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Couples who game together, stay together
Mr_Snuffle
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
I know this is a topic that comes up quite often, but I shall ask it again anyway.
I've recently managed to convince my girlfriend to give some co-op gaming a go. She's finds the whole gaming thing intimidating, so I don't want to scare her off for good. The best co-op game I could come up with was Halo 2, but that was a little much for her. She did okay, but I could tell she wasn't having that much fun with it. I need something simpler. Something more accessible to a non-gamer.
She doesn't like excessive violence, anything more than Halo is probably of no interest to her. She likes to avoid twitch based games too. I don't want anything competitive, I want something where we work together.
I had a great time playing with her, and I'd like to make it a regular thing, I just need suggestions on what to play.
I have the following systems
Snes
Genesis
Dreamcast
Wii
360
PS2
I was thinking of giving Zelda Four Swords a go, but please, give me your best couple gaming suggestions.
I've recently managed to convince my girlfriend to give some co-op gaming a go. She's finds the whole gaming thing intimidating, so I don't want to scare her off for good. The best co-op game I could come up with was Halo 2, but that was a little much for her. She did okay, but I could tell she wasn't having that much fun with it. I need something simpler. Something more accessible to a non-gamer.
She doesn't like excessive violence, anything more than Halo is probably of no interest to her. She likes to avoid twitch based games too. I don't want anything competitive, I want something where we work together.
I had a great time playing with her, and I'd like to make it a regular thing, I just need suggestions on what to play.
I have the following systems
Snes
Genesis
Dreamcast
Wii
360
PS2
I was thinking of giving Zelda Four Swords a go, but please, give me your best couple gaming suggestions.
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DO IT!
Also Crystal Chronicles, Secret of Mana etc.
My wife saw me playing Battlefield 2142 about a week ago. She doesn't really pay attention to a lot of games I buy because she's not normally a twitch gamer.
Needless to say, I was shocked when she made me go out and buy her her own copy of BF2142.
We've been playing together in a squad at least one round a night since then.
It's awesome.
My personal favourite though is Bubble Bobble.
Anyway, as far as simplistic co-op games go....you'd be hard pressed to find ones that are easy to just pick up and play if you were a non-gamer. Women usually gravitate more to puzzle games than action shooters, so find one that piques her interest. I would go out to a rental store and allow her to pick out some games she would like to play (with or without you! If she starts to play some games with or without you then she will get better and feel more comfortable playing with you on other games.). I would suggest renting Kameo for the 360 and letting her play it while you watch. If they need help you can, but try and press her to do it herself a few times.
Good luck. It took me a while to get my girlfriend into games, but now she plays most co-op games I can find as well as beating Voodoo Vince and Sphinx and the Cursed Mummy by herself.
-Edit-
Bolded in case you didn't want to read all that.
You must really suck at Mario Kart.
Wii U NNID: MegaSpooky
My Mario Kart is one of the few games my girlfriend can actually win at against me. That and Warioware.
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She likes Excite Truck, but I think she's happier playing that solo than two player. (She's unlocked more tracks and extras than I have so far, and keeps re-doing races just to improve her rank on each track. What kind of monster have I created?!)
Soul Calibur II is her fighting game of choice (and Voldo is her favorite character). I'm tempted to pick up Super Smash Bros. as soon as I get around to getting a GC memory card and some controllers to see how she likes that one.
Oh, we've also been playing the hell out of Lego Star Wars II lately.
It's 2d, so it's very easy to get grips with.
(3d, even if it plays 2d, still feels more complex by a whole magnitude to a lapsed or non-gamer)
It might be an rpg underneath but it's action based interface keeps the numbers well hidden.
(slower paced, yet easy to grasp with depth to be explored rather then taught)
The action interface is very simple and elegant. If you wish, you can play with just the d-pad and one button and let the other handle the complex stuff. But once you're comfortable with that, you can explore a little more in what the character can do.
(she doesn't need to be as good as you from the get go, you can work functionally together from the moment the second character is introduced)
Also, thanks to the rpg base you don't need pure skill to finish the game. If a boss, enemy or sequence is too hard, you don't have to try and try again but you can also grind a little to beat it instead.
(to non-gamers, dying in a game is still a big form of punishment)
Furthermore it's charming, neat, and in a way there'll be three of you playing together, you, her and an npc so you get both the co-op experience with a little singleplayer experience thrown in.
And finally: she can select a female character, which you might find to big deal to. In fact, in this game the female character is the general purpose character rather then the weak magic user (for experts only) you'd usually find in this type of game.
However, she loved WoW when we played it together. We'd get a couple of other friends that we have to play together. She was a healer, which she really liked to manage. All in all a good game that isn't terribly hard for players who don't care for twitch-based gaming.
Constants: Gaming with girlfriend, co-op.
Variable: SNES
Solution: KIRBY SUPERSTAR!
And get some form of a Bust-A-Move game. It may not have co-op, but she'll love it.
I WILL NOT BE DOING 3DS FOR NWC THREAD. SOMEONE ELSE WILL HAVE TO TAKE OVER.
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Mario Kart Wii: 3136-6982-0286 Tetris Party: 2364 1569 4310
Guitar Hero: Metallica: 1032 7229 7191
TATSUNOKO VS CAPCOM: 1935-2070-9123
Nintendo DS:
Worms: Open Warfare 2: 1418-7870-1606 Space Bust-a-Move: 017398 403043
Scribblenauts: 1290-7509-5558
Four Swords and Crystal Chronicles are both great games, if you have the hardware for them. Wii sports is cool, too. My wife has a higher bowling score than me.
