Hey Oluseyi,
Well argued and, yes, google is a poor substitute, but not distressingly so when you're rushing out of the office to watch the Lakers get their game on (hopefully).
But here is my original statement, let me know if you can spot the tautology:
"I'm a big believer that great story is the future of linear, single-player games."
Making the "linear" distinction is important, is it not?
Greatest Game Story Ever
Quote:Original post by Xyphyx
But then, I suppose that a 'Great' story can only be classified as great by those who are enjoying it. It'd be a fallacy to say that my story is the greatest ever. Of course I think so - It has, or at least should have, all of the elements that I believe make a great story. But the true judge of my story is you - the reader, watcher or player.
Agreed. When I think back at great paper'n'pencil RPG sessions, I can objectvely see that some of them were horrible clichés barely strung together and covered in corn and cheese. But we were having the time of our lives!
Story should never trump fun. I know some people can't enjoy a game if they don't see a good story, just like some people don't enjoy violent, or unrealistic, or less-than-gorgeous games. But the word for when game masters think that their story is more important than the players' desire to express themselves through their characters is railroading, and it doesn't have any positive connotation.
Author
Quote:Original post by Trapper Zoid
I've read through your articles. First off, your articles seemed well written with good presentation from my quick read through, and you express your opinion well. Despite that I disagree with your storytelling philosophy, I have to give you kudos for that!
Hey Zoid,
Great post -- you really presented your ideas well and, you may be shocked, but I agree with many of your points (games aren't films, use the game's strengths, etc).
The only distinction I'd make (for you and others) is that my flavor of story-driven games isn't hypothetical, but tried, true and exceedingly popular.
Witness Halo, HL2, God of War, Gears, etc. These are all story-driven, linear, single-player, non-customizable games.
Arguing that gamers won't accept single endings, non-customizable characters, cut scenes, linear plotting, non-interactive environments, etc. just denies many of the biggest titles ever.
My goal is simply to take this genre to the next level :)
Quote:Original post by J-Ray
The only distinction I'd make (for you and others) is that my flavor of story-driven games isn't hypothetical, but tried, true and exceedingly popular.
I agree; it's the biggest point in linear storytelling's favour. It's a very safe technique for telling a specific story precisely because the writer maintains control.
Quote:Arguing that gamers won't accept single endings, non-customizable characters, cut scenes, linear plotting, non-interactive environments, etc. just denies many of the biggest titles ever.
I'm not arguing that there isn't an audience for this kind of game storytelling, because clearly there is. I am arguing however that this approach cannot lead to the greatest game story ever, as you are ignoring the primary strength that games offer over films, that of player interactivity.
Quote:
My goal is simply to take this genre to the next level :)
That's one of my long-term goals too, but I think it cannot be achieved until the industry moved away from holding onto the apron strings of the film industry. We have decades of games that follow down the linear film story style, and only a handful have been moving away from that. (And somewhat paradoxically to me, I regard using the environment to tell the story as a big step in the right direction, which you've flagged as a bad thing).
Quote:Original post by J-Ray
I think it is worth mentioning that games don't, I believe, function differently on a dramatic level than film, TV and literature.
That statement, to me at least, flies in the face of everything that defines games as a medium set apart from film, TV and literature. These traditional media are non-interactive vehicles of narrative, whereas games are, by design and definition, an interactive vehicle. They hence produce interactive narrative. The game player is now a reader-writer of the narrative, rather than a spectator.
Great games are those that draw the player in and provide the means by which they can produce great narrative. The designers role is to constrain the narrative to implementation-feasible limits (and to direct the players creation of narrative via choice of theme and setting, along with the nouns (characters) and verbs (gameplay)) and to provide the underlying motivation to generate this narrative (goals and rewards). It is not the designers role to write the story for the player, at least in my opinion (and this is what I teach to my students).
Thus, from the dramatic perspective, it is the player that determines the final dramatisation within the narrative framework and not the designer. Certainly, the designer has something to say about the limits within which the player can operate, but to step beyond this and to enforce the designers perspective of story is to remove from the player the motivation to play (as opposed to simply spectating).
J-Ray, if you have a reasoned argument for why the above is not the case, I would be interested to hear it.
