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Evan Balster
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« on: February 27, 2013, 05:02:19 PM »

Something which is often implicit in a game design is the relationship the player and the player-character(s) have.  This relationship can take many forms depending on the game design, and I think it's a very interesting thing that deserves some analysis.

The player character's agency (the choices it makes) is by definition in the hands of the player.  Some games, however, have the character make choices autonomously (as in cutscenes) or restrict the player's agency to a set of choices that would be reasonable for that character.  I like to think of game design in terms of contracts, and this one extends to the narrative -- there is a contract between the player and the character defining what actions the player may reasonably take through that character.

Direct actions are most commonly the player's domain:  Where to go, what to interact with, and other actions which directly affect gameplay.  Sometimes, these comprise the full set of choices a player can make -- I like to call such choices the player's "vocabulary".

Expressive actions may fall to either side, or both:  What to say, what face to make, and other actions which have a more purely narrative or sentimental effect.  Generally a player's vocabulary here is more limited, and reasonably so:  Expressive actions tend to be comprised of many small choices and to have a lesser and less-direct effect on gameplay.  There are always exceptions, of course, and the line between direct and expressive action is not a sharp one.


So some simple examples:

Half-Life:  Gordon Freeman's vocabulary is running, jumping, and shooting at things.  The player has absolute say in his direct actions, with virtually no exceptions, and there isn't much expressive action to speak of -- Gordon's thoughts and emotions are left to the player's imagination.  I call him the Silent Protagonist.

Elder Scrolls:  These games are designed so the player may create a character and play that part as freely as possible.  Like Half-Life the player is virtually never deprived of control over direct actions, and these games try to facilitate free characterization through dialogue choices, apparel and role-playing.  I call this the Blank Slate.

Little Big Planet:  Another Blank Slate, but with an important difference:  Because expressive actions (in this case, facial expressions, personal appearance, and dancing!) don't have a strong effect on gameplay, players are more free to take expressive actions without being constrained by an optimal play strategy.  For fun, let's call this guy the Canvas -- a more colorful alternative to the slate.

Batman, Arkham Asylum:  A very, very common case is that direct actions are in control of the player and expressive actions are in control of the character.  Thus the character has a defined personality and the player simply takes actions as that person.  This is almost any adventure game or platformer protagonist; let's call it the Actor.

There are a relationships beyond the ones I mention, and perhaps other categorizations of action, and I think it would be interesting to discuss these and their implications.
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« Reply #1 on: February 27, 2013, 09:25:13 PM »

Okay, two part answer for myself:
A) I prefer the Blank Slate when dealing with a character, being immersed in a game with your own variety and twist to things is really a key to games and gamers. I think, that some things like Elder Scrolls or Saints Row did grow popularity through customization features. I would like to one day incorporate more range than WoW did. (Yes, we call it pipe-dream I know)
B) The problem is also though that having fully controllable characters would be challenging, which is why Elder Scrolls has such a high budget for each of the series. Sure they promo the expansions and stuff but honestly the high cost of programming such parameters is astounding. So look at God of War, Prince of Persia, Legacy of Kain, realms of Action RPG, people really enjoyed them and it isn't so open, maybe a mixture of these two elements, would create a successful game 
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« Reply #2 on: February 27, 2013, 09:58:35 PM »

An interesting thought on direct versus expressive action:  When the player is assured that an action will not have any effect on gameplay, but one must be taken, they inevitably express themselves with that action.  A great example is in Okami when the player must draw a mask on a piece of cloth.  Another is when naming an object or character.

My own preference in characters is the Actor.  I like a character with a mind of its own, principally because I've never played a Blank Slate game where my interpersonal interactions were any kind of interesting.  What if I want to flirt with the shopkeep, or taunt the guard, or act dismissive toward the knight-in-training?  When games do give us these options they generally use dialogue options; such expressions are necessarily clear and discrete, lacking the subtlety a willful actor might achieve.  It's difficult to imagine a game where you could control your character's body language; more conceivable if still far-fetched is a character with autonomous physical expressiveness...

