Pirates Are Way More Interesting Than Elves

[Voltano]

As much as I keep hearing that game developers these days just don't care about story, one can't get away from the fact that story, setting and context all define the gameplay.

I'll admit that I'm one of the players (and amateur game designer) that doesn't care much for stories in video games since I feel like they serve more as exposition for a narrative I don't care about, or they distract from the main game that I find more enjoyable than the stupid character's drama with their parents. However this sentence does make some sense since I do believe that story should justify the reasoning why a player might do something in the core mechanics of the game. For example, "Prototype" gives a context reason why the avatar can eat people to unlock more information of the story or XP rewards; whereas "Fable II" gives no context reason why you could be a dick to a bunch of 1s and 0s.

In most of my experience I tend to stick with the core mechanics first, and then build a story around that. However I think this is where some game designers might fail in justifying things in the context of the game. For example, I've been watching Graham and Paul (LRR crew) LP of "X-Men: Destiny." Supposedly the game starts with the destruction of the town from a mob of people that hate mutants--armed with electric batons and guns, but are capable of destroying a town so it looks like something from "Fallout 3." But if a game designer starts first with the story to justify the context of the core mechanics, could this limit options in the game-world to the player? How would this work with something like Skyrim or other sandbox games?

 

[BehattedWanderer]

It's this reason I'm playing Fallout: New Vegas again. Zombies with character, no sign of elves, some decent RPG dicking around, and a group of people who are basically pirates, even going to the extent of raising their ship from the bottom of some water. But this is ancillary to the point at hand, that point being: Pirates Rule!

 

[Xenominim]

What would be really nice is a pirate game that's actually based on real history. Where pirates are sometimes criminals, sometimes government agents, sometimes both. It's an absolutely awesome set-up, several powerful nations at war even when they're supposedly at peace, each with their own distinct culture, trying to take over a brand new world as far as they're concerned with natives stuck in the middle, captains going rogue, building their own fleets at times. History offers so many other situations like this that are far more interesting than the usual 'good guy vs bad guy' nations that most game stories seem to fall into.

I think this is a huge failing of the story-telling process as well for games, they make the good guys and bad guys extremely obvious and stereotyped, they don't give you anything to think about. The last time I can think of a character even approaching being a sympathetic villain was Loghain from Dragon Age who seemed to think killing the King would allow him to keep the nation safe. But the game barely developed that motivation and set about making him otherwise so evil that it pretty much fell apart.

 

[Imp_Emissary]

This is so true. I understand why it's done though. You make your character as blank as you can because then the player can just "be" the main character, but they could at least give us some more reason to care about why we want to save the world or whatever.

That's what I like about Fallout 3. Because it lets us develop our main character's personality from our birth to when we step out of Vault 101, and it gives us a goal we can aim for besides save/destroy the world. Find our dad. All done with gameplay and story choices.

 

[rembrandtqeinstein]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Chronicles_of_Thomas_Covenant

Chronicles of Thomas Covenant. Completely original fantasy settings despite the plot revolving around the main character carrying a plot pivotal magical ring.

Also has quite possibly the best big bad villain in the history of fiction writing.

Third chronicles went off the rails so it is skippable but first and second is some of the most brilliant fantasy ever written.

 

[Delock]

Still waiting for an RPG where you're either A: the back-up hero and people clearly know this given there's a system for "chosen ones" with you being something like 48th in line and the villain ends up systematically killing everyone in front of you off over the course of the game as they gather all the ancient artifacts while you went off on your own (increasingly interrupted) quest to go fetch something mundane or B: someone who increasingly runs across what a normal hero of an RPG would be while you carry on trying to keep the local inn afloat while dealing with the continual forces of evil trying to burn down the hero's home town (your town).

 

[Stalydan]

As cliche as it is, revenge is usually my favourite reason for why some character feels the need to go to war again big bad world-raper. It's a personal reason and driving force behind many things.

Personally, I'd like to see more modern-day RPGs with magical elements e.g. the Persona series but done with a more western style RPG.

 

[Aerograt]

Anyone else think moral masturbation sounds pretty hot?

 

[him over there]

Anyone else think moral masturbation sounds pretty hot?

I read that in the voice of Purple Link, now I feel rather silly.

