One of the most important parts of a game is the storyline imo. Its what makes me wanna play to the end, makes me wanna turn that corner to see whats there. So lets talk about game story theory. What makes a good story? When is it that you have gone to far? Assests that should go into every story? A good game story that you know of? Snarkpit wants to here it.

That'd be your cue riven. :biggrin:

Actrully this good be a pretty good thread.

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Aaron's Stuff

This isn't a subject limited to games.

Writing quirks follow more an ideology than a theory. Since, a theory is a fairly commonly accepted "solution" for some problem ... that doesn't really apply to writing ... and there's no need to make "creating a plot" sound more important, because it's really just not related.

In any case.

Most stories, of any kind follow structured acts, through the acts, a journey is conveyed. Most things now are in a three act structure, and I'm sure you know what each act represents. But, you can have many acts, in Greece (and all thems ancient places) they held plays that lasted days, like 12 act plays. It would be part of some sort of festival (think about epics like Oedipus Rex)

Anyway, any good story is about balance. It's a theme of balance that makes a story stand on it's feet. You have balance of the three acts, rise, climax, fall. There's antagonists and protagonists. In many stories, not both roles are played by a person. (An adversary could be a natural disaster, for example).

There are entire fields of research and study on this topic. In lower education, you have nearly unlimited access to advice on how to write, especially when concerning stories. Take advantage of school faculty and libraries if you want to know how to write and plan better.

Anything can be a good story as long as the structure is there. As for making it a fun game, that is something completely different.

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Blame it on Microsoft, God does.

Video game stories need explosions.

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o

Good stories have good pacing. If you throw too much at the player in one sitting then you'll have them thinking your watching a movie aka: Metal Gear Solid 2, and even Halo 2 in a few cases. But you don't feed the player enough story then you have them wondering what the hell your doing there in the first place. I can't really tell you any games that have done this, but I guess I could say that games without stories fall from this (Ghost Recon you don't know why your ever there in the first place shooting terrorists).

So yeah its all about balance and feeing it to the player in a timely manner. This is why the final fantasy series is so good, square knows how to pace them selves and deliver a story in a balanced way (no crono I don't want to get into the 'corporatsized' square eunix). To give you an example arron, halo 1 did this well. The only movies really were of you being inserted into the level, no fancy dramatic scenes with the main characters, and you were enveloped in the story as you were moved through the level in FP mode. Halo 2 however took it to another level and gave you 5 mins of video at the beginning and end of every level (essentially 10 min between every level transition), as well as breaking up the game play with their videos, when I just wanna f**king shoot something, not watch the master chief doing 'cool' stuff.

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Posting And You

Final Fantasy X is THE "playable movie", even MGS2 had less cinematic interruptions.

If the story you're telling isn't exposition and it's more "action" (as in, happening in real-time and not just told to the player) then you will have more impact. Of course, that doesn't always work for every type of game, it works really well for action oriented games.

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Blame it on Microsoft, God does.

uh in the original Ghost Recon you are in Georgia (the country) fighting revolutionaries trying to overthrow the government and bring back communism. I know that required reading all the map briefings and such, probably too much effort :rolleyes: The missions themselves even follow the story, starting off with discovering the intentions of the 'terrorists', the UN gets booted from the country by force, the capital of Tbilisi with the US embassy comes under attack, and eventually you crush the revolution through events I no longer remember.

Cut scenes are appealing to game writers because all the tricks of film are available to them, it's an easy way out so to speak. But some certain things occur when we have cut scenes in games. Gameplay in a game is everything, the story has to work with the gameplay; afterall, were playing a game, not watching it play itself. I'm speaking about this in context mainly to fps games.

Having a cut scene does just what it says: it cuts the gameplay; it stops it. When one comes up, the player realizes that the game has gone into "story mode" and they take their hand off the mouse to passively watch.

There are several problems when stopping gameplay dead in its tracks to run a passive cut scene.

• You destroy any momentum built up in the previous gameplay section. The cut scene must re-establish momentum on its own.
• The shift in method of delivering the entertainment is jarring and serves to accentuate the differences between gameplay and storytelling, harming immersion in the entire experience,
• Players play games to ... well play! They don't want to take their fingers off the buttons. They will impatiently stab at those buttons until the cut scene is done. It's become habit with many players. What is the normal solution to this? Allow players to escape out of the cut scene and advance directly to the next level of gameplay. This may not be much loss in a game that has gven only prefunctory attention to the storytelling, but it enforces the habit, and makes it harder to use the cut scene effectively. And we should be trying to create story that is as entertaining as the game. We don't want players to click out of it.

Simply put there are less obtrusive, and more organic ways to accomplish the same thing.

I quoted that list from a book I'm currently reading titled: Character Development and Storytelling for Games (page 32) check it out!

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Blog: www.playingarchitecture.net
LinkedIn: Eric Lancon
Twitter:@Riven202

I think that for a good story, I mean really good story (not your average game story) you need lots of mystery, you need to raise lots of questions about the story and these questions can be awnsered at the end of the game or in a cool sequel, some sweet twists in the story to throw the player of balance and so its not predictable and boaring, an awsome backstory for the hard core fans to check out and just in general many cool things. A sad story/ending is always good and will be remembered. I hear Halo3 is a very dark game. One of the voice actors (Jen Tyalor) who plays Cortana and some other cool charecters (Princess Peach from Mario and some cool movies) burst out into tears after she finished doing some gioluge. Thats pretty cool.

