Microsoft appears to be showing interest in bringing back split-screen multiplayer thanks to a patent that reached publication this week. The system described in Microsoft's patent seeks to leverage streaming technology in order to provide split-screen multiplayer capabilities for modern games.
Multiplayer gaming has always been an extremely popular way to enjoy games, and many gamers fondly remember split-screen sessions on the couch with their friends. In modern gaming, the majority of multiplayer is carried out remotely without a split-screen. Gamers playing together generally need to be using two displays and two consoles in order to play their favorite games together. This sort of online multiplayer certainly has its advantages as it doesn't require players to be physically present, but many gamers also miss the connection from being able to see what each other is up to on a shared screen.
The patent from Microsoft, filed last September seems to have found a new solution for split-screen multiplayer. In essence, it's a system where separate streams of a game are merged onto a single display. Rather than burdening the players' computers and consoles with two to four times the rendering load as in classic split-screen implementations, the system will use the internet and the cloud instead to stream each player's audio and video merged into a split-screen frame. This not only makes it possible for multiplayer games without local multiplayer support to now be capable of things like local co-op split-screen but also allows for remote split-screen, an exceedingly rare format at this time.
Split-screen gaming has fallen by the wayside in modern generations of multiplayer games. Over the years, game developers have increasingly pushed the limit of computers and consoles. Where once it had been possible for a console to have the resources to render separate instances of a game, the capability is becoming increasingly rare as most devices struggle to keep up with rendering just one instance of a game. Many modern games already suffer from major performance issues with just one screen. Developers have to put considerable effort into making a game capable of split-screen if they want their games to have the feature, and this is one of the main reasons most multiplayer games are remote-only.
The technology described in the patent may have far-reaching implications for the gaming industry. Imagine a 4v4 match of Halo where each team is coordinated on their own split screens, for example. That's something that has rarely been seen since The Duke Xbox controller was still being passed around at Xbox system link parties. This patent will also go a long way toward improving the visual fidelity of split-screen multiplayer. A common side effect of split-screen is downgraded visuals in order to make performance passable. This wouldn't need to be the case if each screen was being streamed rather than rendered simultaneously on one machine.
Patents get filed all the time by companies like Microsoft since they're always researching and developing new concepts, so time will tell if Microsoft moves forward with the idea. If it becomes a reality, it will be interesting to see how developers, as well as gamers, feel about split-screen making a possible resurgence.