How Can We Save Magical Story Hour?

[Kaspian]

Telling a good story in a video game is not an easy task, not just in regards to what sorts of tales games try to tell, but how they are told. In this editorial (http://www.armchairempire.com/Editorials/save-magical-story-hour.htm) at the Armchair Empire, the mechanisms of storytelling in games are examined, and questioned, while looking at emerging trends that could help lead game narrative into interesting new directions.

...games are meant to be interactive, so we already have a problem with the action being ground to a halt so that the game can arbitrarily push forward a morsel of its story. However, let’s take this whole thing a step further and apply it to real life. If you went on some crazy adventure over the summer, and were telling your friends about it six months after the fact, it would probably make for a very interesting tale. So, how can this story be reverse engineered from things like telling your buddy about being run out of town by a group of peg-legged albinos to the moment where you were actually experiencing it yourself.

[J Arcane]

There's already a game like that.

It's called Half Life.

Thing is though, I think a lot of game deisgners are rather too in love with their spoon-forced little CGI cut scenes and such to even take the simple steps the Half-Life games took towards involving the player more in the events taking place.

[bean19]

The article goes on about how designers are not meshing the narrative and gameplay together well without giving examplse for the longest period of time and finally we come to this:

What has the most potential, though, is the fact that players can read books laying around in the cities, or stumble across ruins, and learn about people, factions, or mythology of the game world at their leisure. More importantly, this often has the effect of peaking someone’s curiosity. They may hear about an ancient race that has long since died off, but left amazing technology or treasure to be discovered, or about a line of kings, whose political policies have shaped parts of the world in ways that can still be seen today. Whatever the topic may be, discovering these things often gets players to want to learn more, see these things with their own eyes, and almost go on their own self-imposed quest to satisfy their curiosity. This isn’t mutually exclusive to World of Warcraft either, as it has been done to varying degrees in plenty of other MMOs as well.

Okay. . . so instead of looking at ways for game designers to do a better job telling the game's story, this person's answer is to let the player look for the story and read it out of books if they are interested?

That's pretty fucking stupid. In fact, I think the "storytelling" if you can even call it that in MMOs is pretty freaking terrible. But then, this author doesn't understand, or at least, doesn't explore the various methods that different designers have used to tell stories in games. . . yet, he chooses his ideal method to be text boxes that the player can read at their leisure. . . that are completely independent from the character's personal experience and hold no hint of danger or importance to the player. . .

I was excited to see this being discussed, but was amazed at how elementary the article on it was. . . Why not discuss different methods for story-telling and which have been more effective? How about discussing the relative strengths of a strong narrative? The Dreamfall: The Longest Journey built itself completely on great narrative. . . . as have all adventure games really. . . Grim Fandago, Monkey Island, Fahrenheit, etc. These games can be found on many people's favorite all-time game lists. Though there are only a few games that make their money through strong narrative moreso than their gameplay, certainly there are still games around that gain their notoriety from their narrative MORE than their gameplay, and blockbuster AAA hits never abandon the narrative or try to get away with FUCKING TEXT BOXES LIKE MMORPGS.

Disgaea while a strong tactical RPG made it's developer famous amongst fans of these types of games and was able to sell a menagerie of okay gameplay tactical RPGs with very simple graphics and coding constraints by focusing on great dialogue, narrative, and voice-acting. Additionally, by using interesting artistic style they used different large still images of the various characters while they were voiced to convey their current mood and entertain the gamer. This serves as a really good example of how someone who intelligently uses various story-telling methods together can create a great story.

The most successful games have strong narratives. Halo without it's rich story is just another shooter. . . their narrative was much weaker in Halo 2, and look how it has stained many people's opinions of the franchise. However, they also do a lot of things right with the STORY-TELLING. While they do not do all of their story-telling completely in-game as Half-Life really taught people to do (and as we have seen done in most FPS games since Half-Life), they still have directed content so that as you are playing a level, things happen. Though you are really just shooting aliens in different ways over and over, it is part of a story that unfolds as you go.

This "Half-Life" technique is really the complete mesh of narrative and gameplay. It is the most important story-telling technique and it is super helpful in drawing players into the game's story so that they care about the characters involved. Also, it cuts down on the exposition required in cut-scenes during or between levels.