Speaking of Halo (me heres people going "oh god here he goes") Omegaplayer said some stuff about the cut scenes from Halo 2. I thought that they where cool, they gave the player its dose of the action and then scent them back into the universe for some killing/grunting. Many people belive that cut scenes are a disturbance or are breaking the action. MAbye this is one of the factors that seperates the Half-life people from the Halo people. But imo, a well done entertaing cut scene could go one for ever, I dont care as long as I get some target practice in the end. For example: (Halo 2 warning) I would watch these if you have broadband :smile: :

Coolest ever Start of a game : http://halocinema.bungie.org/halo2/01_one_size_fits_all.wmv

Coolest ever anger/sespence build op of a boss: http://halocinema.bungie.org/halo2/30_delusions.wmv

Coolest ever cliff hanger game ending: http://halocinema.bungie.org/halo2/31_finale.wmv

Coolest ever Video game twist : http://halocinema.bungie.org/halo2/22_inside_job.wmv

Just check em out. You only live once.

<DIV class=quote>
<DIV class=quotetitle>? quoting Baron Von Snickers</DIV>
<DIV class=quotetext>Video game stories need explosions</DIV></DIV>

lol. Episode 1 reference ahy?

@ Riven: Yes riven I agree with the book and I have to so get a copy, but the 1st and 3rd quote have exeptions in my imo. I'm going to use halo as an example (snarkpit:"arr again!") because I know it really well and if I use another game, i'm at risk of not knowing what I'm talking about.

For me, Halo is not a game really, its an experience. From when I start the game till the next movie and back to the gameplay and so on... I'm in like trans. I'm totally immersed in the universe just thinking of all the possiblites like, OMG that stupid brute tataurs... or I wonder why the forerunner really built the rings? or whatever. It is still really fun and hard and a game an all, but that singleplayer, I swear totally immersive to me :eek: . Its not just about the action, its about the fear of what the possiblities are, what the covenent are stupidly going to do, whats arounf the next corner.

However I can see how these rules apply to games like Half-life seris, well actrully that ending scene for hl2, I just didn't want it to end. It was amazing. It had mystery and it had unanswerd questions, for me these are the things that make a story great. Now I'm gonna go watch those movie links I posted again for the fiftyth time .

Actrully this would seem like a good moment to reveal something/release some more imformation. Nuh I better not. Aww I'm lokking foward to that day. Oh sorry what, you where reading this. :o

edit: I forgot something because my brother was yelling in my ear the whole time: Most unexpected thing in a game: http://halocinema.bungie.org/halo2/29_backseat_driver.wmv

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Aaron's Stuff

If the story in a game is interesting, then people will most likely play your game to -- guess what? Finish the story! Just like in a novel, short story, movie, or other piece of fiction in any other media form.

I think Riven did a good job bringing up the pros and cons to cut scenes. I think, more or less, the more cut scenes you have in a game that are devoted to story, means that your game's story needs to be interesting. Like Riven said, nobody wants to suffer through long, tedious, and hard to understand cut scenes if they can't even understand the story! On the flip side though, if the story itself is intriguing and interesting, some players -- such as myself -- will find cut scenes as a reward for playing through the game. In other cases, I find cut scenes to be a nice "mental breather" from a game -- though this generally only occurs if the game I'm playing is something like Resident Evil or Silent Hill, where walking around in dark cramped areas with a sinister feel to things can eventually weigh on the player's mind.

And with cut scenes, comes a major question -- full motion video, or in game sequence? FMVs have the horrible tendency to feel like "breaks" in a game, like Riven said. The graphics are usually different, the music changes, sound quality changes, video quality usually changes, there are usually continuity errors (such as, you enter a room with a shotgun in-game, but your character shown in the FMV is weaponless) and so forth. The benefit of executing cut scenes within the game itself, is that the transition from game-to-cut scene is usually much, much smoother. Plus, because everything in the cut scene is rendered with the game's own engine, rather than being pre-rendered, things generally look a bit more "correct" so to speak.

With that being said though, a game doesn't necessarily need a story to succeed -- take for example, Doom or Quake? The story in those games could probably be summed up in a single sentence, yet they were quite possibly some of the most popular games ever -- and still are. Even Half-Life didn't seem to have much of a story -- as far as I'm concerned, HL1 is about a guy who goes to work, s**t happens, and then he has to deal with job employment all over again.

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Breaking the laws of mapping since 2003 and doing a damn fine job at it

Half-life 2 and Episode I are great examples of story-telling, at least mapping-wise.

In HL2, you start the game with the sight of the Citadel towering above. Throughout the game, you get far away from it because of other goals, but in your return to City 17, that huge building is closer and closer as you complete the game, giving you a very important sense of progress and epic journey. Eventually, you reach the Citadel and start owning the Combine and eventually Dr. Breen. You make it to the top of that building that once felt so menacing, filling the player with a sense of self-accomplishment.

In Episode I, it works the other way around. The Citadel becomes a "big bomb with a countdown", which you have to escape from. That sort of creates a conscious tension throughout the short game. It is also a constant visual reference like in HL2, and the state of the Citadel tells you more about what's going on (monsters being released, packages being sent etc).
There are basically no cutscenes in this games, and that doesn't make them any worse. On the contrary, the player immersion is never broken at all.

