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Widespread introduction of lightning-fast Internet connections has revolutionised the world in more ways than one, and a particular aspect of gaming alongside it. Namely, we’re talking about multiplayer here. When it became clear that players could finally begin to rely on quick and stable Internet, games began to make good use of this new boon. Thing is, when we made the move to online-oriented video games, hotseat gaming mostly fell by the wayside. Thankfully, this sort of multiplayer experience has been making a comeback over the past few years, and here we’ll take a look at how two games in particular fit into the story.
Overcooked 2 and Headsnatchers are the dedicated multiplayer games which we’ll be concerning ourselves with, and each of them manages to embody one facet of multiplayer gaming rather well. Overcooked 2, for example, is focused primarily on establishing itself as a cooperative experience, while Headsnatchers is anything but.
It goes without saying that stable Internet connection has mostly been the best thing since sliced bread, but what online multiplayer lacks compared to playing locally, in hotseat mode, is the direct social interaction that is not entirely dissimilar to that which is found in, say, board gaming, or the likes of DnD. While Overcooked 2 does introduce online multiplayer functionality (whereas its predecessor had none), playing online lacks a certain oomph that is always present during local play.
Due to the game’s frenetic nature, where food preparation tasks gradually increase in complexity, and levels become increasingly - and ridiculously - intricate in design, not being able to coordinate and communicate directly and at a moment’s notice takes away a core component of what makes the game fun. In a pinch, playing Overcooked 2 online is fine, but being able to see how your compatriots react to what’s going on gives a heightened sense of urgency and makes for a wholly different experience.
While voice comms have gotten incredibly reliable as of late, especially when using third-party services such as that of Discord, they still cannot properly relay the reactions and behaviour of the other player when you’re not there to see them. Online multiplayer disallows for any sort of physical interaction, too. Dropping a fresh patty into the pool calls for some show of force, at least! Playing multiplayer games online implies a certain amount of social interaction by default, yes, but engaging in local hotseat play makes things that much more interesting, simply by virtue of everyone included actually being present.
This counts doubly so for PvP-oriented hotseat titles such as Headsnatchers, which tasks players with taking down the rest of their troupe, stealing their heads, and then tossing them away. Whereas for Overcooked 2 you want an immediate opportunity to convey information from your perspective (and this is way easier when you’re there, in person), for Headsnatchers you want to see the reactions of other players when you finally manage to take their heads off and feed them to the sharks.
Much could also be written about our tendency to entirely dehumanise other players online. After all, in practice, others are little more than highly-contextualised bots running into our sights for easy takedowns. Some play better than we do, while others do not, but sometimes it’s hard to keep in mind that these, too, are in fact people whose avatars we are gunning down. This cannot happen when you’re playing hotseat multiplayer. Simply enough, you are continuously reminded of the fact that it’s not AI that’s trying to punch you into submission. This keeps things fresh for a surprising stretch of time.
Of course, none of this is neither necessarily good nor bad, depending on where you stand on the matter. The point is that hotseat gaming is a wholly different beast from regular multiplayer, and now that there’s plenty of phenomenal games on offer for us to enjoy, why not invite a few friends over for a match every now and then?
It is a given that there will always be a market for local multiplayer titles: Duck Game and Gang Beasts immediately spring to mind as two long-lasting examples of this being the case. However, it also happens to be the case that the vast majority of AAA releases that feature split-screen functionality on consoles ship on PC without it. This is interesting, but not entirely unexpected, given the notion that console gaming is more of a social activity than PC gaming is. More elitist attitudes might scoff at the idea of playing hotseat, even, which is rather silly.
Regardless, if you’ve not yet had the chance to set up a lively game of Overcooked 2, we must recommend you give it a shot. Even though its focus remains on providing a solid cooperative experience, there is a versus mode to compete in. Headsnatchers, on the other hand, will offer you the chance to resolve old reservations while giving way to new ones. All in good fun, of course. All in good fun.
Get in the Game ! 