Regards,
Timkin
Author
Quote:Original post by Timkin
...from the dramatic perspective, it is the player that determines the final dramatisation within the narrative framework and not the designer. Certainly, the designer has something to say about the limits within which the player can operate, but to step beyond this and to enforce the designers perspective of story is to remove from the player the motivation to play (as opposed to simply spectating).
Hi Timkin,
Great points and I think you're absolutely right, but only for certain kinds of games. You, and most people who have a problem with my ideas, seem to make the foregone conclusion that games can't be as linear as I describe. To reference myself:
My flavor of story-driven games isn't hypothetical, but tried, true and exceedingly popular.
Witness Halo, HL2, God of War, Gears, etc. These are all story-driven, linear, single-player, non-customizable games.
Arguing that gamers won't accept single endings, non-customizable characters, cut scenes, linear plotting, non-interactive environments, etc. just denies many of the biggest titles ever.
That said, games can be plenty of fun without good story (or any story for that matter). But when striving for games that can legitimately be called "great stories," only linear, single-player genres offer us the dramatic canvas needed.
Quote:Original post by J-Ray
Great points and I think you're absolutely right, but only for certain kinds of games. You, and most people who have a problem with my ideas, seem to make the foregone conclusion that games can't be as linear as I describe.
I can't speak for Timkin, but I don't think anyone here is arguing that you can't make an extremely linear game. I've played dozens of them, analysed them, debated their strengths and flaws on this very forum, still got the mental scarring from the game industry's early experiments in using video in early CD-ROM games *shudder*.
I think the main bone of contention is that you're arguing that having less interactivity is the future of games, which I think is the completely wrong direction.
Quote:My flavor of story-driven games isn't hypothetical, but tried, true and exceedingly popular.
Witness Halo, HL2, God of War, Gears, etc. These are all story-driven, linear, single-player, non-customizable games.
If you want to argue from popularity, I would argue that The Sims is closer to the alternative model where the player has more control over the path of the story than the designers. Admittedly the story is a simple one of the protagonist versus society, but if you're arguing based on popularity, i.e. titles sold, the stories that can be told in The Sims trumps the games you've listed. In fact, from my back of the envelope calculations it seems that just the original Sims, no expansion packs (50 million) has out sold all three Halos, both Half-Lifes, both God of Wars and Gears of War combined.
Quote:But when striving for games that can legitimately be called "great stories," only linear, single-player genres offer us the dramatic canvas needed.
Honestly I think that's just your opinion. You really need to back that up for me to believe it.
Author
Hey Zoid,
My original statement:
"I'm a big believer that great story is the future of linear, single-player games."
Linear, single-player games = Halo, HL2, Gears, etc.
I'm NOT arguing that great non-linear, multi-player games like Sims, WoW and others should adhere to my rules. I never implied such. They can't and shouldn't.
As for popularity, my point was that a few people on this form argue that linear, single-player, cut-scene, story-driven games can't exist. Obviously they can and already do.
Now, whether or not a non-linear, multi-player game can have story that rivals film, tv or lit is another question entirely :)
My original statement:
"I'm a big believer that great story is the future of linear, single-player games."
Linear, single-player games = Halo, HL2, Gears, etc.
I'm NOT arguing that great non-linear, multi-player games like Sims, WoW and others should adhere to my rules. I never implied such. They can't and shouldn't.
As for popularity, my point was that a few people on this form argue that linear, single-player, cut-scene, story-driven games can't exist. Obviously they can and already do.
Now, whether or not a non-linear, multi-player game can have story that rivals film, tv or lit is another question entirely :)
Quote:Original post by J-Ray
"I'm a big believer that great story is the future of linear, single-player games."
Games are, BY DEFINITION, non-linear. Ergo, your statement makes no sense. A linear, single-player game is an oxymoron. Your inability to grasp why suggests that I've not been clear enough in my original rebuttal, so I'll try again:
It's late evening and little Johnny asks his mother to read him a bedtime story before he goes to sleep. The first night, the get as far as Chapter 4. Johnny's bedroom is a mess: he hasn't put away any of his toys! So Johnny's mother decides to make her son take care of this chore...
"You'll hear the rest only after you tidy your room! And not before!"
"Awww! Mum!"
"No, Johnny! Look at this mess! Clean it up, and we'll finish the story tomorrow!"
"And if I don't?" Johnny's at that difficult age.