Though an interesting counterexample, and a good addition to the discussion, is Chris Bell's Way.
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« Reply #3 on: February 27, 2013, 11:17:56 PM »

What about Fable and Fable II, these were games where gestures not only could be made toward anyone, but really anyone could have a reaction. Liked by some, hated by others. Plus the element of the character evolution by character decisions. Evil or Good reflected in the appearance. If that could be scaled to be a more customized feature as the progression took place would only sharpen the games enhancements, but still for the effect Fable did wonderful job at giving reaction to actions in the game that were completely user controlled.
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« Reply #4 on: February 28, 2013, 12:37:01 AM »

This is very interesting!
*I came here by luck when I saw the topic in the most recent post thing in the Developer section. My english is not the best and I am not too familiar with the subject from a writers point of view but I think I might have something interesting to add here.

We are currently developing a game where the player and the main character are separate, meaning that the player has no direct control over the main characters actions or behavior. But the player has an indirect control over the character where he can manipulate the surrounding environment to make the character behave in certain a manner.

And just to tie back to fable which you mentioned. What if there were only two persons in fable, the player and another character? If you would narrow it down like that you could possibly put a lot of effort and affects into that single relationship. I can imagine it being kind of powerful if you focused on just that player and another character relationship.

This is something that we are exploring to some extent in our game, where we are building puzzles around character behavior and the understanding of how an interaction calls for a reaction. In our case, as an external force of some kind, you might say that the player is playing himself. This fact is also something that creates an interesting dynamic in the relationship between player and character, since they are very different in both what they are and what they can do. Still depending on eachother.

I totally think that this kind of 'in direct control' over another character can be explored in so many more ways than we are trying to, especially in a focused and narrative based game. Probably very much so in an narrative that is more fable like where you actually get a consequence out of your interactions.
Just take away all the fighting and deaths and pointless mini games and that kind of noise that clouds both characters and narrative in a bad way...

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« Reply #5 on: February 28, 2013, 10:35:42 AM »

I agree with the focusing bit but at the same time you are hindered by the fact of a deep relations with specific character while another may have lacking or none at all. True that RPGs have often done this with Quest Givers and such but that doesn't always account for better relations, building a dynamic character with responses is hugely difficult because as human beings we don't have a simple list of programmed responses: If Answer A then Reply B - If Answer B Reply C- we don't have this controlling dominance to our conversations, it has more depth than simple response, in fable response also changed future interactions. Same thing in Elder Scrolls, sometimes they may just run up and attack you if you do something wrong. Well things are interesting in the world of gaming but to get a character to have so much depth that the Player continues to grow and learn would be quite a difficult task.
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« Reply #6 on: February 28, 2013, 11:02:05 AM »

What if there were only two persons in fable, the player and another character? If you would narrow it down like that you could possibly put a lot of effort and affects into that single relationship. I can imagine it being kind of powerful if you focused on just that player and another character relationship.

Very insightful.  Smiley

I'm trying to do something a little like this in a project of mine.  The way I'm trying to implement it is through a dynamic body language system -- very technically complex, and doomed to be a crass oversimplifiction of the real thing.  However, people have a way of reading into ambiguous signals and ascribing depth to them.  If I can do my work well enough to represent subtle mannerisms and queues, they will not go unnoticed.  Or so I hope.

(That's key, really -- we're not simulating reality, or the subtleties of people.  We're representing them.  That's the basis of art, and there is power in understanding it.)
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« Reply #7 on: February 28, 2013, 11:53:06 AM »

I agree with the focusing bit but at the same time you are hindered by the fact of a deep relations with specific character while another may have lacking or none at all. True that RPGs have often done this with Quest Givers and such but that doesn't always account for better relations, building a dynamic character with responses is hugely difficult because as human beings we don't have a simple list of programmed responses: If Answer A then Reply B - If Answer B Reply C- we don't have this controlling dominance to our conversations, it has more depth than simple response, in fable response also changed future interactions. Same thing in Elder Scrolls, sometimes they may just run up and attack you if you do something wrong. Well things are interesting in the world of gaming but to get a character to have so much depth that the Player continues to grow and learn would be quite a difficult task.

