4 ms·

The mode that games don't make anymore because they want you to pay double, the split screen.

o11c 3y ago
There's also the fact that keyboard input sucks: * if you have multiple users on the same physical keyboard, you're very likely to run into the problem where the hardware won't actually register the keypresses simultaneously (some hardware even generates keypress events for keys you didn't actually press!). * if you plug in multiple keyboards, most input event APIs drop the source index, and hotplug is even less supported. Also this is likely to break single-user-like use cases and sometimes hardware macros.
- Atotalnoob 3y ago
  There is Nkey rollover in a lot of keyboards
  - crote 3y ago
    N-key rollover is pretty standard for higher-priced gaming keyboards, but it's still far from universal. For example, the average laptop keyboard or membrane keyboard is unlikely to have it - and that's exactly what people will be playing casual splitscreen games on.
    - lifthrasiir 3y ago
      Clarification: it's standard for gaming keyboards, which tend to be more expensive. It's not like that cheaper gaming keyboards don't have it (even ~30 USD keyboard has one, if it's advertised as a gaming keyboard).
    - Hikikomori 3y ago
      They're pretty cheap these days.
- andrewmcwatters 3y ago
  Just use controllers.
- Fire-Dragon-DoL 3y ago
  If I remember correctly, the majority of pc gamers use controllers, based on Steam stats. That being said, we can assume that people looking for split screen have the equipment to play such games (which I assume it's multiple controllers)
  - Karliss 3y ago
    According to this (2022) https://steamcommunity.com/groups/steamworks/announcements/detail/3133946090937137591 https://steamcommunity.com/groups/steamworks/announcements/d... it's only 10% of daily gaming sessions. Slightly older (2021) steam post https://store.steampowered.com/news/group/4145017/view/3061855517864424914 https://store.steampowered.com/news/group/4145017/view/30618... suggests better number depending on game genre. Although considering that whole point of that post is to encourage developers having better controller support, and suspicious category grouping and and qualifiers like "racing and skating games", "many sports and fighting games" and fact that some of those genres are often played with genre specific controllers I would take those number with grain of salt. From the other number of 48m players who have used a controller at least once with ~130m overall active monthly users less than 35% of players with a controller seems likely, considering that not every player from first category is regular active user. And from the same link only 10-15% controller sessions with multiple controllers. So maybe 3-4% with multiple controllers. Although actual number with multiple controllers might be slightly higher compared to session percentage, since many games act buggy with multiple controllers, so it's not uncommon to disconnect all the extra controllers while playing single player games. From the controller friendly (but also keyboard friendly) PC games I have worked on, 10-30% of players using controller seems reasonable number. It very much depends on how you define majority. Considering that 4/5 most played games on steam based on current player count are FPS (which on PC are almost exclusively played with mouse and keyboard), not surprising that the "daily gaming session" 10% number is skewed more towards the lower range of estimate. If you exclude FPS numbers are better but even then it's far from majority of PC gamers.
    - Fire-Dragon-DoL 3y ago
      Interesting, thank you for finding that looks like I misremembered. I would exclude rts and fps for the simple fact that those are made with mouse in mind on pc, but fps is challenging because they do work well with controllers on split screen (and you can't play an fps with just keyboard). I think the good answer is in the stats, 35% of players connected a controller, that's a lot of controllers. There might be more, there might be some with multiple. But it's a chicken-egg problem. People don't have multiple controllers because they don't make split screen games anymore, most of them require multiple consoles/pcs. I follow the genre a lot since I want to play with my wife and my friends. It's mostly indie games with the exception of bg3/divinity original sin.
kevingadd 3y ago
It's genuinely hard to do split screen on lower spec hardware and still hit your target framerate / avoid running out of memory for many games. The article mentions this briefly, but it's been a problem for high profile titles very recently (Baldur's Gate 3 for one)
- eru 3y ago
  It's mostly a matter of priorities and trade-offs. Super Nintendo and Nintendo 64 could handle split screen on hardware that was much crappier than anything you would be able to buy today. Of course, they did that by dialing down the graphics. If split screen is not the main focus of the game, the engineering effort to even make these trade-offs would be mostly wasted.
  - Cthulhu_ 3y ago
    That's the real answer, it's compromise and priorities. Modern hardware could do 16, 32 player Mario Kart 64 on a single machine easily, but the manufacturers set a minimum for visual fidelity that the hardware cannot handle. Recent examples are some of the Switch console sellers (Zelda and Pokemon), both of which have framerate issues. Not because the games are that pretty (personal opinion), but because their developers did not prioritize performance.
    - eru 3y ago
      Yes. Though keep in mind that developers only have finite resources (and that includes latency, ie calendar time until they need to ship). So if you prioritize performance, something else gets less attention. It's up to you as a player / customer to decide whether you like the trade-off offered.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]

o11c 3y ago

There's also the fact that keyboard input sucks: * if you have multiple users on the same physical keyboard, you're very likely to run into the problem where the hardware won't actually register the keypresses simultaneously (some hardware even generates keypress events for keys you didn't actually press!). * if you plug in multiple keyboards, most input event APIs drop the source index, and hotplug is even less supported. Also this is likely to break single-user-like use cases and sometimes hardware macros.

