We thought we’d offer you a contribution from one of our Three Speech regulars as we’ve not had one in a while. If anyone else has got something that they want to get off their chest, send it this way and we’ll get it up on the site.
I think that storylines have been massively overdeveloped in many recent games and I think that recently the Tomb Raiders: Anniversary, Legend and (to a lesser extent) Angel of Darkness are examples of games that have suffered because of this. It seems to me that as the games industry has matured, lessons have been taken from the movie industry regarding narrative structure. I believe this to be entirely the wrong approach.
Playing a game is an active pastime, as opposed to watching a movie, which is essentially a passive pastime. The important word here is “playing”. When we are playing a game (any game, not necessarily a video game) we are exercising our imaginations. When we are watching a movie, our imagination plays a role but it’s much more passive. We’re enjoying the ride courtesy of someone else’s imagination. As such, the narrative structure of a good game needs to be much less tightly controlled than that of a movie.
In the early to mid Eighties some of us played Elite. It involved moving a few dozen (and I mean that literally) primary-coloured lines around the screen. In order to translate that into a game, imagination was required. Once that was added, we were each on the bridge of our very own starship, trading across interstellar distances and running the gauntlet of police, pirates and hostile aliens! The content of Elite provided maybe 10% of the game. The other 90% came from our imaginations. Not everyone was able to provide that 90% and so computer gaming was quite a niche pastime, but those that could were rewarded with an incredible and immersive experience.
Fast forward to the start of the PlayStation era. By this time the capabilities of the various game platforms had improved beyond recognition. Less imagination was required in order to access the games. I would say that content provided around 50% of the game while the player’s imagination provided the other 50%. Games like Tomb Raider, Doom and Quake had minimal storylines but that was OK. Gamers brought their own imagination. Everyone played a slightly different game. Did Lara slaughter every animal that crossed her path or did she only kill where she couldn’t avoid it? Core weren’t saying. It depended on who was actually playing the game at the time. Every player brought their own version of her back-story. Her minimal biog was probably due to it being considered unimportant. In fact, it’s very minimalism was probably vital to the game. I would say that this balance (enforced by hardware limitations of the day, admittedly) between content and imagination gave us a “Golden Age” of video games.
Since then, the games industry has ballooned out of all proportion - the hardware is awesome, as are the budgets for producing the games, and I believe that this is where the problem lies. Big money requires that every little detail be taken care of. A lot of games are so overproduced that there’s not enough room left for imagination anymore. Everything’s scripted. Content accounts for maybe 90%, while imagination is left with a paltry 10%, which is why a lot of today’s games feel more like movies. It can be done well, but you need to define absolutely everything. Japanese RPGs are an example of where this approach is an asset. I don’t believe that everything is lost, though. There are a few games in production where the designers are going out of their way to increase the imagination quotient, while using the current technology to improve the quality of play.
LittleBigPlanet is a good example and I really wish it well. If it succeeds, then expect more games with little or no storyline. Expect games that actually require you to exercise your imagination. I hope that games producers realise there’s more to a gamer than a pair of thumbs. I hope they find a way to give us storylines that allow our imaginations to play. Let’s hope so, because we could be seeing the dawn of a second golden age.
By Calvin Davidson
I like having a good story, as long as it doesn’t get too cliched or stops the game too much. Oblivion has done a great job with adding story elements to a game. Half-Life 2 the same. You’re not going to see a big budget game with no story anymore. That’s what titles like Calling All Cars and such are for. I’d rather play on the Ice Planet Hoth (and all that comes with it) over some generic ice world any day.
Comment by Brian — Jun 6, 2007 @ 5:59 pm
I love games that make you feel like you are in a movie. The Max Payne and Metal Gear Solid series of games did a fantastic job of creating a fun cinematic environment. I like playing games where I feel a connection to the characters, which is what most games fail at. This emotional connection is very important to me when I play a single player game.
Comment by Bob — Jun 6, 2007 @ 6:32 pm
I agree with the above comments of brian, Resistance f.o.m is a good example of narration between missions(love that womans voice)even though one or two missions seemed pointless - it was still a good balance of mission plot and story(isnt that the same thing?). Oblivion - oh maaaaaan what a game and such longevity.
