I miss LAN parties

I was watching Tiktok the other day and came across a very well-produced video. Imagine with me: You see a living room bathed in warm gentle light, feel the gentle heat of a summer afternoon after school. The walls are made of that cheap dark-toned woodgrain paneling and the room is furnished with a sitting chair, a small couch, a low coffee table and a single large CRT TV set.

Three friends are hanging out, one reading in the chair, one grabbing a snack from the kitchen nearby, and one has just popped Halo: Combat Evolved into the Xbox. They all realize what's happening and immediately jump to get a seat on the couch, scooping up controllers to join in. The game goes into split-screen Versus mode and the players lose themselves in the collective fun, cheering and ribbing each other.

Then the video cuts to the same angle, a single player on a couch playing a modern shooter on a much larger screen, headset on, scrolling social media in-between deaths and the next match. The laughter of the friends fades away and the drone of constant attention-grabbing media pervades any sense of community. We are left feeling alone.

The way things were

I have many fond memories of split-screen gaming together with my friends. The complaints and bickering over who got the smallest size of splitscreen, the realtime reactions from misplays, sneak-tactics, and everyone tensed on the edge of their seat as a player walks a tightrope to a high-stakes achievement. These gaming sessions weren't about the "multiplayer" compenent itself I think, but rather the companionship and real-life interaction between players.

My point here is not to yell at clouds and wish for older, much worse technology, but just to acknowledge that times have changed. The tech has gotten so much more capable, the voice and chat apps are a dime a dozen, and we can play with our friends literally everyday online. Gone are the days we gathered 20lbs monitors, heavy desktops, and a bin of networking into the home pentagram to perform rituals of LAN connectivity, hoping we didn't drop a decimal accidentally. Gone are the days of turning the monitor on ahead of time to let it warm up and perform optimally.

So why is gaming so lonely now?

My theory is that the effort of bringing everyone together, and the instant feedback which comes from being together, played a crucial piece to fighting loneliness. Being together was worth it enough to make the effort, and the effort we put in showed up to each other as a statement of how much we valued each other's company. We wanted to share in our favourite things together, talk about life's ups and downs as they came up, and would never miss a chance to dunk on each other in-game or irl. We could yell at the screen together and watch replays to prove that a kill was legit.

Gaming online......well, works. Chat apps have gotten incredibly good, and negotiating multiplayer online is a breeze, but as someone who experienced the above....it feels disjointed. Impersonal. It lacks the energy of in-person gaming. There's no way to see each other, you can't bump your opponent's controller, or nod to your teammate. Speaking takes more of a turn-order, since unlike in person multiple people talking results in no one being heard. One example which springs to mind is when I was playing Elite Dangerous with friends. After over an hour of trying to be heard, I gave up and left voice chat, but continued to play. We played for another 2hrs without them noticing that I had left voice. If this session was in person, there would be other ways to communicate, it would be easier to interrupt, and much easier to notice that your friend hasn't responded in a while.

In this context, I believe that online gaming together has developed into "gaming solo, together". We easily log in and connect to each other, and can take on missions together, share rewards, and even high-five in-game...but only see each others' avatar and often only speak when we're not focused on winning the game. There's nobody to pass the chips, we can't look at each other and grin before doing an incredibly stupid thing in game......we don't get the chance to actually be in each others' presence. At the end of the day, no matter how close we might be online, we're left all by ourselves after the match ends.

I guess I am yelling at clouds.

I know from experience, both personal and vicarious, that online friendships are real friendships. People can still yell at each other, celebrate, share their incredulity, astonishment, and more. With the popularity of chat apps like Discord we're better connected than ever, and can shit-post to our heart's content. Yet I've found time and time again that my irl friends become distant the more I rely on remote multiplayer, which I admit is infinitely better than never visiting in any form, but that's akin to choosing the more flavourful of 2 piles of manure to appreciate, when for the effort of walking home you can enjoy the sweet taste Dad's famous BBQing skills.

So what now?