Every Successful Multiplayer Game Has This "Problem"

Discord: discord.gg/mpHFmhW
Twitter: Garbaj2

[@celikokyaz5297]

The biggest gap between the beginner and the average must be in Quake, your "average" Quake player has probably been playing for like 10 years

[@elijah4168]

More like 20

[@21stsavage95]

and fighting games

[@tss1473]

And starcraft

[@brandonsaquariumsandterrar8985]

I play half life with my dad and he is much better than me jest because he has been playing for a very long time

[@IDyn4m1CI]

And GunZ: The Duel

[@TKsh1]

It's sad that offline/multiplayer with bots are almost non-existent nowadays. They not only allow the player to have fun without internet, but also prepare new players to the gameplay basics. And jokes aside, bots make for better teammates than actual players half of the time.

[@Ngong8]

I guess this is why nowadays pvp games can release publicly so quick and so many of them, because they don't include AI bots to let players play against/with and won't be bothering to do AI behaviour with much in-depth.

[@TheAzorg]

@@Ngong8 and then you have games that allow you to play against bots *but* require internet connection to play.

[@Ngong8]

@@TheAzorg One of the examples? Latest version of Starcraft 1 do count I guess...

[@godisforever7263]

Yeah the ones which had those are removed or the game is abandoned.

[@ieatchickens]

@Beaverish Buck Teeth what do you mean with bots are cringe?

[@Fandilin]

I'm sooooo glad TF2 has such a greeeaaaate *"tutorial"*

[@boid9761]

Their Spy tutorial is abhorrent

[@threecheeselasagna5945]

I love the pfp, is it the bullet kin from enter the gungeon?

[@GeneraliskYT]

yeah... 10/10

[@Thornskade]

I don't mind basic tutorials, but TF2 needs to inform players of its mechanics, especially for movement. The fact that at no point the game mentions that you can crouch jump to reach higher platforms or air strafe to control your movement in mid-air is a crime. I remember the first time I learned of crouch jumping was on a Saxton Hale server when I asked in chat how everyone was reaching a specific elevated location as classes without extra jump mobility. That blew my mind. I had already been playing TF2 for weeks at that point

[@MiSTSiM]

based

[@swapertxking]

i've always admired "mentor mode" where experienced players can teach new players. Team Fortress 2 has a traditional tutorial for each class, as well as a trainee/trainer mode where you can join random games as a spectator (or player if you know what to do) and be there to teach positioning, weapon quirks, and class balance. I remember my first time as a trainer and playing coach to a newbie soldier. we're still friends eight years later.

[@zachrobinson8357]

Yes, but have you tried to play said tutorial? Last time I checked, it didn’t work. Sure, one or two classes sometimes do, but it’s not ever been a source of help, which is unfortunate af.

[@swapertxking]

@@zachrobinson8357 personally honest, its bene years, and i know they don't cover the finer details of each class and their unlocks. iirc, they were made for launch tf and really havent been updated. hell SFM still uses a version of tf2 that doesnt allow you to pick up buildings.

[@pongpong8325]

the coach function doesn't work because matchmaking system is now ad-hoc

[@swapertxking]

@@pongpong8325 ah... awww

[@jakaberdajs4378]

Lol tf2 has tutorial for 4 classes... And the menotr mode is heavely outdated, dosent explain anything well, and in general sucks...

[@loafofuraniumfreshlybaked569]

The best system by far is to have another person with you in the game showing the ropes and demonstrating. Preferably a friend, but volunteer players would be more accessible. Setting up a system where volunteers teach newbies the ropes and get compensated for it with rewards would boost the health of so many games

[@fiercestbau]

dota 2 has a coaching system that works very well and is similar to what you're describing

[@cheesepepperoni7418]

escape from tarkov has something like this, they're called sherpas

[@loafofuraniumfreshlybaked569]

@@cheesepepperoni7418 What a cursed name, though

[@luciferofastora]

I just posted the same in a different thread. You'd need to base compensation on progress, which can be hard to measure, if you want to incentivize the mentors to teach well instead of just sorta idling about for free rewards. You'd also probably get people gaming the system by coaching smurfs, but those are a separate problem anyways.

[@elidhanMC]

Team Fortress 2 used to have this (it technically still does but it either doesn't work or nobody just uses it)

[@SYNDIC4T3]

I believe this problem is especially apparent in fighting games, since they are so well established and are one of the core genres of esports. The good thing is that fighting game bots are usually very competent. I understand that a new player may want to crush bots to be invested in the game but an average player will crush even the most difficult bots in an fps game, because they are usually built to have extremely simple behavior. Having good bots actually prepare you for online battle. I think this is lacking in fps games but I believe it is done intentionally.

[@blisterfingers8169]

To be fair it's just a much trickier coding problem to make an AI for an FPS.

[@gagne6928]

Honestly i love playing fighting games with friends but half the time fighting game AI is insane

[@hectormartinbauza9249]

nice pfp

[@garbaj]

Imagine if fps bots were as good as Shroud. That would be scary

[@mode3763]

I remember when I tried MK11, the AI just completely wiped the floor with me. I can't even imagine playing against real people, that must be insane...

[@alex_keller9781]

I really like how "Hunt: Showdown" handles this problem. for a tutorial they throw you into a round with no players just AI and give you three difficulty options, you can spend as much time as you want playing this "training" mode and you get cosmetic rewards for beating each difficulty the first time. for the main game mode during your first 10 levels they put you in a special "Trainee" matchmaking bracket consisting of only new players in order to ensure that the first few rounds are balanced and give you time to get invested in the game without getting steamrolled, once you're out of that bracket matchmaking is based off of an optional ELO matchmaking system with a very prominent "skill based matchmaking" box you can turn off right next to the "ready" button. this helps solve the issue with ELO, that being that it's hard to tell you're improving when everyone else is always close to you in skill. since you can always turn it off and play against players of assorted experience I feel that gives the player the necessary options to decide what's more fun for them, playing against people of all skill levels, or only playing against people of similar skill. In addition to all of that the game also offers "trials" which is a solo challenge mode with stuff like "headshot 40 AI in 30 seconds", or one where you have to follow a set path within a time limit while being attacked by AI and dodging traps(it's more fun than it sounds), all of these "trials" having bonus objectives to encourage you to play and replay them and in the process getting substantially better at the specific skill involved. overall I feel that even a new player would have plenty of fun stuff to try out, all of which would be legitimately helpful with improving at the game, and the aforementioned "Trainee" mode is extremely effective in getting players hooked TL;DR play Hunt: Showdown, it's a masterpiece and the best shooter I've played yet

[@pazz199]

Another thing I'd like to add (which is somewhat unique to hunt): You can finish entire matches without even encountering players. You still have to make many choices, you're still really playing the game, even if you end up getting stomped. Most games, when you're getting stomped, you learn nothing, and end up staring longer at a respawn/requeue screen than actually playing

[@Roberta-yf4ge]

Gonna be honest tutorial and trails are very pointless. The biggest thing is actually having decent match making for bad players. It’s also the type of game you shouldn’t play alone, playing with a better friend is the very best way to improve. I guess I can’t really speak for low star players but it seems that 3 and 4 stars is a hilariously weird bracket were everyone is bad so the game becomes very strange. Trainee mode is great since new players will get curb stomped by even some of the very worst players so their deaths don’t matter nearly as much.

[@gownerjones]

Fun fact: Elo is not an acronym, it's the last name of the person who invented that system. You don't have to capitalize the whole word :)

[@Grooviebones]

Counterpoint. After 50 hours SBMM becomes smurf hell. Just turn off SBMM? Solo play becomes 1 clicks on par with AK rounds is CS GO at 5* and 6* lobbies compounded by the fact that you can see the lobbies skill level in all games now (PS. for a rather long time SBMM players were getting matched with non-SBMM players meaning the lobbies were identical). Anyway a playerbase will optimize the fun out of any pvp oriented game, and that's true for hunt as well. If you're suggesting Hunt has avoided the pitfalls of modern competitive games I would challenge that statement by saying it's just as guilty if not more egregious with it than other competitive games. As a side note, me and my friends have a little game. We call it "Guess how many times he bought the game." Where whenever we die to a 2.5+ KDA player we guess how many smurf accounts they've gone through based on their rate of stat accumulation.

[@kiwi_2_official]

shut up advertiser

[@Daaninator]

Also a fix is to implement a rank system. Like most games. Fortnite has this too but it's hidden I think. But lower ranks are most of the time broken because of smurfs etc, but it's better than matching with random 2000 hours skilled players.