Comment by linton — Jun 6, 2007 @ 6:37 pm
Totally agree with what has been said… I really dont like most of these games today that are just like watching a movie really. Some can be ok if done right but its just not fun.
Comment by Ricky — Jun 6, 2007 @ 8:06 pm
Excellent work.
I agree totally.
I played Elite and loved the feeling of being out in the depths of space with a valuable cargo and limited weapons at the mercy of pirates.
It made for a great experience- IF you brought your imagination to play as Calvin says.
Having said that- I think that if really good writers (professional writers by trade that is) are allowed to create compelling storylines that compliment great gameplay we will be in for a good time.
I look forward to a time when AI is advanced enough to allow a game with no pre-determined story at all- just dump the player character into the environment and let it play out.
Comment by Gareth (GaF) — Jun 6, 2007 @ 10:38 pm
although i agree on some parts, i also have to say that there still ARE some great games that require you to use your imagination.
just a few examples:
HALF-LIFE 2 - hardly any explained background story, you just have to get through it, see how people react to you and what’s going on around you. capturing the mood and stuff.
METAL GEAR SOLID 3 - although this has a GROUNDBRAKING and AWESOME storyline (like every mgs), which doesn’t exactly makes your imagination fly, you can also choose how to fight yourself through waves of enemies - for example kill them, or just make them sleep, or kill them loud and have a big fight with 10s of soldiers. this is very much like your tomb raider example.
MOTORSTORM - the texts you get to read while the maps load are about the “festival”, the “hosts if you wanna call them so”.. there is a lot that never gets mentioned directly, you just get sucked into the festival feeling (also with the menu background movies).
SHADOW OF THE COLOSSUS - i won’t explain this, seriously.
SILENT HILL 2 - SERIOUSLY almost the BEST storyline i EVER experienced. the thing about this one is: there is NO direct word about ANYTHING that caused this scenery. no clear word EVER. just tons and tons of indices that say a little about this or a little about that, and after playing the game the 2nd time, you slowly get a picture of what happened. but as some of you maybe know, the nerds are still speculating about some details of the story (like: who is a ghost, who isn’t, and why). this story will never be told till the end, it’s actually impossible, and 90% of it are directly coming out of the player’s mind.
THIS is AWESOMENESS!!!!!!!
i think the exact counterpart of games like these are games like splinter cell, ghost recon… this kind of stuff. you could also call it mass-production of mainstream videogames that don’t require the old kinds of qualities.
but there will always be GREAT games to go back to. keep GTA IV in mind!!
i’ll leave it at that.
Comment by Coffin87 — Jun 7, 2007 @ 1:19 am
I prefer the guys making the game use their imaginations, not us.
For example, MGS3 has a beautiful story that made me cry in the end.
Shadow of the Collosus leaves too many open ends for me to care.
Imagination is for when I want to read a book
Comment by Techni — Jun 7, 2007 @ 7:56 am
Hmmmmm,
Not sure i agree, games like mercs and the GTA series for example are based on the fact that the player has to use their imagination in order to complete the missions, a storey line is provided to add direction but that doesn’t mean you have to follow it the choice is yours. Use your imagination.
I think the industry is leaning more to this direction now more than ever with games like burnout and medal of honour taking this route of use your imagination.
I for one is very happy with the way the industry is heading, innovation is around every corner and a game will always be what you make of it.
Comment by Scorn — Jun 7, 2007 @ 8:29 am
I’ve got to be honest, here. I came here expecting an “opinion piece”, not a shill for the joys of LittleBigPlanet. You guys desperately need to spend more time actually having an opinion, and less time fronting products. Nothing on your site gives me any idea that there are human writers sitting behind keyboards actually having opinions and feelings, and everything always ends in warm fuzzies for some future PS3 product.
If you guys want an honest readership, start doing some honest writing. Telling me how much Tomb Raider Anniversary is an example of taking lessons from gaming, when in fact it’s a recreation of a ten year old game (and one of the all-time best sellers at that) just for the sake of making LBP look good is more than stupid, it’s shortsighted. I expect more from the stuff I read, and if I want press releases regurgitated at me I can do it in another blog.