G.Ballblue said:
Even Half-Life didn't seem to have much of a story -- as far as I'm concerned, HL1 is about a guy who goes to work, s**t happens, and then he has to deal with job employment all over again.

Once again I must reiterate, you are dumb. There's 'no story' because there aren't any third person cutscenes or overly dramatic voice overs that explain every plot point as it happens. There's a reason HL revolutionized single player FPS and why every one released since then has tried to copy it in some way. (HINT: it's because of the story and the way its presented!)

I'm well aware that HL didn't have any cutscenes or any third person sequences -- I don't need those for a story to be told to me. Half-Life was immersive, as in, the lack of any form of cut in the game or "seqence" certainly made you feel like you were in the game.

I simply feel that Half-Life didn't have much of a story :razz: Regardless of how it was presented. I'm not arguing with you about its gameplay, which I thought was excellent in the manner it was executed :wink:

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Breaking the laws of mapping since 2003 and doing a damn fine job at it

Nobody mentioned characters so far, so I'll do.

HL2 had a lot of great ones: Kleiner, Eli, Breen, Grigori, Odessa, "The Vortigont".

And a lot that I found to be forced into the story and didn't really care for, like - behold - Alyx and Barney. I know they were supposed to be the big heroes but, while Episode 1 did a little better in this aspect, they really were nothing but gimmicks.

The cool thing about the security guard in HL1 was, that you didn't know who this guy was outside his job. In HL2 Barney is Gordon's good old friend, making references to the beer he owed ya ect ect. But, actually, he still is a stranger - which becomes terribly obvious by the time you fight along him and see that he's nothing but a game character that shoots your enemies.

Same thing goes for Alyx. Granted, E1 is better with this, but everytime the game got emotional about Alyx the scenes felt very constrained.

I think it has something to do with how well they supposedly know you, a wordless guy with a crowbar, from the very beginning.

The most powerful characters in HL2 are IMO the ones that interact with each other or treat you like a stranger, because that's much closer to how you feel about them in return. Within all this real-time, first-person action there's little room for true emotional bounds.

One of the most atmospheric moment in the game for me is when you can just barely hear a conversation between Breen and Eli about the Combine's dimension in another room.

"...carbon stars with ancient satellites colonized by sentient fungi. Gas giants inhabited by vast meteorological intelligences. Worlds stretched thin across the membranes where dimensions intersect..."

It made you realize that whatever happened on your path here was just a small, unimportant incident compared to the huge world behind. That there were people who cared about more than your heroic shootouts in the streets of City 17. It could have gone bananas if it weren't well written, but this is superb science fiction and subtle enough to not feel forced. You spend a lot of time in very narrow corridors for gameplay reasons, so moments like this are important to give the illusion of a background, things happening you never hear or see in the game. HL1 had much more little scenes like this (like the soldiers chatting about Gordon, what they knew about their job and how they seek revenge for their buddies). The world felt bigger and, yes, more mysterious. It's good to hide the fact that the player only follows a confined path with a few obstacles thrown in for the action.

If Gordon could answer, things would be different. And further away from the player... but we had the first-person vs cut scenes discussion already.

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Why snark works.

<DIV class=quote>
<DIV class=quotetitle>? quoting G.Ballblue</DIV>
<DIV class=quotetext>I'm well aware that HL didn't have any cutscenes or any third person sequences -- I don't need those for a story to be told to me. Half-Life was immersive, as in, the lack of any form of cut in the game or "seqence" certainly made you feel like you were in the game.

I simply feel that Half-Life didn't have much of a story :razz: Regardless of how it was presented. I'm not arguing with you about its gameplay, which I thought was excellent in the manner it was executed :wink: </DIV></DIV>

Apparently you DO need cutscenes and third person sequences to spell it out for you because you think that HL doesn't have much of a story.

I'm gonna make this clear for you: HL has a story, a very good one, in fact it is considered one of the first FPS ever to actually have one that is important to the game. Every level is designed with this story in mind. The fact that you don't think it has a story means yes, you need to apparently be force fed it so you'll actually understand it.

I just finished replaying HL1 a few days ago and I have a spoon, and by god I will shove it down your throat repeatedly if necessary.

I agree with G.Ballblue. I didn't think that half-life 1, not 2, 1 had much story. Almost none. Just what? Moving through Black Mesa, going to the surface, then to Lambda, the Xen. It was still cool though. And Half-life 1 DID have a cut scene or 2. Look again :biggrin: .

Also like G.Ballblue I like cutscenes. They are a nice reward for ma. However the type of cutscenes that are usally bad are the ones that a boaring and go on for ever. I dont wanna name any names but I was playing a hl2 mod where you are wathcing this ship drop of combine soilders then go back and disapper through the cliffs again. That went on for about 1 minute. Just one camera following the ship the whole time. It was a bad start to the mod, and I would have quit, but I didn't. The mod was actrully ok-ish but the start was terriable. You can loose alot of you audience if you dont make a good first impression.

And on that note, cutscenes that are not rendered with the game engine are usally crap. There are exeptions.

