Story and Games

[OB1]

Then why do your main complaints about BG, or Torment, or whatever, seem to be about things that they couldn't help, and that are inherent to 2d games -- static conversations (this is just a fact of life in gaming, OB1, and not one that bothers me too much. Honestly, it bothers me more in a KotOR than a Baldur's Gate... KotOR looks like it SHOULD have something like that, but fails, while BG doesn't (look that way), and doesn't (have it), so it's not missing. BG compensates with well done text that conveys some personality and emotion, I'd say... though the first one is far from perfect, as I've said many times before. But hey, that's why you make sequels, to improve on things, and they did...), lack of graphical displays of emotions, the "boredom" of reading lots of text (you obviously think this a much greater problem than I do.), etc... none of those are things the BG engine could have done better! Or should have done better. It's a fantastic strategic 2d engine and I wouldn't want it any other way.

As I've said, Torment improves on BG by having larger graphics (the characters, etc. are bigger on the screen than in BG), many more clickable-description-areas (click on the slabs in the mortuary and you get various interesting descriptive messages), more text to read (fleshing out the NPCs with more to say so they can establish a style and more detail so you can learn more if you want), and just plain better writing... well, not to mention a better story. BG's is admittedly somewhat cliche. BGII/ToB is better, and is intersting, but it's still standard fantasy stuff... and if there's one thing Torment is not, it's standard fantasy stuff.

The 'imagination' thing is, admittedly, most true for text-based adventure games, not Baldur's Gate. But there is truth to it in a BG as well... not as much as for a Zork or Planetfall, but truth.

That's really, really lame. I could then say that the crappy apple pie that grandma made was actually great because I used my imagination and imagined it as not being crappy.

Static characters with lifeless dialogue boxes scrolling over their heads is a terrible way of telling a story. I've explained in great depth many times in the past why that is, and will not continue any further.




And lazy, saying that game designers can't be good storytellers is about as dumb as someone saying in the 30's that a filmmaker cannot be a good storyteller either, that they can only be a good photographer and editor. The medium is slowly becoming a better storytelling medium, and as long as this continues different kinds of people will want to make games, people who can tell good stories. There are already a number of game designers that can tell a good story. That Finnish guy (I can never spell that name), Hideo Kojima, Tim Shafer, and Fumito Ueda just to name a few. I agree that most games have shit stories and that there has yet to be a video game equivalent of Casablanca or Gone With the Wind, but I believe that that time is fast approaching.

There's nothing contradictory about saying that running around for hours in Mario 64 is more fun than playing through Grim Fandango or whatever. Of course it's more fun. Just as any Buster Keaton movie is more fun to watch than Citizen Kane. But there's a place, and an audience, for both types of games.