I totally see your point and agree with you. Though, say that you have a whole bunch of programmed responses to different player actions. I can imagine that this would work pretty well for a while, as you were kind of getting to know the character. Every human has emotional triggers that give you a certain emotional respons. Fears for example are very individual and good triggers for direct responses.
The thing with game charaters that takes away their soul is when you get into these moments where the AI repeats the same thing over and over or do not act in a logical way. I really wanted to fall in love with Yorda the first time I played ICO, but when I found myself trying, for the 58th time, to get her to climbe down a small ladder it just became too evident that it was a stupid AI character.
It's like that weakest link thing, a character is just as real as their weakest character moment.

So I would say that good AI and a well designed logical game that tries to avoid repetetive situations and unlogical behavior could probably help make the player learn and grow by themselves. Though I have yet to see a game like this.
And I at the moment very much believe that it is the characters around that will trigger the emotional responses in the player, not his own action.
AI is one of the huge things in games which I feel is somewhat unique to games and I would rather have major studios focus on that than prettier graphics.
You are very much right in it being a very difficult task but I would love to see more focus on just that.

What if there were only two persons in fable, the player and another character? If you would narrow it down like that you could possibly put a lot of effort and affects into that single relationship. I can imagine it being kind of powerful if you focused on just that player and another character relationship.

Very insightful.  Smiley

I'm trying to do something a little like this in a project of mine.  The way I'm trying to implement it is through a dynamic body language system -- very technically complex, and doomed to be a crass oversimplifiction of the real thing.  However, people have a way of reading into ambiguous signals and ascribing depth to them.  If I can do my work well enough to represent subtle mannerisms and queues, they will not go unnoticed.  Or so I hope.

(That's key, really -- we're not simulating reality, or the subtleties of people.  We're representing them.  That's the basis of art, and there is power in understanding it.)

Your project sounds very interesting. And I think you are right in your observation. We try to do something in line with that too. But our game is built around an AI characters behavior puzzles, which means that our focus is not quite just to make this character as alive as possible but to be as human as possible. So what we focus on are more the general traits of a human, almost a charicature of a human, where we try to boil down the essence of human emotions. We then try to figure out who this character are and gve him fears, longings, targets and so on. This is mixed with the basic human needs, food, comfort, safety... And these things are depending on the immediate surroundings. If you are a little bit more cold than hungry your target would probably be a warming fire rather than an apple. But we are still figuring things out but it is sure an interesting topic.
Thanks so much for sharing your thoughts on this.   
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« Reply #8 on: February 28, 2013, 02:43:40 PM »

emotional responses in a game although difficult can be achieved but it would require a very complex and changing algorithm. That would also have to keep into place a complex random generator. See when we go through our lives with independent thought, we have responses based from our perspectives and so you trying to flirt as a character can cause a variety of responses, but to make it successful the randomness factors would have to be enormous. Programming the language aspect is something that Elder Scrolls and others. But then to convey those in aspects with the hints of body language rules and submeanings and openings would take a very complex code for doing that.
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« Reply #9 on: February 28, 2013, 05:32:38 PM »

Philosophical tangent:  Randomness is a game developer's canned substitute for complexity; any sufficiently complex system is "random" to the extent that it is unpredictable.  "Randomness" as we know it is a simple chaotic behavior which helps us make a system less predictable easily.

Non-repeating behavior is a really special thing, and has been put to good use with narrators in Bastion and The Cave.  It's a simple, elegant rule that solves one of the principal problems with non-player characters in games.  That said, it's a concept which would be better discussed in the "good characters" thread.

These two sort-of-tangental ideas can be related back to the notion of deep characters, though:  If the behavior patterns of NPCs and the non-controllable behaviors of the PC are subject to complex systems, and those systems have specific provisions to ensure a repeated stimulus does not provoke a repeated response, then those characters will be a little more "random", and a little more believable.  Poke me with a stick once, and I'll give you a filthy look.  Poke me again and I'll try to take it away from you.

