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Evan Balster
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« on: January 07, 2013, 11:10:45 AM »

"If you want to tell a story, don't make a game.  Write a book.  Shoot a movie."

This is a statement I disagree with, but I'm a little challenged to articulate why.  I'm interested to hear responses from the game-narrative-writers here.


Here's my attempt at explaining why the combination of narrative and game, rather than those things taken on their own, is important to me:

It's my skillset.  I'm an excellent programmer, a good game designer and of at least amateur competence in other relevant disciplines.  My prose-writing experience is limited.

Immersion and exploration.  I cannot quite name the visceral feelings I have when given an opportunity to navigate an unfamiliar space with a body which is not my own.  When I project myself into that situation and begin to explore with the mobility available to me, a depth of experience is something I treasure profoundly.

(When the space being explored is not only physical but narrative, more tangible thoughts and emotions can be built upon that basis -- but is this an afterthought?)

Agency in narrative.  Games let us make decisions, which adds to the emotional and mental situations we can create for our audience.  Unique to our palette are regret, reward, indecision, confusion, frustration, attachment, protectiveness, malice, playfulness and numerous others.  If we use them artfully they can be powerful colors for painting a story which no other medium can.
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« Reply #1 on: January 07, 2013, 11:35:28 AM »

The problem is that linear stories are not what games are good at.  You take away from the game by having a linear story.  Books and movies are linear by design, and that's fine.

When games tell a 'story', they need to do so in a different fashion.  They need to allow the player some creative control in the story.  This is difficult because many gamers are not story-tellers.  You need to provide them a means by which to tell their story, and some hints on how to make them happen.

For example, Dishonored.  That game lets you choose how you get around the city.  Sneaking on the rooftops, killing everyone you see, possessing things and simply walking through...  Many options, but all given by the game.  And the missions are similar.  You can usually (always?) kill them head-on, or sneak around and do tricksy things.  Even the fate of people in the story isn't set in stone.  You apparently don't have to ever kill anyone, and can instead find other ways to remove them from the city.  (They aren't always obvious, though.)

So decide what kind of story you want to tell.  If it's interactive, and depends on the user, then a game is the way to go.  If it's completely static and the gamer is just forced along a path, use a book or movie.
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« Reply #2 on: January 07, 2013, 11:38:15 AM »

The simple fact that many linear narrative games, which don't really even have that good of a story, can resonate so strongly with players simply because they're "in the game" is reason enough in my opinion. 
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« Reply #3 on: January 07, 2013, 02:53:43 PM »

I think that games are actually very capable of telling good linear stories. As you mentioned, Evan, because agency is given to the player, games can evoke emotions in ways that other media cannot. I actually wrote a short essay about Shadow of the Colossus in which I argue that games can arouse emotions in a unique way that makes them a potentially amazing storytelling medium. Games like SotC, OFF, and Superbrothers: Sword and Sworcery, all tell great linear stories that I believe would not be as effective in another medium.

Not only do I think that games can be as valid a method for storytelling as prose or film, but in many ways I think that they can be a better method for storytelling. The problem is, most games tell crappy stories, so their potential is very rarely realized.
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« Reply #4 on: January 07, 2013, 03:04:03 PM »

I appreciate some games for gameplay (Spelunky) and others for story or message. Take Aether for example. It only took me 45 minutes to beat but it left me dumbfounded as the point Edmund was trying to make was obvious. Not many movies leave me like that.
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ஒழுக்கின்மை (Paul Eres)
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« Reply #5 on: January 07, 2013, 03:08:12 PM »

i think some in this thread are assuming something which isn't true: writing for games isn't necessarily linearly. it's perfectly possible to have a non-linear story in a game and also to have a lot of good writing (e.g. planescape, fallout 1 and 2, alter ego...)
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Evan Balster
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« Reply #6 on: January 07, 2013, 03:11:26 PM »

Just a note:  Let's not let this tangent into a discussion on linear vs. nonlinear storytelling.

The points made so far are interesting and I agree with them -- even a linear, seemingly non-interactive story can be made compelling by gameplay.  But in what ways do the interactive aspects add to storytelling independent of changing the story?  How do they arm us to tell stories better?

