Are Video Games the New Great Medium for Telling Stories?

[Oliver B Campbell]

Are Video Games the New Great Medium for Telling Stories?

Storytelling has evolved through the ages, with video games being the newest medium to do it. Will games be the ultimate mode for relating meaningful stories?

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[Silentpony_v1legacy]

I doubt it. For every Shadow of the Colossus there are 30 Shower with your Dad simulators.

 

[gargantual]

I remember from a recent vid from Super Bunny Hop talking about a conference from Riot games where they said the 3 act structure was useless, because people over time wanted to do different things.

To me I think it depends on the level design or how challenge is facilitated. Its it about progressively harder obstacles or is it about choice?

Also how content is distributed in the game makes a difference. To me story serves to motivate actions or foreshadow challenges in a game adventure, thats its main purpose.

Whats your opinion on attempts like Witcher 3 or GTA to make all activities and emergent gameplay moments that dont follow the main story of equal prominence?

 

[inmunitas]

Nope. Video games are poorly suited for storytelling. In a game the player needs to take an active role in what ever is going on, video games are better for simulating scenarios where the players actions may effect the outcome, which is what they already do. I guess the scenario is the story element when it comes to games, but I don't think trying to dictate the story to the player is the way to go.

edit: Also while story might be unique to human beings, games are not.

 

[Oliver B Campbell]

Whats your opinion on attempts like Witcher 3 or GTA to make all activities and emergent gameplay moments that dont follow the main story of equal prominence?

I think that this is a super interesting thing that I've also noticed happening. I just finished The Phantom Pain and felt like this was a story closer to the audience than other Metal Gear games in the past. There are events and sequences that not every player will experience, purely based on how you approached the content.

In this, the stories are becoming more personalized based on the player's point of view and how they approach it. This is a difficult trick to pull off, obviously, but I'm really interested to see where it's going.

 

[Oliver B Campbell]

Nope. Video games are poorly suited for storytelling. In a game the player needs to take an active role in what ever is going on, video games are better for simulating scenarios where the players actions may effect the outcome, which is what they already do. I guess the scenario is the story element when it comes to games, but I don't think trying to dictate the story to the player is the way to go.

I disagree.

"1000 travel books aren't worth one real trip."

We can be told about something all day, every day, but it is rare that a told experience is as impactful as experiencing it for yourself. Video games, being a very rudimentary form of having that 'experience', are beginning to scratch the surface of that idea. In this, I do believe that games have the potential to be far more effectual.

But as I said in the article, time will tell.

 

[inmunitas]

Nope. Video games are poorly suited for storytelling. In a game the player needs to take an active role in what ever is going on, video games are better for simulating scenarios where the players actions may effect the outcome, which is what they already do. I guess the scenario is the story element when it comes to games, but I don't think trying to dictate the story to the player is the way to go.

I disagree.

"1000 travel books aren't worth one real trip."

We can be told about something all day, every day, but it is rare that a told experience is as impactful as experiencing it for yourself. Video games, being a very rudimentary form of having that 'experience', are beginning to scratch the surface of that idea. In this, I do believe that games have the potential to be far more effectual.

But as I said in the article, time will tell.

I think I get what you mean, but if the player isn't taking an active role in the activity, wouldn't that just be a computer simulation? Like a Matrix sort of thing?

 

[Oliver B Campbell]

I think I get what you mean, but if the player isn't taking an active role in the activity, wouldn't that just be a computer simulation? Like a Matrix sort of thing?

Well the idea that I'm going with here is that a book/film is an experience told/shown, while a game is an experience lived (as close as we can currently get, safely). In this, they have a different impact on the audience.

A query for my point; we've seen plenty of movies with torture sequences, right? Now, let's look at the torture sequence in Grand Theft Auto V. I don't know about everyone else, but I walked away from that with a much different point of view, comparatively.