Anyways did anyone actrully watch those sweet video's I linked up earlyer or did I just waste ma time? :cool:

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Aaron's Stuff

<DIV class=quote>
<DIV class=quotetitle>? quoting aaron_da_killa</DIV>
<DIV class=quotetext>I agree with G.Ballblue. I didn't think that half-life 1, not 2, 1 had much story. Almost none. Just what? Moving through Black Mesa, going to the surface, then to Lambda, the Xen. It was still cool though. And Half-life 1 DID have a cut scene or 2. Look again :biggrin: .</DIV></DIV>

That's because you are a 12 year old child who thinks Halo is God's gift to mankind. Maybe your parents will let you rent the movie 'Aliens' so you can better understand the cutscenes from that jungle level where the Flood is released in Halo1 and see where the design for the dropships came from.

Almost no story... did you not pay attention? Here's Halo1's story: You are fighting the Covenant over a 'mysterious construct', you discover the Halo is a weapon that could turn the tide of the war, you release the Flood, you blow up the Halo to contain the Flood. Guy grabs the ass of a Covenant if you beat the game on Legendary. Then there's a sequel which is lame as hell cause of akimbo rifles. Did I skip over alot of the story, miss important plot points? Yes. Now realize you did the exact same thing in your post.

Perhaps if HL had five minute cutscenes of Gordon talking to himself saying "christ what have I done did I mess up the experiment? I've caused so much death and destruction" or "I gotta get to the surface and help these innocent people" or "oh no the soldiers we thought were gonna rescue us are killing us" or "oh my god the scientists knew about xen before the resonance cascade and were experimenting on them the blood of hundreds is off my hands" you might understand the story better. That is just a tiny bit of it. It doesn't work if you just stop thinking about what your doing and just go through the motions of killing whatever moves onscreen.

And the end of Apprehension is not a cutscene.

What's remarkable about HL1 is the density of events. Something completely new and unexpected happens pretty much around every corner. Very small details at times, but they sum up.

If the cut scenes in Halo 1 (which I don't know, although it seriously starts to annoy me just from reading this forum :razz: ) are a "reward" of any kind, this is a completely different approach to storytelling in games. An older (I won't say outdated, though) one.

HL1 doesn't use its story as an "reward" for anything. It's not like "beat this boss and then, as a reward, see a cut scene about the origins of Xen". That's how the game never separates the action from the story. It's totally interwoven. Not that there has never been a story about aliens beaming in from another dimension before, but the pacing is excellent. Doom 3 learned that lesson from HL1 and did pretty well IMO (using cut-scenes, btw.).

The "cut-scene reward" principle has been there for ages now. I'd try HL1's approach, if I could, because it's a more interesting way of telling a story in games.

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Why snark works.

<DIV class=quote>
<DIV class=quotetitle>? quoting reaper47</DIV>
<DIV class=quotetext>"I think it has something to do with how well they supposedly know you, a wordless guy with a crowbar, from the very beginning."</DIV></DIV>

<SPAN style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Verdana">@reaper47: Yes it would make sense that you like those other characters rather than the ones highlighted to help you out. As writers for any story, there is always that struggle with keeping the knowledge between the audience and the character(s) balanced. Sure, the audience knowing more than the character in Stranger than Fiction can be pretty entertaining, but the player knowing more than the character they control can be pretty detrimental to the illusion of the player character's life in the fiction of the world. </SPAN>



<DIV class=quote>
<DIV class=quotetitle>? quoting Lee Sheldon</DIV>
<DIV class=quotetext>"Never, ever, ever consider amnesia as a means to keep the knowledge shared by the player-character consistent. It's such a clich? that to call it a clich? is a clich?. There are plenty of other ways to tackle the sharing of knowledge between player and the character."</DIV></DIV>

You should try to keep all surprises to the player character a surprise to the player and vise versa. If you do cut to a different scene that the player character is not observing, you shouldn't reveal a lot of information. This relies heavily on Aristotle's unity of action. The only reason you would do this, is if you wanted to create suspense.

So in the case of the character supposedly knowing more than the player in HL2 is not really evident with Barney and Alyx. You the player have been in control of Gordon ever since the accident, which apparently is when you met Barney. The only relationship Gordon had with him was shared by the player, so really, he is still a stranger, and his job then is just as evident now (helping you open doors, shoot headcrabs, and owing you a beer.) So you probably don't like him because he is a little audacious, but his reactions to Gordon are also his reactions to you as the player, because you were Gordon when you both "met" back in HL1. He still has a helping hand in the story?.read on!

<SPAN style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Verdana">Alyx works the same way; she meets you for the first time in HL2 and every experience she has with Gordon, she has with the player. She is trying to get to know Gordon, like the player is trying to know her. And there is not a minute in the game where Gordon knows more about her than the player, nor where Alyx knows more about Gordon (relevant to the action). Now you're probably thinking back to some lines where she mentions the stories Eli has told her of Gordon (you) working with Eli before the incident. Well, every story needs a setting or background, and the background for Half-Life is that Gordon is a Physicist. That's why he is going to Black Mesa, That's where he knew Eli, bla bla, and so the connections are established, without the player having to make the boring small chat and lunch breaks to get to know the characters outside of the main action. So to establish Alyx as a viable character to meet and interact with Gordon, she needs to have a common ground with him: she's Eli's daughter! And to have this common ground already established makes it easier to get to the point on things, and to let the story continue to the action </SPAN>



<DIV class=quote>
<DIV class=quotetitle>? quoting reaper47</DIV>
<DIV class=quotetext>"And a lot that I found to be forced into the story and didn't really care for, like - behold - Alyx and Barney. I know they were supposed to be the big heroes but, while Episode 1 did a little better in this aspect, they really were nothing but gimmicks."</DIV></DIV>

I would have to argue that Alyx and Barney were far from gimmicks. For reasons already stated, they are the "pivotal characters" of the game. And the role of a pivotal character is to drive the action.



