other players waited, referred to as hot seat play. A solution for the problem of con-
straining two or more players to the same location came with the advent of split-screen
gaming, where each player has a section of the monitor devoted to displaying the por-
tion of the game-world that is relevant to them at any given time. This includes such
classics asMario Kart, and continues today for games such asCentipede 3DorWarofthe
Monsters. This last title is one of the latest in a long line of games to dynamically switch
to non-split-screen when both players happen to be in the same location in the
game-world.
Split-screen is used even more extensively for single-machine adaptations of
games that were originally designed to be played over a network, such as the
death-match modes inHalo,Syphon Filter,orSOCOM. For these games, there is the
distinct disadvantage that all players can see the location and status of the other players
simply by looking at their portion of the screen. This may be unethical, but is hard to
avoid when their view is right next to your own world-view. This is not detrimental to a
game such asMario Kart, but can often weaken the experience in a game likeHalo,
whose death-match gameplay is modeled after online, blind-play competition. How-
ever, split-screen play cannot be considered unfair since all players have access to the
same information about the other players’ status; the fact that it is split-screen simply
makes it a different type of game. Some single-system games have tried to allow some
degree of blind-play through various devious techniques.Robot Rascalsincluded a deck
of special cards that dictated the victory conditions for each player, with the cards kept
secret until the end of the game. The Sega Dreamcast included a display in the control-
ler that allowed players of football games to make their play selections without the
other players seeing their choices. Despite the potential disadvantages in terms of
blind-play, multi-player games that take place around one system have a tremendous
advantage in terms of the social interaction they engender. Whenever you cluster a
bunch of people, presumably already friends, around a single screen, they are guaran-
teed to talk to each other and play differently than if the other players were in another
room or building. Anyone who has watched the verbal and physical interaction between
players around a cart racer or a sports title can testify to this and how much fun players
derive from such interaction. Though networked voice communication and other
advances can help make players who are far away seem closer, nothing can compare to
240 Chapter 13: Multi-Player
Many early multi-player
games, such asSmash
TV, confined two players
to the same portion of
the game-world.