Atotalnoob 3y ago
There is Nkey rollover in a lot of keyboards
- crote 3y ago
  N-key rollover is pretty standard for higher-priced gaming keyboards, but it's still far from universal. For example, the average laptop keyboard or membrane keyboard is unlikely to have it - and that's exactly what people will be playing casual splitscreen games on.
  - lifthrasiir 3y ago
    Clarification: it's standard for gaming keyboards, which tend to be more expensive. It's not like that cheaper gaming keyboards don't have it (even ~30 USD keyboard has one, if it's advertised as a gaming keyboard).
  - Hikikomori 3y ago
    They're pretty cheap these days.
andrewmcwatters 3y ago
Just use controllers.
Fire-Dragon-DoL 3y ago
If I remember correctly, the majority of pc gamers use controllers, based on Steam stats. That being said, we can assume that people looking for split screen have the equipment to play such games (which I assume it's multiple controllers)
- Karliss 3y ago
  According to this (2022) https://steamcommunity.com/groups/steamworks/announcements/detail/3133946090937137591 https://steamcommunity.com/groups/steamworks/announcements/d... it's only 10% of daily gaming sessions. Slightly older (2021) steam post https://store.steampowered.com/news/group/4145017/view/3061855517864424914 https://store.steampowered.com/news/group/4145017/view/30618... suggests better number depending on game genre. Although considering that whole point of that post is to encourage developers having better controller support, and suspicious category grouping and and qualifiers like "racing and skating games", "many sports and fighting games" and fact that some of those genres are often played with genre specific controllers I would take those number with grain of salt. From the other number of 48m players who have used a controller at least once with ~130m overall active monthly users less than 35% of players with a controller seems likely, considering that not every player from first category is regular active user. And from the same link only 10-15% controller sessions with multiple controllers. So maybe 3-4% with multiple controllers. Although actual number with multiple controllers might be slightly higher compared to session percentage, since many games act buggy with multiple controllers, so it's not uncommon to disconnect all the extra controllers while playing single player games. From the controller friendly (but also keyboard friendly) PC games I have worked on, 10-30% of players using controller seems reasonable number. It very much depends on how you define majority. Considering that 4/5 most played games on steam based on current player count are FPS (which on PC are almost exclusively played with mouse and keyboard), not surprising that the "daily gaming session" 10% number is skewed more towards the lower range of estimate. If you exclude FPS numbers are better but even then it's far from majority of PC gamers.
  - Fire-Dragon-DoL 3y ago
    Interesting, thank you for finding that looks like I misremembered. I would exclude rts and fps for the simple fact that those are made with mouse in mind on pc, but fps is challenging because they do work well with controllers on split screen (and you can't play an fps with just keyboard). I think the good answer is in the stats, 35% of players connected a controller, that's a lot of controllers. There might be more, there might be some with multiple. But it's a chicken-egg problem. People don't have multiple controllers because they don't make split screen games anymore, most of them require multiple consoles/pcs. I follow the genre a lot since I want to play with my wife and my friends. It's mostly indie games with the exception of bg3/divinity original sin.

kevingadd 3y ago

It's genuinely hard to do split screen on lower spec hardware and still hit your target framerate / avoid running out of memory for many games. The article mentions this briefly, but it's been a problem for high profile titles very recently (Baldur's Gate 3 for one)

eru 3y ago
It's mostly a matter of priorities and trade-offs. Super Nintendo and Nintendo 64 could handle split screen on hardware that was much crappier than anything you would be able to buy today. Of course, they did that by dialing down the graphics. If split screen is not the main focus of the game, the engineering effort to even make these trade-offs would be mostly wasted.
- Cthulhu_ 3y ago
  That's the real answer, it's compromise and priorities. Modern hardware could do 16, 32 player Mario Kart 64 on a single machine easily, but the manufacturers set a minimum for visual fidelity that the hardware cannot handle. Recent examples are some of the Switch console sellers (Zelda and Pokemon), both of which have framerate issues. Not because the games are that pretty (personal opinion), but because their developers did not prioritize performance.
  - eru 3y ago
    Yes. Though keep in mind that developers only have finite resources (and that includes latency, ie calendar time until they need to ship). So if you prioritize performance, something else gets less attention. It's up to you as a player / customer to decide whether you like the trade-off offered.

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]