 

[Barbas]

Not yet - they're not good enough - but it's as inevitable as the advance of technology that they will be. I just wish more developers who claim to want to get the most out of this young medium would embrace its strengths over other forms instead of just trying to make the most "realistic" or "human-looking experience".

 

[Oliver B Campbell]

Not yet - they're not good enough - but it's as inevitable as the advance of technology that they will be. I just wish more developers who claim to want to get the most out of this young medium would embrace its strengths over other forms instead of just trying to make the most "realistic" or "human-looking experience".

Yep, exactly this is what I also said. They're a good start, but they're not good enough. They're able to start exploring some ideas that can't be replicated in other mediums, but it's so rudimentary right now.

 

[Redryhno]

Not yet - they're not good enough - but it's as inevitable as the advance of technology that they will be. I just wish more developers who claim to want to get the most out of this young medium would embrace its strengths over other forms instead of just trying to make the most "realistic" or "human-looking experience".

Eh, forget the ones making them realistic or human looking, I'd rather the ones that talk about them being able to be more utilize more than the left stick/WASD and good(sometimes even amazing) art teams.

 

[Barbas]

Not yet - they're not good enough - but it's as inevitable as the advance of technology that they will be. I just wish more developers who claim to want to get the most out of this young medium would embrace its strengths over other forms instead of just trying to make the most "realistic" or "human-looking experience".

Yep, exactly this is what I also said. They're a good start, but they're not good enough. They're able to start exploring some ideas that can't be replicated in other mediums, but it's so rudimentary right now.

That's strange. How come you have two profiles?

Yeah...it's started to dawn on me now how superfluous it (my comment) was. So, to elaborate a bit, I loved what Dragon Age: Origins did as an example; it actually left me feeling a sense of loss like a friend had gone when it was finished. Looked like crap as well, though that didn't even matter at the time. I think advancements in graphics have been pretty reckless considering the shortcomings in other aspects of game design (sadly writing's a pretty frequent one), compatibility and optimization. There needs to be a minimum acceptable standard for performance before priority is given to fancy whiz-bang effects. You can have the fanciest backdrop in the world, but there's no story or "experience" to be had if the character who's meant to be looking at it is clearly a droid with the personality of a Twinkie recovered from a nuclear test site. Nothing fades like modernity and graphics appear to be advancing like the dickens, but great music and lines are timeless.

...It's a little sad that I got so excited over the Nemesis system in Shadow Of Mordor. I mean, it really was great when I played the game, but you'd think more development teams would have gotten further than that by now. And a little more in the writing department for the character would have worked wonders to complement it. The voice acting alone was remarkably good.

I guess we should be hopeful and excited. We're pretty lucky to be living in a time where advancements in this kind of technology are so rapid that the computers we use today might be unrecognizable in a decade.


Edits in bold

 

[FFHAuthor]

Yes, yes it is if we begin to take a broader stance on just what a good story can be. For the majority of the history of art in any medium, the 'story' has been solely the creation of one person (usually, though when you get into film, TV and stage-play, it is a larger group of course). Video games are the first medium which at it's heart can take the viewer as a part of the creative process, something that is fundamentally alien to the historical concept of art. It's not about holo-decks and VR and neural uplinks, it's about giving the viewer hand in the creation.

You can of course make the argument that every Call of Duty clone sullies the hope that Videogames will be a 'great medium' for storytelling, I just have to throw back at that, how many damn movie rip offs are there?

Films that are barely functional and merely exist to capitalize on other stories that were just done like Transmorphers or American Warships (to name two that jump out at me from Netflix), do they make Citizen Kane or Terminator or Metropolis worse films?

Is every cliche situation comedy TV show detracting from Band of Brothers or The Walking Dead?

Does the fact that Twilight exists mean that Shakespeare and Lord of the Rings are diminished?

Games are fantastic storytelling devices, sitting at the head of their own form of interactive media, and that style of telling a story has fantastic potential. The fact that there are pathetic games made doesn't mean that the entire idea of games as a storytelling tool should be discarded.