[@ashleyzimmermann1706]

Agreed

[@hobbyl0s]

No, because not nearly everyone plays ranked, and even if they do, it's more frustrating because you just get stuck on a certain rank

[@Buttersaemmel]

@@hobbyl0s he isn't talking about ranked matchmaking but about a hidden ranking system that runs in the background. many games do that so even if you don't play "ranked" there is a skill determination in the background which ranks you but doesn't get shown. this often is mostly (even if not fully) seperated from your "ranked" rank. on the note of this system: the smurfing is probably the biggest problem. for cheap games or even worse free 2 play games the new-player-rank-expirience can be just way more awfull than in the average ranks. in my opinion you can see that especially well in overwatch where players with levels under 20 or a little bit above that join (the progress up to 20 is extremly fast) and not only play theire hero like they mastered it but also got perfect map knowledge giving newer players who lack the skill AND the map knowledge absolutely no chance. and the biggest problem here is that smurfs abbuse the hidden ranking system because it gives them an easy oppertunity to explicitly target low-skilled players. point is even if you want to create an enviorment that is as fair as possible there will still be people who find ways to abbuse it so they can raise theire own egos with destroying the fun of others.

[@Ametisti]

Yeah, something like that would be better for some games. I know when I was trying to get into Halo MCC it kept matching me with teams WAY WAY higher level and the match turned into an incredbly unfun massacre

[@arcturuslight_]

Somewhere around 2015 I've been playing a lot of Supreme Commander: Forged Alliance in singleplayer missions and with friends a few times. I later wanted to try multiplayer (using a community made modded version as the core game isn't well optimised or balanced for multiplayer) and any ranked match I tried my opponent destroyed me with 0 effort. One of them even started asking how I managed to get such a low rating (it was starting rating, it wouldn't even go lower from the losses) and when I told that I'm new he went "Ohhhh" I think some of them haven't met a new player literally ever.

[@BlurbFish]

This phenomenon is further highlighted in team games, as you're playing with people who *expect* you to already be familiar with all the game's "basics" (that take hundreds of hours to learn), people who will typically be angry if you fail to meet those expectations. I am personally surprised that games like dota and league of legends continue to draw in new players, especially considering that the amount of things that must be learned (items and characters in particular) keeps increasing at a steady pace.

[@Buttersaemmel]

oi mate then let me tell you the following: i never played LoL and got only a few hours in Dota 2. a few months ago i tried LoL because it looked like something at least worth to try. the tutorial is completely useless as it teaches you the very basics but not why you *should* do what you can do and it in no way teached me a way to determine for my self what to do in certain situations. so i was sitting there in LoL just knowing the controlls, the goal of a match and how to buy items and was expected to find out on my self which of all these heroes i should pick what purpose the speciffic heroes fullfills and how i should play with that hero. i didn't even knew where to go when and my teammates weren't usefull either. THIS was one of the most horrible new-player expiriences i ever had in any game as i really just walked around like a headless goose trying to figure out what i'm supposed to do (besides mindlessly slappign minions)! after 3 tries i simply uninstalled it as it wasn't fun. i think if you watched some streams/let's plays and hop in after some time you could have a pretty good experience as you know the game at least a bit and not only fundamentals. but going in completely blind (just like you should expect it from a new player) is awfull.

[@ClikcerProductions]

Do those games really draw in new players though? I recently picked LoL up again with a couple friends, some had not played before so had fresh accounts, and almost every single game the low level players we queued into were very obvious smurfs, with the very occasional genuine noob sprinkled in going 0/20/5

[@jamesphillips2285]

@@Buttersaemmel My brother said he gave up either Dota or LoL on the first play-trough because he got death threats for not knowing how to play.

[@ToomanyFrancis]

With how much content League has I can't believe seasoned players still play it. If Valorant ever hits 150 agents I will be out entirely.

[@vadnegru]

Dota 2 has good noob mode with 15 or so characters that's easy to play with specific roleplay. So if you liked archer you start to go deep into other characters of same class.

[@bruceluiz]

I've felt the effects of this increased base skill with Chivalry:Medieval Warfare. For a few months, every multiplayer match was evenly balanced as players from both sides usually had the same grasps of the game and played accordingly to how it was envisioned. Then, a few guilds discovered how to do completely overpowered 360º blocks, duck under enemies' blows with oversensitive mouses settings and yadda yadda. Short story: playerbase dumped horribly, me included. Never touched that game again. The aging of the game also played some part in this, but surely the high playerbase skill impacted the community too.

[@jonathangould189]

I feel like a tutorial that explained necessary thought processes and decision-making in-game would make more complex games such as Rainbow 6 Siege and LoL far more approachable for new players. Using R6 as an example, there could be a tutorial that gave situations, where a 'virtual coach' explained "they have a Kapkan, check that doorway," or "they have a Frost, shoot the floor as you vault in the window," or "they have a Caveira, watch your flank," or "This room is often defended, check these common angles." Even simple little phrases like those could become memorable, and it wouldn't take long for newer players to start anticipating these things themselves. And most importantly, it would actually test the player on things other than basics of how to play.

[@enraikow6109]

I agree with everything, and i'm just adding to that for anyone else that's reading. To have a coach to say stuff like "this room is often guarded" or "check those angles", etc, then the game must be played with real people first so the devs could observe those most used tactics, unless the devs already predicted it.

[@ohohgreasy660]

r6 has that already basically

[@unskilledwarthunderplayer4011]

Or another good example are “you have a teammate watch out for teamkills” and “They have a clash you’re fucked”

[@grqfes]

but the situations in R6 are fantastic because they are still really difficult for new players and allow them to learn the maps and operators

[@krisnaputramaulidan2843]

man i've only gotten decent in r6 after about 300-ish hours where i can get kills consistently and have good-ish recoil control and i still often get caught off-guard by kapkan EDDs and frost traps because i rushed in as amaru with a shotgun. never played ranked because heard it's a hellhole and there's not really a reason to play it because plats joins quick match too, especially in SEA servers, there's a hell ton of veterans in quick match since i got the game for the first time. hell not even quick match, in fucking newcomer i felt like i wasn't going against new players and instead veterans that has been playing since launch and made a smurf account

[@certified9104]

Yea I remember in apex season 0 I did really well because I had played Titanfall in the past, so I got a bunch of crazy games.

[@VoltFall]

Sadly they didn't add the titans

[@certified9104]

@@VoltFall it would've been a cool addition, but I don't know if it would've worked

[@VoltFall]

@@certified9104 yeah you got a point, it's supposed to be a more grounded version of Titanfall, so basically Titanfall but not Titanfall If that makes sense

[@rahbek100]

Yea where as I came from cs and wz. So my aim was good, but my movement and playstyle sucked

[@garbaj]

I really ought to play titanfall 2

[@tux_the_astronaut]

i also like tutorials that dont feel like tutorials like warframe where it docent feel like a tutorial but has you survive though a level while teaching you how to play

[@irax2714]

Yea the 1st "Quest" where thr tutor is basically in the story is freakin amazing

[@irax2714]

Warframe is also not good at teaching new stuff btw ;-;

[@christophbeck1305]

That Level didnt just teach me the mechanics it let me get used to m+k Was the first Thing i played on PC

[@irax2714]

@@christophbeck1305 m ps k?

[@tux_the_astronaut]

at the beginning its good but once you get further in it basically tells you nothing and it turns into a complex mess

[@thevaf2825]

the scenario described in this video is the primary reason I have difficulty finding a game I can play with my friends. we all have kids and very little time to spend learning the meta and complex gear/level-up systems. this has pretty much limited our choices to co-op campaign shooters, and there aren't that many of those going around at the moment.

[@julianmorrisco]

I feel you. I’ve had the opportunity during the pandemic to become a ‘player’ and it’s a different experience to when I didn’t have much time.

[@markercrayon457]

This is a bit late but battlefields like 1, 4, and 5 are pretty good and are very uncompetitive due to the sheer size of teams. It’s pretty easy to learn and you can do well with a lot of the guns so it’s not like you’ll have to grind for hours to get good stuff (at least in 5 because that’s the one I play)

[@masterdeetectiv9520]

@@markercrayon457 tf2 as well, the 12v12 allows room to goof off, and in battlefront its 20v20

[@tiagobelo4965]

If you want something with co-op, I'd recommend warface, pve and spec ops is fun, pvp is full of sweats on the advanced servers

[@kennethwang1455]

left 4 dead 2 shesh

[@chernobylthing3932]

I feel like one of the best ways to get a new player into the game is something like Titanfall 2's Gauntlet, where players can practice, get better, et cetera. Even better, (for the player, maybe not for the devs) is a short campaign that could introduce most if not all of the MP's mechanics

[@fallongarens6734]

God I miss Titanfall 2. Its campaign is genuinely a great tutorial for the multiplayer

[@gamespender8605]

@@fallongarens6734 Same. Recently I tried getting back into csgo but it's just not fun to get clapped early because of 0 positioning knowledge and then have to suffer through watching your silver teammates yell at eachother over voice chat. I'm just gonna go back and replay the campaign of tf2

[@inquisitorbenediktanders3142]

The main problem with a campaign, especially when the game is a bit older, is the fact that most of the time, when there is content added and the game changes the campaign stays the exact same. That means that if they were reliant on a weapon that was very strong in general at launch time and then hop into MP with it, they find out just how much it got nerfed in the 2nd worst way possible.

