Lack of Offline LAN in newer games. How do people feel about this?

[r00t|{it]

Hey guys just wondering how people feel about the lack of Offline LAN play in most newer titles.
Please try to include in your comments, your age and your prefered gaming platform as well.
This is not for any study this is just personal interest.
I was mildly urked to find out that even though MW3 has LAN play you still need to be signed on to steam to play any kind of multiplayer.

[rec]

Doesn't bother me. When am I not online? Never. Not by myself at home, not with a mate at playing a new release at his place, not at a 100 person strong organised event.

[Aegis]

it pisses me off, rootkit. In my 30's and play primarily on a PC.

Proper LAN support was a big part of how many of these companies became so big. Unfortunately there's too many people like Rec who don't care anymore so, as I've mentioned in the past, more of what we took for granted in games will fall by the wayside. Despite the fact you can't really have those hundred people playing, say BF3, off that connection because the lag would be woeful and there are no user-deployable dedi servers (yet! I still hold out hope).

I don't mind so much if the game requires a constant net connection, so long as it has some form of locally hostable server solution. Even if it's P2P rubbish, on a LAN the problems with that mostly evaporate.

but yeah, it's irksome.

[jimmy]

Fast internet has made lanning a pointless idea for me. I don't care if games don't support it as long as the socialising aspects of the game and netcode are well done. I would much rather sit at home with mumble than lug my gear to a venue.

[feary]

I'd rather just hear you too Jimmy

Fast internet has made lanning a pointless idea for me. I don't care if games don't support it as long as the socialising aspects of the game and netcode are well done. I would much rather sit at home with mumble than lug my gear to a venue.

[Mungus]

there's still plenty to be said for a small, beery, shouty, junk foody, porn sharey lan.

its just that fast internet has made offline lan a less relevant feature in modern games.

[Lothar]

Well I am 22. Love playing at lan's and enjoy their environments and game play. Been to DGA's of all sorts, went to NOS gaming LANS and hosted a few of my own. Now go to LAN's here in Perth which I am getting into.

Now I also play online usually either DOTA / HoN / LoL variants or mainly the BF Series as big games that I have played.

I would thougherly enjoy playing BF Series on a lan environment for LAG and or server requirements to have everything controlled locally and to support the lack of a good internet connection. The only time this succeeded was probably the last lan at the Chan building I think it was DGA 38 or 46 I can't recall *(basically was my first DGA).
Now that event went off like a ball because we had over 40 people in a single game having a ball. I can't recall any other LAN game been that large Ever Period.

Now with 2142 that never happened because of the lack of people owning the game and the lockdown from a patch level. Basically after version 1.02 (Release day Patch) online authentication was required and hence could not play at most of the previous lans - so limited the availability of this game.

BFBC2 had no server files. When I was able to get a hold of the files and have a server running successfully I could not run the server as it required a heartbeat to be sent from a whitelisted IP address (EA server side Patch) that broke the LAN server.

Online play for these games had been a great thing for me and my mates. I was involved in several modding communities that were an Australian spin off of some MyIS tournaments. Namely BF2 AF (Australian Forces), AAF (Australian Allied Forces), 2142 AAF and AoW (ending community that went through FFOW trackmania and BC2). These tornys were premade teams of 30v30 (with 4 admins / ref's) on a Friday night 6 Hours at a go. We would play on a freshly created map by out mod team on a mod that we patch on a regular basis. I recall in AAF we had patched Ziplines and quads into a mod of Stock 1.20 BF2 so that everyone could use them as required. Had all unlocks so that it did not matter which side you were on.

Later with the modding stage of things we ended up having modified teams and guns - we patched the AUG / Styer into the game for the assult kits. Added in smoke grenades and flashes. Changed the way support re-supplied combatants to make a game that was both competative and fair. We changed the FAV to have V8 sounding engine and responsiveness. We patched in a 2 weeler motorbike that would wheelstand if you put the throttle down. We had all types of Vehicles patched in from mobile artillery from BF1942 style spotting and shooting.

Now without mod tools and or functionality this community would not have existed for the 4 years that it did. Without community server tools the competitions would not have been run.

Now with me moving to Perth and attending a lan at my workplace is a different storey. I was instructed to download TF2 and also League of Legends through the internet because A) it wouldn't take anyone off playing the game to back it up. And 2) it would not impact 2 ports on the LAN router / switch that we were on. It would only affect my port (10/100) and the Wan port (1000). I downloaded TF2 in under 6 minutes and LoL in 20 (due to their shitty CDN / Patching). Now this example is probably on the far end of the extreme of LANing in Australia but I am a testament to it existing. When the rest of Australia gets FTTH or FTTN I would say this would become the Norm Providing that equipment can handle it at LAN centres.

Depending on the setup costs involved with turning on a 2nd UNI-D on the ONT/NTU box it may be costly to have this turned on for a separate weekend for events or for running the LANS when NBN comes around. As turning this port on is only a virtual configuration change as both points in theory should be terminated (at least on the fibre side).

TL;DR version. I play games and like customisation to play the game how I think it should be played in the environment that I can play it in.
Until NBN comes around LAN play will still exist in some form of offline capabilities. When NBN is here and every lan event has this LAN / Online play will feel and be exactly the same provided that servers are made available to admin's/users.

[mepm]

lan for me is extremely important and i miss it in all the new games. i still play cod4 purely due to the lan aspect.

i dont always have an internet connection - all it takes is a decent rain to take out the net, and hell sometimes i just can't afford it and don't have internet for a week.