Of course Frank Gibeau likes single player games

So Frank Gibeau does like single-player games after all.

Yesterday the publisher exec seemed to dismiss non-multiplayer games by saying that he had not not green lit one game to be developed as a single player experience”.

Of course, as is often the way with high-profile executives, that’s not what he meant at all.

In fact, far from criticising single-player games Gibeau now claims to passionately believe in them”. And to think – companies wonder why we in the press don’t always take them at face value.

"What I said was [about not greenlighting] anything that [doesn’t have] an online service," Gibeau told Kotaku. You can have a very deep single-player game but it has to have an ongoing content plan for keeping customers engaged beyond what’s on the initial disc.

What I’m saying is if you’re going do it, do it with an open-world game that’s a connected experience where you can actually see other players, you can co-operate, you can compete and it can be social. Everything that we do, we see the telemetry coming in telling us that’s the best way to build our business and that’s the best way to build these experiences and be differentiated from others.

I’m not suggesting deathmatch must be in Bejeweled. It’s just you need to have a connected social experience where you’re part of a large community.

"I still passionately believe in single-player games and think we should build them. What I was trying to suggest with my comments was that as we move our company from being a packaged goods, fire-and-forget business to a digital business that has a service component to it. That’s business-speak for ‘I want to have a business that’s alive and evolves and changes over time’.

"That should not be misunderstood as the death of single-player games, or single-player experiences or telling stories. Narrative is what separates good games from bad games. Or great from good, even.

"So, don’t worry about not getting a Campaign/Story Mode in thenext Battlefield.It’ll still be there, along with all the online elements that point at a more social, connected future.”