"Then the Nasty Banmonster, who loves messy rooms, will come and ban you from Phorumville!"
Johnny gasps! He'd better do it. He really wants to find out what happens next. His friend Keff told him that Chapter 4 is the bit where Larry Trotter accidentally wipes out half the country by triggering a thermonuclear flamewar!
Now... how is this any different to showing me a movie that requires me to perform an irrelevant chore before I can see the next scene? Sure, I get to shoot some aliens, find a key, turn a page or insert Disk #3, yet no matter what I do, the story itself is barely affected by my actions: I'm merely reacting to external events, rather than influencing them proactively.
I might as well be voting in an election for all the influence my joypad-abusing actions seem to have on the final outcome.
Sure, if the story's really good, the incentive to perform the chore to find out what happens next is strong, but you are still telling us a linear story. That I have to hack the limbs of the Slimy Gargs of Ventaxila before you'll let me see Act II, Scene 4 doesn't make it less linear. It's exactly the same as asking me to tidy my room before I'm allowed to find out what happened in Chapter 4.
In fact, I'd argue that such games are even less linear than, say, a DVD. At least I can fast-forward and chapter-skip through a DVD. Damned few of your "popular" games will even give me *that* much freedom! And this, you claim, is the *future* of gaming? Hell no.
I do believe that, in an abstract sense, the notion of "Story" exists everywhere -- listen to a sports fan describing a particularly good game: nobody wrote a script here, yet the *story* is clearly still gripping -- but I don't agree that the techniques learned in a linear media are as relevant to this industry as you suggest.
The story is the *reward*, not the *point*. The *game* should be centre-stage. Games are all about the journey, not the destination.
Quote:
As for popularity, my point was that a few people on this form argue that linear, single-player, cut-scene, story-driven games can't exist. Obviously they can and already do.
Actually, I'm arguing that such games should put the game first. Story is important, yes, but the story should emerge naturally from the gamer's actions, not be foisted on him by the Auteur God.
GTA IV (almost) pulls this off: there's still a "movie" sequence to play through, but there's so much else in the game even when you're not doing a formal, scripted mission, that you rarely feel like a marionette.
This is quite a trick given the finite nature of computers. There's only so much content you can build for a given time and budget, so going to the effort of including a mo-capped Ricky Gervais stand-up routine for a single game location, shows an impressive level of attention to detail.
Quote:
Now, whether or not a non-linear, multi-player game can have story that rivals film, tv or lit is another question entirely :)
Why should game designers feel required to "rival" such media? Games are not movies, TV or literature! Those are all in the business of telling stories written by an author! Games are in the business of enabling *PLAY*, not Story!
I wish to blazes this industry would grow out of its inferiority complex: games are a far, far older medium than any of the traditional linear media. It's clear the linear entertainment industry is running scared. That's why they keep doing us down and try to make themselves look more worthy and important. I don't recall it being a particularly successful defence against rock'n'roll, punk or techno, so good luck to 'em.
[Edited by - stimarco on June 13, 2008 11:58:29 AM]
Quote:Original post by J-Ray
Hey Zoid,
My original statement:
"I'm a big believer that great story is the future of linear, single-player games."
Linear, single-player games = Halo, HL2, Gears, etc.
As for popularity, my point was that a few people on this form argue that linear, single-player, cut-scene, story-driven games can't exist. Obviously they can and already do.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but aren't those "linear, single-player games" actually heavily played in their multi-player, non-linear modes? Is it not in fact those modes which make them so popular?
Far more gaming hours are devoted to the multi-player deathmatch/teamplay modes of those games than to the single-player portion. They are not single-player, cut-scene, or story-driven games. You attribute their high popularity to their story mode, when in fact it is simply a complementary mode which increases overall appeal. If HL just involved watching Gordon Freeman go from cut-scene to cut-scene, I doubt it would even be worth space in the bargain bins. The *game* is the interesting bit.
You also mention God of War, and sure people mention the story when they review it. But they're playing the game because they get a kick out of swinging huge chains into multitudes of enemies. If you're going to argue that it's the story that makes the game in this case, you'd also have to argue that Diablo 2's popularity is based on its story, which is quite obviously laughable.
So in summary, the story is complementary, and trying to kick the game out to make way for the story is a really bad move.
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