31st March 2005, 11:13 PM
Quote:They spelled it "Shafer" in that article.
I looked at the article, we're both wrong. :)
Quote: Tim Schafer
Quote:Great rebuttal.
Haven't we covered just about every possible element of that arguement already?
Quote:Lazy, I know what you're saying and where you're coming from, but you have to admit that you're looking at this from a film perspective. Games are not movies, like you said. Because of that, stories in games should not be bound by the same rules that dictate films and even books. If you want a game with a captivating story that is told in a very uniquely game-like way, play ICO.
As I said before, game designers are still trying to figure out how to tell stories in games. Because of the constantly changing possibilities and restrictions of the medium, it is going to take a while before gamemakers truly figure out great ways to tell stories in this medium. There are already some examples of great storytelling in games, but the percentage is so small and it's still not quite standard-perfect, so you just have to give the designers some time. It is ridiculous to claim that videogames are inherently poor storytelling mediums simply because nobody has figured out the perfect method just yet.
Yeah... games are not films. But OB1, what is the best model, then? How should games be done that is not like film and that you like? You're clear on disliking any idea I have, but I'm not so sure about what you want...
Quote:OB1 I agree with you completely, but I think ytou misunderstood me, video games cannot be movies and should not try to be (we agree with that), story telling in video games will always be krap if they try to emulate actual story telling (using the traditional guidelines), video games call for a new breed of story telling and the only people doing that in my opinion are the devs who design gameplay mechanics that are fun and then throw a story over it as long as it doesn't get in the way of the game. Mario 64 is the most pure example of it.
As I said to OB1, if you think that, either you haven't played many games with great stories, or you dislike the presentation and translate that over to disliking the whole story... because it's unquestionable that some games have had great stories. As great as the best films? Perhaps not. But games are a lot younger than films are.
Quote:FF6 does not have a good story, it is trite 'save the world' backyard mythology with an inate hero fighting inate evil with no character driven plot. You walk around and get in fights to boost your stats so you can fight more difficult enemies and progress through the game in that way, occasionally having bits of story thrown at you that seem more random than crafted. The entire story element is built around the idea of exploring strange new worlds and dealing with circumstances and conflicts within each new area, in essense a collection of tiny stories to make one large one. RPG's (and most video games in general) have to be designed around that otherwise it gets boring. Unfortunately it's that sub-plot after sub-plot that makes the entire story trite sense those sub-plots aren't even that good to begin with because they were built around the idea of gameplay which in an RPG is building stats and strategically fighting enemies with a team of extremes.
Games have to be dramatically longer than films. Thus, you cannot do as straightforward a story as you can in a film (focusing just on one thing), because you've got to spread it out over a lot more time... so either you add more complexity, sidequests, plot twists, whatever, or you make it have a very thin story with lots of time in between each story part. Complaining about RPGs having too many sidequests seems silly to me... given the length of a game, you couldn't really make just the main quest good enough to fill up so much time! Games aren't movies...
Quote:A fighting type person, a healing type person, a person who only uses long-range weapons, a defensive person, etc. Each one comes from a different town and has an extreme personality to go with their extreme visage. The fighter is overly heroic with a strong body and mad sword skills, the healer is usually a cute woman with a weak body against attacks and so on. They do this so it's more fun to play the game.
The more true this is the more standard it is... and yes, most games like to use stereotypical characters. I wouldn't say they do it because it's more fun... not all game conventions are there because they're more fun. They're mostly there, I think, because of either just so much time is behind them that they're hard to change or because the designers don't want to spend the time and effort to come up with something more interesting... and yes, maybe because they know the gamers will expect certain stereotypes from the characters.
Quote:But this is krap story telling, this is comic book-writen by a 12 year old-bullshit story telling where there's no guidelines, it simply happens because "It's cool". Your progress is blocked and you cant reach the next town, you must accomplish these goals and defeat this enemy. The enemy is a horrible one-eyed tentacle monster that lives in the north cave and eats puppies (unlike the last town that had a horrible one-eyed tentacle monster that eats ham), however in this fight you will have the added features of your new magic skills and a new character on your team. Okay, did you learn your lesson? Good, you are now set up for the next major boss battle you may progress to the next town or area.
The primary goal of a game is to be fun. If this is best achieved by using stereotypes and stories or sidequests you've seen many times before, so be it... sure, that makes those parts of those games less innovative and perhaps less interesting story-wise, but still... the point of a game is to be fun. Stereotypical situations aren't necessarially less fun than innovative ones.
And I really do think you ignore the fact that there definitely are games out there that are innovative and different in their stories and their story-telling... not everything is as formulaic as you say.
Quote:Silent Hill has an awesome story that fits well with gameplay. It has hidden meanings and subtextual design, a 3 act paradigm, an already existing character that evolves through trial. A hook, an expo, and a resolution. All of it scoped in to a web of complimenting sub-plots, characters and scenary that are based on the STORY not the main character. This is the first mistake most video games make with their story design. Yes, i'm going to play as this character for the entire game but the story doesn't have to revolve around him; You need antagonists to cause change to the CHARACTER, that's what story telling is! In FF6 there are no antagonists, just monsters that you go find and pick fights with because they're eating the children or poisoning the water, you're playing as the antagonist; You're the one causing the change and that my friends is bad story telling but excellent game design.
If you weren't the antagonist, you wouldn't have a video game. You'd sit around waiting for something to happen to you. YOU have to go find the conflict and cause change in the characters and environment around you.
With most kinds of game design, it's kind of hard to not have the main character be proactive about wanting to discover things, or move on, or defeat evil, or whatever... some games do do that (more often in text/graphic adventure games (since the prototypical adventure game character is "the normal person"), I'd definitely say), but in most of the other genres... yeah, not too often.
Still, you bring up an interesting question. Perhaps more games could be designed without the main character being an protagonist, but it'd be a lot harder... but yes, they could try. Take Tales of Symphonia -- did it really need a "main character"? I'm not so sure... and Lloyd is annoying. :D