<DIV class=quote>
<DIV class=quotetitle>? quoting Lajos Egri</DIV>
<DIV class=quotetext>"Without a pivotal character, there is no play. The pivotal character is the one who creates conflict and makes the play move forward. The pivotal character knows what he wants. Without him the story flounders...in fact there is no story"</DIV></DIV>

<SPAN style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Verdana">

<DIV class=quote>
<DIV class=quotetitle>? quoting Lajos Egri</DIV>
<DIV class=quotetext>"A good pivotal character must have something very vital at stake. He is necessarily aggressive, uncompromising, even ruthless."</DIV></DIV></SPAN>

Remind you of anyone? We find out that Eli is trapped, and Alyx must get him back, thus your mission is at hand! Now Barney is still questionable. We have to remember that the story is not over! He may still have a bigger role to play.

How?s that for character talk? :wink:

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Blog: www.playingarchitecture.net
LinkedIn: Eric Lancon
Twitter:@Riven202

I do not really consider them "gimmicks". I just said that to get your attention (and it worked, sorry :biggrin: ).

It's just that I felt that HL2 struggled really hard with the "lone wolf" attitude of Gordon, which worked so well in HL1 for obvious reasons, and was thrown overboard in HL2 by making Gordon the big, well-known savior, rather than a new guy that came out of nowhere. Every sequel faces this problem but the jump from HL1 to HL2 was extreme. This is quite specific for the game and probably can't easily be generalized as a principle for every other FPS out there.

It's probably a simplification, but I could say that in HL1, the only and unrivaled "pivotal character" was Gordon Freeman (the player) while in HL2 Gordon had to share that honor with a handful of sidekicks. Which I didn't get to know very well because, you know, all the explosions and gunships.

I'm really not sure if classic writing techniques can be applied to interactive media so easily. I once read an interview with Will Wright who said that he doesn't believe in pre-written stories for games. That may come from the style of games he's doing but in some way it can be applied to other games as well, including FPS games. In HL1 the action was the star, in HL2 it was Alyx.

Don't look down at me for this, I believe in good stories. I believe in making the player care about his actions, setting an interesting background and a high level of immersion. But I don't like secondary characters stealing the player's show.

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Why snark works.

http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/1420/the_everyman_and_the_action_hero_.php

:smile:

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o

Other games approach the issue by defining the hero as little as humanly possible. Half Life 2 is an example of this category. Although you technically play as Gordon Freeman, it feels much more like you yourself have been sucked into Valve's beautiful, dynamic, lovingly crafted world. But in the end this hurts the story side a little ? Alex?s role as a potential love-interest feels more like the developer flirting with its fan-base than a romantic sub-plot.

ahh, cynism :biggrin:

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Why snark works.

@ Yak_Fighter- I'm actrully 15 years old and The Halo story is so much more complex and better than that. I could get into it and discuss it but I think I would die before I explain every aspect. The half-life story, while being good is actrully pretty simple with the biggest mystery being the gman and xen.

My freind highly reccomended a game called Deus Ex and burnt it and the secal for me and told me to play it. Its actrully pretty frikin sweet (the story) although being as old as half-life (i bet somones gonna quote me on that). It has a very interesting structure and I deffenetly learnt a few tricks from it that I could shove in reddawn. yeah...

Omg everyone has such good replys, one day I'll write like that.

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Aaron's Stuff

Let me highlight the most important part of my post you failed to read:

Yak_Fighter said:
Did I skip over alot of the [Halo] story, miss important plot points? Yes. Now realize you did the exact same thing in your post.

As in, I was purposefully glossing over much of Halo's story to show you how you yourself were glossing over Half-Life's story. But why am I bothering :rolleyes:

one day I'll write like that.

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o

Image macros aren't funny.

.... Baron Baron Baron.

@ Yak...- Oh sorry Yak_Fighter. I'm very sick today got a massive headache, sore everything and all. I know what you mean. But the Half-life story is a simple one. Good and simple.

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Aaron's Stuff

Well, let's see:

I think in many regards, I probably did "skim" the Half-Life story to some degree. I suppose complexity is the word I should use. Guess I can't get too more descriptive than that, on my end.

Off topic: Aaron, I fail to see why you can't write normally, now.
And Yak, cool it a bit :wink: No need to get too fueled over anything that's going on here.

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Breaking the laws of mapping since 2003 and doing a damn fine job at it

Also off topic: I write casually (if thats the write spelling), most people on snarkpit write like there emailing there boss or somethin. :razz:

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Aaron's Stuff

G.Ballblue said:
And Yak, cool it a bit :wink: No need to get too fueled over anything that's going on here.

I will murder you in your sleep.

God, where have you been?