Anyway, horrible article, but very interesting subject. I'd welcome an intelligent article on the subject if a dev reads this and wants to do something for Gamasutra or Gamedev.net.

[bean19]

There's already a game like that.

It's called Half Life.

Thing is though, I think a lot of game deisgners are rather too in love with their spoon-forced little CGI cut scenes and such to even take the simple steps the Half-Life games took towards involving the player more in the events taking place.

You are right in naming the precedent, but you are wrong if you think that game designers haven't been emulating Half-Life ever since it came out.

Go play any FPS or action game.

[J Arcane]

I have. And while a few have come close to copping a little of HL's style, none have gone the whole hog.

The Halo games have some great parts where interesting scenes actually play out with the player still in control and moving around, then drops the ball with a bunch more of the usual old cut scene nonsense.

I've yet to see a game that really went the whole way and kept the player in control through every scene. Even the HL games have a few points in them where it resorts to non-interactive cutscenes.

As for books, those are great for revealing backstory and setting info, makes the player feel like they're really in a real place, with a real history. But unveiling the main story should be something the player is directly involved in. I do like it though, when a game lets me find the story on my own, so long as there's enough of a clue as to where to go to look.

But at the same time, a little bit of ride on rails can be fine too. After all, HL and HL2 are basically about as linear as it gets, but I still had a grand time there, because I felt truly immersed in the world, and the lack on non-interactive sequences had a lot to do with that.

[gspot]

If one were to play Half Life 2: Episode 1 in commentary mode, you'd see them address the different ways they worked story into the game while not interrupting gameplay. They refuse to add cut scenes and don't want to take control of the camera away from the player. So they must use subtle and innovative tactics to create the story line without spoon-feeding it.

Their tactics involve goodies (story event being triggered in an area around weapons or health packs) and strategically placed enemies (forces the player to address the threat while during or soon after a story event happens on screen). They also use large, involved battles that are taxing on the player. After the ant lion whack a mole fight, the player heads up stairs to a large area of destruction and an emergency broadcast playing on a big screen. The player, now fatigued from the battle, gets to enjoy the graphics of the torn destroyed city, and gets story information from the broadcast.

They also use the tactic of "starving" the player of story. You don't get information from NPCs, because they assume you know whats going on, and realistically don't want to tell you what you already know. Since the story is so obviously complex and the player knows virtually nothing of it, any tiniest bit of story that comes along the player jumps on it like dingos on a baby. Thus, no spoon-feeding required.

As for why other game devs have not followed their example, it's difficult and requires a lot of planning, work, and testing to make sure it fits. Not too many developers are interested in putting that much effort into their games, especially when there are people who will buy shitty games that haven't had any thought put into them, and like it.

[J Arcane]

IT's also kind of amusing hearing him crow about how interactive MMORPGs are, considering that so many of them seem to be doing their best to remove as much as possible.

The Matrix Online even uses what amount to cut-scenes in it's combat engine. You queue up a few actions, then basically stand back and watch as you guy does some kind of fancy kung fu. I didn't even know what was going on at first, I just knew that suddenly, right in the middle of combat, I had zero control over my character.

And this is what he's calling the future of interactive story?

[bean19]

If one were to play Half Life 2: Episode 1 in commentary mode, you'd see them address the different ways they worked story into the game while not interrupting gameplay. They refuse to add cut scenes and don't want to take control of the camera away from the player. So they must use subtle and innovative tactics to create the story line without spoon-feeding it.

HL2 does this to good effect. . . but it also honestly still has "cut-scenes". Like at the end where you are "free" to watch the big-thing that happens (trying to be spoiler free). However, you aren't really free, and they have to go to a lot of trouble to give you such a great view of the action.

Not all stories need to be told in direct first person as they are in Half-Life. Cut-scenes are not a bad thing. In fact, I love games with really good cut-scenes. I used to cue up game saves of Final Fantasy games when I was a kid to rewatch cut-scenes.

I think the problem that people have with cut scenes isn't that they are too long or that they take people out of the action. . . while there are people who will bitch about that every time, most of the people (who don't like cut scenes) only don't like them when they aren't cool.

