teknoarcanist said:
" No one wants to experience the inner emotional life of a videogame character; no one wants to see Tommy Vercetti die like Al Pacino in Scarface; and certainly no one wants to play a videogame about someone's descent into heroin addiction."
You're joking, right? This is a joke. That's EXACTLY the kind of game I would want to play; how about pointing me to the developer that can pull it off with some nuance and depth? This article seems to imply that all gamers play games for the basic escapist entertainment of being the white knight saving the princess from the Totally Evil Wizard Guy, which just isn't true. Technology has sufficiently advanced now to the point that it is possible for videogames to tell an interactive story, and to tailor an emotional experience for the player. I'd kill to play as a heroin addict, but I don't think any dev on earth could make that and resist the urge to turn it into a minigame with flashing lights.
this basically sums up what I thought.
although it was a very well written article it was fundamentally flawed in that it was subtly taking the stance that games are just something to be enjoyed and aren't a legitimate art form, which is only a step away from the games are just for kids arguments.
EDIT: Just to add an afterthought.
An example of how games can be moved forward in the correct path was something I found whilst playing Fahrenheit. Sure I can see how the game could be heavily criticized for its somewhat lack of real gameplay but the story was so compelling I couldn't put it down.
Although I'm not entirely sure whether the rumours that you can achieve multiple hugely different endings are true, I would not be surprised and in that is a where the ability to forge your own story comes in and is done well.
Although many people disregard everything he says I found myself thoroughly agreeing with Yahtzee when he raised the point that if everything is left too open-ended (see farcry 2) and the story is left entirely up to you it usually won't work out.
But to have a number of paths which you will flow into fluidly whilst being often unaware of the path you have directed yourself into is a very good development.
This is where the all important ambiguity comes in.
In Fahrenheit you were often strapped for time. Unlike typical RPGs the world refused to wait around for you to check up on everything you want to before you decide to move the story on and it would force you to abandon potentially crucial information in order to survive.
Because how much you know would always be limited you had to make decisions without fully knowing the consequences of your actions.
This is what leads to the not knowing of which path you have directed yourself on.
In most games, regardless of their attempts to disguise it you can pretty much always tell the effect upon the story your decisions will make.
Although I may be wrong, and there is only one clear path and one ending it always felt to me as though there were other plausible ways the story could have panned out, or at least changes to the overall ending which could have been made by decisions you made, but it always felt like the way the story was going was influenced by my decisions, although I hadn't always been aware of the consequences.
This is the sort of the thing that will bring gaming closer to real life, and in the right way.
Don't get me wrong, I love a well done good vs clearly evil FPS/Survival Horror/RPG/RTS/etc but I would like to see games like what I have described being made also brought into existence.
Gaming is not just a form of light entertainment intended for kids, it is as valid an art form as theatre, television and film, just one filled with far more potential due to it's ability to be far more immersive than any of the other three.
