16th November 2004, 1:00 PM
Quote:It would never be good as it is if it were a book or movie or tv series.
Maybe not straight as it is, but it'd make a fine book if it was expanded on some.
Quote:I was referring to you saying that books can be duplicated in games just as easily and effectively as movies.
But my main statement was that both are better when adapted and not taken straight... maybe games can be more directly closer to movies most of the time, but if you look at some genres you see strong influences by books as well. For something like MGS obviously the movie influence is very strong, and maybe there aren't games quite as strongly tied to books, but I've mentioned a few that are somewhat close and anyway overall MGS probably is not the future of gaming. Too non-interactive.
Quote:And they're talking mainly from a gameplay perspective. Grim Fandango sets itself apart from all of those other adventure games because of how extremely well it tells a story, and does so only like a game could. Sam and Max and Indy are terrific games, and I never said anything bad about them (according to you if I say that pumpkin pie is my favorite pie that means that I despise apple pie... great logic!), but Grim Fandango rise far above all of them on an artistic and narrative level.
They are different, but about equal in the effectiveness of doing what they set out to do. Sam & Max tries to be a comic book-inspired game. It succeeds brilliantly. Indy Fate tries to be like a new Indy movie. Again, it succeeds brilliantly. And Grim Fandango tries to be film noir. I guess the difference there is that the thing Grim is trying to be is a more complex thing, but that should not take much away from the effectiveness of the other games at succeeding at doing what they set out to do...
Quote:Where have I even mentioned Lucasarts' other adventure games in this discussion? I said that Grim Fandango is above the heap, not that it's only good because everything else is crap. You have a very strange way of looking at things.
It seemed like you were trying to say that Grim was head and shoulders above the rest and that the other LA adventure games were irrelevant and when I tried to mention them you dismissively said that Grim was way better. You seem to retreat a bit from that in this post, which is good... I was just trying to make the point that if you talk about how well Grim does things you have to talk about LA's style in general because of how consistent it is, despite differences between games.
Quote:Yes, I'm sure they did. But that's not enough any more.
First, we are not talking about high literature. We are talking about fantasy literature. Now, I love to read fantasy books, but I'll certainly admit that they generally don't try to be great literature. And I'd say that BG is a perfectly good fantasy work, the equal of most of the books in that class. I will also say that expectations for the majority of these games to go far beyond that is a false hope because in the majority people aren't as intrested in that. Simple stories are popular because not everyone appreciates complexity. This is why Planescape: Torment failed relative to Baldur's Gate: BG is comfortable for fantasy fans. It's about what you'd expect from fantasy. Torment is not. It does more, and tries very deliberately to be different. And for this, it did not sell anywhere nearly as well at retail and did not get even a spiritual successor.
Quote:Ah-HA! This is precisely what I was talking about. You, and most gamers out there, always use the excuse "they're just games, not literary pieces of art" whenever someone criticizes the poor form of current story-telling methods in games. People like you are so content in your current opinions of video games that you refuse to let the medium grow as a legitimate form of art. You may deny that but that's precisely what you do. Like Tim Rogers wrote in his essay about Metal Gear Solid 2's themes, people like you defend games and want your friends and family to take them more seriously, but at the same time don't want to let the medium grow into an actual respectable art form, and don't want to look at the problems with games today. The current way game stories are told is not going to legitimize the medium, and there are reasons for that aside from "mainstream is dumb". You can choose to continue to be thick-headed or you can choose to open your eyes and realize these facts. Knowing you, however, gives me very little hope in that respect.
See my previous response. Then... what is this ideal that games should try to match? Where do things so far outclass them? It is not among many of the direct influences from other media formats into games, that's for sure -- comic book games aren't hugely less intelligent than the comic books overall, action-movie games the same, general fantasy games too... sci-fi? Games may be behind for hard sci-fi, but there are some pretty good sci-fi titles out there. But maybe hard sci-fi is something games should explore more...
I guess where the difference is is that games have less of the top layer -- the ones that do make you think more. There are some movies and books like that, but there are fewer games. However, you are making sweeping statements about games being behind that aren't really accurate when you look at most of the material that is popular in the movie or book worlds and that games would be taking as their influences.
Still. Could games use more games that go beyond? We have some, but not as large a percent as in other media formats that must be admitted... so yes, they should. But that won't happen until those games start selling well, and that is often just not really the case! At best the ones I can think that come even close of sell decently; often it is worse. (see Torment, primarially, though stuff like The Longest Journey would also qualify... I'd mention Ico, but I have no idea how that sold...)
MGS2? They caught people on the action and the predecessors which were different, so that's a special case. And people disliked it, as you have said, and didn't understand.
Quote:That's a pity. Some of the greatest movies ever made are Westerns. If you've never seen a Sergio Leone or John Ford movie before you haven't seen a true Western.
*shrugs indifferently*
Quote:I've already explained myself. Dozens of times. I've explained how reading scrolls and having conversations with townspeople are not good, effective ways of narration and that if you bring these games up to the standards of other story-telling mediums like books and movies, they would be laughed at and never be taken seriously. There are few video games that have actually been able to tell stories very effectively, among the best being MGS2 and ICO, though they approach story-telling in very different ways. I've explained in detail how each game has shattered video game conventions and raised them up to a level where they could actually be compared to respectable books and movies, and that they are the future of gaming. ICO is the best example, as it tells a story so perfectly and in a way that only a video game could do. And there are only a couple of lines of understandable dialogue in the entire game. The story is told through visuals and emotion, something that you have to play to understand. It's easily the most moving game I have ever played.
I can't understand anything wrong with telling your story in the majority thorough conversation. It's a very standard way of storytelling in movies and books, so of course it should translate over to games! This complaint of yours is quite mystifying to me... BG tells its story just as well as anything in the category of books that it's trying to copy. Is that the most intelligent kind of books? As I have said, no. But I at least enjoy reading them, so playing a game that acts out the same way is great. It's almost as close as you can get to D&D in a game... or at least it was when it came out. BGII of course eclipsed BGI is almost every single way.