More succinctly:  Characters should learn and change, even if in a very simple way.
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« Reply #10 on: March 02, 2013, 02:32:23 AM »

I myself think that randoness is just something that creates more obstacles in a situation like this. I am not sure if there is that much randomness to human behavior. I can imagine most human actions to be base upon past experience. This would be part of your character and your personality and in some ways make you predictable.
So rather than having a random response in a character I would like to see situations that are well written and maybe even scripted to emphasize a consistent personality of a character. Most games does this in a shallow way I think where important characters lack depth in personality because they "need" to be likable rather than personal.

I agree with you Evan. And I very much think that the NPCs can be connected to the learning and growth of the player. Especially in a gaming environment where moral and ethics are generally much lower than other mediums. Mainly because how games handle issues like death, to give an extreme example. Death is a very serious matter in real life and something that has a profound consequence on people that experience it up close, in one way or another. In games it has far from that same impact as a death would in real life.
And to make a point, I think we need to try to get that impact back, not just regarding death but all things that can affect and make growth within the player. This can maybe partly be achieved by well written NPCs.
Say that we have a game about a marrige. In the game there is a certain object that is totally meaningless to the man(player in this case) in terms of emotional depth, so he simply throws this object away. The thing is that this object is of great emotional value to his NPC wife which is shown in her reaction to the player throwing it away. Then, from her reaction, maybe the player would learn the value of the object and then even grow to know his wife a little more.

Maybe things like this where you let the player learn the meaning and value of things through interaction and NPC reaction might be an interesting standpoint. I don't know but I can imagine an NPC to have a bunch of influence on the PC and player if situations are well written.
Also if certain events had a consequence throughout the game and was referred to later I think it would give more depth to the experience and remind the player of the consequence of actions. And the consequence is probably better if it doesn't abrupt the game where it tells you "this was wrong, redo!" but rather just a branch off leading in a slightly new direction.

So the wife could forgive the man for throwing away the object but would remind him of that first incident later in the game.
And further down, in a similar situation, the palyer might not throw away a certain thing before asking his wife, which would mean that he had both learned and changed.
 

 

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« Reply #11 on: March 02, 2013, 07:07:57 AM »

i think silent protagonists only work as long as there are a lot of interesting secondary characters which are actors to pick up the slack. for instance, in chrono trigger, crono was a silent protagonist, but the real story was with the other characters: marle, lucca, robo, frog, magus, etc. -- those are the characters most of the story scenes revolved around, not crono. similarly, most of the main suikoden games are story-driven through non-player actors, the player is just sort of along for the ride

in other words, i think that a story still needs to be composed of actors, regardless of whether or not the player actually controls an actor or not. whenever they make a player silent, all that means is that the player character has very little impact on the plot, and has to ride along with it rather than take part in it
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« Reply #12 on: March 05, 2013, 01:06:26 PM »

Silent characters has never been one of my likes, like in Doom 3 the character stayed silent the whole game, sometimes it's just great when the character speaks like Duke Nukem.
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« Reply #13 on: March 07, 2013, 12:01:55 PM »

i think silent protagonists can be pretty awkward in gams and i don't find the half life style of storytelling particularly "immersive"  tbh.
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« Reply #14 on: March 07, 2013, 12:11:14 PM »

Why was Freeman silent? Was there ever an actual reason / explanation? To me it also feels very strange when someone is speaking right in front of you and you say nothing and they carry on like nothing's wrong. I would be "fucks sake, say something!".
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« Reply #15 on: March 07, 2013, 08:19:24 PM »

I guess the thinking is that if Freeman expresses himself, that's undermining the agency of the player and the fantasy they undertake as him.  We don't know whether Gordon is humble or proud, gentle or stern, self-interested or heroic.  So we make those decisions based on our own feelings and there's nothing to undermine them.