In games that have really entertaining cutscenes like Psychonauts, Halo, Grand Theft Auto, and the Prince of Persia games, most people look forward to the cutscenes.

This discussion isn't just about one true preferable method, or at least it shouldn't be. It SHOULD be about the advantages and disadvantages of using different story-telling methods, and examples of each method done RIGHT as oppossed to examples of each method done wrong.

[Rafer]

Okay. . . so instead of looking at ways for game designers to do a better job telling the game's story, this person's answer is to let the player look for the story and read it out of books if they are interested?

Yeah, sounds like he's advocating the Doom III method of storytelling where you find messages all over the place, which as a fan of the works of Samuel Richardson I appreciated the epistolary aspect of the game, but I don't think it was a that great a method of advancing the story (and yes I know that method was borrowed mostly from System Shock).

[Morangie]

They also use the tactic of "starving" the player of story. You don't get information from NPCs, because they assume you know whats going on, and realistically don't want to tell you what you already know. Since the story is so obviously complex and the player knows virtually nothing of it, any tiniest bit of story that comes along the player jumps on it like dingos on a baby. Thus, no spoon-feeding required.

Bullshit. That is something I really hated about HL2, the fact that NPCs told you nothing. I don't know about you, but if I was suddenly teleported onto a train in a wierd city and then shot at by troops, I would maybe ask what the hell was going on and get someone to fill me in on the time I've apparently missed out on. The NPCs assuming you know whats going on only works if you assume your character wouldn't have a very fucking puzzled expression on his face.

[bean19]

Bullshit. That is something I really hated about HL2, the fact that NPCs told you nothing. I don't know about you, but if I was suddenly teleported onto a train in a wierd city and then shot at by troops, I would maybe ask what the hell was going on and get someone to fill me in on the time I've apparently missed out on. The NPCs assuming you know whats going on only works if you assume your character wouldn't have a very fucking puzzled expression on his face.

Well they also do it by keeping you in a position where you have more pressing concerns than sitting down and asking what the hell is going on, and they do tell you what is going on, though they don't bore you with it. . . I never felt the least bit in the dark during Half-Life 2 or Episode One. Then again, their art tells a LOT of the story. Obviously the Combine were an oppressive police force. Very quickly you learn that some of the Black Mesa crew is still around, and that one of them has made a deal with the invaders while others are helping people get out of the city and are resisting the invaders. . . Then you are actively trying to get out of the city yourself. . . etc. How could you have missed any of that?

[Wombat]

Another thing episode one did well was build the relationship with Alyx fairly well. In just about every FPS with sidekicks of any sort, I end up hating their guts. They get in the way, they make useless or even counter-productive comments.

I'm thinking of Perfect Dark Zero where every 30 seconds someone would say 'lead the way! we're right behind you!' even if your in the middle of a firefight. As for the mission with a time limit with Carrington continually whining about how slow you are, by the end of it I was ready to join the bad guys and hunt HIM down.

This is really important because typically the designers want you to like the game characters, and they want you to build a relationship with them, and it's very jaring if, after coming to hate a character ingame, they then show a cut-scene with you being all friendly with them when they have completely failed to build such a relationship.

[gspot]

Another thing episode one did well was build the relationship with Alyx fairly well. In just about every FPS with sidekicks of any sort, I end up hating their guts. They get in the way, they make useless or even counter-productive comments.

I'm thinking of Perfect Dark Zero where every 30 seconds someone would say 'lead the way! we're right behind you!' even if your in the middle of a firefight. As for the mission with a time limit with Carrington continually whining about how slow you are, by the end of it I was ready to join the bad guys and hunt HIM down.

This is really important because typically the designers want you to like the game characters, and they want you to build a relationship with them, and it's very jaring if, after coming to hate a character ingame, they then show a cut-scene with you being all friendly with them when they have completely failed to build such a relationship.
I am now convinced this thread must be adjurned and then reassembled once everyone has played HL2 E1 with commentary mode on. They address all of these concerns, tell why, and then show how.