[@Thornskade]

I think there's another way to avoid this problem: by making the game really fun to play, even when you suck and get stomped. I believe that's demonstrated by TF2. At least I had that feeling when I started out, I didn't mind getting wrecked by veterans all the time. I didn't want to get better because I got stomped necessarily, I wanted to get better because of how fun it was to play, and the sense of humor of the game itself. Especially getting good at explosive jumping

[@toninhosoldierhelmet4033]

sadly quake champions as far as i am aware is the biggest victim, a game thats endlesly fun to play even when you are getting murder-fucked, and to be honest, if shit ins't hard you are playing the game wrong, for me what kills QC dead on track is high ping matches, and with a player base so small a low ping lobby is almost impossible.

[@Thornskade]

@@toninhosoldierhelmet4033 Yeah Iunno, Quake Champions had a really rocky start. I do generally really enjoy Quake but never gave Champions a chance. TF2 goes way beyond just being a good game which appeals to my tastes. You get a real sense of community on fun servers similar to MMOs, it is incredibly mod friendly so you can get creative if you want to as well as try tons of community mods, and it has awesome characters, character interactions and generally quirky humor like goofy weapons and cartoony ragdoll shenanigans. I enjoy playing TF2 competitively from time to time, but the real reason I stick to the game and come back to it is because it makes me laugh. I genuinely feel better after having played it and that's one of the best things a video game can provide me. Many of my favorite games I played for similar reasons. Like GTA IV for all the unscripted and hilarious situations you run into by exploring the city Not saying every game needs this, and games can be fun and hilarious with buddies even if the game itself is kinda dry. But either way this is something that Quake lacks, which TF2 has, and is definitely a reason why I play TF2 so much more than Quake Live

[@toninhosoldierhelmet4033]

@@Thornskade damn how did i forget that? QC had one of the worst early years, the game was unoptimized to the sin, about TF2 i have played for about some 700 hours and can confirm that at times the game is endlesly hilarious, but for me in most recent years, well idk, either a pub match goes wrong thanks to bots, people genuinily doing nothing creative to the point it feels like a bot match, or a match full of sweaty vet snipers, the enjoyment became inconsistent, it seens that all of the weapon nerfs that came around 2012 made the game worse even if more balanced, sure pyro with that fire axe as broken af but there were much more room for dumb crap to happen.

[@toninhosoldierhelmet4033]

@Shards to be fair for me the biggest selling point of quake multiplayer, is the reward is just you getting better at the game, no ranks, no rewards none this crap, the grind is up to you not up to the game, and this is how you make grind enjoyable, i am not a good quake player, but least in QC i am decently competent simply because the game is just fun to play.

[@zombeef2158]

thats what happens to me then i start learning movement and have a more understanding

[@slyfoxblox]

This is an abhorrently clickable title, well done.

[@boid9761]

Clickbait done right

[@CiDK]

He's an average veritasium enjoyer

[@sannidhyabalkote9536]

@@CiDK veritasium gang rise up

[@garbaj]

Science youtuber changes gaming youtuber's life with this one simple trick!

[@hundvd_7]

His titles are always insanely clickable. And not like it's a lie or anything. It's just top-tier marketing

[@JeffReeves]

I hope that one day we can re-embrace that it's okay to play games for fun, and not have the average player feel they need to go sweat eSports competitive ham mode on every single game. Gaming used to be about having fun with friends, or at least strangers with similar interests; over decades I've seen it slowly turn into a toxic cesspool of perfectionism where no one is actually having any fun. No one with any sort of life is going to want to spend hundreds or even thousands of hours on one specific game to learn all of it's ins and outs, just to get good enough to win *on occasion*. Over the past five years I've found myself going from playing games I like to just watching professionals play them; because it's impossible to keep up with an ever changing competitive meta, patches and balance changes, and a massive skill ceiling when all I really want to do is run around and play Terrorists and Counter-Terrorists for an hour or two after work once every couple of weeks.

[@howmuchmorecanItake]

Personally, I blame the rise and all-encompassing beast known as Skill-Based Match Making. Fuck SBMM

[@plu3]

Idk, i have fun while playing and atleast for me (i mainly play csgo), you can muck around as much as you like. That being said im gn3 on aus servers so idk what its like on na or china, but most people is cs at my level dont really give a fuck and if they do you can just mute them xd

[@jeckjeck6943]

From an old school quake3 player who gave up pvp games for that reason , you are absolutly right.

[@arcticfox037]

This is Warzone 100% for me. Even Jackfrags has had trouble winning games as of late apparently! Honestly, it started going downhill the moment people found you could pull the parachute and cut it over and over again to shot people out of the air and gain way more distance.

[@MrMolotow97]

Even in Tetris there existed some hardcore competitive players already...

[@jonathandifonzo726]

THANK YOU FOR MENTIONING THIS!!! I have noticed this for soooo long with games like splitgate, I know not “new” but when it was first blowing up it was so good then everyone became way too good and if I stopped playing for a week it was really hard to come back to. Not just splitgate has this problem with me but I’ve noticed this soo much and it’s really a weird paradox of how as a game gets “better” with a larger player base, it becomes “worse” with no new players joining.

[@ShrimpChimps]

I think skill based match making is the best way, that way even after a tutorial or bot games, you’ll still be playing against people within your skill level. This not only keeps new players from quitting, but it also ensures seasoned players keep coming back by making it difficult enough that it doesn’t become boring.

[@charlieh_h]

Sometimes players in the lower skill groups are still quite good at the game such as in cs and much better than new players

[@castertr0y357]

While that would be the ideal, if there aren't enough players available that are your skill level, then the system automatically matches you with other skill levels to avoid having you wait 30 minutes between each match. This results in getting players way above or below your skill level, which just doesn't do anything if it happens consistently. Had this happen with multiple games, and it's made me completely quit multiple games over the years for this very reason.

[@REDNECKISBOSS]

I completely disagree unless you are playing a "ranked" game mode. i think the bottom 15% of players should be separated and thats it. The reason is you will never ever feel progression. Everyone is too sensitive now days. I remember when i first started playing COD (MW) i would be on the bottom of the leaderboard every game. But as i kept playing and getting better it slowly got to the point of me being at the top of every leaderboard. SBMM removes that and makes it stale. Plus SBMM can easily be abused with smurfing. back when i got good at cod if i wanted more of a challenge i would simply play CDL

[@waynwastaken]

this happened with COD and the good players were complaining they were facing other good players. you literally cant win.

[@jacobgardiner9267]

That could work in some cases but there should also be an option to play in SBMM lobbies and randomly selected lobbies

[@CiDK]

Came up with this possibly stupid idea in the shower a while ago. But what if there's a "coaching" system where old player can sign up to get paired with a new player to teach them the game, and they get ingame rewards or something. Haven't really thought about the details or balancing (maybe enemy opponents also gets a coach?). Just an interesting idea.

[@miweum]

Yeah that's Team Fortress 2

[@CiDK]

@@miweum Oh, of course it already exists lmao. Nothing i think if is original anymore I guess.

[@randomguy4643]

@@CiDK Actually in TF2 nobody really use this and people have forgotten about its existence :D So I think it would be still original to do this and also if the reward system was made it would be the best. In TF2 there is not even a reward system to fucking "competetive match", like cmon Valve.

[@No-jt5nf]

@@CiDK If you thought about it as a functioning system it's not tf2

[@lowcostfish]

tf2 has this but there's no incentive to use it and the tools aren't the best. I can't remember who, but someone made a really good vid about how they could improve the coach mode.

[@VEVOJavier]

This is exactly how I felt when I first tried titanfall 2 multiplayer after the amazing campaign. The only people still playing it are people who play have played it every single day since its launch, and the good weapons and titans are locked away only for the experienced players. Getting constantly stomped by those players whizzing around at Mach 3 gets stale really fast.

[@maxwellsterling]

Some of the best stuff is either already unlocked or unlocked early, but ok.

[@maxwellsterling]

@@colbyboucher6391 Even knowing bunnyhopping exists, it took me people explicitly telling me slidehopping existed for me to start trying it, otherwise I was just doing what the game taught me, which was sprinting, wallrunning and sliding. There's just no reasonable expectations for a player to learn the advanced movement from the campaign.

[@squiggles9612]

You get started with the grapple and the best weapons of each class (car, r201, spitfire, kraber, eva etc.), and there is no bad titan except scorch. The only real issue is what you mentioned, the decaying playerbase

[@IAm-zo1bo]

both tf2's getting mentioned

[@TheMasterT97]

@@maxwellsterling How is he ever supposed to figure out the meta if he's getting stomped by day 1 players?

[@SJrad]

One of the best tutorials is a campaign mode. Yes that involves writing a story and all this other stuff but it gets the players invested in a way that they are also learning.

[@josealcala4756]

That's exactly what I was thinking. I remember playing the Halo 3 campaign nonstop and when I finally got xbox live, I was able to quickly move up of the matchmaking until I was matched with players of similar skill.

[@pravkdey]

Miss when games did this

[@iaiain]

Interesting. Planetside 2 is always having this problem. They've actually tried a couple of those suggestions. Like the Halo one. They had a small continent just for low level characters. But, turns out they stopped it because it was a pretty non functional solution. (Basically, some vets will turn up with new characters and maul everyone to death). And from what I understand it was a pretty hollow experience compared to the full continents, the massive scale is what sells the game, and that really wasn't happening on the beginner continent. Interestingly, they've now gone with a tutorial.

