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[JWK5]

Chess has no story, it is a contest of strategy not a delivery of social understanding or recounting of events. "Black wins" is not a revelation it is an outcome of action, it tells you nothing other than you have won the contest. Same with checkers, Bejweled, or sports. You could give chess a story, of course, but it doesn't inherently have one. It has a theme, it has rules, but no story (that is not to say it does not have a history, of course, but that is different than an actual story experienced during play).

Castlevania (NES), on the other hand, is a story. Not a particularly deep one, but its challenges are events leading to a point of understanding (the Belmont clan's victory over Dracula). It is not simply "player wins", it is the resolution of a journey and a fulfillment of a purpose.

In that same regard Super Mario bros. is also a story. Duck Hunt is not a story, it is a shooting gallery (a contest of aim) with a theme.

[starsrift]

Stories excite the imagination.
A game without story just excites the mind.

[gimymblert]

It's a mix answer to point above me, I wasn't answering directly to your post.

However I think there is a huge misconception about game mechanics and "narrative", as if game machanics aren't expressive in themselves. Consider you can name game token "noun" and action in game "verb", the mechanics are generally verbs and the visual skin "noun". So when a noun take an action it define a unit of expression. LND happen because two narrative channels say different things in inconsistent ways. It's not specific to game, in understanding comics, scott mc load point to a similar things about image and text interaction (>> i'm happy! <<). So LDN can be use in a good consistent way.

Chess has a story, story aren't limited to "social understanding". A contest is a story, western view of story as drama is based on conflict at the heart of story (hero defeats the odds) which is the same for game. People expect story to only be the huge swipping epic like in books and movie, story is actually large. Stop idealizing story into grandeur, you can have story without grandeur. Just because something is one thing it cannot be another things, some definition aren't mutually exclusive.

[s0]

Chess has a story, story aren't limited to "social understanding"

actually on second thought chess doesn't really *have* a story. a game of chess has the potential to *become* a story after it ends tho.

theres a difference between a game that tells a story and a game where events that happen as a result of players acting according to the game's rules add up to a story (and yes i don't think "emergent stories" are actually a thing that can exist, at least not in the way its usually discussed in a videogame context)

A contest is a story

not really. a contest is an event (or a series of events if you will). a retelling of a contest is a story about the contest.

However I think there is a huge misconception about game mechanics and "narrative", as if game machanics aren't expressive in themselves. Consider you can name game token "noun" and action in game "verb", the mechanics are generally verbs and the visual skin "noun". So when a noun take an action it define a unit of expression. LND happen because two narrative channels say different things in inconsistent ways. It's not specific to game, in understanding comics, scott mc load point to a similar things about image and text interaction (>> i'm happy! <<). So LDN can be use in a good consistent way.

but what you're talking about is just aesthetic "dissonance" in general. i was talking about ludonarrative dissonance in particular. you're also sort of twisting the term to mean something other than what it actually means: "ludo-narrative" implies a "dissonance" between a "game" and a "narrative", implying that those 2 parts are separate but related. so if the game IS the narrative, the term becomes obsolete because a game can't be "dissonant" with itself.

EDITTTT: this discussion is already starting to get tedious. i'll leave my post here but im not sure if ill respond to any responses

[gimymblert]

I'm telling that it's like trying to say there is a grammatico narrative dissonance, it won't happen, LDN IS "aesthetics" dissonance, however I'm not sure aesthetics is the right word as I'm talking at channel of communication. The term ludo narrative is kind of bad "semantically" however it's use to point that teh message of the "gameplay" is different that the message told through cutscene or various audiovisual narrative. It's bad "semantically" because it imply that ludo is not narrative which I contest, BUT there is still a fondamental dissonance between the "ludo channel" and the other narrative channel based on a cultural distinction that mechanics don't communicate narrative (despite the description of the term imply that gameplay do communicate something).

I use to make a distinction between story and other type of structure, now I don't because in practice I don't see it. Your point is arguable and I use to have it, however now I stand on my new position, I don't see any meaningful nor functional, because "linear stored" story can still be open ended and contain potential story (see LOST).

[Uykered]

When people talk about stories they usually mean a linear authored story, not just a random list of events, otherwise the term loses a lot of meaning.

We wouldn't call chess a story, though you might tell a story about a match afterwards (though it would probably be a bad story). It does usually have a little bit of a medieval setting/theme, which serves the purpose of helping you grasp the rules/mechanics quicker.

[gimymblert]

functionally it's an arbitrary line, that's why I discard it, and game are authored like I demonstrated by contrasting chess and go, events are no random, they have purpose, the meaning is retained.

[s0]

We wouldn't call chess a story, though you might tell a story about a match afterwards (though it would probably be a bad story).

you should read "the royal game" by stefan zweig

[JWK5]

functionally it's an arbitrary line, that's why I discard it, and game are authored like I demonstrated by contrasting chess and go, events are no random, they have purpose, the meaning is retained.

You might as well call tying your shoe a story; the events leading up to a tied shoe are not random, they have meaning and purpose and they reach a climax (the shoe is tied).

The problem with chess (and tying a shoe) is that it is not telling a story, even if a story could be told about it.

[gimymblert]

In fact it's a school of narrative thinking, I'm not making that up either even though I ultimately ended up with the same conclusion, tying a shoes could be a yonkoma you wouldn't say it is not a story there


edit:
as a creator you don't want arbitrary line drawn, because it open you endless possibilities.

[LeonDaydreamer]

You guys have really gotten abstract about all this.

If you want to distill something like chess to its core you are still left with a battle taking place, with the court and troops defending the king and going after the enemy. It's something most people might take for granted, but the pieces aren't arbitrary, they're actually characters. I think we can all agree that checkers has less plot than chess.  :-)

Someone should make a game about tying a shoe! It can go like QWOP.  :-P