We live in a fantastic age for online gaming, with nearly any game with a multiplayer mode being playable across the world through the ether of the Internet (on Xbox 360 and PS3, at least). That’s why the lack of online co-op in buddy-buddy game Kane and Lynch such surprising news. Sure, the new Fragile Alliance mode — both competitive and cooperative at the same time — sounds interesting enough (read all about it in our new preview), but the lack of a traditional co-op mode seems like an obvious omission.
In an interview with Eurogamer, Kane and Lynch director Jens Peter Kurup explains the decision. “It’s a matter of focus, choosing what you want to deliver at what time,” Kurup said. “We looked at it and decided it was too much of a risk to change our code to be very, very good at that, and we’re not going to be very, very good at other elements. I’ll miss the online co-op, but not terribly.”
Unsurprisingly, they’ve caught some heat from people who will miss it terribly. “Everybody always wants more,” Kurup said. “People are going to say it would have been nice to have online, but they also want the game at some point.”
Kurup says online co-op is something they’d like to do in a sequel, which may not be much solace to those looking to play with their-long distance friends now. But hey, we could all use a little more face-to-face human interaction in this crazy day and age of emails, IMs and teleconferencing… right?