Get some integrity, and while you’re at it, some passion.
Comment by Greg Block — Jun 7, 2007 @ 4:34 pm
Thanks for your comment, Greg. Calvin, who’s a Three Speech ‘reader’ rather than a journalist, submitted this piece without any direction from us. He’s excited about LittleBigPlanet and a potential future that it points to, which is good news, but not an opinion we stage-managed.
Cheers
Comment by Three Speech — Jun 7, 2007 @ 4:44 pm
Well, in this day and age, imagination is not somethign you expect IME. People are accustomed to being force-fed opinions and stories on everything, from toilet papers to entertainment to politics.
Early games had people coming from a culture where books (without pictures!!!) were commonplace, even the “TV” (in the general way, covering channels to youtube or cameraphone snaps) wasn’t anywhere as ubiquitous.
In a way, marketing has won the battle, there is very little opinion that is vanilla. This opinion included
Comment by John — Jun 7, 2007 @ 5:30 pm
I agree to a certain extent and understand what you’re saying but expression and freedom to create your own experience is something that I feel is heavily tied to the arcade genre. I feel a strong narrative can still allow a player a huge amount of imagination.
Take fan fiction as an example; something that is very prevalent with Blizzard games. Diablo, Warcraft and Starcraft all have huge followings with lots of fan fiction, yet all of the three game series have quite strict and well documented narrative.
Comment by Ben Furneaux — Jun 7, 2007 @ 7:15 pm
Hi. I just want to clarify why I wrote this piece. I have no connection with Sony or any of the rest of the games industry, except that I’ve been playing games since the early ’80s. I recently started playing Tomb Raider Anniversary while I was in the process of replaying the original game and I started wondering why the original, even with it’s ten year old graphics and minimal sound content, actually felt like the better game. I couldn’t shake the feeling that we’ve lost something in the process of all the improvements that have happened to to gaming hardware and software over the years and came up with the simple idea of a content/imagination percentage. It was supposed to just be a post on a forum but it grew into a little essay in its own right and I decided to email it to this blog.
I wasn’t slating the use of storylines in general, rather the use of movie-style narratives within games. It’s interesting that a couple of you bring up the Half-Life series. They were written by a science-fiction novelist, Marc Laidlaw, who did a splendid job of fitting a storyline into the games without making it feel like a movie. He actually said in an interview that with the Gordon Freeman character “We just wanted to create somebody who didn’t get in the way of the player exploring on their own yet feeling like they had a specific role”. This is just the kind of characterisation that allows the 50/50 balance between content and imagination that I’m advocating.
Greg, I’m sorry you think this piece is just a shill for Little Big Planet. Actually, no. I take that back. I don’t really care what you think. It’s not a shill. I just picked that game as an obvious example of one that’s been developed to stretch the boundaries of gaming by bringing imagination back into the picture. I hope there’ll be many more. It’s refreshing for me to know that there are still developers who can think of better things to do with the awesome hardware we’ve got than to just portray sweatier men with shinier guns.
Comment by Calvin — Jun 7, 2007 @ 7:53 pm
Well said Calvin.
As a gamer since Invaders I agree with your sentiments. We need a challenge; we need an engaging story line that may be formed as much by our imaginations as by what is in front of us. We do not need to be held by the hand like a movie story line.
Give us freedom to explore and to imagine. Stuff on rails has always been boring to me.
Comment by Emperor_Fish — Jun 7, 2007 @ 10:15 pm
At the risk of annoying all, I agree with everyone.
On the one hand… I too look back fondly on the games of old, their limited graphical abilities, shortness of narrative, and simplicity of gaming. But this gave us great game play instead (had to). SensiSoccer on the Amiga, graphically simplistic, audio, rubbish. But by god the game lasted. Yes imagination, game play and light control over the players experience was the standard fare, and we should indeed try to capture and perhaps build upon those early foundations…
BUT…
I also love to play in a movie. What can be better than lush cinematics, great voice acting, and story that you acting within. Yes, my actions may be more controlled, the narrative driving my experience, but that’s okay, because that’s also what I wanted.