I'm inclined towards my "exploration" answer -- that we can take things at our own pace -- but it's maybe a bit skewed.  Exploration is my whole paradigm for looking at games and tends to be how I evaluate them.
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ஒழுக்கின்மை (Paul Eres)
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« Reply #7 on: January 07, 2013, 03:19:08 PM »

i think that even if games don't *add* to a story, who cares? what matters is audience. here's an example: what did the harry potter movies add that the harry potter books didn't already have? not much, except: a larger audience, a different audience, introducing new people to the books

games are similar. media affects who is going to see something. if more people will see your story in game form (or visual novel form) than in book form, that's justification alone for making it a game or visual novel rather than a book

according to what i've read, only 13% of people read a book to completion for pleasure in the last year. but, i suspect, way more than that have played a videogame to completion in the last year. so videogames currently have a much larger audience than novels do

so basically, even if you like to write stories and don't care about videogames, it'd often be better to put your story in a videogame than in a book, because more people will likely see it
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« Reply #8 on: January 07, 2013, 03:42:44 PM »

The problem is that linear stories are not what games are good at.  You take away from the game by having a linear story.  Books and movies are linear by design, and that's fine.

When games tell a 'story', they need to do so in a different fashion.  They need to allow the player some creative control in the story.

I used to believe this myself. Nowadays, I think games don't necessarily need multiple choices to push the envelope when it comes to narrative. That's one possible direction, and I still love it when games manage to give me the feeling of choice, but now I admit it's not the only direction.

I've rather become interested in how games could tell a linear story in ways other mediums can't. The presentation can also make a huge difference in emotional investment as long as the game creates a fascinating world, even when the player is ultimately helpless in how that world is created.

What I'm trying to say is that control is not the only variable in immersion.
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Wilson Saunders
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« Reply #9 on: January 07, 2013, 03:46:34 PM »

I think one of the big problems with people trying to tell a story through a game is they try and tell a complete story. If a developer forces their player to go down a particular path just so they will see all elements of the developer's fabulous story, they are doing it wrong. Writing for a video game is about telling part of a story and setting up mechanics so that the player can tell the rest of it.

The difficulty of writing for games isn't that games use different tools to tell a story than film or books. It is because games can't tell a story without the players interaction. Through that interaction the player contributes part of the story, and that part may be much different than the writer's original intent.
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« Reply #10 on: January 07, 2013, 03:53:38 PM »

I think one of the big problems with people trying to tell a story through a game is they try and tell a complete story. If a developer forces their player to go down a particular path just so they will see all elements of the developer's fabulous story, they are doing it wrong. Writing for a video game is about telling part of a story and setting up mechanics so that the player can tell the rest of it.

The difficulty of writing for games isn't that games use different tools to tell a story than film or books. It is because games can't tell a story without the players interaction. Through that interaction the player contributes part of the story, and that part may be much different than the writer's original intent.
I think this is only true for first person stories in games.  When I'm playing a good well written protagonist I *want* to go down that story
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« Reply #11 on: January 07, 2013, 05:39:07 PM »

The difficulty of writing for games isn't that games use different tools to tell a story than film or books. It is because games can't tell a story without the players interaction. Through that interaction the player contributes part of the story, and that part may be much different than the writer's original intent.

That's true, but it is possible for a game to make the player think that he has many choices, but is actually incentivized by the game to take one specific path, so that all players experience the same story but still feel responsible for their own actions. For example, in Bioshock the player naturally chooses follows the instructions that Atlas gives him without question, and the game uses this choice as an element of the story. In this case, the player actively contributes his part of the story and sincerely believes that it is his own contribution, but the contribution is exactly what the writer intended. It's a win-win situation.

However, you are ultimately correct in the sense that, even if a game does do this, it is impossible to prevent all "unintended" player contributions to the story. in Bioshock the player can still add unintended contributions by doing stupid crap like making his character teabag every enemy he kills or repeatedly charge at a wall with a wrench. The player character as the writers intended him to be wouldn't do those things.