[@E1nsty]

I think that in planetside, the best way for new players to get into it is to forget about kills. As a noob you're not going to get them unless your opponents make a bone headed move. There's a lot you can do to contribute to the battle without having a positive K/D and that is a pretty good way of keeping the new players in.

[@jimnpen8451]

@@E1nsty yeah engineer and medic are best for noob players. We can't all jump in and be Sephuku or Vert or even visgodo.

[@wotwott2319]

The first few hours of Planetside 2 for me had me getting stomped by absolutely everyone. Only after I checked out youtube videos on how the guns work and how you should train yourself to shoot in the game that I learned how to actually start playing for real and I've been having such a blast with it ever since.

[@s3_555]

When i first got in i played Light assault with icarus jets. I think I had it pretty easy because i was always on the roof shooting down below. I stopped playing heavy a long time ago because every 1v1 I got into was always crouch spamming, chugging med kits or just beaming me in the head super fast. I suggest newbs play infiltrator. they can cloak, equip snipers and one shotters. Probably the most new player friendly class.

[@NotAnIlluminatiSpy]

A good tutorial. Not just "stay behind your minions" but explain the core aspects. Don't go too deep, like pockets, tempo, etc etc. But the middle ground between a 16 hour power point presentation and a sign that says "don't lose".

[@vvhoknows6958]

Playing with bots for a new player's first few matches needs to be optional. I have seen people drop a game because it wouldn't queue them with real people.

[@kjr1690]

lol yea that’s what I did with paladins.. 😬

[@siren_atlantica]

That’s not really the games fault though, if a player can’t be bothered to play a few games against bots to learn the basics they probably were never gonna stick around very long.

[@kjr1690]

aiming skill transfers throughout fps games, if you have good aim you’ll be fine until you make it to a point where abilities and game sense actually play a factor

[@fuglaa4766]

if you cant play 3 bot games then you are not gonna play the game lol

[@kjr1690]

true

[@GuagoFruit]

This is how I feel with siege after stopping for about 2 years right before the operators started going wack. Even as a returning player I feel lost. I can't imagine how new players feel.

[@besparks7440]

Its wierd a really new expirience but I played around 172 hours of the game watched A LOT of videos on how to play the game and from what I can see im not really that bad.

[@buntfalke1235]

Ohhh the learning curve in Siege... it almost never stops. I have played like 50 hrs or something and was quite proficient in the "Beginers league" or how it's called but never having played shooters before I was so fucking lost. Its has to do with expectations I think: I played as much as I would play other games at all am level 50 and in other games that's like mid rank or so but in Siege you're an absolute beginner especially because you get to play some maps only after in ranked and that's a level 50. I think Siege is only enjoyable if you have a friend on the same level (which I have) to play with you and have some fun while doing that.

[@peterpeterson4800]

Yeah, I noticed the same in a lot of games. I used to be a lot better in League of Legends and World of Tanks, but I wasn't even trying that hard back then. Not only did these games change a lot, but the average player also got a lot better. There are fewer players that make really dumb mistakes. In World of Tanks, the meta of how the maps are played totally changed, and almost no one goes to certain positions anymore, it's really weird. In League of Legends, the average performance of basic things like buying the right items and getting enough last hits on the minions for gold has really gone up as well. I never played siege much, I only played a bit in the beginning with my friends, because I always felt it had too many gimmicks. I really like CS:GO because it is a really simple game that has no gimmicks, just a few basic grenades and simple maps. Siege is a really complicated game, so people can't only beat you with shooter skills, but by knowing the maps and all the gimmicks. It really sucks when you just spawn in and get killed by a defender from one of the windows. And the gimmicks have only become worse in this game with all the new operators. Don't get me wrong, I like complicated games like League of Legends or Age of Empires 2 or World of Tanks, too, but I don't think it's the right aproach for a first person shooter, at least not for me.

[@deliriousjason8133]

Fresh Siege player here. After playing for a week, I can say that the game is really enjoyable, but really hard. Most of the time I get killed by some guy shooting through a tiny slit behind several doorways and I have no idea how they know which window I will break through so they can camp there, even when there's no camera nearby. And that's just newcomer mode, I don't know what to expect in the other modes. I'm slowly learning the layout of the maps and operator abilities, hopefully I won't give up because the game is fun so far.

[@poggamer69]

@@deliriousjason8133 I played a bit of siege and I can tell that drones are really important (unless they updated the game or something). Hope that helps :)

[@metalspoon69]

Tarkov has this for me. I used to play it a ton back when it was early in development (only paca and fort armor existed!) and had a ton of fun because no one really knew what they were doing. Quit it for a while because IRL stuff and other games and came back to it a few times but almost always quit after a brief honeymoon period. Players had gotten so ridiculously good at it i just could not compete, i could keep economically stable because of scav runs but getting clapped game after game by someone with level 6 armor, a meta gun (val, m4, etc) or a cheater just wasn't really doing it for me. Worst of all, sometimes i'd get the drop but could not kill them because i did not have access to proper AP ammo. Early wipe this is less of a problem because no one has anything, way more fun tbf. Didn't help that i mostly played solo, i'm an anxious wreck and don't have the confidence to use discord servers to find teammates, it just wracks my nerves even more. Thankfully there is a single player tarkov mod in development which looks very promising, the cycle and hunt are also looking promising.

[@aguspuig6615]

Tarkov is even worse, that feeling when you finally manage to outplay someone but you just cant win bevause they are just too well equiped

[@jamesc8968]

Teenagers have flooded the gaming market and spend every waking second playing. Constantly stomped by them in Fortnite and COS.

[@jamesc8968]

COD

[@kakokapolei123]

That's been a huge problem with Tarkov: if you weren't playing every day, you fell behind very quickly and it gets really hard to catch back up. But with the new flea market changes, you can't easily buy high tier armor and ammo right off the bat when you hit level 15, so it extends that early wipe feel. I've been taking breaks every now and then and whenever I hop back on, I never feel like I'm falling behind. I still consistently run into people running low-mid tier gear and gun fights are no longer won by how much money you put into your laser beam, juggernaut kit, but by actual skill and who can get that 1 good face shot.

[@von...]

@@kakokapolei123 adult with a life here, tarkov this wipe has been completely changed for the better. Mainly the economy changes & how it changes what you run into on other players during raids. TBH this wipe is the best wipe for new-comers I have ever seen in the last 5 wipes I have been playing for.

[@ITSJUSTRUNO]

i think that every competitive game should have its own official youtube channel with all the tips and tricks, meta, guides, even some info on pro scene etc

[@borgejoh]

Would‘ve loved to have Escape From Tarkov mentioned as an example of games that make it as hard as possible for new players.

[@von...]

its kinda the vibe of the game & I am so glad I clawed my way though the hell that is learning how to just survive raids & only take the fights you need to. I was a massive rat for quite a long while lmao

[@ribspreader123]

The thing with Tarkov is twofold. One is an open ended gameplay loop, where you can play as you wish within the context of the game mechanics. It's also a looter in a way, which is the primary fuel to keep coming back. There's also the amazing clips of people playing and you feel motivated to reach that. On the other hand the game has no refund policy, so if you don't like it after an hour? Well, gg, cause there's no refunds. This causes pressure to keep playing and try to get some return on your money or quit and take the loss. To the content of the devs.

[@tridra5714]

I saw your bots thing in CS 1.6 I felt like in that game the bots basically taught you the basics (choke points, camping area the most basic strats) and some other things.

[@TheZenytram]

back in the day cs bot was terrifying precise and hard as fuck to play alone against, i remember getting owned by those expert bots.

[@annadess]

One of the most important questions to ask when starting any new competitive multiplayer game is probably something like: will it really be a fun time being really really bad at first? How long will you feel like you're playing below average for? Because I think there's also another component, besides trying to teach players how to play your game well, there's always one important and unavoidable component: Time. If you're like me, you probably just want to have some fun in a skill-based multiplayer game that you play with your friends every few days or so, or maybe on weekends. But for most of these games that means that even 4 weeks in you'll probably still be smashed to pieces all the time, and wondering about all the things you still don't understand. Even then, you'll still often think to yourself "oh right, that's a map I have barely played on", "oh I have no idea what that enemy champion is doing" etc. and it feels like you'll need another few months at a minimum to even begin to amass enough game knowledge to understand what you're doing well and what you're doing wrong. So why spend so much time on one game then, if you could in that timeframe, probably try out the other games people are playing that are hopefully a bit less of a pain in the butt? Sure, casual games can be fun from time to time too, but I honestly feel like there's an untapped niche for either new competitive games or new game modes in existing games that can make you feel like you know most of what you need to know within the first few days or week where you're playing the game, get you feeling like you're on par with the average player sooner, while still leaving a lot of room for improvement and mastery. Something in-between of completely casual, and long-established competitive e-sportsy game. A game that I can feel like I've improved in just a relatively short amount of time, a game where - even if our friend group decides 4 weeks later we have a better game to play - I can still say I will look forward to when we come around to play again together (instead of being happy we can try something different) is something I really look forward to finding. Cheers.