Take the movie analogy. Sunday afternoon, it’s raining, you’re halfarsed about what you and the bird fancy doing, oh look, an Arnie movie is showing on the telly, or the first Italian Job, whatever. Bish bash bosh, a couple of hours are dealt with. It’s another leave the brain in neutral, big load of entertaining rubbish. Brilliant.
Now, another time, you fancy a proper movie. What’s it going to be? Apocalypse Now, Heat, Children Of Men?
You’re arguing about a trend of where gaming is running the no brainer route and are worried about it. But that’s okay mate, the gaming world is simply going through a phase. As you said, there are already changes afoot. We’ll soon be able to choose the feel of our games.
What do I feel like tonight?
Comment by LordOfRuin — Jun 8, 2007 @ 12:56 pm
A nice piece of advertising for Little Big Planet. It seems I am in the minority when I announce I don’t give two shites about Little Big Planet. I am a Sony fan but I just don’t buy into the LBP hype. Give me a story because when it’s executed and told well it makes for an amazing game.
Comment by Jason — Jun 11, 2007 @ 9:47 pm
While I do agree that some games can do it well, and I think the writer does too. He’s saying there’s too many games trying to be movies.
Oblivion IMO is an example of too much freedom though. Sure you can spend hundreds of hours leveling up and exploring, but after about 3 or 4 hours, I felt a big sense of POINTLESSNESS. What was I doing it for? Completely bland experience if you ask me, I don’t know how it got game of the year besides technical achievements with streaming and scope. But yeah, Final Fantasy, DQ, Dark Cloud, the recent Odin’s Sphere-these are great examples of limited imagination that works.
LBP is definitely a breath of fresh air though, I think it’s PS3’s killer app in fact…
Comment by Jarod — Jun 13, 2007 @ 12:12 am
Obviously a topic with some very definite feelings behind it. And to no real surprise, but I think that some people are seeing a threat where there isn’t one.
The condemnation is a little much, and attacking the man for stating his opinion is unnecessary. But to be fair to the commenters as well, he did start it.
Yes, it’s an opinion piece. He’s got his opinion, and he shared it, and that’s fine. We all love to read someone else writing about something we were just talking about the other day, or just thinking about. You feel less alone when you realize someone out there thinks just like you do, and they’re willing to say it, out loud and in public like this.
But to take the position that your particular flavor of gaming is somehow superior to someone else’s is going a little far. You like a certain type of game. Good for you. That’s fine, we all have our favorites. That yours is somehow the Bastion of Goodness and Light in Gamerdom, and the rest is cancer and rot, that’s going a little far. You’re being derogatory, insulting, and arrogant, without cause or invitation.
It’s a huge leap to go from claiming that you prefer a game with little backstory or exposition all the way to telling someone else that they’re somehow using less of their brain by playing the games they do. They prefer a little something else. Who are you, who is anyone, to tell them how much imagination they invest in the games they play?
I know a man who can argue for hours about the cultural significance of the architecture used throughout Gears of War, what it says about the world that was created, and how that all adds to the atmosphere, and thereby to the game experience. I know another who can be very detailed and precise while he talks about the effect of blending military fact and fiction in the Metal Gear Solid series. These guys are thinking on more levels that some people still have access to, and it’s all invested in the game they’re playing.
There’s a certain breed of gamer that pride themselves on their imagination. On identifying with, on becoming, their character. On living through the game, not just playing it. Gamers who will readily admit to being moved to tears by a Metal Gear Solid, or a Silent Hill game. Gamers who play the games they do for the experience, to get caught up in something huge and bright and exciting.
You could not be more abrasive and insulting to this gamer than to say that his game requires less imagination or intelligence. That he is somehow less creative, or mentally stunted, because he enjoys a different style of game than you.
Games are only getting bigger. The industry is still growing, and is getting more and more attention. There are game types yet to be created, and yes, older ones to learn from. The types of games you like are going to stay, right beside a whole slew of games that you don’t. Find the ones you like, and play them. Let us know what you like about them, even. But for fuck sake, let the guy next to you play the games he likes without you looking down your nose at him.
Comment by Michael — Jul 3, 2007 @ 4:54 am
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