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i think some in this thread are assuming something which isn't true: writing for games isn't necessarily linearly. it's perfectly possible to have a non-linear story in a game and also to have a lot of good writing (e.g. planescape, fallout 1 and 2, alter ego...)
I can't speak for the others, but I wrote about games as a means for linear storytelling because games are obviously more capable than prose or film for non-linear storytelling (simply in that choices are possible). If you want to tell a non-linear story, telling it through a game or interactive fiction is an obvious choice. If you want to tell a linear one, then you have many more choices of media - so in that case the question of "why write for games" instead of books or film is more relevant.
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ஒழுக்கின்மை (Paul Eres)
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« Reply #12 on: January 07, 2013, 05:52:57 PM »

well if he's just looking for why to have linear stories in games rather than no stories, i think the most obvious thing is: because people like games with stories. story-heavy games sell pretty well. the trend in games for the last 30 years has been towards more story, not less. it's what people want. isn't that reason enough? to make people happy, to give people what they want?

as for a more philosophical reason why, i think it's basically that most people care more about people (characters) than they do about things (mechanics). 'save the pink dot' isn't as motivating as 'save the princess'. whenever a game doesn't have a story, i don't really see any reason to play it for very long; it's like: why am i killing these dudes? who are they, what do they want? what's the point in all this fighting? what is this world that i'm wandering around in, what's its history? who am i, do i have a family, where was a born? if questions like that are unanswered, the game doesn't have enough context to be interesting, because it's only about abstract objects rather than people, it's not relatable
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« Reply #13 on: January 07, 2013, 06:11:27 PM »

To be honest, I think this thread is full of valid opinions- I think that games, just like every other artistic medium, will constantly keep moving forward and there's no one "right way" to use the medium.

Cave Story, for example, has a lot more lines of dialogue than Don't Look Back, but both were effective in their narrative; I felt like I plenty of emotions at the end of both games, it's just that both games took very different approaches to storytelling. =

That said, I do believe that games need to continue combining gameplay with storytelling in order to advance as a medium.
I love lengthy cutscenes as much as the next guy, but some of the most memorable parts of games I've played happened when I was actually acting out a part of the game's story; the ending of Bastion comes to mind. While I'm not going to spoil it for anybody who hasn't played it, would that penultimate scene have been nearly as strong if it was just a static cutscene?

Also, this is my first post here, hopefully there are many more to come :D
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« Reply #14 on: January 07, 2013, 06:44:24 PM »

well if he's just looking for why to have linear stories in games rather than no stories, i think the most obvious thing is: because people like games with stories. story-heavy games sell pretty well. the trend in games for the last 30 years has been towards more story, not less. it's what people want. isn't that reason enough? to make people happy, to give people what they want?

as for a more philosophical reason why, i think it's basically that most people care more about people (characters) than they do about things (mechanics). 'save the pink dot' isn't as motivating as 'save the princess'. whenever a game doesn't have a story, i don't really see any reason to play it for very long; it's like: why am i killing these dudes? who are they, what do they want? what's the point in all this fighting? what is this world that i'm wandering around in, what's its history? who am i, do i have a family, where was a born? if questions like that are unanswered, the game doesn't have enough context to be interesting, because it's only about abstract objects rather than people, it's not relatable

Good points. When it comes down to it, I guess that I'm answering the question "If you want to write, why write for games and not something else?", while you're answering "If you want to make games, why write for them?". Narrative clearly strengthens games, but do games strengthen narratives? I think that they can be reciprocally beneficial to each other.
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ஒழுக்கின்மை (Paul Eres)
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« Reply #15 on: January 07, 2013, 06:54:11 PM »

well, i mentioned audience earlier: more people play videogames than read novels. so if you want an audience, and want to write a story, putting it in a game will get you more attention. just in terms of sheer economics, it's very hard to make a living selling novels, compared to selling games. i mean, both are hard, but as hard as it is with games, it's even harder with novels. something like 299 out of every 300 novels are rejected by publishers. and self-publishing your novel as an ebook or something isn't as developed or as viable as self-publishing your game is

also, with novels, standards of writings are higher. a novel that's only mediocre would be way above-average as a game. that's another reason; if you write for games you aren't competing against doestevsky or hemingway, you're only competing with kojima or something. for an illustration of this, read the comments to the immortal defense greenlight page (in my sig) -- almost all of them praise the story. but if that game were a novella instead, a) nobody would have heard of it since it'd have gotten less attention, and b) it wouldn't be as notable because it'd be competing with all the sci-fi classics, which set a much higher bar
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« Reply #16 on: January 07, 2013, 07:45:47 PM »

