Game Design Mechanics Narrative

Journey: First Impressions

05/09/2012 – 9:31 am

A unique sensation, even without words.

In general, I’m quite skeptical of games like Journey.  In fact, I’m skeptical about all the games that come out of thatgamecompany.  Not because their products are bad, it’s sometimes the way they talk about their work that, I feel, belittles the idea and replaces is it pretentiousness.  So when I first heard about Journey, a year or two ago, I took cautious steps.  The best idea I thought they had was the communication (or lack of communication) between players.  Details were rough back then but the idea of not being able to communicate via voice or chat in an MMO like setting was mind-boggling.  Encounter another human player in a huge and sparsely populated landscape!!!  That was exciting to me.  It sounded like it would be hard to find people and if you did it was valuable but because you couldn’t communicate efficiently, it somehow strengthened that bond.  Loneliness really does push us out of our shells.  When I played briefly a few nights ago, that was the last thing I was thinking though.

More after the jump…

read more »

Permalink | Comment (0)
Critique Game Design Narrative

Auteurship

05/08/2012 – 1:49 pm

Game of all games

Wow.  Long time no post.  I think this will be the last longer form post since I’m just so terrible with it.  Usually start writing and have good ideas and then trip over said ideas.  So I’m going to try and write shorter things from now on.

So I just finished Mass Effect 3 and it was simply sublime.  The trilogy was an absolutely thrilling ride.  Each title surpassed its predecessor in all the best ways.  While the narrative vectors could have lined up a little better, it was a very well told story that uses surprisingly simple methods to create player empathy.  I cared so much about these characters.  Characters.  And that was all Bioware had to do.

And this has since been blown over a million times, but many fans are extremely unhappy with the ending that ME3 provides them with.  They want more closure, more choices, this and that.  I’ll admit that I’ve tried very hard to steer clear from these discussion until now due to spoilers but I’ve overheard the main complaints and I’d like to address some of them.

Obviously, the rest of this blog post will have tons of SPOILERS after the jump.

read more »

Permalink | Comment (0)
Game Design Mechanics Narrative

Story and Character

01/04/2012 – 12:50 pm

I'm fucking space galactic famous

I’ve been having a ton of trouble trying to write this post–it’s been several weeks now and I feel if I try to explain myself to the fullest I’ll figure out every problem there is with game design.  I think what I’m trying to tackle with the importance of characters is really about whether or not an NPC’s (re)actions are believable based on a player’s actions.  Originally, this post was about my difficulty in being immersed in Skyrim.  While the environments are vast and I’m able to get lost in them for several hours, it’s the little things like townspeople telling me about the mage college in Winterhold and I’m already the fucking arch-mage.  And let me tell you, when one NPC finally acknowledged that I was arch-mage I was simply ecstatic.

read more »

Permalink | Comment (0)
Critique Game Design

Min/Max: Are we a dying breed?

12/07/2011 – 5:12 pm

Bad example :P

I’m a min/maxer (yup, and I look like that guy!).  Any time there are skills, attributes, or variables that I can tweak I will seclude myself into a sanctum of focused insanity.  No matter how obscure my goals are, I’ll find a way to succeed.  My happiest min/maxing days were in Diablo 2.  Some goals included everything as quickly as possible.  Depending on the character, it might have involved being a straight direct-damage or area-of-effect/damage-over-time character.  There were so many knobs to tweak, so many avenues I could have gone down, but oh so many places where I failed and restarted characters.  If I had to bury each of my disowned avatars then I would need one helluva crypt.  I have fond memories of these times but as I reach out and study what new games are doing and even noticing what my own tendencies in play and design are, I’m realizing that the kind of experience I just described is becoming far less common

read more »

Tags , , , , | Permalink | Comment (0)
Glossary

Glossary: Vector

11/26/2011 – 11:07 pm

Vector is a term I use to describe the direction of a story.  The general idea of a story, the husk, the main idea, is itself a vector.  A vector, in math land, has a direction and magnitude.  We can imagine this with cardinal directions, an arrow pointed in some direction, and how far that arrow extends to.  If our main vector is pointed due north for 10 miles, then we better have at least 10 miles of content to support that main idea.

