With the disappointing news of For Honor's decision to remove split screen multiplayer from both online and offline play, the only real question on the minds of fans hoping for a great couch co-op experience is "what's left?"
And, to be frank, the answer is bleak. While the heyday of split screen is long behind us, here is a look at split screen multiplayer games that are still worth a poke in 2016.
Best Split Screen Multiplayer Games
-
Borderlands: The Handsome Collection
Available On: PS4, Xbox One
rn
rnWhile I've never been the biggest fan of the series, I recognize that it is best played with a large group of friends - three of them, to be exact. While many people were quick to compare it to other remasters, such as The Last of Us Remastered, Borderlands: The Handsome Collection has one thing (and only one thing) The Last of Us Remamtered doesn't: split screen multi-player. Sure, this wasn't a new feature The Handsome Collection added, but it certainly wasn't "held back" by the "technical limitations" *cough* Halo 5 *cough* For Honor. -
Call of Duty: Black Ops III
Available On: PS4, Xbox One
rn
rnMany people fault the Call of Duty series for keeping the games mostly the same over the years, while their only big changes have been the most disastrous (fuck Exo), but, with respect to split screen multiplayer, I think I speak for everyone when I saw we're happy it stuck around.
rn
rnNot that it will forever, though. Call of Duty Infinite Warfare has already dropped split screen from it's campaign - not that anyone plays Call of Duty campaigns anyway, but hopefully this is a blip rather than a troubling omen of what's to come. -
Rocket League
Available On: PS4, Xbox One, PC rn rnIn terms of split screen, Rocket League is burning out its fuse up there alone. As you can see, it's in pretty exclusive company. Not only is it a strange beast in and of itself (I can only imagine how the pitch went: "it's soccer with cars."), but it allows you to increase the organized chaos with four players at a time. rn rnAnd, while split screen on PC will always be a fleeting dream, there is even a workaround to get that functionality going for all Steam users out there (although it appears to be very dodgy). -
Gears of War 4
Available On: Xbox One
rn
rnYeah, Gears of War 4 isn't out yet. I'll counter that complaint with two arguments. 1) It's almost out. 2) This just goes to show how slim the market is for split screen multiplayer games that you're hard pressed to come up with five of them that are at least half-way decent and not almost a decade old.
rn
rnBut hey, we'll have this one, and that will keep us going for the time being until the next big multiplayer game announces split screen only to remove it a few months before release. -
Minecraft for Xbox One & PS4
Available On: Xbox One and PS4 for local multiplayer
rn
rnAnd here we have yet another remastered version of a game that was able to work past the technical difficulties of implementing split screen to deliver a more consumer friendly experience. Of course that may not be much of an accomplishment, comparably, because this game happens to be Minecraft, which can run on toasters.
rn
rnFour-player split screen for some mindless fun doesn't seem like a bad idea.