[Wombat]

Yes, I've played the commentary and it was very illuminating, though I didn't want to quote too much from it in my previous post. The most important was the point they made that originally Alyx was more of a active goad, who would continually tell you where to go and what needed to be done, but playtesters found her too much of a nag and ended up disliking her, so they scaled these coments back drastically. This is why I brought up those examples from PD0 where they got it so horribly wrong.

[gspot]

Yea I figured you did, I was actually refering to anyone interested in the thread who hasn't. It would be incredibly illuminating concerning the subject at hand.

[bean19]

Yea I figured you did, I was actually refering to anyone interested in the thread who hasn't. It would be incredibly illuminating concerning the subject at hand.

Actually, that's just one source of information on game design. . . though it is a really good one since they can discuss something and then show it to you immediately.

There are also books out on this stuff, and websites. Gamasutra is the most popular one, but there are actually whole communities built around every form of game design that exists out there, from complete projects built by indy and professional developers to specific boards on level design, 3D animations, or coding RPG loot tables.

My point is that while the subject does seem to require some study, there are many sources for it. They actually have schools now that teach degrees in game design. :)

[Varsity]

Not all stories need to be told in direct first person as they are in Half-Life. Cut-scenes are not a bad thing. In fact, I love games with really good cut-scenes. I used to cue up game saves of Final Fantasy games when I was a kid to rewatch cut-scenes.
This is about integrating story with gameplay, not simply creating a good story.

For my part, I think the answer lies in unifying languages. Everything takes place through a language of some sort: for gameplay it is usually violence, the simplest of all, and for story it is usually the player's spoken tongue. If we can bring those polar opposites closer together, we have a game story instead of a film or book story interspersed with play.

I believe we can do that either through lowering the language of the story (Shadow of the Colossus/HL1) or by raising the language of the interaction (EVE Online/HL2) - either is spectacularly effective.

So in some ways I agree with the article: while reading the books is contradictory to our purpose, once we're over that hurdle language and gameplay are almost synonymous inside the player's head.

[bean19]

This is about integrating story with gameplay, not simply creating a good story.

Not true. It is about using good story-telling techniques, and I think that while integration as in Half-Life does a lot towards creating immersion. This doesn't mean that this is the one and only true technique for good story-telling in games.

[Shifteh]

yet, he chooses his ideal method to be text boxes that the player can read at their leisure. . . that are completely independent from the character's personal experience and hold no hint of danger or importance to the player. . .

He may not say it, but what about Deus Ex? Main plot is given in 3rd person cutscenes, but extra plot is everywhere - ad's, newspapers, books, overheard conversations, etc, etc.

I have to say though, Ive never understood the belief that Half-Life 1 was some sort of great storytelling marvel. Honestly, other than "ZOMG EXCAPE TEH ALIEMS!!!11" what story is there? G-man is mysterious, what's his motive, ooohhhhhhh! *ghost sounds*

PS - They actually have schools now that teach degrees in game design.
*hands up* Have one :)

[bean19]

I have to say though, Ive never understood the belief that Half-Life 1 was some sort of great storytelling marvel. Honestly, other than "ZOMG EXCAPE TEH ALIEMS!!!11" what story is there? G-man is mysterious, what's his motive, ooohhhhhhh! *ghost sounds*

Okay, well it is being sited as a great example of a game being good at story-TELLING techniques. . . which is not necessarily the same as story.

Honestly, though the game is amazing in it's exposition, the story is fairly simple. You are Gordon Freeman, a scientist working in a high security laboratory called Black Mesa. You perform an experiment, and things start to go very wrong. . . the resolution is not only in survival, but in seeing how that plot develops and all of the little plot points that continuously spice up the story.

[Pretzel]

I have to say though, Ive never understood the belief that Half-Life 1 was some sort of great storytelling marvel. Honestly, other than "ZOMG EXCAPE TEH ALIEMS!!!11" what story is there? G-man is mysterious, what's his motive, ooohhhhhhh! *ghost sounds*

Don't confuse the story itself with the techniques they use to tell the story. Yeah, the story is as derivative as any other shooter of the time, but how you were introduced to the story is completely different from what anyone was doing at the time.

Most games from that era started you out by reading a big setup story, or showing a CG cutscene, and then drop you down in the action.

