Digital friends with benefits: Socialization in games

EDITOR'S NOTEfrom Eduardo Moutinho

As someone who spent hours going on dates and reading endless blocks of text during Persona 4, I can relate with Jonathan's article about socialization in games.

I'm a little disappointed with video games these days because most are just yearly rehashes of previous releases. Thankfully, titles like Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 4 and Team Fortress 2 stand apart from the rest of the crowd. These titles use social elements to enhance their gameplay in lieu of more pedestrian mechanics.

Even though one experience is strictly single-player while the other is multiplayer, both games reward you for interacting with people.

Persona 4 requires the player to speak with different characters to build social links. These special bonds allow you to create new personas for use in combat.

This system also helps develop the overall storyline. Without the feature, I wouldn't have been able to learn more about Yukiko's ambitions to become the innkeeper of the Amagi Inn, for example.

Team Fortress 2 uses social-based gameplay in a different way. It encourages people to trade items and weapons with fellow players.

Even if you don't trade anything, you're still going to find these items. Unlike some first-person shooters, Team Fortress 2 gives you the chance to receive weapons randomly from your opponents.

During a recent session, I found a special bat-and-ball weapon. Strangely enough, I only received it after someone who possessed the item killed me. I just can't get the same social experience from other FPS games.

I really wish that more developers would try to follow the formulas of Persona 4 and Team Fortress 2. Players need more social experiences, so they don't feel lonely or isolated from the rest of the world. I just hope that I'll find more games like these on sale in the near future.

Tags: Team Fortress 2, Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 4

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Chris Hoadley

May 31, 2011

I have to agree with you on the art styles. If I played shooters I would probably play Team Fortress. It's also interesting the social system of a single player game compared with that of a multiplayer game.

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Jonathan Oyama

June 01, 2011

I honestly have a tough time picking up new shooters nowadays, because of the extremely realistic graphics. They don't seem as simple and fun as old Japanese action games, like Strider or Bionic Commando.

I think the graphics are keeping me from playing games like Fallout 3. I just wish I could bring myself to play it, just to see how the social trees in the new RPGs work. I suppose someday I'll start playing more of the post-apocalyptic games eventually. Sigh...

Dewan J. Haque

July 31, 2011

The TF2 bit was coincidence, sadly. The way the item system works is that every x amount of time playing you will get an item, where x is a random number between y and z. (I don't actually have the numbers, it's probably on the wiki somewhere.)

But otherwise I agree- I think TF2's ingame voice chat helps a great deal, too.

August 03, 2011

Yeah, I figured that there was only a certain probability to get that item. Still, I think it's nice to know that the drop system is much more exciting than a boring MMO.

Strider Kuja

Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 4 sounds vaguely like the Sakura Taisen series... has anyone played both that can elaborate on any similarities? I realize they are very different games, but in the Sakura Taisen games, you need to build relationships with the party members so that by the time the battles take place there is good morale... which modifies things like luck/stats.

Sadly, I haven't played any Sakura Taisen games yet. However, I understand the gameplay mechanics well enough to understand how it works. I think Record of Agarest also has an interesting relationship system that allows people to determine the stats of their future offspring. I haven't reached that point of the relationship yet, though.