Spectator games: When watching is more fun than playing

7:10 PM on 01.04.2009   |   Jim Sterling

56 comments

As we all know, the one thing that sets videogames apart from other forms of media is interactivity. Being the catalyst for your own adventure is something that makes gaming more interesting to me than any movie or book. With videogames, one can stop being a mere passive observer and actually be a part of the action.

That said, if there's one thing I may have done more than playing videogames, it's watching videogames. Whether patiently waiting for my turn or being astounded by the skills of a superior player, sometimes it's more desirable to be a passive observer. 

Certain videogames, I feel, cater to that perfectly, and as such have become what I call "spectator games." These are titles that I can just as easily watch as well as play, sometimes even preferring to leave the controller in another's hand while I sit in the passenger seat. Read on for what I feel are the best examples of these spectator games.

Metal Gear Solid:

The Metal Gear Solid games are naturally the first choice, if only for the fact that even playing them can feel like observation more than action. The lengthy cutscenes and movie-like quality to the narration makes this game perfect for watching, and I am just as happy enjoying the story and allowing someone else at the controls as I am with my own hands on Solid Snake.

To me, MGS has always been about story first, gameplay second. Some may argue that this is the wrong attitude for a game to have, but it doesn't mean that, regardless of whether you're holding the controller or not, it's one great franchise. Metal Gear Solid represents a game that more than one person can experience at the same time, even though there's only one player.

Some of my best MGS moments have been spent watching instead of playing. The twists and turns of the game's exposition don't require anything but eyes and an easily confused brain to enjoy. 

Resident Evil:

The original game may have been single-player all the way, but you're a fool if you think you can play this game solo. The first Resident Evil is so deliciously stupid that it needs multiple people in the room to truly get the best from it. With awful acting, laughably unscary zombies and some of the most classic dialog ever to grace a game (Jill sandwich, master of unlocking, living things, etc.), you're cheating yourself if you don't have somebody to laugh with. 

It helps that the lift-truck controls and dodgy handling of the characters don't make this the easiest of games to get to grips with. Old school survival horrors aren't the most pleasant of games to play, and while that's the point, it can be preferable for many to just watch events unfold. The cheap scares will still make you jump, and the crazy arm movements in cutscenes (that continue long after a character's stopped talking) will still make you chuckle.

Dance Dance Revolution:

While one can also include games like Guitar Hero and Rock Band, there are few spectator games more about performance than Dance Dance Revolution. Whether you're good or bad at the game, you're going to provide entertainment for an audience. Either your fleet-footed skills will dazzle and amaze, or your flabby flopping and gasps for air will delight and amuse.

Final Fantasy:

This is more personal than my other choices, since I have fond memories of watching my brother play through Final Fantasy VII and IX. Again, this is a franchise where story is incredibly important and as such, I happily watched them before I ever played them, reading the many, many text boxes and simply enjoying the tales unfold. 

Of course, thanks to grinding and endless, repetitive minigames, this game might not be considered a good spectator title -- after all, nobody wants to sit and watch someone leveling up for hours. However, therein lies the beauty of the RPG. With many spectator games, the rule is that one must not play without the other(s) there to watch it. With an RPG, you can still play solo without angering the person watching -- grinding and acquiring items and breeding chocobos while they're at work actually earning money while you waste your life playing games on the couch. 

Final Fantasy, and indeed any good RPG, makes for a win/win spectator game. 

LittleBigPlanet:

Although LBP is a game about creating and having adventures and all that jazz, there are a number of reasons why Media Molecule's big sack-themed game makes for spectator viewing. Chief among them is the fact that, as a platformer, the whole thing is a frustrating mess with physics and switching 2D planes that confuse and infuriate more than anything else. 

LittleBigPlanet looks about ten times better than it plays, and if you're not the poor sod with the controller in your hand, you can have a lot of fun looking at the cute little sackpeople bouncing around and getting squashed, spiked, set on fire and electrocuted -- provided you pay no attention to the guy on the couch chewing his DualShock and cursing the game's very name. 

By all accounts, the game looks breathtaking, and will seriously impress anybody watching. They just won't be tapping their feet anytime soon, waiting to have a turn. 

Street Fighter II: 

This wouldn't be an article about spectator games if it didn't include at least one title with a ridiculously hardcore tournament scene. Street Fighter II is a title played for public consumption, and you only have to scour Youtube to find videos of wild crowds joined together to jeer and scream at the finger athletics of two Metallica shirt-wearing combatants locked in a deadly game of cat and mouse. 

The important caveat here is that this game does not work as a spectator title if two people insist on being Ryu all the time, as would happen with the people I knew. He is a boring character and hadoukens are rubbish. 

Ikaruga:

As with Final Fantasy, Ikaruga is being used more as a blanket example of a genre. I am of course talking about Shmups, but only Shmups done well. Most honest gamers will tell you that they are not really very good at Ikaruga and its hail-of-death ilk, and secretly harbor a burning desire to be the next Topher Cantler, dancing a most beautiful dance with bullets and lazerbeams. A shmupper who knows what he is doing is as enchanting as a ballet dancer, and is probably dressed slightly better.

For chubby-fingered, worthless sacks of feces like me, we can but watch in silent envy at these displays of digital dexterity, watching a small spaceship flutter and fly among endless, impossible screens of death. We watch, but we can never be.

Nearly everything on the Wii:

Ultimately, the best games are the ones that make you look stupid, and nothing is better for that than the Wii and the deluge of humiliating nonsense that the White Box o' Waggle brings. You want to know why Nintendo never focused on HD graphics this generation? It would be a waste of R&D with everyone too busy looking at their grandmother making a complete arsehole of herself.

Whether it's Wii Sports or Raving Rabbids, the point of most Wii games is to make an example of their players. Wii games make great spectator games because, first and foremost, any sensible person would be much happier watching someone act like a tit rather than do the titty acting. 

Of course, these are just my personal examples of games that can be watched just as enthusiastically as played. I'm sure there are many more out there that you can recall, so feel free to share.