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Blame it on Microsoft, God does.

<SPAN style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Verdana">First off, excuse me, it's Alex, not Alyx. (Sorry Valve)</SPAN>

<SPAN style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Verdana">Secondly, I did read that article; a very, very good article. I did get a lot more out of it than this, but just to lay down my view on the table:

<DIV class=quote>
<DIV class=quotetitle>? quoting Ben Schneider</DIV>
<DIV class=quotetext>"Other games approach the issue by defining the hero as little as humanly possible. Half Life 2 is an example of this category. Although you technically play as Gordon Freeman, it feels much more like you yourself have been sucked into Valve's beautiful, dynamic, lovingly crafted world. But in the end this hurts the story side a little ? Alex?s role as a potential love-interest feels more like the developer flirting with its fan-base than a romantic sub-plot."</DIV></DIV></SPAN>

<SPAN style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Verdana">Here's what I have to say about that: Because we are Gordon Freeman, every interaction we have with other characters is with us after all. If that is the case, what makes Alex's potential love interest any different? It's just like Dr. Eli's respect towards us, and Barney's cheerful attitude to see us. To claim that Alex's role is a different experience is poppyc**k. EVERY interaction with the player is like the "developer [interacting] with its fan base." The story is beyond that. I know he was just using that as an example, but personally, I believe that Valve has stumbled onto a more pure way of telling a story in a game. Yes, you are Gordon Freeman, but you have to have a name. Why not let me be So&So McGee(your name)? Well, So&So McGee isn't a physicist, Gordon Freeman is. So&So McGee isn't gonna save the world, Gordon Freeman is. So in retrospect, we realize Gordon, while being the player at the same time, still has an identity of his own that the player shares with him. So, the player now has not only a common identity with other characters, but also an identity with the main character himself. </SPAN>



<DIV class=quote>
<DIV class=quotetitle>? quoting reaper47</DIV>
<DIV class=quotetext>I'm really not sure if classic writing techniques can be applied to interactive media so easily. </DIV></DIV>
(I keep quoting you because you make some very interesting points . Don't worry, I don't have anything against you, :smile: .)

It is true that a lot of the "language" of drama and film must be juggled around with before looking at it through the lense of the electron microscope of gaming, but most of the vocabulary and techniques still apply to any game story. I'll attempt to point some out:

<SPAN style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Verdana">
[list]
[*] Every game story, as every other story, should begin with a theme. This is what will give you the end to your story, and all points in between.</SPAN>
<SPAN style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Verdana">

[*]
<DIV class=quote>
<DIV class=quotetitle>? quoting Lajos Egri in The Art of Dramatic Writing</DIV>
<DIV class=quotetext>"And it must be a premise worded so that anyone can understand it as the author intended it to be understood. An unclear premise is as bad as no premise at all."</DIV></DIV>
What Egri means here by premise is taken to mean the idea or situation that a story is based from. It would be best though to look at it to mean a theme. </SPAN>



[*] Players need to have conflict, meaning the story needs to have conflict. This is what gives the player the urge to move on.
<DIV class=quote>
<DIV class=quotetitle>? quoting Egri</DIV>
<DIV class=quotetext>"Conflict is the heartbeat of all writing. No conflict ever existed without first foreshadowing itself. Conflict is that titanic atomic energy whereby one explosion creates a chain of explosions."</DIV></DIV>



[*] Every good story needs characters; this should be pretty evident by now.


[*] All stories are susceptible to universal themes. Game stories, just like all other mediums, have the same potential to burst out of the bubble. But be weary, not all themes are universal truths. "Poverty doesn't always lead to crime." But themes like "doing bad stuff is bad" and "evil must be fought" are pretty universal.
<DIV class=quote>
<DIV class=quotetitle>? quoting Lee Sheldon</DIV>
<DIV class=quotetext>"Want to make your game stand out from the crowd? Find a theme that is less lofty, but more personal. It will focus your writing and your game."</DIV></DIV></LI>[/list]



In short, games are very susceptible to traditional writing, but they have potential for a lot more stylization, which means new methods to be tested, which I think Valve is doing a wonderful job for doubling as a research facility.

One last thing: This started out a good thread, but, with all these "off topic" discussions, it's beginning to create more posts than the "on-topic" discussions. If you have something "off-topic" to say, please, take it to a different thread. Thanks.

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Blog: www.playingarchitecture.net
LinkedIn: Eric Lancon
Twitter:@Riven202

Riven you have out done yourself.

Golf clap for Riven

Since where all on the topic of Half-life. The residence cascade (very bad spelling). Everyone is always going on about how the player/gordon created this mess and how it is the players fault (people in the game and actual people say this) but was it me or does anyone fell like they/gordon didn't cause it. All I did was climb up a ladder and press a button and push some cart thing because the scientists told me to. If I didn't than nothing would continue and I would be board in the room for ever. I think Valve did a poor job on makeing the player belive they caused the mess. The player hardly does anything.

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Aaron's Stuff

The best games have stories that don't matter-- Like Quake. It's not a book; it's a game.

Maybe it is all about presentation? Like a movie with an interesting story can be destroyed by bad acting.

Valve was very proud about the facial animation system. While it's leaps beyond most of the competition, it's far from perfect. Probably they relied to much on it to make the player connect with the characters. I've mentioned the Uncanny Valley a while ago on this board and it's such an interesting aspect of game character design. HL2 is, unfortunately, exactly in this state between hyper-realism and weird artificiality.