HL1 starts you out with zero info (aside from a couple of lines of text that appear on the screen during the train ride to give you your name and occupation) and the player (though constrained) experiences the set up of the story. In fact, the first 20 minutes or so before the actual premise of the story actually occurs--that aliens have teleported to earth and art causing havoc.

And even after that, little bits of the premis are still doled out to you through situations in the gameplay:

- monsters are killing people throughout Black Mesa
- some people are fighting back
- the military has been called in and are not helping people, but killing them
- a mysterious man in a suit who was somehow involved in the experiment is observing things, but not (apparently) helping

These things are all doled out over time while the player is always directly controlling Freeman. You're never taken out into 3rd person or shown a cutscene. Very little dialog is used to advance the story. HL1 was a definite shifting point for how games revealed their story. It has nothing to do with what the story itself was, but with how the story was presented.

[Wombat]

Just to nitpick, there is a cutscene in Half-Life. Although it's not in first person, control is completely taken from you. It's when you're captured.

[Varsity]

Control is taken from Gordon too, so that's hardly an issue.

[Stormwatcher]

Wow, this is a good thread.
I agree with two things:
1) HL series offers what is probably the most sophisticated *Storytelling* in all of gaming. that doesn't mean that it has the best *story* or plot. I personally like it a lot, but YMMV.
2) the SystemShock/Oblivion/ultima school of storytelling is also another good option. IF the player wants to know more about what's going on, he can read all those books. otherwise, he can just move on and kill more stuff.

Cutscenes are a passable way of telling stories in games, and in few instances, like the very short ones in Shadow of the Colossus, it works out as well as the above examples. But I really HATE the JRPG school of storytelling. It is masturbation. It is broken. the scenes themselves are usually good and often awesome, but that is LAZY storytelling.

[bean19]

Cutscenes are a passable way of telling stories in games, and in few instances, like the very short ones in Shadow of the Colossus, it works out as well as the above examples. But I really HATE the JRPG school of storytelling. It is masturbation. It is broken. the scenes themselves are usually good and often awesome, but that is LAZY storytelling.

Okay, people shit on cutscenes all the time, but there are a LOT of games with good or even great stories that tell their narrative (or portions of it) through cut-scenes.

F.E.A.R. - There were brief portions of the game where it makes sense to take control away from the player and have things happen, but their story-telling was still excellent. For instance, you are a psychic (of sorts) and occassionally you have flashbacks from your interactions with certain creepy what-nots. While Max Payne experimented with going inside people's heads, this is not always ideal.

Max Payne - Uses cut-scenes as well as comic book page stills with voice-acting. Both of these games have incredible stories that are entertaining to watch (the first time). . . honestly, I would have preferred ALL cut-scenes to the stills - the game had the feeling of a pulp noire comic - putting some of the story-bits in them instead of placing them in-game sort of took me out of the world. Suddenly, I had it slammed in my face that these were all melodramatic noir characters even though the world that I played in had suceeded in immersing me. I was willing to suspend my disbelief until they got artsy on me.

Psychonauts, Prince of Persia, Zelda, Final Fantasy, Resident Evil, Kingdom Hearts. . . heck - name a game that people say has a good story and 95% of the time it will be a game with cut scenes.

I think there are lessons to be learned from Half-Life. . . like telling as much of your story as possible during the gameplay. This can include plot points like having to find the milkman (Psychonauts), or finding radio transmissions from your home planet while trapped inside an alien harvesting ship (Prey).

However, I think that cut-scenes have their place in telling a game's story. The secret seems to be to try to limit cut-scenes to things that would be very difficult to show or do in the game engine, but are really amazing, and needed - and to tell as much story as possible while in the game's levels.

[Spigot]

Okay, people shit on cutscenes all the time, but there are a LOT of games with good or even great stories that tell their narrative (or portions of it) through cut-scenes.

I think there are lessons to be learned from Half-Life. . . like telling as much of your story as possible during the gameplay. This can include plot points like having to find the milkman (Psychonauts), or finding radio transmissions from your home planet while trapped inside an alien harvesting ship (Prey).

However, I think that cut-scenes have their place in telling a game's story. The secret seems to be to try to limit cut-scenes to things that would be very difficult to show or do in the game engine, but are really amazing, and needed - and to tell as much story as possible while in the game's levels.
What he said.

