Landfish, et al...
You have unfortunately proved my fears right.
You are all story gamers.

Every post you guys make has "story" plastered all over it.

"Wouldn''t Quake have been a better game if it had a better story?"
No, it would have been a different game. The story doesn''t interest me in Quake. The guns and my multiplayer opponents interest me. The layouts of the levels interest me. Bugger the story, it''s completely superfluous. I don''t want any effort wasted on it.

What bothers me is those games that play like shit because they supposedly emphasise story. Seventh Guest.
Possibly FF. I have never played it.
Is it a great game ''cause one of the characters dies? Could you stop it? If you couldn''t, it was a great STORY because the character died, not a game.

Now, you guys will not see the point, because you hate games with no story. That''s your fullest right to do, but it is limiting you as game designers.

Some of the best games ever:
Tetris. Sim City. Railroad Tycoon.

Stories? Where?

QuakeIII.
Diablo ( don''t you go arguing, you''ve constantly said it completely lacks depth. )

The three-liner stories work because they are not interactive, and not restrictive so as to bother you while you play the game.
You never get "but, I don''t want THAT to happen in the story" because there''s nothing to change in the story.
Wolfenstein: Your BJ Blaskowitz and you have to escape from a Nazi Prison Camp. That''s the ENTIRE story. The long version at that. It never gets in the way.

Let me put it this way:
if you make the story central in the game, you better have a DAMNED good way of influencing it, or it''s just FLUFF.



Give me one more medicated peaceful moment.
~ (V)^|) |<é!t|-| ~
ERROR: Your beta-version of Life1.0 has expired. Please upgrade to the full version. All important social functions will be disabled from now on.

I think if I were to summarize the revaltion that you have brought, MadKeith, is that the what''s the important part and what''s the fluff of any game varies from game to game. You can''t have one all-inclusive aspect that is "fluff" and one that is "the meat of the game".

Let me say this: I like quake, I liked Duke Nukem and Shadow Warrior. NO story, but I liked them, and played all of them for hours. However, my point is, is that I liked Halflife and Theif MORE. I could really get into these games, and it made the whole experience better. Call it fluff, but if it makes the game better, I think that should catch our attention.

I''ll admit, I am the guy reading the manual of Tekken #, trying to learn the background story of the fighters that intrest me. But that doesn''t mean I don''t hate games with no story. God, I played Doom 2 more than I''ve played any other FPS, including the above mentioned. And yes, Keith, it bothers the HELL out of me when a game is supposed to be story based (RPGs) and don''t deliver. I feel like using it for a coaster when I''m done. I also like (and am currently playing) SimCity 3k, Master of Orion 2, and Diablo 2. Diablo 2 is the only one of these games that comes close to having a story (I said comes close ), but I still like them. Thinking that games would be better with story doesn''t limit me in any way, as I can make pong just as easily as full blown story game. In a sense, I guess my opinion is an elaboration on your own summary:

Don''t make the story in the game fluff.

-------------------------------------------
"What's the story with your face, son?!?"

I realized that what we are talking about here is not novel; however, it seems like it to me because I never thought of it quite like this.

Landfish, I, and many of us have said before that the reason why we say Quake is a good game even without much story depth is because the designers didn''t try to pretend that it did have story. What we meant was that they made the running around shooting monsters using many different weapons the core of the gameplay.

Landfish has also said before that you have to have a central concept, and then make sure that everything else supports that concept. The central concept is the gameplay, and the "everything else that supports it" is the so-called "fluff".

We''ve been saying this all along in some form or another, but, for me, it just finally all came together in my think brain





"NPC's are people too!" --dwarfsoft

"`Nazrix is cool.' --Nazrix" --Darkmage

I think maybe this is something that could be related to the death of adventure games, they attempted to carry the game along with a linear story, which was apparently an interactive experience. This interactive experiences was the game part of it where you ran around trying to solve a particular "puzzle" (more like a case of hide and seek).

There was no action to focus on, no realy gameplay, just a series of decisions made by the designer which lead the player through the story, having approximately the same effect as a book.

Now with the large amounts of data that can be processed I think this idea can be taken the step further that it really needed, and that is the player makes the decisions about where the character goes even if these paths are more or less pre-defined as long as there are multiple-well-written paths to take.

quote: Original post by Maitrek

There was no action to focus on, no realy gameplay, just a series of decisions made by the designer which lead the player through the story, having approximately the same effect as a book.

Yes, except the worst part (for me) was that playing an excellent adventure game with a great story was maddening when you couldn''t solve the puzzle. It was like reading your favorite book, only to have someone rip it out of your hands and demand that you solve a maze or crossword puzzle. Even when the puzzles completely fit with the plot, there was seemingly no way for the developer to give you interactivity once you''d gotten stuck.