It's possible that there are bits of very smart writing and character development hidden behind a wall of insufficient animation.

It seems obvious that the writer cannot be blamed for this, but then again, knowing the possibilities is important if you work with technology. Maybe the story of HL2 takes itself a bit too serious at times. Episode 2 already looks like it could overcome a lot of the things I complain about in HL2. But the original HL2 probably wasn't fully ready for acting out the drama parts in-game.

PS: Deus Ex is great, aaron. One of the best written game stories IMO. Did you reach the Hong Kong levels yet? They're my favorite.

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Why snark works.

Valve moved over the entire facial animation engine to run on the graphics card (specifically on the new ATi cards, but I imagine it works on the GF8's too). The animation is really nice and is being released with TF2.

The whole idea of "the uncanny valley" is bulls**t. It stems from people not being familiar with whatever they're interacting with that makes them feel "negativity". It also seems to be associated with people who really don't understand the entire field of robotics/AI/etc.

I never, personally, experienced this "phenomena" from anything. And I doubt anyone really has in the last 10 years.

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Blame it on Microsoft, God does.

<DIV class=quote>
<DIV class=quotetitle>? quoting Lawjackal</DIV>
<DIV class=quotetext>The best games have stories that don't matter-- Like Quake. It's not a book; it's a game.</DIV></DIV>

@Lawjackal: that may be true, but those are just different kinds of games based on preference. But I will say (and I think most would agree here) that if I bought Half-Life and any of the Quakes on the same day and played them both, I'd play Half-Life again before playing Quake again.

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Blog: www.playingarchitecture.net
LinkedIn: Eric Lancon
Twitter:@Riven202

? quoting Lawjackal
The best games have stories that don't matter-- Like Quake. It's not a book; it's a game.

wwwwhhhhhhaaaaaaaaaaaaaaatttttt.....!!!!????. Mate, mmaattee?

reaper47 said:
PS: Deus Ex is great, aaron. One of the best written game stories IMO. Did you reach the Hong Kong levels yet? They're my favorite

Lol, yeah i'm actrully up to Hong Kong. But I just arrived and I'm stuck . I;m where the helicopter is. I downloaded a walkthrough for the game but dont want to use it because I may aswell cheat my way through. And your not alone with likeing the Hong Kong level, TZ on this site ( Who is NOT me : message aimed at some folks) loves that level to. But I dont want to raise my expectations to high so i am assumeing that the Hong Kong levels are the worst in the game.

But anyway I am planning to add an extension to this thread where you folk vote on a game or game series with the best storyline, you are not voting on your fav game, no matter how bad the game is its about the story. It would be a poll. I'm going to include the Halo Series, the Half-life Series mabye Deus Ex Series and I dont know mabye Gears of War or Quake or something. I hear Oblivion has a good story but i'm not into those games. Does anyone have any suggestions, wether it be " Dont do it, it a wate of time" or " make sure you add ....... to the poll".

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Aaron's Stuff

Don't forget to add an "other" section to the vote as I think many might find the best stories outside of the collection. The helicopter sucks. Wait for jumping around the fa?ades of high-rise hotels, Blade Runner style!

Crono, I know it's pseudo-science (which makes you hate it so much I suppose) but you can't tell me the Japanese zombie-android robot ladies don't creep you out?

I think it's important to have a name for this kind of 99% realism we see in games so often (and movies, I find ILM CGI to be far from perfect on an artistical level and they're not making any progress for years now). I was surprised when I found out about the "Uncanny Valley" and instead of inventing my own word I'll use the phrase that has been existing since the 1970ies.

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Why snark works.

Hulk, Jurassic Park, Pirates of the Caribbean 2 & 3 (Davey Jones), and Weta's work on King Kong. All of those are difficult (or not possible) to "see" the cgi artifacts. The only thing that gives them away is what they are, not because "they look fake", all the work in those the cgi looks real. There are exceptions in Jurassic Park and in King Kong, the people look out of place (I would imagine it's because they were shot on lower resolution stock and thus look blurry, no matter what resolution the movie is outputted to, which is a real shame)

But, you see, you're using that term incorrectly. It doesn't mean, "it looks so real, that it looks fake". It means, "it looks so real ... but looks dead and that makes me despise it". Like I said ... it's obscure.

Even robotics doesn't "suffer" from this anymore.

I've only seen one "Japanese zombie-android" that was made to look close to human, and it looked like a mannequin, those don't creep me out.

Let me ask this though, is traditional art applicable for this "phenomenon"? If the idea is stretched from robotics ... to CGI work and characters in games ... why isn't it applied to art in general. Most of the reason that crap "doesn't look right" is because the people producing it don't have a proper background in art (or haven't studied it enough to understand realism).

By the way, no game exists that has 99% realism. Games don't look real, not even close.

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Blame it on Microsoft, God does.

Thaks for the suggestion reaper 47. Any others before I make the thread.

Anyway, the closest game I have ever seen to real-life is actrully Half-life 2. Most of the textures where photos and well it looks really realistc. Even the people and the damage and, the levels even the physics is pretty life like. But its NOT the best game imo. Nor is it the game with the best story line imo. I'm off to play H A L O 2, if you catch my drift.