 

[Aiddon_v1legacy]

This constant wanking of Tolkien is why I made my version of elves the heavily-industrialist race of the setting who realized there was a reason that people made advanced technology. The West really does need to get away from Tolkien (or also Martin) catalog of fantasy or typical sci-fi. Say what you will about Japan's RPGs, but they certainly don't rely on Tolkien when it comes to settings.

I would like to see more pirates, but I think the point Yahtzee is trying to get across is that the West seems to relegate themselves to very narrow settings for know other reason that because D&D was swords and sorcery typical high fantasy. I mean, come on, TONS of pen and paper RPGs have settings other than fantasy.

 

[weirdee]

I like how the Japanese have made badass RPG's like Persona which has a High school combined with demons setting and yet western developers are content eating Tolkien's leftovers!

You thing COD is generic and same-y? Well so are most RPG's now a days! Do something new!!
Make it based on Dresden Files, American Gods, Hellboy, Hellblazer/Constantine!

to be fair, both high school and demons are the done to death subjects in japan, so just moving to somebody else's pond and seeing their big fish means that you're resorting to being "exotic" again

it's the characters in those games that carry the content

I want to see a RPG (the usual fantasy setting would be fine) where you manage a small band of adventurers with the goal of getting rich. They willingly go into the dungeon of horrors or wherever so they can kill things and steal their gold and magical whatsits. There would be endless rivals trying to do the same thing. The town outside the doom pit would be like a gold rush town; ramshackle, unruly, build and frequented by people thinking only of the cash they can make today.

If you want a larger story you can have your money-grubbers stumble onto something down in the hole that they're just not practicably able to ignore, no matter how much they'd like to.

watch me railroad this post

...

have you ever played megaman legends?

 

[RockPlazaCentral]

Still waiting for an RPG where you're either A: the back-up hero and people clearly know this given there's a system for "chosen ones" with you being something like 48th in line and the villain ends up systematically killing everyone in front of you off over the course of the game as they gather all the ancient artifacts while you went off on your own (increasingly interrupted) quest to go fetch something mundane or B: someone who increasingly runs across what a normal hero of an RPG would be while you carry on trying to keep the local inn afloat while dealing with the continual forces of evil trying to burn down the hero's home town (your town).

Nice. I'd play both.

 

[The Random One]

Well MY game based on the life of Muhammed Ali is an epic role playing game that's essentialy a Barkley: Shut Up and Jam 2: Gaiden spinoff so everything you said is probably wrong.

It's called Ali: Shut Up and Punch 2.5: Gaiden Gaiden.

You thing COD is generic and same-y? Well so are most RPG's now a days! Do something new!!
Make it based on Dresden Files, American Gods, Hellboy, Hellblazer/Constantine!

"I want something different! There are lots of stuff that are different!" *lists four urban fantasy works*

Although I do love urban fantasy and it's a shame that very few games use that setting. That is pretty much the only reason I'm keeping a hopeful eye out for The Secret World.

 

[Lunar Templar]

wouldn't say more interesting, just less used.

sides 'pirates saving the world' sounds off, not saying ever protagonist needs to be a hero, but i donno, not big on 'well crap if i don't want have any one to burn and pillage' storys

 

[Vault101]

you know...we could eather give our change to the charities and have a small moment of mental masturbation

or we can just be our susal apathetic selves and the charities get no money

I don't see the issue

 

[Vault101]

Although I do love urban fantasy and it's a shame that very few games use that setting. That is pretty much the only reason I'm keeping a hopeful eye out for The Secret World.

Secret world look so cool...but unfortunatly its an MMO

 

[Terminal Blue]

I personally blame D&D rather than Tolkien.

I mean, Tolkien wrote a pretty generic story and gave us a generic terminology for fantasy creatures. D&D however gave a full fledged system for telling any number of generic stories using generic fantasy creatures. The problem is that the mechanics themselves actually favour a particular type of story, namely a generic bildungsroman about characters setting out to be adventurers and growing from poorly armed peasant farmboys to badass heroes of the land.

Something I never actually realized until I read this article though is how much that system also rewards deeply non-human behaviour. Yeah, it's actually kind of dumb for my character to repeatedly risk life and limb or carry out senseless fetch quests, unless we accept that somehow my character knows that every time they do this stuff they become more powerful because arbitrary bullshit says so.