Is SOCOM Obsolete?

Flashback to 2002/2003, on the heels of the releases of SOCOM I and II, Zipper was sitting on top of the world as a revolutionary developer that could do no wrong.

SOCOM, is quite simply, the reason many people play online. Zipper revolutionized online gaming. At one time their PS2 titles had more active accounts than all of Xbox Live. When studies showed that more of the demographic that advertisers love (males ages 18-35) were playing video games online than watching TV during primetime, online gaming was no longer a fad--it was a potential cash cow.

But how times have changed, fast forward to current day and Call Of Duty is now the dominant name in the online, squad-based multiplayer genre and the game that is reportedly in 1 out of every 8 households. The question now begs to be asked, was SOCOM a truly great online game or just the best that early online play had to offer and without a competitor? The raw data now associated with the COD series is the stuff that publishers can only dream of: COD Modern Warfare? 13M copies sold, Modern Warfare 2? 20M copies. Black Ops? 7M copies in the first 24 hours. Those kind of sales prompt copycatting and it seems everyone is trying to make the next COD at this point, and who could blame them? This isn't the music or motion picture industry, brand new PS3/360/Wii games cost 60 bucks, so 1 million copies sold = 60 million dollars gross revenue.

But make no mistake, COD is largely a good-looking, standard deathmatch, glitch-filled game devoid of any semblance of teamwork. While the bulk of brain-dead casual gamers LOVE that kind of work-off-some-steam-and-pwn-some-newbs experience, the mature gamers that flocked to SOCOM could never find any kind of prolonged enjoyment from anything close to that. There is, in fact a demographic that wants to use teamwork, tactics and be forced to OUT-THINK their opponent in a videogame.

"There's always this kind of revisionist history when it comes to SOCOM.  There WAS a TON of camping in previous SOCOMs its so funny how the purists try to make you believe it was this perfect game when it wasn't. Not even close."
--SOCOM Veteran

 And therein lies the problem, while the experiences and communication in SOCOM were great, the gameplay was NOT. The headset often goes overlooked, but included headsets might have been SOCOM's greatest addition. the ability to converse and plan with your teammates, the social aspect of SOCOM, is what truly made the game great.While the game tried it's best to be objective-based, lack of respawn made it largely a deathmatch, and certainly a CAMPFEST from early on, and the third-person view made it WORSE. Corner Camping (hiding behind a wall or structure and abusing the omniscient 3rd person viewpoint) made even classic games like Escort or Demolition turn into games of "camp the bomb" or "go hide with the bomb" and who can ever forget "go take a swim with the bomb"? Camping made gameplay stale and the lack of patience with newcomers (noobs who are learning the game get voted OUT in SOCOM, people) made it a hard game for non-veteran players to pick up and enjoy.

SOCOM Purists were largely unsatisfied with SOCOM's first foray onto the PS3 (Socom Confrontation, which was outsourced and developed by Slant Six, not Zipper) and while the game wasn't horrible, it was hardly what many expected from SOCOM on a new system. Many players felt like it was a PS2 game, and wondered what the legendary developer was doing. It turns out, they were working on revolutionizing squad-based gaming yet again, with their 256-player Opus, MAG. Many fans of Zipper, still convinced of their brilliance, bought MAG on the strength of Zipper's reputation and while many of the game's elements were poorly implemented, and it was plagued with lack of new content and imbalances, their concept of persistent elements, large scale battles and organized teamwork, communication and tactics was revolutionary.

Zipper is  now in a middle-ground where they are no longer the dominant force and their reputation can no longer sustain them. No one will buy a game that is too much like COD (why not just buy COD?) and some SOCOM fans think what they've brought to the table isn't "hardcore" enough. In SOCOM 4, Zipper has tried to address many of the game's long-time issues (like abuse of the third-person view and camping) with elements like e-tags and a zoomed-in viewpoint, but true to form, the small-but-vocal hardcore contingent complains endlessly about anything that changes what they were comfortable with previously. It makes one wonder, are so-called die-hard fans of the series holding it back? (No open mics? isn't it 2011?) It's very possible, frequently fans of a series will resist changes in gameplay--particularly if they are elements that these same players exploit. In my opinion the objectives-based gametypes are what make the game great, but they can be too easily ignored and until gameplay finds a way to make the objectives every players #1 goal, it will continue to be an unimaginative deathmatch-style game.

The almost amusing issue amongst all of this, is that MAG came like a thief in the night and addressed many of the gameplay issues (its amazing how ineffective camping is in an FPS) that SOCOM players complained about and gave them many of the extras they had always asked for. The game was more MMO-styled FPS than anything else, but blinded by anything that didn't say "SOCOM 2 in HD" on the packaging, purists insisted on waiting instead, for a SOCOM that was done by Zipper. Unaware that SOCOM had actually evolved and had been transplanted onto larger scale battlefields--and waiting for what they were used to--they MISSED it.

I for one, like the road that SOCOM is taking by changing many of its worn-out and weak elements, and hope it does well sales-wise, I hope the developers can ignore the small-but-vocal minority who just don't want anything to disrupt the way "they like to play" I want Zipper to make a game worthy of playing, but I can't help but worry that the game hasn't dealt with longtime issues (the cover system actually makes camping easier) or really found its "lane", so to speak. It seems Zipper has tried too hard to please everyone rather than focusing on a casual or hardcore demographic.