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Aaron's Stuff

actually :biggrin:

Each medium has it's own method of story telling. I agree with many that Half-life hit upon a certain potential, possibly the essence of interactive story telling - utter immersion in the world. Movies have a phrase "Don't tell it, show it". Games should have a phrase "Don't show it, do it".

One thing that people need to understand, and this goes for all forms of story-telling. You have to leave room for the observer to inject his or her own imagination, and also some space for personal exploration. A connection made on your own, is twice as powerful as a connection made for you. I think Halflife2 did this brilliantly - there are alot of details in the world that are there for the observer, but you have to pay attention. There's a certain level of maturity there that I appreciate.

Movies have a phrase "Don't tell it, show it". Games should have a phrase "Don't show it, do it".

Nice one, Finger!

Crono, you're taking everything so literally. Don't you see I don't really care about the exact statistics or word definition?

There's something wrong with the kind of borderline realism in games today, something that has to be overcome, and maybe it has nothing to do with "realism" (in the literal sense) at all. Maybe it's just that the additional polygons are used badly by the character designers, with smooth curves where there should be a hard edge, new details they don't know how to animate properly yet, etc., etc. With fewer polygons you can edit every detail manually, make sure it's perfectly aligned and the proportions fit. With a million polygons this becomes more difficult.

That's what I mean.

Modern game graphics too often get carried away by details and loose sight of the big picture. And the result often looks weird and less natural than the simpler models of past times. This mostly shows in animation which is often too slow or overacted.

With modern game characters I often feel like they're "pretending to be real". Almost "arrogant". That may sound obscure, but I can't help feeling this way.

PS: I think it's difficult to apply the Uncanny Valley to things that aren't animated, but with almost everything that has an ultimate goal, there is this short period before perfection that mostly turns out to be the very uncomfortable. I guess you can apply that to art as well.

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Why snark works.

aaron_da_killa said:
Thaks for the suggestion reaper 47. Any others before I make the thread.

Anyway, the closest game I have ever seen to real-life is actrully Half-life 2. Most of the textures where photos and well it looks really realistc. Even the people and the damage and, the levels even the physics is pretty life like. But its NOT the best game imo. Nor is it the game with the best story line imo. I'm off to play H A L O 2, if you catch my drift.

S T O P P O S T I N G, if you catch my drift.
Oh and unrelated: Deus Ex's story and quality took a dive off a steep cliff after NYC ended. By the time you get to Hong Kong the level design that showed all its strengths in NY shows all its weaknesses, where it was once freeform and allowed for multiple strategies but became no matter the obstacle you face there's always a lockpick and a vent about five feet away. Plus there's those lame as hell rocket launcher troops in France that make combat boring as s**t since you are forced to use stealth + dragon's tooth or end up a smear on the pavement. And the story turns into nonsensical gobbledegook and I just stopped caring. There's only so many obvious 'twists' and conspiracies within conspiracies within conspiracies before you just go whatever. Gunther is cool though.

Heh.

Reaper, stop using terms that don't mean what you want them to mean. If I didn't take things the way people said them I'd be crazy ... since that's how most crazy and possibly emotionally challenged people behave.

In other words, if the term "uncanny valley" doesn't mean what you want it to mean, then don't use it. Describe what you mean instead or at least, define how you interpret the meaning of what you're talking about, otherwise anyone talking to you has no frame of reference.

Maybe you should just define stuff before continuing? What exactly do you mean by "Uncanny Valley"? "So real it looks fake"? "Disturbing"? What? And what do you mean by "inanimate objects"? I know what all these things mean, but obviously I'm not sure how you're using them, as you've pointed out.

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Blame it on Microsoft, God does.

Just saw this article on the front page of Gamasutra.

http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/1436/uncanny_ai_artificial_.php

Crono, I can't help you, sorry. I think it's obvious that you can adjust the Uncanny Valley, as a concept, to almost everything that tries to be real. Even if that is not what the word was invented for in the 1970ies.

I don't know why it bothers you so much, either. Maybe I should just stop replying, ignore the patronizing, and move on. Because, obviously, arguing with you is like explaining the smell of rosebuds to a HAL 9000 supercomputer. I give up. I can't do that. I usually respect your knowledge and input on things but this is going nowhere.

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Why snark works.

It doesn't "bother" me you just didn't clarify how you were using it, so when I was referring to the term it meant something different than when you referred to it and that made confusion. That's really all I was talking about. If it looks more obscure or, die hard? than that, ignore it, that's not how it was meant.

I do agree that there is the possibility of art (in whatever form) looking "so real" that it looses all hints of realism. I just didn't, personally, label that idea as "The Uncanny Valley".

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Blame it on Microsoft, God does.

<DIV class=quote>
<DIV class=quotetitle>? quoting yak_fighter</DIV>
<DIV class=quotetext>S T O P P O S T I N G, if you catch my drift.</DIV></DIV>

ummmm....... . No.

Anyway I got past the bit I was stuck on, didn't realise you could bash open some doors! I'm finnaly up to Hong Kong right now, and I just got some sowrd, but i've stopped playing it for now. Redawn needs to be finished.



Ha ha very funny admins. Some one has put a snark there. I've had red boxes, weird blue font, weird font size and now this.