[@EAGLEBLACKInquisido]

I like the new type of "Bots" introduced in Halo Infinite (with their respective difficulty levels), as they not only "move and shoot" but have been trained in player's movement and use the meta of the game somewhat. They are the first bots that rather than feeling "too difficult or too easy" they feel more "organic". They still have room for improvement as they do not know how to handle vehicles in the sandbox, but aside from that, they are a really good tool to help introduce new players into the game.

[@pencrows]

1:26 That bot just went for a nasty clip

[@TheLazyJAK]

I've never thought about the bots being anything more than to fill spaces that they don't have enough players for. Splitgate probably used bots for this reason, to make you feel better than you are

[@poggamer69]

Bots disappear after level 10. Now I get salty when I'm not MVP lol

[@evilduck5691]

@@poggamer69 they still fill lobbies with them. You can tell a bot is a bot because they have a generic face as a pfp which you can see regardless of platform. I'm level 100 and i still see them quite often

[@Spookoffi]

I love how valve avoided the problem by literally being the first popular mp game So you are forced to train yourself

[@pottyputter05]

Hardly the first popular mp game, there were plenty of games that were large enough for the day before 1.3 gained traction and the IP sale.

[@MsDestroyer900]

Its not even close lol. Quake is a good contender for the first widespread mp game. It predates even half life which is where all source titles derive from.

[@mandeadd]

@@MsDestroyer900 if we're talking boomer shooters then shouldn't DOOM precede Quake? Colleges had to ban DOOM from their computers because so many were playing its multiplayer, according to Masters of Doom.

[@MsDestroyer900]

@@mandeadd if we're talking about that might as well include the Paleolithic age. Where cavemen played the most popular shooter at the time, dodge rock. It was so wildly popular in fact it was banned in most tribes for being "too violent".

[@Lol-jp1ju]

The thing he is talking about what I hate the most. I love games that are NOT noob friendly just like CS:GO, VALORANT ETC.

[@thejustanoob4926]

This happened to me. I played Fortnite since season 1, it was a pretty fun game, bought the battlepass 2 times and saved enough for all battlepasses up to season 10/11. Around season 11, I felt everyone was becoming a sweaty god, I raged almost every match, after I noticed I wasn't having much fun, I quit the game. Not even the Save The World mode was enough to keep playing me it,since it was abandoned by Epic Games and thus there were no more meaningful updates to it. the bots don't interest me to come back, a win against bots doesn't feel like a win.

[@boid9761]

Well what are you playing rn?

[@godisforever7263]

@@boid9761 other games with no try hard sweaty gamers.

[@2dimensionalmango855]

fortnite is just so trash in this basis i can write an entire essay on it, i played fortnite in the earlier chapters was kinda good cuz no one was building 10 build a second, now it's hard to get kills on real ppl, as i get matched with ppl who literally have no life and play 10hrs a day... only thing keeping fortnite alive right now is it's competitive situation, but game will die in an year, and nothing can be done about it....

[@that_kaii]

i moved from Fortnite to CSGO like a year ago. Even if the community is more toxic in CS GO, the players still go for fun. Not "I WANT TO WINNNNN". They only want to have fun. I find myself raging wayy less than i did iin fortnite.

[@godisforever7263]

@@that_kaii yeah also CSGO players help the new players with the basic to help them.

[@MinistryOfMagic_DoM]

I like games that do skill based matchmaking to give you players that play at the level you do so you're steamrolling at first but eventually you even out with players at your level and can get better without going up against the crazy hardcore meta players at the end game crushing you in early matches.

[@sethbright7615]

Rainbow six has a newcomers only playlist that new players can use up until a certain level and I wish more games would utilize that idea

[@phillduffy]

You're missing the ability for online games to put similar skilled players into lobbies with other people of the same skill and experience level.

[@JoshLathamTutorials]

SBMM is current widely accepted solution, but can fall short for new players with no SBMM data. To accurately build a skill profile, you'll need quite a few matches. You then have to take matchmaking into consideration. The software has to build matches from people currently searching for a game. The amount of new people diminishes massively for well established games meaning SBMM becomes almost irrelevant. You can only create games from the pools available. You'll either have to increase search times for low skill and high skill players or come up with an algorithm that does it's best to make it as fair as possible, but in the end that'll still sometimes create "unfair" matches. The initial experience for new players is the most critical. You'll need to decide what's more important, fair matches? Quicker queue times? etc. Heck it even raises the question of - should the bias be to try and put you in games against people with slightly higher skill levels to push your skill? Or mix and match? For hardcore and casual gamers there doesn't seem to be a goldilocks system.

[@jonnykb1155]

which is so easily routed by smurfing. SBMM hardly does anything because of this.

[@ZealothPL]

It feels like lots of "skill based" matchmaking is just horribly tuned. It wants you to have roughly 50% win rate, so a lot of the time it feels like you get 45% ez games, 45% impossible ones and 10% of fun ones and its just infuriating, especially in games like dota

[@IAm-zo1bo]

matchmaking is a mistake and people forgot how good server browsers used to be until we lost it.

[@Waxotoo]

there could be a gamemode only accesible to the new player(lvl 10 or under or something like first 50 game) and to stop smurf you would lock them out of the gamemode if they do too well in a game.

[@nightblade178]

No one : TF2: Aye kid, Left click to shoot and wasd to move. Now go get em kiddo. *Literally gets matched up against seasoned veterans*

[@seaque.]

tutorial: W A S D, click online game: Flying Soldiers and Demos

[@crayonchomper1180]

that's why you go to 2 Fort or Hightower, those matches last so long you can play around with every class and learn how to play each

[@spiceforspice3461]

Nah, tf2 players can sink like 5000 hours in the game and still suck ass. I pubstomp regularly with less than 2000 hours. Tf2 is basically the exception to the rule.

[@Mittens...]

Their secret weapon is random crits

[@Mate_Antal_Zoltan]

you're making it sound like TF2's tutorial is laid-back and cool it's the exact opposite

[@VoltFall]

How is this dude much better at explaining video game stuff than actual game dev teachers?? Love your videos btw helps me as a game dev

[@certified9104]

Ikr, something about his videos make it really enjoyable to watch

[@VoltFall]

@@certified9104 he's going to become a successful KZbinr for sure!

[@bickboose9364]

I guess doing something as a hobby means you'd probably be way more passionate about it than doing it as a job.

[@jexuseta7304]

Most players play games more than game devs

[@sdjhgfkshfswdfhskljh3360]

Bots for newbies are good when developers are honest and says about it right away.

[@Tarheb]

there's also the solution of placing players in tiers based on their skills. so at start the only play against other new players and once they reach a certain skill they advance to the next tier

[@Tulemasin]

Best solution for these problems are youtubers who make tips and tricks videos. For example LazyPurple's videos of "how it feels to play..." about TF2 made me return to the game after many years for I finally understood I was playing the game wrong.

[@uryzen3177]

Bots can help a lot . Like you lose 5 matches in row so you may even rage quite or be so sad and delete the game , so the game can put bots against you in 6th match . Or in amature game matches the game should put some bots among humans in your team and enemy team . Game should keep the matches balance to keep its players (sorry for bad english)

[@taktuscat4250]

Also when you didn't log in for a long time. The game would match you to a bot for a couple of time then bam! You're getting wrecked again

[@VovaliumsThings]

Little did you know, games already account for that. Except instead of bots they used worse players. matchmaking often isn't made to be fair, it's instead optimized to keep people from abandoning the game.

[@gabemerritt3139]

@@VovaliumsThings Which recently just makes me want to abandon competitive games. I get a good match and the game decides I must be good. I get put in a lobby of sweats. I lose constantly, and if I ever start to improve I'm more inclined to believe the matchmaking threw me a bone than I actually got better.

[@z4gee12]

5 matches is already enough for me to rage and destroy something.. lessen it to around 3 and maybe it’ll work

[@garbaj]

if only it wasn't so obvious when you get literal bots on your team. Feels bad when the game "decides" you are going to lose

[@MechMK1]

Every game will eventually end up with the average player being so good that the average new player won't enjoy any form of success for a *very* long time, causing most new players to drop out if they don't have a friend who carries them through. And even then, these games expect me to invest more than 100 hours before I can expect to have any joy.

[@luisaazul]

Not If change the meta every so often

[@pandemicaunt6341]

I think that Fortnite is a great exemple. It was SO FUN to play when everyone had the same skill level, but they did the exact opposite of the problem you talked about, fixing ut by adding playground. Now, new players could learn the basics in there. The new problem: people stayed so much in that sterile environment and getting better that over the night, everyone was a god at the game and it was not anymore for people not staying days in playground

[@verrufen2642]

The best training for a multilayer shooter is a singleplayer campaign. For example, after playing through Titanfall 2 i had a good feel for the guns and movement of Apex Legends and actually started having fun in that game, whereas my previous attempts to get into it ended in frustration.

[@deskrabbit2190]

I always liked the bootcamp mode from World at War. It just meant that for your first few matches youd be up against other new players so you wouldn't get absolutely crushed instantly.

