What we’ve learned with LAN Party Games

Let me share some of the results we got from the LAN Party Games survey I put on.

Here’s a TL;DR version, with the caveat that this is as of today.

Games to buy (as of this article) for upcoming LAN Parties: Mass Effect Andromeda, Blackwake, The Forest, Civ 6, Age of Empires II HD

Games to buy and/or be willing to play a little bit next time: DOOM (2016), Starcraft 2, Dead by Daylight, Civ 6, Monopoly (Tabletop Simulator? -S)

Don’t install or bring up Left 4 Dead 2, the people don’t want it.

Most people like the shooter game type and dislike sports games.

A majority have no preference to game length, but do have a preference that we are looking for games we can all play at the same time.

If you want more details, see below:

First up, favorite games to play at a LAN:

Unsurprisingly, 44% of you guys stated that shooters were your favorite games to play on LAN. Turn based strategy was #2, followed by RTS, Action Games and RPG/MMO games.

I asked you guys are there any games you wish we played more. I didn’t get any consistent responses, but the verbatims I received included:

“Dungeons and Dragons”

“I would have liked to play DOOM multiplayer”

“Starcraft 2”

“Dead by Daylight”

“Civ”

followed by “Monopoly” (not sure if trolling) and,

“More games with Unlimited Amounts of people”

Speaking of the Unlimited Amounts of people, here’s your preferences regarding player count:

A large majority preferred having the entire group in the game. I would challenge you guys to be on the lookout for games that can hold 17+ people. Most server based games can accommodate.

Usually, I’m the person who gets people to buy games. I asked you guys if you could get everyone to buy a game to play at LANs or Quakecon, and here are your responses:

“Mass Effect: Andromeda” — this one had two respondents wish for this

“Civ”

“Age of Empires II”

“Blackwake”

“The Forest”

The rest were nonsense, or “Your Mom.” Thanks, guys. She’s dead.

Lastly, talking about game length:

Most people don’t have a preference one way or another — I think it just comes down to how fun the game is in the long run. Gang Beasts can take hours and still be a blast, while short games can not be fun right off the bat.

Let’s transition to the negative responses. Games that were wished to be played less were:

Left 4 Dead 2 (with two respondents)

and Overwatch (with two respondents), one verbatim was “Overwatch is awesome but gets old after awhile.” I’m not terribly surprised since the game is about to approach it’s one year anniversary, some people are starting to get burnt out while others who may have not had a large opportunity to play it often want more of it.

The other responses were nonsense answers “Tickle me Colby,” “Single player games” and the most profound of them all, “No.”

I would be happy if we never played __________ again:

Left 4 Dead 2 had two responses, while Chivalry had one. Chivalry was also qualified with a ❤, not sure if Olivia just didn’t want to be the King again or not. Those were the only responses I received.

Lesson learned: let’s not play Left 4 Dead 2 again. Got it.

I’m not sure where I would’ve put Rocket League — technically, it is a sports game, but could be rounded up under an action game, but I digress. In the words of Kenny Powers, sports games are “fucking out” for most of us, as well as Simulations as well. Most “Sims” games don’t have multiplayer, so that makes a little bit of sense.

Fighting Games usually has a small group that are passionate about those, so it makes sense that most of the group doesn’t enjoy them.

And lastly, our comments or open responses. Enjoy!