Personally I don't care for it, though.  As far am I'm concerned it's more interesting to fantasize I'm someone different than a powered-up, repercussion-free version of myself.
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« Reply #16 on: March 09, 2013, 06:13:06 AM »

Balster, your work is similar to mine. I'm working on a body language system too, dynamic conversations etc. etc.

I don't like the "canvas" character though. Expressive actions without mechanical relevance bother me. In Mario you can duck-jump without need but the situation still plays out differently. Looking different in LPB is just aesthetic; making faces is the same.

Westman, companies don't focus on AI because AI is hard. The situation is that simple. We don't approach the problem right yet. AIs are super iterative. They also require a complete harmony between technical implementation and the understanding of a person, or how a person acts. These things are opposites.

Malice, complex code isn't required to solve these problems, just well designed code. You don't need a complex painting to have a beautiful one. Minecraft is enormously simple. Look at its depth. The process for reaching this code however is complex.

Westman, even better if the NPCs react to player decisions that are rooted in core mechanics. For example, in Skyrim the player runs around town and explores. NPCs never react to this. They react to dialog decisions, though clearly the choice of what mission to do next, where to explore next, are the most revealing ones (of the player's personality). NPCs should react to that. You can do a lot with NPC reactions.

I like non-silent protagonists because I need either an action to express myself through or a character to do it for me. Gordon Freeman fought, but I didn't imagine a personality behind it, not outside of the fighting. That's just me.

Freeman was silent because of game design. Same thing with Link, who just make noises. Link is called Link because he is a link to the player, the player's proxy in the world.

The silent protagonist thing hits home for people who fill in the story naturally for themselves. I'm not crazy for it either, but that's because I find filling in a character without in-game tools very difficult.

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« Reply #17 on: March 12, 2013, 03:49:20 AM »

We don't know whether Gordon is humble or proud, gentle or stern, self-interested or heroic.  So we make those decisions based on our own feelings and there's nothing to undermine them.
yeah that's valve's reasoning but tbh i don't buy it. or rather i should say it doesn't work for me because 1. half life is completely linear and there's no player agency to speak of, and 2. in plot terms, gordon is basically a silent goon who does what other people tell him. i can "imagine" how he feels about being a goon, but doesn't change anything about it.

also i guess why it doesn't work for me as immersion is that i generally don't think about videogames in terms of "this is me, i'm doing this."

so yeah basically i think the gordon freeman-style silent goon protagonist is an often awkward storytelling device and i agree with rinku's point that it essentially reduces the protagonist to a passive entity who needs other (actual) characters give them some kind of motivation.

the funny thing about this is that valve is aware of these problems and even parodies them in portal (tho ofc that sort of thing dates back to at least system shock)
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« Reply #18 on: March 12, 2013, 04:03:04 AM »

Yeah this is true. At least Link has some personality. He makes noises, animates etc.

I think maybe if you're less used to it you'll think like a character. I played Skyrim with my step-siblings - children. They loved the character creation part. I knew like, you never see your model, or only from behind, so details like barely matter. But when you don't know you pour yourself in.

You move Gordon around and you're like, "this is me, I am doing things!" You are unused to the experience of controlling a guy in a universe. Though on the other hand reviewers project into Skyrim characters. Though they are paid to find the fun in games. We just move on to different ones.

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« Reply #19 on: March 12, 2013, 06:29:34 AM »

I prefer it far more if the protagonist has an actual personality. Silent protagonists are just a crutch for not being able to write the main character so that they don't come off as annoying. It takes you out of the story and destroys any semblance of realism when you can't talk to the supporting cast, it feels like the MC is just your "cursor" in the game world and not a legitimate character.

Self inserts are not a very good storytelling device in a linear game, they make me feel like a powerless servant of whoever wants to boss me around. When someone talks and I can't, I don't imagine myself talking, I just take it as fact that they didn't say anything because they're wimpy. It wouldn't have made someone like Gordon or Crono any worse if they said a few lines at times, just more interesting to play as.

You can always combine the "Blank Slate" and the "Actor" by giving them a personality and changing their appearance, see also Commander Shepard.
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