I watched Journey to the Moon on Netflix...and damn it's rough. But looking at what film was over a century ago and looking at what it is now, it boggles the mind. Think of the jump in storytelling in games in just 30 years, hands down, the jump is even bigger.

 

[Vigormortis]

I doubt it. For every Shadow of the Colossus there are 30 Shower with your Dad simulators.

I've never understood this stance.

Every story telling medium has but a handful of masterpieces among a deluge of rubbish. For every The Godfather there are thirty Meet the Spartans. For every Lord of the Rings there are thirty 50 Shades of Gray. Does that invalidate film or literature as quality story telling mediums?

Film making's been around for over a century. Literature for hundreds of years. Video gaming, as an industry, has been around for only a few decades.

Give it time. The medium has already shown its willingness and ability to change, adapt, and venture into old and new forms of story telling. It's far too early to say it will never reach the heights of other mediums.

Whats your opinion on attempts like Witcher 3 or GTA to make all activities and emergent gameplay moments that dont follow the main story of equal prominence?

My opinion on that point is....complicated. But to summarize: I feel emergent narrative is going to play a revolutionary and, ultimately, crucial role in storytelling's evolution. And at this point, video gaming is the only medium that offers a proper range of tools to create emergent storytelling.

 

[immortalfrieza]

The answer is yes, so much so that it's kinda ridiculous that this is even a question. Video games are the greatest medium for telling stories hands down, simply due to the interaction that video games can provide that no other entertainment medium can on top of being able to provide everything the other mediums can. Now, do video games often take advantage of what they can uniquely provide? Of course not, there's plenty of half assed games with little to no attempt to put any effort into the story, just like other mediums have plenty of. There's also plenty of games that are little more than interactive movies with little gameplay involved as well as really easy games that have little to no actual challenge and thus defeat the entire purpose of video games in the first place.

However, when there are good games with great stories and gameplay they are absolute masterpieces that immerse the viewer deeper than any other medium ever could, and even just sort of decent games provide more entertainment over a much greater period of time than any other medium does. What is needed is get some people with actual talent and drive making video games as a whole rather than as an exception and we'd get a lot more worthwhile games.

 

[Oliver B Campbell]

That's strange. How come you have two profiles?

Yeah...it's started to dawn on me now how superfluous it (my comment) was. So, to elaborate a bit, I loved what Dragon Age: Origins did as an example; it actually left me feeling a sense of loss like a friend had gone when it was finished. Looked like crap as well, though that didn't even matter at the time. I think advancements in graphics have been pretty reckless considering the shortcomings in other aspects of game design (sadly writing's a pretty frequent one), compatibility and optimization. There needs to be a minimum acceptable standard for performance before priority is given to fancy whiz-bang effects. You can have the fanciest backdrop in the world, but there's no story or "experience" to be had if the character who's meant to be looking at it is clearly a droid with the personality of a Twinkie recovered from a nuclear test site. Nothing fades like modernity and graphics appear to be advancing like the dickens, but great music and lines are timeless.

...It's a little sad that I got so excited over the Nemesis system in Shadow Of Mordor. I mean, it really was great when I played the game, but you'd think more development teams would have gotten further than that by now. And a little more in the writing department for the character would have worked wonders to complement it. The voice acting alone was remarkably good.

I guess we should be hopeful and excited. We're pretty lucky to be living in a time where advancements in this kind of technology are so rapid that the computers we use today might be unrecognizable in a decade.


Edits in bold

I've no clue, and I'm certainly not a British fellow! Hopefully this gets fixed by... someone. Pardon my newness.

Man, you are SO on point with this that I want to share it with everyone. Video games are still so young, and I feel like we're finally starting to really tackle what we can do with them. Just like with film, the technological aspects can end up being something that hurts the story if not addressed well.

 

[Oliver B Campbell]

there's plenty of half assed games with little to no attempt to put any effort into the story, just like other mediums have plenty of.

