No Darksiders 2 multiplayer – PS3, Xbox 360, PC
Fans of the surprise hit, Darksiders, will be disappointed to hear that the follow-up to the original will not have a multiplayer feature, be it local split-screen or online.
The news comes despite earlier reports of the developers apparently looking to implement a multiplayer component in the sequel, Darksiders 2 (it seems the developers like to keep things simple both in terms of gameplay and naming the titles), which they
had plans of doing in the first game but could not.
Marvin Donald, the game director, stated that multiplayer, “has been something we've been wanting to do since DS1 (Darksiders 1).”
According to him, the issue was that the amount of effort it would take to make the multiplayer a possibility would not be feasible in the end. He likened it as the same as making four separate games.
He went on to give details that the decision to axe multiplayer was not done out of laziness or because the developer could get away with an inferior product but rather due to the technical difficulties which would arise and how they would not be able to
do justice to each character.
Donald explained, “You've got completely different animation sets. It's 800 to 1,000 animations for Death alone and they're all unique.” He continued by explaining that each of the characters designed in the game had, “completely different proportions, so
you can't share any of the animations across them.”
The reason may still seem like it was made because the developer was put off by the amount of effort required but he went on to explain that finding a balance in the different characters would have been a challenge on its own.
“Of course there's balancing with the different abilities. We're going to want them to play differently, so we wanted to spend some time developing each of the characters individually,” he added.
At this point it seems that all signs point to laziness but the honesty has to be appreciated. Instead of adding a tacked on, broken multiplayer component for the sake of it, the developers opted to scrap the idea and instead focus on the main strength of
the game; its single player.
The first Darksiders told the story of War, one of the four horsemen of the apocalypse, and how he had been set up. The second installment will follow the story of another horseman, Death.
Donald also reiterated his intention to add multiplayer somewhere along the series, though he could not put on an exact date on when that would be. However, fans should not be disheartened as it just means that the Darksiders 2 single player will be getting
all the developers attention.
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