--------------------
Just waiting for the mothership...

Landfish, I wanted to say I really respect you for posting your viewpoint on this matter. I''m a writer who is just getting into game programming and every time I play a badly written game, I want to tear my hair out. There are so many writers here in Hollywood that we could spare a few for the gaming industry ... if the industry would only make room for us! I am only just now applying for a job in the game industry, but already my writing hand is twitching in anxiety because I am afraid I won''t want to keep the job if it requires me to work on a badly written game (I will forgive it the ill writing if it somehow manages to still be fun).

Writers get a lot of flack from non-writers. Rather like programmers get, "Only immature geeks would make juvenile computer games for a living," writers often get, "Hey, writing is easy -- I could do it in my sleep. I don''t see why you should get paid to do that!" Writers often don''t get taken seriously by non-writers, and often it is assumed that what they do is "pointless" or even "easy". But writing is not pointless, and it is definitely not easy.

There is a reason why there is only one Shakespeare.

Or one John Carmack.

Next time you work on a project, insist that a professional writer (with published work) be used for the storyline. If you don''t have the power to insist, at least voice your objection when they hire the guy who was DM for a year in high school. No matter how enthusiastic you are, or how good your ideas seem, if you don''t know C from C++, you shouldn''t be lead programmer. And if you don''t know second person from third person point of view, you shouldn''t be the game''s writer.

girl in a box sez------>And if you don't know second person from third person point of view, you shouldn't be the game's writer.<------

You know, that makes me think of something bearing very little relation to what you've said. (sorry)

That is one problem w/ computer game writing I'd never thought of: narrative POV.

Should you use first person? Sometimes its hard to get the point across using first person. Plus, it does have an effect (good or bad, depending on what you're going for) completely different in computer games than in print. Rather than drawing a player in, as it would a reader, it distances the player somewhat because the player's avatar is establishing his own independant existence through the word "I". So first person's not good for games involving a party, or games in which the player is supposed to feel he/she is the character.

Second person is just clumsy. Text adventures proved that. I always had the feeling in Infocom games that I was a blind person being led around by someone explaining everything to me. "You see an antique dresser. There is a blue vase on top of the dressers, in good condition. . ."etc.

Third person would be good for an "epic" feel, but it would really destroy immersion. (could be good if you wanted the player to feel they are creating a story, tho')

That's an odd thing to mention, and a good example of the different perspective a traditional writer would bring to the table in game design discussions. Also, if you would agree w/ me when I say that the game's story should be told through the game itself and not through cut-scenes and external narration, it makes you think of what kind of writers you're looking for.

I would venture to say that Joe Novelist could not write an effective game plot without some guidance. The demands of game writing seem more suited to script writers, but even then, the medium is so different that you couldn't just pull in a Hollywood script writer, either, and expect to get it "just right". Which in turn is an effective argument for dedicated game writers, even if they are outsourced from another agency. Huh. Interesting.

If you see the Buddha on the road, Kill Him. -apocryphal

Edited by - Anonymous Poster. on September 9, 2000 9:03:22 PM

I agree with this, but there is one more problem: A lot of good games (Homeworld, Descent) are made by new developers, who then go off to make their share of boring sequels and clones, and become normal developers. So all the game industry cares about is making better graphics, and the new developers, or just people with an idea, need to find programmers to make a good engine if they want to make a good commercial game. What we need is for more engines that are easier to license, so the people with the real original ideas can get a good engine and code their game with one programmer, instead of spending a lot of money and getting a whole team of programmers.

quote: Original post by girl in the box

Writers get a lot of flack from non-writers. Rather like programmers get, "Only immature geeks would make juvenile computer games for a living," writers often get, "Hey, writing is easy -- I could do it in my sleep. I don''t see why you should get paid to do that!" Writers often don''t get taken seriously by non-writers, and often it is assumed that what they do is "pointless" or even "easy". But writing is not pointless, and it is definitely not easy.

At least I (a programmer) definitely respect writers, because I know how hard it is to write a good story. I have written a few poems, but never a good story because I can''t even think of a basic idea for one. I consider myself better than average (what''s average?) writer, though I would never be able to write a book. I prefer poems and short stories.

quote: Next time you work on a project, insist that a professional writer (with published work) be used for the storyline.

One point: if the entire team consists of amateurs, why should the writer be professional?

We are working on a strategy game, and our team has two writers. Both are also designers and the other also a 3D modeler. I''m also a designer, but not a writer.

-Jussi