Exactly my thought process. I like to look at video games, as a medium, like a fantastic canvas. There's so many directions that we can go with it. But just like any other canvas, someone might produce utterly terrible and forgettable works, and others will create something that will heralded for ages to come.

 

[Johnny Novgorod]

The problem with games is that they're made by hundreds of people who 99% of the time are not united under a singular artistic vision such as a filmmaker's, and that's if you buy into the auteur theory. When we talk about games we talk about companies. "The EA game, the Ubisoft game, the Nintendo game". Most of the time there's very little personal input into the games.

I've never played a game where I could reach out to the artist behind it, if that makes sense. I've never felt the artist, let alone the person, behind a game. I can read Raymond Carver and Sylvia Plath and Kurt Vonnegut and feel how these people bare themselves for me. I can read Aeschylus and Sophocles and Eurypides and sense how they tackle the grand questions that plagued humanity for thousands of years, before and ever since.

Games get an emotional response from the gamer. They make you happy, sad, scared, whatever. I was very sorry the horse died in Shadow of the Colossus, I thought Okami was very pretty, I got feelings of melancholy while playing ICO. And Silent Hill 2 has a tremendously heart-wrenching story. Fair enough. But I feel that, for all the emotions I find in myself, there's very little emotion in the game. You're not looking into anybody's soul. There's a lot of artistic input, but little personal input.

Most artistic decisions in a game have a practical nature. Everything serves a purpose. And if not, you compromise, because time and money. But you take a brush or a pencil and you can go anywhere you want.

It'll be a long, long time before gaming produces anything that can be compared to the literary classics.

Film making's been around for over a century. Literature for hundreds of years.

Thousands.

 

[Nazulu]

Yeah, engaging story's for everyone who's looking for a book or a movie to tell it.

Video Games most unique thing has been setting up a special scenario that you have to overcome/control, but the first thing a lot of people here like to make the most important is the same thing movies have been doing forever, which is just seeing the drama.

As someone that was sucked far more into games like Super Metroid and Half Life, you're just confusing your personal interests to the actual advancement. Even people here are saying they like to go through games where not everyone will experience the same thing, and while interesting, do you really believe that is the only direction to go? I'd rather play linear games that are incredibly well thought out and different than something that just gives more options.

Another thing is, every team are good at some things, not all things. You want everything perfect, but you won't get it.

Edit: Frankly, I reckon the players emotions are more important than the characters. Movies have already pulled off the set up and emotions perfectly so I never get this discussion.

 

[Oliver B Campbell]

The problem with games is that they're made by hundreds of people who 99% of the time are not united under a singular artistic vision such as a filmmaker's, and that's if you buy into the auteur theory. When we talk about games we talk about companies. "The EA game, the Ubisoft game, the Nintendo game". Most of the time there's very little personal input into the games.

I've never played a game where I could reach out to the artist behind it, if that makes sense. I've never felt the artist, let alone the person, behind a game. I can read Raymond Carver and Sylvia Plath and Kurt Vonnegut and feel how these people bare themselves for me. I can read Aeschylus and Sophocles and Eurypides and sense how they tackle the grand questions that plagued humanity for thousands of years, before and ever since.

Games get an emotional response from the gamer. They make you happy, sad, scared, whatever. I was very sorry the horse died in Shadow of the Colossus, I thought Okami was very pretty, I got feelings of melancholy while playing ICO. And Silent Hill 2 has a tremendously heart-wrenching story. Fair enough. But I feel that, for all the emotions I find in myself, there's very little emotion in the game. You're not looking into anybody's soul. There's a lot of artistic input, but little personal input.

Most artistic decisions in a game have a practical nature. Everything serves a purpose. And if not, you compromise, because time and money. But you take a brush or a pencil and you can go anywhere you want.

It'll be a long, long time before gaming produces anything that can be compared to the literary classics.

Oh man, this is pure gold. You're really onto something here. I want to see you explore this even more so in depth. I agree that there does seem to be a missing component, the connection with the creator.