Cutscenes aren't inherently evil. Long, drawn out, BORING cutscenes are. Sure, some people just loathe these mini-movies, but many others (myself included) look forward to them as rewards for getting through a stage of gameplay and because they're just so darn pretty these days :)

Ingame cutscenes are getting better at keeping the sense of immersion complete, be it by having your character wearing the same armour in the cutscene as during the rest of gameplay or by showing what kind of destruction your trip has wrought on the environment in the game. Does Half-Life do a great job of telling its story by never taking you out of Gordon's perspective? Sure! Is that the only viable way to tell the story? No. And frankly, like most other things in life, if you don't like the style of a certain game's storytelling, by all means, DON'T PLAY IT!

[bean19]

Btw, we've focused on cut-scenes and the format for telling the story a lot here. That's really important and interesting, but there is a more artsy side to this topic that we are pretty much ignoring: characterization.

A game writer can make the most interesting characters in theory, but if they are not communicated well to the end user because the artists suck (Akira Toriyama) or the voice-actors suck (BloodRayne 2), or the animations for the characters suck, etc. then people are not going to connect with the character and no matter how good the story is, they aren't going to be interested.

Really fantastic examples of doing this RIGHT are Psychonauts and Fahrenheit (forget it's US name, though that was the version I played - Anyway, I know it's story went completely in the crapper near the end when you start finding things out, but they did voice-act the game well and do great animations so that I felt a real connection to the three playable characters. . . I cared about their problems. . . until they got so absurd that I didn't buy it anymore, but I still LIKED the characters even then).

Oh. . . Metal Gear. You even grow to like the bad guys in these games because Hideo is so masterful at making them cool and interesting.

Negative examples. . . gosh, bad characters are so forgetable. What was that Xbox game with 4-man co-op that was so terrible. . . (had to call a friend) Brute Force. Horrible game, but aside from the gameplay I also didn't give a shit about any of the characters. They had all of these trailers about each character's specialty and the importance of working with your squad together in videos for the game, and then when you play it there is very little character development and all of the characters are extremely one-dimensional cliches.

[Spigot]

A game writer can make the most interesting characters in theory, but if they are not communicated well to the end user because the artists suck (Akira Toriyama)
HEY!

Back up the truck a bit there. While I LOATHE Toriyama's DBZ stuff, Dragon Quest VII and VIII (especially VIII) were great games and the world just popped with the awesome cell shading in DQ8.

And this is also the guy who did the character design in my most favouritest game of all time, Chrono Trigger. I'm playing through it again at the moment and think that it has amazing design.

[bean19]

HEY!

Back up the truck a bit there. While I LOATHE Toriyama's DBZ stuff, Dragon Quest VII and VIII (especially VIII) were great games and the world just popped with the awesome cell shading in DQ8.

And this is also the guy who did the character design in my most favouritest game of all time, Chrono Trigger. I'm playing through it again at the moment and think that it has amazing design.

Chrono Trigger - Yes. His art works VERY well in the 8-bit world. I loved the character art in ChronoTrigger also. . . but I thought the deformity there was so that the over-large faces could better show expression. In newer games, it just looks like you are playing with weird dolls that have absurdly high foreheads.

Dragon Quest VIII - I didn't HATE the character art in this game. . . but the cel-shading is what saved it. The technique applies very well to RPGs, and I hope to see it used again.

Actuall, I take that back. The insanely high foreheads on the main characters, the monster art that we've seen before in DBZ, the freaking arena master with his bullshit mustaches that we've also seen before. . . DQ VIII for me was enjoyed by shifting my focus away from the art and trying to forgive it.

Most over-rated artist. EVER.

I know. Other people's mileage definitely varies from mine, but I just can't stand this artist.

[OUX]

Most over-rated artist. EVER.

I know. Other people's mileage definitely varies from mine, but I just can't stand this artist.


Agreed he ruined DQ 8 for me, it was like playing DBZ with a sword. The exact same charcters bothered me more than a lot but I pushed through until that is a tensed up enough to go Super Sayian, I promptly threw the gamepad spit on the box and chucked the disc.......no regrets.