[@Bruno-cb5gk]

This is combated somewhat in Due Process, where the map rotation is replaced every week. This removes at least one part of the meta.

[@ultr4nima]

Reminds me of how CS:GO's Danger Zone limits you to one map option which cycles every few minutes, but to be fair there's only like three maps for that gamemode and each round is long so it makes sense to do that. There's also Overwatch which pretty much removes the ability to pick your map but who cares about that

[@Bruno-cb5gk]

@@ultr4nima thats completely different though, since the maps don't change. In Due Process each week you get a completely new set of maps that no one has seen before. This means old players can't use map knowledge to bully new players.

[@ultr4nima]

@@Bruno-cb5gk Wait wait wait, new maps altogether?? Weekly?? They must either have the most efficient level designers or they're somehow generated

[@Romanian901]

i loved Unreal Tournament 99's mutators so how about a main mode that gets randomised frequently. think of a weekly or monthly generated custom ruleset. examples: -halving weapon ranges -recoil increasing exponential the more damage a weapon deals in a single shot/with dps -increased player health so your meta smg won't have enough ammo in a magazine to deal with someone, opting for a different weapon. -sustained firing causes shot accuracy blooming fortnite style while still having a recoil pattern like realistic fps games -projectile speed decreased however they home in on the crosshair

[@sshhiinnoollaa]

Makes the game impossibly difficult so that the ones who get past this continue playing because of how much sheer dedication they have put in the game ie rust, tarkov, or getting over it

[@archangel3237]

I feel this as a 3yr apex veteran. My hands hurt constantly and I'm tired from work pretty much whenever I'm home, and I don't have the energy and time it takes to keep my skill level competitive, and I definitely don't have time to waste in aimlab or other skill trainer sessions. I get one good game and I'm thrown in with high level players and get smacked for 4-5 games and just quit. Some of us are never going to hit a certain skill level but we still want to enjoy these games, and I don't know how thats possible

[@Chris-xl6pd]

Its not.

[@kade6776]

@@Chris-xl6pd so basically give up trying to do something you enjoy because you’ll never be good enough? Well I guess I solved our problem folks. If you’re not good at video games then just fucking quit losers

[@lolman9913]

this is just like whean i playd tf2 for the first time

[@annadess]

I think there's something important - especially in shooters - that can help keep up morale while trying to learn: quick respawns. Sure it will make dying less of a consequence than say in CS:GO or R6, but I think there are definite benefits to it. Got killed in TDM? Next time you respawn you can get your revenge! Died while trying to defend the flag in CTF? Now you can try and take theirs! Lost a point in Domination? Next time you'll be able to try a different approach and capture it back! It keeps things flowing, and it doesn't nullify the effect of death, in all the examples I gave, dying made the enemy team get closer to their objective. But death there also doesn't take away nearly as much time, control, (and honestly) fun as without respawning.

[@NirajArts]

Makes sense! When I started playing PUBG especially mobile, I noticed that if you're a beginner, then most of the time other players (mostly teammates) are near the same level as you. I'm not sure about the enemies, but they didn't seem like bots but the real beginner players.

[@TheZenytram]

bots

[@Gamercrow]

This will sound like an ad, but tbh Planetside 2 actually does these things really well : new tutorial where you fight bots, a dedicated mentor chat where only new and veteran players can talk, frequent updates (the game is almost 10 years old), dynamic tips in-game about the stuff around you... You should give it a try just to see how nice some things may be for new players (even though the game is hard as hell when you don't know it, especially considering there is no ranking or whatever : everybody play together)

[@breezeless_7665]

This is why I recommend valorant more than csgo for a newbie, both games can be hard to learn, but valorant have various things that are simplified making the learning process much easier, want someone to entry frag, pick Jett, want someone to smoke a choke point, pick brim and etc. csgo smokes always needs a line up, some aren’t hard, but press 3 button is still much easier than looking at the sky

[@michagolinski4510]

Maybe some official "noob-friendly" servers that only players with sufficiently low levels/kd ratio can enter should be introduced by developers.

[@jaku1622]

Chivalry got this

[@juanausensi499]

I think that is a good solution. Players can be ranked like in chess or tennis, and can play only on servers of their level.

[@luisaazul]

Smurfs would get in and crush everyone then

[@Lychwee]

some game has it, but i know a bunch of guys like me who has multiple account at that low level server just so that we can crush them for fun occasionally.

[@JoshLathamTutorials]

@@luisaazul Like Siege.

[@garbaj]

For those wondering why SBMM (skill based matchmaking) isn't a solution, it's because the game doesn't have enough data on these new players to accurately rate their skill. If the game matches players together based purely on how new their account is, then it will result in super lopsided matches because some new players will have decent skill coming from other similar games, and others will be true noobs.

[@pxlspace8253]

yeah makes sense

[@pxlspace8253]

btw ur videos are awesome

[@PsychoMachado]

But the problem won't keep up for too long, because the ones that already have skills (like FPS players) will get their SBMMR faster.

[@jacobtwibell]

What if there was some way to combine the “bot mode” and SBMM? The first few matches are against a variety of bots that adapt to you throughout the match to find the right “skill.”

[@garbaj]

@@PsychoMachado this is true, but that takes dozens of games, meanwhile, new players will decide if they want to keep playing or not within the first 2-3 games

[@SomethingForMyComments]

I mean, campaigns are great "tutorials" though... I think that truly when it comes to multiplayer that a good ranking system is required for skill based matchmaking. Making skill a focus without giving it a competitive title. Then having the same system implemented with another name for your more competitive players.

[@mattiaskjelltoft4758]

One of the best ways to solve this problem is skill based matchmaking. Having some version of an Elo rating system to estimate player strength and then matching players of roughly equal strength to set up balanced games is a win-win solution for both skilled and inexperienced players. For such a system to work though the player base must be large enough to guarantee that a match close enough in Elo rating can be found. I recommend to read Richard Garfields treatment of the topic in his book "Characteristics of Games". I guess that one of the common cases where the problem described in the video becomes apparent is when the number of new players is too low to consistently find proper Elo-matchings quickly. In the "big military simulator" genre (Squad, Hell Let Loose, etc.) this is usually semi-solved by having the games so large that individual players doesn't really matter, coupled with a community atmosphere where new players are welcomed into squads and helped to learn.

[@MaoTao]

Funny enough, my sister showed me a game called Super Auto Pets, the matchmaking in there is so bad that I thought it was buggy. Honestly, an elo system would save that game

[@mehemynxm6974]

SBMM makes every match a struggle. You can't casually play because your fighting people at your skill level. And then there are the cases like in apex where it just puts you against top percentile players despite being nowhere near their skill.

[@davidnichol4735]

SBMM prevents learning. When fighting worse opponents, you learn what habits are bad and you get better by becoming more conscientious of your habits. When you fight better opponents, you learn how people better than you play, and you can then adapt that to your game play. Fighting people of the same skill is basically just slamming your head into the wall. You are given nothing to learn, so you just further ingrain your current habits which probably aren't ideal.

[@ProfTuNichts]

What happens when you don't play the game for a long time, but are ranked a lot higher in elo. The moment you come back and try to play it you fight against Player that are ten times as strong as you are --> you loose a lot of games. --> you don't play the game anymore

[@yvrelna]

​@@ProfTuNichts Many ELO-like rating systems like Glicko and Glicko-2 takes into account the recency of other matches into account. If you've not played a rated match recently, you're still going to be matched with players at your last known skill level, but the rating system will take into account the rating's "reliability" and increase its volatility so any wins or loses will move your rating points much greater than when you have lots of recent matches. This means that whether your skill level degrades or improves during a period of inactivity, you'll quickly be placed into the correct skill bracket again just after a few matches. For example, if you win or lose a match when you've been playing for a while you may win or lose 8 rating points; but if you take a break from playing and then you start playing again, a single win or lose might move you 100 points or so.

[@arlox5092]

Best way to fix this is to have friends that play the game to teach you how to play it

[@NielsBlok567]

Bots need a comeback with the help of deep learning / AI tech. Having systems that can generate bot profiles from player data at any skill level could make for a scalable solution.

[@baronzad2056]

This reminded me of my greatest bot idea of all time: train a League of Legends bot to be a peak (and by that I mean completely middle-of-the-road) Iron player. Then see how many iron bots it would take to kill one challenger bot and so on

[@blisterfingers8169]

Bots are too derpy to make me feel confident. I just expect to die a lot when I play a new competitive game and sooner or later you start clawing in the kills.

[@aurin_komak]

Just make the bots OP as fuck Problem solved😎

[@rarbin]

The problem is that most casuals don't have this mindset

[@TheZenytram]

but the sooner or later gets longer and longer, and each second it grows, the more player will stop to never play again.

[@TheZenytram]

@@rarbin ah yes the filth casuals who dont have the WILL POWER of a hardcore gamer to masochistic lose for 7 or more months to have a chance to a fair play. yeah it is the "casual" fault right.

[@rarbin]

@@TheZenytram Hey calm down there, we talk about video games here: nothing personal. I just said that mindset is a important thing while playing shooter. I did not point fingers or anything. And there is a difference if a pro gamer start a gamer vs a normal dude play occasionally. But if that normal dude has a positive mindset and has fun losing.

