Local Multiplayer: Having Friends Has Never Been Better - Part I

What’s Up

This article is a 2-part piece that primarily focuses on my favorite couch competitive and couch co-op games at the moment.

I’ve always loved competitive gaming. First Person Shooter’s were my entry point, starting with Counterstrike just over 10 years ago along with Unreal Tournament 2004 and Battlefield 2. I played each during a period when these games were introducing new concepts, had large communities and they came packed with content. Nowadays, gaming companies are releasing reiterations of their franchises every year and it’s just tiring—I get bored and can’t actually afford to spend $100 for a full game when I know it’s so similar to last year’s version. Since I’ve found myself losing interest in FPSs and the player bases for my favorites are long gone, I went out on a quest of discovery to find a genre to fill the void at an affordable price point. This fix is indie couch co-op and competitive gaming.

Why You Should Care

Indie couch co-op and competitive games are simple, addictive and, most importantly, fun. They usually are under $15 and provide hours of entertainment. For example, the last few nights I have been playing one of these titles and saying to myself “just one more game...” That started around midnight. The next thing I knew it was 2AM. These games are pick up and play, easy to learn and difficult to master.

SpeedRunners

SpeedRunners is a 4-player, fast-paced racing game where you control a character racing around a 2D platforming environment. You can jump off walls, grapple on ceilings and shoot your opponents, all whilst avoiding the stage’s obstacles. Everybody shares the same screen, and the screen follows the player that is in the lead. As soon as someone falls behind and leaves the screen, they are eliminated. Once a player is eliminated, the screen size begins to shrink, making it increasingly difficult for the remaining players to stay alive. All this is going on while you shoot rockets at one another, drop mines and grapple your way to victory.

The game naturally becomes harder when you are the leader because you can’t see what lies ahead, this means the players behind have a chance to catch up while the leader trips and stumbles into objects. This is why it is difficult to master, if you want to be great at SpeedRunners, you have to be incredibly familiar with each level.

Not only does the game have 9 awesome levels, it has Steam Workshop support so that the list of maps is ever-increasing.

SpeedRunners is 4 players and can be played locally or online. It’s currently in early access on Steam and costs $10 but is often going on various sales on the bundle sites.

Nidhogg

Oh Nidhogg, the 2-player game which combines fencing, tug-of-war and Tremors, the movie about a giant underground worm.

Each game starts with you and your foe sharing the same screen facing one another with a sword in hand. The object of the game is to get past your opponent and keep on running. The catch: your opponent has to die in order for the screen to move in the direction you are headed. So if you kill your buddy, you can advance and they will respawn in your way further down the road. The game switches frantically between offensive, defensive and evasive gameplay. It creates many chaotic encounters, laughs and backstabbings.

To top it all off, if you do win, you end up being devoured by a giant worm known as Nidhogg.

Nidhogg is available on Steam and PS4 for $14.99 and is a 2 player competitive game with both online and offline play.

TowerFall: Ascension

TowerFall is a fast paced 4 player couch competitive game. You play within a 2D arena that loops around on itself, meaning that if you leave the screen on one side you will appear on the other. The object of the game is to kill everything on the screen whilst avoiding death yourself. Your weapon is a bow that can shoot various arrow types. You can also find items inside chests which provide you with different arrow types, defensive items or abilities. Your only defence against another player’s arrows (or your own), is a dashing ability. If you are going to be hit, you can intercept the arrow with a dash and you will pick up that arrow and cheat death.

The looping screen is a huge part of the gameplay as players aren’t the only thing that loop, arrows do too, meaning you can shoot an arrow off one edge of the screen and it can nail your opponent on the other.

There is both a 4-player PVP competitive mode and also a 2-player co-op mode where you fight against various monsters and minions. The co-op is fun but the game really shines when battling your friends.

TowerFall: Ascension is available on Steam and PS4 at $14.99. It’s only available for offline play sadly.

Final Thoughts

These 3 games are tremendous amounts of fun and I cannot recommend them enough. If you have friends to play with, pick them up now.

My personal favorite out of the 3 games above is definitely SpeedRunners because of it’s online match making and fast paced gameplay. It’s not a game with a real end to it so the pleasure comes from becoming a master at each level and destroying your friends.

Nidhogg is something I can pick up and play for short periods of time but is far more enjoyable if you play it alongside other similar games. I find that I get bored of it quite quickly and like to jump from Nidhogg to other games back to Nidhogg fairly frequently but I do know people that could play it for hours on end.

TowerFall is another favorite of mine as every game is completely different and unpredictable making it always fresh and fun to play, unless you are getting wrecked by someone that is far better than you. It is possible to combat the difference in player skill level by adding mutators which completely changes the dynamic of each game. These mutators force even the most experienced players to relearn how to deal with each levels environment.     

To Be Continued…

Come back for part 2 of this multi-segment article that will include a few other games that I have had ample amounts of fun with.