You have a Wii, do you have Trauma Center? Give her the nun-chuck and let her be the "nurse" while you play with the Wii-mote. It's really fun and frantic, and once you get used to it can get really fun. Switch it around, you be the nurse, etc. Expect a lot of "HEY! COME ON! KNIFE! GEL! WE TOTALLY DIED BECAUSE YOU PICKED THE WRONG UTENSIL, ETC!" followed by "NO WAY! YOU MADE A BAD CUT AND YOU KILLED HIM!"
But the yelling isn't ANGRY yelling, it's bonding yelling. It's really fun.
Also, my girlfriend saw me posing dead bodies in Oblivion (I was bored, everyone does it) and she accused me of playing with virtual dolls. I offered her the controller, quickly got her acquainted with the controls and took a nap on the couch while she played. I woke up 1 and a half hours later, and she was excited.
She lured people into my house, murdered them, then took their bodies and arranged them at the dining room table. The fact that she figured out how to lure people, let alone murder them without being caught and then pose their bodies into a macabre portrayal of an Orc dinner, it was surprising to say the least.
I find my girlfriend likes games where there aren't any clear objectives or time limits. They're just stressful and make her feel like she isn't very good at playing, so Oblivion fits the bill. She also likes playing the New Super Mario Bros. versus mode, but not any of the minigames. Give it a go.
Lumines
Animal Crossing (GC and DS)
Anything on DS (Rocket Slime, Brain Age, Bust-A-Move, etc.)
Final Fantasy series
Anything on Wii
All of the above have an amazing affect on my wife. It's like she turns into a drooling fangirl in their presence.
Try not to look surprised when you come home and there are a bunch of dead strangers sitting at your dining room table around a nice roast beef dinner.
She's practicing for the real thing...
EDIT: I've got my wife playing Guild Wars, which is quite impressive. She logged more hours this week than I did. Pity we only have one copy of the game...
Along the same lines, the Marvel Comics co-op games are also good. X-Men Legends 1 and 2 as well as Marvel Ultimate Alliance. My wife and I have played through all of them as soon as they come out.
What. The. Fuck.
oh god oh god there is a leg sticking out of the closet
Oh, wait!
It's just the nephew we were taking care of while his parents were out. I guess we forgot to feed him, with all the gaming. Well, at least he won't go to waste. Someone is joining use for dinner!
Gradius V has co-op but that's more of a hardcore player's choice.
my chick doesnt really play games but we have fun with that one.
WoW has never worked for us (it requires too great a time investment from her), but I know couples that play it together religiously. Our great recent success has been with Rayman for the Wii. It is fun, intuitive, and can be played in small bursts so it isn't intimidating. The mixture of co-op and versus play is enough for us to switch back and forth to enjoy it without being adversarial. I can't recommend it highly enough for your situation.
Oddly enough, the other game we enjoyed together recently was Resident Evil 4. We played in chunks at night, with the lights off. I was almost a chauffer, running the controller while she suggested directions, helped with the puzzles, and shared in the suspense. It started out as a "you should watch this for a few minutes" experience, and ended up with her taking the controls for short periods of time before she couldn't keep up with the shooting and handed it back.
Good luck--
Plus, once you start playing Pro-level players, that shit gets hard. Anyone whining about a lack of difficulty in the game never bothered to play it for more than 15 minutes. But she and I are a killer doubles team.
EDIT: Also, too bad you don't have an N64 ... 'cause Pokemon Puzzle League is something me & my girlfriend used to play together a lot. In it's stead, I'd recommend Puyo Pop Fever on the Dreamcast or Gamecube(Wii).
Steam ID : rwb36, Twitter : Werezompire,
After pissing my girlfriend off by not "checking in on her enough" while I was playing Zelda, we played a shitload of Wii Sports last night. She kicks my ass in bowling and seems to love every minute of it. I'm so happy to have her playing ANYTHING with me, that I don't really mind. It's the first time we've really enjoyed playing together at all. I'm just not sure how I'm ever going to get through Zelda now.
I got her a DSlite for christmas and she absolutely loves it. It's so bad, we will be playing NSMB at a restaurant while waiting for our table and one of us will start yelling obscenities. We get a lot of weird looks when that happens. I lent her Phoenix Wright and Ouendan and she loved both (she really likes anime so this really isn't all that surprising).
Being nerds is a big part of our relationship. She is more the anime type and I am more the gamer, but that just means we get to share each others hobbies. We also both really like graphic novels.
Wow, I was re-reading this post and I am a total fucking nerd.
Hi5!
My wife is more of a scrap-booking, knitting, book nerd. I'm the hardcore gamer junky - although admittedly, I have little tolerance for anime (but I cherish many anime-inspired games, go fig). Somewhere, we meet in the middle... then we bust out DDR.
I found Rayman the Raving Rabbids to be a good choice for this on the Wii. the game play is simple yet fun and she will get a big kick out of the Rabbids. At least that worked for my wife who has always not been into gaming at all. she cna't get enough of that game now.
Other good choices are
Mario Kart Double Dash.
Super Smash Bros Melee (go easy on her)
Naruto gekitou Ninja Taisen 4 (go easy on her)
Both Bust a Groove games.
DDR
Quiz games.
I'm going to try Viewtiful Joe and Super Monkey Ball 2 next. Hopefull the 2.5D style of VJ will help ease her into 3D. I know it's probably hard as hell for a non-gamer, but I really don't think that will bother her that much - she EXPECTS to die many, many times anyway. And some of the minigames in SMB might work for her, too. Any other suggestions?
My gf hates games that require more than 2 buttons, but this is the exception.
Also, Top Spin was fun for her.