A story can be broken up into shorter parts like character interactions, scenes, and beats.  It doesn’t matter how you divide your story up, you just have to consider the granularity at which you do.  These smaller parts will eventually be added up.  Like in math land, when you add vectors together you also inherit direction and magnitude.  Our main idea is pointing due north, if we have a lot of content that’s pointing due south then I think we have a problem.  However, if something is going north-west or north-east then then you have to consider if its worthwhile to go off topic.  Sometimes going off topic is desirable to create tensions and suspense.  With that said, you’ll need at least 10 miles of content to reach the point where our main idea ends.  I say “at least” because the shortest path between two points is a straight line.  I don’t think any good story is as bare bones as a straight line, it’ll weave in and out of the main subject matter.  Maybe all the smaller vectors’ lengths add up to 15 miles.  That’s fine so long as it reaches the destination set out by the main vector.

There’s no absolute formula of how far you should deviate.  This is just a tool to evaluate your story and its components to see whether or not you should cut things out.  This analogy, of course, an be generalized for all kinds of editing purposes like whether or not you should include that game system or not.

Permalink | Comment (0)
Glossary

I’ve made a glossary

11/26/2011 – 10:58 pm

I’ve made a glossary category where I’ll be writing up short descriptions and definitions of terms that I think I’ve created or at least how I understand them.

Click on the category and you’ll see all the posts and terms.  I hope that helps!

Permalink | Comment (0)
Narrative

Does Openness Mean Dilution of Story?

11/18/2011 – 5:08 pm

I recently finished playing Batman: Arkham City and while it was a fantastic sequel, I couldn’t help but leave the game feeling a little confused.  In this post, I want to talk about something I call ‘vector’ and how I use to to tell good stories.  Arkham Asylum was much smaller in terms of actual play space, the square feet that the player can traverse.  That’s okay so long as that space is filled with content to discover and explore.  Like a page in a book, the sentences you read need to be interesting.  In Arkham City, there are many more pages but the sentences are still meaningful.  It’s just that while the novel is mostly about the Joker, I only get Joker content every couple of pages.  Instead in one paragraph I’m reading about Mr. Freeze, suddenly it’s now The Penguin.  The Riddler appears in parentheticals.

None of the vectors lined up.

read more »

Tags , , , , , | Permalink | Comment (0)
Mechanics Narrative

Confession of Dual Personalities

11/18/2011 – 1:25 pm

I’ve known this for quite some time already but have never really come to terms with what my dualities mean.  On one hand I am obsessed with numbers.  I like math.  I like when you add numbers they are clean like 5.525 over 2.3841.  This is where I enjoy creating and exploring systems because at their base they are numbers, they are logic trees.  On the other hand I am enamored with stories whether they be crafted with words or with pictures.  Unlike a system, the story is has a kind of looseness, a fluidity, and yet can encompass a wealth of meaning and emotional impact.  I’ve always struggled to come to terms with these two interests of mine.  I feel game design as a profession satisfies both of these things most aptly, I’m lucky to be doing it.  However, even within this field I am always stumbling over my persons and fighting for an answer.

For a long time, especially when I was studying game design a
short year ago, I felt that games were just as capable as books to speak about the human condition and to present a story as well as the best movies and novels.  I fondly recount my time spent with games like Final Fantasy 7 but after replaying that game several years later, after a few months of not thinking about my master’s thesis project, it seems like my opinion on the matter has changed.  The storyteller in me has grown pessimistic.  Games are not the best medium to tell stories.  At least not on the level of complexity of, let’s say, a Haruki Murakami novel.

read more »

Tags , , , , , | Permalink | Comment (0)
Mechanics Narrative

Immersion is Red Velvet Cake

11/10/2011 – 1:44 pm

[this is very old, I forgot about it, but here it is now]

I just read a post on #AltDevBlogADay written by acquaintance Eddie Cameron.  There’s nothing wrong with what he wrote, in fact I’m adding another perspective to what he’s written.  A very blunt one, I’m sure some generalizations will be made.  Most of the game industry does not understand what immersion truly means.  Better yet, we all have an understanding of what immersion is but they’re all just different–there are many different types: tactical, strategic, narrative, and spatial.  Our definitions are all different.  Going off of the link that Eddie provided, the definition of immersion I want to address relates to narrative content–the definition that is most inline with Murray’s Holodeck.

I may be biased because I have a writing background but I would stress that narrative immersion is by far the most important factor when people talk about this thing called immersion–I think that’s what most people are talking about when they say the word.  In the We Got This Covered list that Eddie linked to, all the games listed tell intricate stories as far as games go.  A quick Google search for “most immersive games” you will find, after skimming many threads in various forums, that the bulk of the games listed also have some interesting story that ties everything together.  This is not to say that game and other design components become unimportant (hey, I’m a game designer now!).  Far from the case.

read more »

Permalink | Comment (0)