[@rahbek100]

Also I feel like missions and the grind can be a good way keep players and also attract new players. If you have challenges or missions that feel fun and takes time, a lot of those new players will grind even though the enemies are better than them

[@poggamer69]

It can also make them feel sick of these challenges and give up (I used to grind Fortnite a lot and thankfully stopped at some point)

[@rahbek100]

@@poggamer69 that is also true. But that's the challenging part of grinding and having fun new ways to keep players engaged

[@_Anonymoose_]

The way I would do an academy type system is by allowing players of a certain rank and level to became a “coach" and teach new players how to cope with the meta, the coach would then decide if the player is ready to also become a coach in a star wars master apprentice type deal. Along with what R6 does with every season having a free weekend as well as the game being 70% to attract new players in a never ending loop

[@Hotdog80085]

in 2015 I played the TF2 tutorial, figured it was just another run of the mill shooter... joined an actual game and was so completely lost.

[@peesafpayper9688]

Happened to me for Warzone. A few months ago played the game for the first time. Isn't there any level based grouping for matches? I, level 3ish only played the tutorial match, got in a match with a dozen players above 150 level. So basically, 13 matches over the course of a week, more than 5 hours in, I got just 1 kill that too when the guy was sniping some other guy and I happened to be there... I know that I am a noob but battle royale matches take time and firefights end in less than 10 seconds, I deleted the game I think maybe a few bots wouldve helped a lot. The mobile pubg, codm, freefire, all have matches filled with many bots and few real players at lower levels. They help train for when the real enemies ambush you and also helps keep the morale up.. Call me a noob, but Im gonna play what keeps me happy and hooked

[@besparks7440]

"Im gonna play what keeps me happy and hooked" You should!

[@sambosak]

*Creating a gamemode for new players is one of the most effective ways of allowing new players to learn the game with other new players, until they've leveled up to a point where they can join the "average" skill level group.*

[@succmeister7808]

this creates a smurfing problem like in siege

[@CommanderKrieg]

@@succmeister7808 Exactly. the new player playlist in siege is harder than just jumping into casual, so most new players don't touch it or leave.

[@lowspecghost2403]

So..... Skill based matchmaking

[@KSMinhoka]

It's true because it's written in bold letters

[@robertlinke2666]

exactly, this is the option.

[@WarpSonic]

I think advanced training modes, bots etc. plus establishing the game as being competitive (think what Overwatch, Valorant and League etc are doing) are the best ways to ensure that new players don't feel too overwhelmed by the skill gap.

[@Umdee]

In rainbow 6 siege there are situations which are single player. Each situation uses a different operator so you get used to each one as well as being able to practise on: easy, medium and hard. Then for each objective you complete you get the in game currency which makes people more likely to try out the new/different abilities/actions.

[@Evanz111]

Call of duty used to have rookie lobbies where you had to be a low level to join. Sure there were smurfs, but even they were limited to more basic equipment and loadouts.

[@sety5591]

I like CS:GO method, it is clever, it use the players to create "new" challenge; every new Match you fight against a new set of opponent, which skills curated by an algorithm, (there will be newbie, or "bottom player", skilled player, called "top fragger" or "carry") which you to fight against over and over again (in a loop) for 90-minute.

[@_Rockok]

Bottom fragger doesnt mean bad btw

[@sety5591]

​@@_Rockok yea, top-fragger often blame bottom-fragger for losing but sometimes it is their own score which is worse when compared to enemies' top-fragger. If a bottom-fragger manage a same score as enemies' bottom-fragger then that is a good play.

[@_Rockok]

@@sety5591 if bottom fragger is shit, which is usually the case in low ranks, but most of the time in highers ranks people have the same kills, in pro play you sometimes see high difference in kills but thats because of the roles each individual player plays

[@sety5591]

​@@_Rockok oh, pro-teams. But manually pick teammates in MatchMaking will break the algorithm; if you pick all-Pros mates then you will reach Global Elite in just few days and then nothing else to do.

[@_Rockok]

@@sety5591 ??? I'm not even just talking about global, I'm talking about like above mg2 that you start to see that top and bottom start to get the same amount of kills

[@psych0ticbanana]

Definitely having this problem with Halo recently, a lot of the people who play Halo have been playing for years, some even since CE so getting into multiplayer is quite difficult as someone who isn't new to the series but new to it's multiplayer.

[@tobiramasenju6290]

Just strafe. And have pinpoint accuracy 😁

[@BebxOfficial]

This is why I love competitive games, though. I suck at them, get better at them, and now I don't. They wouldn't be so fun if I didn't get absolutely demolished the first time I played them.

[@evanbradley6169]

I think counter strike does it pretty well. There's no permanent progression so you don't have the problem where new players are just stuck with worse stats. It's the same game design that has worked for thousands of years; you don't have to grind to unlock the queen in chess, or the ace in blackjack, or the left fielder in baseball; all the pieces are on the table, you just have to use them well.

[@RandomFandomOfficial]

Exactly. Everything else is pretty much predatory grinding and pay to progress/win. It’s garbage.

[@rotua98]

true, recently i back to try Valorant with my friend, and often i said "what happen ? explain to me", so many changes in just a few months unlike CSGO, but the problem with CS related to this topic is the smurf, well... like other game smurf playee actually just gonna make the game more confusing and making people doubting their own ability

[@yvrelna]

For most games that have complexity, it's actually not a bad thing to limit the options that new players have just to not overwhelm the player with too much options too soon. By limiting the player to few options, it also teaches the player the main playstyles, before the game opens up to more advanced, situational playstyles. That said, it would be good if the progression mechanic would unlock the whole game after a couple hundred hours of playing. It's not fun to have to grind for tens of thousand of hours just to get a complete tool set that the pro players have.

[@RandomFandomOfficial]

@@yvrelna It’s a terrible thing. Only toxic players like you would say that. People should be able to learn stuff on their own without a ton of hand-holding. This builds reasoning ability, which the majority of people lack. Heck, they are so dumb that they’ll buy lootboxes and other P2W microtransactions… which only encourages game companies to implement more of them. The only thing progression systems do is rig games so that the newer/average players who don’t spend a ton of money or an eternity grinding have a harder time winning and are forced to spend more and play more.

[@yvrelna]

@@RandomFandomOfficial You need to think of it from a game designer's perspective. Would you want a new player to go play the game as it was intended, or would you rather them be in the equipment screen for hours trying to research and compare every possible equipment combinations before they even start their first round of game? That question might seems dumb, but there are many players that, when given too much options, would actually do exactly that. When they are in the equipment screen, mulling over their choices, they are not playing the game and more importantly they are not having fun, which is crucial to get people hooked in that very important first few hours of the game where the game had a chance to make a first impression. Heck in some games, people would spend hours on the character design screen nitpicking over what hairstyles and color, or what race or how large their nose are, when these don't even affect gameplay in any way. Of course a progression system can be build for evil, but when it's done well, it is a tool for game designers to smooth out the new player experience over a complicated game system. It's a way for game designers to not-so-subtly hint to new players, that they shouldn't worry about all the complicated options the game have to offer for now and to just have fun first. For this to work, you do need the stock equipments to be a good and viable all-rounder for the major classes of playstyles, they need to be viable even to the highest level of play, and not just a noob-weapon that you'd discard as soon as you get better ones. And so people don't get frustrated, the drop rate of unlockables need to happen quickly enough as you start getting experiences with a particular playstyle and want to explore more specialized playstyles, but not too quickly that players don't even have enough time to experiment with what they already have. It's a very fine balancing act that game designers have to tackle. Unlockables should generally not be straight upgrades, but rather specialized sidegrades, which rewards certain playstyle at the expense of deviating from that particular playstyle. This means that the stock equipments will remain viable for that playstyle, since even players that do like that playstyle might not want to deal with the negatives of the more specialized equipments. New players are not going to play to the meta anyway; by definition, they are not experienced enough at the game to understand the subtleties of the game to properly play the meta, they have not built the skills to execute the specialized playstyle. At the beginning, there are many things that new players have to learn about how the game works, these are much more important than playing to a particular playstyle, so the game pointing you to the good all-rounders makes it much harder for new players to fall into a pitfall by screwing themselves into a very specialized pick that have serious drawbacks that they might never realize, because they had never experimented with the other options. > People should be able to learn stuff on their own without a ton of hand-holding I don't know why you called me toxic, when you're proposing that games should just be brutal to their players and not help new players learn at all. That's usually the kind of game with the most toxic fanbase. "Noob should just learn it the hard way like all the veterans did", that's textbook definition of toxic attitude.

[@Svulpix]

3:07 it would be funny if the game teaches you what a normal player do,like in halo i imagine the line "u was great defeating that enemy,now spam "c" to teabag"

[@0sac]

Not the most elegant solution but tf2's random crits were designed exactly for this, allowing new players to occasionally get kills throughout the match instead of dying repeatedly.

