely, mutually enjoyable would be a better bet if this is the case. Note that I'm not saying it is: you're the one in the relationship and you must trust your own judgment.
As another alternative, you could try something like Go, a board game with a natural way of leveling the skill barrier by giving one side a handicap. Otherwise, I you could be on a quest for something that doesn't exist.
Anyhow, I also vote for "Dance Dance Revolution" and its ilk (see StepMania if your platform is a computer, not a console). If you haven't played before, then it's a toss-up as to whether you or your GF is going to be the better player, so the whole skill disparity thing may not be an issue. Even if you're a relatively experienced player, it's possible for two to play at widely different skill levels. And then, ultimately, it doesn't matter who wins: you mostly play to beat your personal best.
On top of all that, it's a great way to get exercise. Be entertained and get fit at the same time. Get experienced enough that the soft mats don't cut it for you anymore, and upgrade to the hard platforms. Get good enough that you can go for half an hour on the hardest levels and work up such a drenching sweat that you both need to shower afterwards.
DDR: a healthy addiction.
proof, n. A demonstration that a conclusion is implied by certain premises and axioms.
Will you marry me?
Someone save me from this sanity.
All of my friends, ecen the non gamers play Worms World Party, it's easy to learn, a blast to play multiplayer, and only requires one PC and will run on very old hardware (100MHZ, 32MB). Being turn based makes it a bit easier on noobs who can't compete with your highly trained reaction times as a gamer. Chicks especially love Worms for the cute factor. It's also playable by people of all ages, so it's something you can play with your kids.
Everyone is entitled to their own opinion. It's just that yours is stupid.
The original Half-Life port for PlayStation 2 had an excellent co-op mode which my wife and I played through until the end (I don't think that she's ever finished another game - except maybe Quake 1). AFAIK that's the only format that the co-op levels appeared in. It's really cool, both players have to work 2gether, but a good player can help out a less skilled one without detracting from the fun at all.
One thing to note about this is that if either player dies the mission is failed and you have to go back to the start of the level, so co-operation is far more critical than in something like Halo.