I feel like game storytelling only reaches its full potential when the message is delivered primarily through the gameplay itself. Games are an almost uniquely participatory medium and reusing the same narrative techniques (e.g. pre-written linear story) from more passive forms like film and (to a lesser extent) written fiction will rarely have the same impact as they would in their original form.

This is a bit difficult to expand on, but take for example a game like Far Cry 3. For all the ways in which it succeeds it's a game beset with a staggering level of (ugh) ludonarrative dissonance. There are two distinct stories there which have almost nothing to do with each other. The "story" story is your typical privileged white manchild coming-of-age affair with a side of "becoming a monster to stop a monster" and a sprinkle of mystic nonsense. The story told by the gameplay is that of a supersoldier's murderous holiday jungle romp. It's not too hard to deduce which story the game does a better job of telling (what's your most vivid memory of the game, a scripted plot point or a moment of gameplay?).

A game's real story isn't written in English but in C++ (pick your language).
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Evan Balster
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« Reply #17 on: January 07, 2013, 10:52:13 PM »

Well-spoken, d.  Well-spoken.


So here's my story:

I had a narrative I had designed, based on a dream, and begun writing as a short story.  The idea grew and I decided to make it a game instead.  I did this because I wanted to do the story justice with my best skills, but I was also aware of a great conflict that created.  You can't simply move something from one medium to another.  It is deeply changed.

I spent some time pondering this conflict and what ultimately shook me out of my indecision was a Jon Blow talk about mechanics.  (I can't remember which one, exactly.)  I conceived a system of game mechanics that would uphold the story, in which every atomic action taken by the player is a meaningful action taken by the character in the narrative.  A system that is explorative in nature, suiting my favorite type of play.  The story has developed greatly since that decision, and the game design alongside it.  It's become a somewhat co-dependent relationship.

I've waited and delayed and fiddled with a lot of technical ambitions and now I'm making headway.  I don't know if I'm doing things right, or if my story and game will be as cohesive as I expect, but I feel a warmth on the horizon.  I'm writing this game because I'm excited to step into this world I've been dreaming of and meet its people.

It sounds silly, but I write for games because I want to bring that dream to the waking world.
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« Reply #18 on: January 10, 2013, 12:38:01 PM »

I think the medium in which you deliver a story is very important. If you' writing for games you are communicating the story and the person's experience will shift. Some stories will work better in some mediums than other, whilst some seem more adaptable.
I often think about the Hitchiker's Guide to the Galaxy since it has so many different versions in different mediums Radio play, text adventure, film, tv series. All of those are enjoyable in their own way, but still offer a different experience.
I also think the idea of using gameplay to tell the story make sense, " show not tell" is often repeated bit of advice for writers and I don't see why games are any different.

(Hello by the way, I've been lurking here for a while and this thread seemed really interesting to me so I thought I'd jump in.)
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« Reply #19 on: February 02, 2013, 03:43:34 PM »

This thread is a good one. Sometimes we do well.

Games are powerful because of mechanics, obviously, relative to other mediums. Writing for games is about enhancing your story with mechanics, or your mechanics with your story, or both at the same time (in the ideal scenario).

I don't like the idea of writing for books because I don't feel liberated by the thought. I know technology. I know like, a lot of technology. I also know teamwork, and I like frontiers. Games are heavy on all 3 of these things. Books are not. Books are best written when the author wants to express an idea that doesn't suit games, or can't get the funding for it; books fund cheaper.

Want to write about Russian history? How much detail do you want to include? Or do you just want to capture a particular sensation and drill it in your reader's/player's brain? The answers to these questions are the kind that determine where your writing talent belongs.

Anyway, good thread.

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