[@zjanez2868]

except that it benefits the ones stomping(more damage you do=more random crits), not to mention how unfair it feels to randomly get hit for 3x the damage even without benefiting the stompers its a pretty flawed system

[@0sac]

​@@zjanez2868 It allows every player to get kills, even if just through luck. This will be significantly more enjoyable for new players who get no kills, and only really make a minor impact on good players, sisnce they are getting plenty of kills already. Well in concept anyway, in practice I find random crits to be annoying and cheap, but I cant deny that it does somewhat help newbies.

[@zjanez2868]

@@0sac yeh, they may sound good but in practice they dont really achive anything good even without them new palyers could get kills and better learn what works and what doesnt, without the randomness added by them it also probably puts off new players, because a random oneshot feels very cheap und undeserved

[@JoshLathamTutorials]

@@zjanez2868 The initial experience is what's most important. So, getting completely rekt vs getting 1 or 2 lucky kills... I know what I'd rather experience as a new player. Of course you can get better, but those 1 or 2 lucky kills are what trigger that naughty dopamine addiction in the first place.

[@ChaS4m]

This is absolutely true. I remember when I first started playing TF2 I sucked ass but because of random crits I was able to get a few lucky kills and it made me wanna stay on and keep playing and eventually get better

[@THEWILLY417]

Bots can give a false sense of being good at the game then when you match vs real players and you get crushed you get demoralized. I don't think there is any way for dev's to make sure you keep playing a new game you either need friends to get you started or the game has to charm you enough to get through those first painful 100 hours or so. In the first 20 hours of playing Rainbow 6 Siege I probably "quit playing this BS game" every 2 hours or so because I was constantly dying to Fuze and spawn peeks, the only thing that helped me overcome that was spending a day watching gameplay videos and informing myself on every operator and map available at the time, obviously no complete newcomer to FPS games is going to do that.

[@kkammo]

this extends even moreso into fighting games, a couple months after the game releases and trying to get into such a game would mean getting your ass repeatedly stomped. For Honor is one such game that is so famous for this, even though it's not strictly a traditional "fighting" game.

[@twosiest]

i think that to address the tutorial thing without making it seem like handholding, there should be (i can’t remember where i read this but) a “slider” of some sort, basically telling the game your skill level. It could range from “my first game i’ve ever played” to “i’ve played similar games” to “returning veteran” and it could show movement basics to new players, but show more advanced like meta-related things to people that understand the core concepts of the game

[@dianafajardo546]

This problem is especially prominent in Valorant, where you are constantly getting smacked. While your teammates insult you, and you have no idea what you are doing.

[@daveausdauer1310]

I’m an advocate of leveling up newbies in AI environments before meeting experienced players. Of course you could always do the WoW method of game zones for various skills levels so players learn the game around other newbies and level up into more inexperienced zones. The WoW model also gives experinced players to opportunity to help weaker players with leveling.

[@aliel-rukby6140]

Garbaj: "Skill gap between average player and noob is so great" Fortnite in a nutshell

[@juntingiee2602]

lmao you shoot a guy and he builds to the height of burj khalifa and shoots you in the head with a musket

[@aliel-rukby6140]

@@juntingiee2602 So tru

[@WhiteError37]

Rank systems, they incentivise people to “level up” while putting new players against “new players” (Smurfs). Thus, increasing matchmaking times which increases how much time people play the game for. They need to make a payment system where I can pay to be lobbied with whoever and add algebra puzzles to the bomb defuse so I can have more of a challenging game. The more you level up the harder these puzzles get and therefore needs more people to help solve them. This means the party sizes will increase and will mean more player cooperation to defuse the bomb is needed. Sooner or later, you’ll need party sizes of 50 to solve 1 bomb and then 100. You’ll need to cool off that heat that is created so better dump the players in the sea. (Somewhere in here there are some great ideas)

[@napiski2260]

wtf is this?

[@gagekellstrom3978]

Take your meds

[@toninhosoldierhelmet4033]

i hate rank systems, also cooperation in an online multiplayer as an effort decreases in engagement the more people you stuff in the game, MMORPGs have this problem were the player base gets popular but not really, the reason for that is people just don't have the time for it, not only that people play games to have fun, not to get tired, i had to drop tibia because of that, anything that you want to do requires a ton of time and grind, fun for those who have patience and the free time, but most people don't have such luxury.

[@WhiteError37]

@@toninhosoldierhelmet4033 I was hinting at bitcoin mining

[@WhiteError37]

@@gagekellstrom3978 I did Saturday but they have all worn off now

[@hammerth1421]

I see this in Overwatch a lot. The people in the lowest ranks aren't just bad, they often simply lack understanding of fundamental concepts of the game. It doesn't help that the tutorial isn't more than a generic FPS tutorial and that you don't get any explanation of the MOBA aspects that are the core difference between Overwatch and CoD.

[@mtube8564]

My favorite thing that games do when they're famous and have new players always joining in, they match up the new players with other new players, and rank you up with people of similar ranks as you. Everything is fair that way :D

[@SSebson]

I had this exact issue with csgo, but i knew what i was doing, i knew that there are people with years of experience and that i will get destroyed all the time. I knew it and i wanted to be one of them, that motivated me. (I still suck btw, but not as much as in the beginning)

[@AndroidX1X]

I can help you.

[@Skrenja]

My advice? Just give up, you'll never get out of silver. CS:GO is the sweatiest game ever. 🤣

[@godisforever7263]

Its sucks to get owned by everyone around you when your new and theres no one to teach you because you don't have friends. The only reason I play CSGO,CSS and CS 1.6(yes people still play these games) is because players aren't try hard sweaty pants unless its ranked. Even if they are toxic they help new players and motivate them.

[@garbaj]

it's nice when the game allows you to goof around when you feel like it. That's one thing Valorant could learn from CS:GO

[@godisforever7263]

@@garbaj yeah not to mention the freedom to use commands or to use the engine to make maps models.

[@pacifistminigun3987]

i don't see how being toxic would motivaed anyone

[@godisforever7263]

@@pacifistminigun3987 Bro I mean the community is toxic but the players are good they help new players and motivate them not to mention they will always be there for you.

[@pacifistminigun3987]

@@godisforever7263 the players are the community tho, or at least the big part.

[@Drakuba]

imho best way to acomodate new players is for new players to play against new players. I started playing Tarkov few weeks ago and i tell you it is painfull. 70% of my deaths are deaths that i had no idea what i did wrong, only 30% of fights i had in a game felt like i had any fighting chance, and thats when i realize i fought newbie like myself. These encounters are fun, i learn from them...but being killed without being able to doing anything is just frustrating. let newbies duke it out, and after they become invested introduce them to better and better players, this is the best way how to handle the issue imho, even tho probably the most complicated one

[@EliaGram]

Make a system of levels, level 1, level 2 and level 3, Level 1 fights against each other, level two fight against each other and so on, win 10 matches to level up and start meeting people in higher levels just an idea

[@shepardofsheep]

i think a good solution to this is a changing meta, the more experienced players are kept on their toes whereas the newer players still "learn" with the older players. this presents its own problems but things like this I think are a great help.

[@cptclonks7279]

Siege has this but it vetoes aids fir returning players such as myself cause you are so used to the old old old meta you are mindfucked

[@yvrelna]

This might help for a bit, but if you keep changing the meta, over time the meta would become so complicated that new players would just get completely lost in it, making it even harder to maintain. And worst is that tutorials wouldn't help either, because most tutorials would be talking about old meta that no longer works in the current game, so there's still really no way for new players to learn the game, while old players still have a massive advantage since to them there's just a few small changes.

[@gabemerritt3139]

My favorite time to play fps games is during beta's because of this issue. You can actually play against a variety of skill levels instead of the game putting you with nothing but twitch streamers and sweats after one good match.

[@tactu666]

I don't think Counter-Strike is a "hard-to-master" game. All you really need to know is recoil patterns and the spots' name on the map you're good to go. You don't really need hundreds of hours of gameplay just to understand the basics, like with most MOBAs.

[@gagekellstrom3978]

Let’s forget about the fact it’s one of the largest esports, it takes a long time to master. It is basic but it isn’t shallow.

[@cua2279]

I thing i found interesting that fits this topic is: Knowledge of maps, their spots and layouts. Old player memorize maps and crush uninformed (casual) or just new players trough that knowledge. The game Due Process makes an interesting move regarding that "issue". They use procedurally generated maps that are build with different tilesets. Having new and fresh maps in rotation is a great way in my opinion for tactical games (like due process) to take away the part of memorizing maps.

[@TheL0rd0fSpace]

One interesting facet of this is that balance can shift over time for exactly this reason: things which are balanced around assumptions made by the developers may change as the playerbase gets so good, they break those assumptions. (For instance, mechanics which become broken as players break through what the devs thought the skill ceiling was.) TF2 is a great source of examples like these.

[@zailanfoster7014]

Hello there

[@Svoss6]

Hi

[@osiris2472]

General Kenobi

[@nishikiyamareaction]

General Kenobi

[@certified9104]

General Kenobi

[@MS-kc4uz]

General kenobi

[@chrystal3736]

Tf2 be like: Learning curve? You mean a wall?