Story problems with modern shooters

[Jangles]

It has typically been a common criticism of First Person Shooters in the last few years that the campaigns seem cheesy and unimaginative.

I find this interesting because this criticism was not so common during the days when AAA FPSs were mostly set in WW2, and re hashing a well documented historical event is not the pinnacle of creativity.

Medal of Honor thrived when it was set in WW2 and CoD campaigns also thrived and got good reviews.

Since the transition to modern day scenarios, Medal of Honor, Battlefield, and CoD have all received particularly stinging reviews concerning the campaign portions of their games despite them coming up with stories that haven't actually occurred, nor are not set directly in modern day conflicts. There was no call of duty where you invade Fallujah or Baghdad in the context of simulating the Iraq or Afghan wars.

CoD MW got great reviews and I think the campaign did too, but that may have been becuase it was so refreshingly not WW2


What is also interesting is these games have moved away from having you be a grunt among grunts, to being SEALS, SAS, JTF2, etc. Even Battlefield Bad Company has you part of a "rag tag" super squad...

In summation, since dropping WW2 as a setting, AAA campaigns have received much more criticism despite the fact that they are much more original than re-telling different aspects of WW2.

Why do you think we are less forgiving of modern campaigns, is it because there is no emotional connection like we are taught to have to WW2? Has the move away from having the player be a grunt among grunts taken away from the experience? Or does it lend credibility to the player's character having abnormal abilities?


*Disclaimer* Despite the fact that Call of Duty and MoH referred to the Afghan and Iraq conflicts, there were no campaigns involving real battles like Op Medusa, etc.

Disclaimer 2* Also, The CoD series while some parts take part in middle east, it uses the context of a war between Russia and USA, then South America and USA.

*Disclaimer 3 - MoH abandoned having the player be a common grunt and moved to SOF units operating, therefore avoiding the real war part as well

 

[Elfgore]

I think it's all about the special forces thing. The true war experience comes from being a grunt rather than a badass navy seal.


The first opening scene of this game has more emotion and grittiness than any other COD game. It shows war for what it really is, people dying and explosions all around.

 

[JacksonDemolition]

It has typically been a common criticism of First Person Shooters in the last few years that the campaigns seem cheesy and unimaginative.

I find this interesting because this criticism was not so common during the days when AAA FPSs were mostly set in WW2, and re hashing a well documented historical event is not the pinnacle of creativity.

Medal of Honor thrived when it was set in WW2 and CoD campaigns also thrived and got good reviews.

Since the transition to modern day scenarios, Medal of Honor, Battlefield, and CoD have all received particularly stinging reviews concerning the campaign portions of their games despite them coming up with stories that haven't actually occurred, nor are not set directly in modern day conflicts. There was no call of duty where you invade Fallujah or Baghdad in the context of simulating the Iraq or Afghan wars.

CoD MW got great reviews and I think the campaign did too, but that may have been becuase it was so refreshingly not WW2


What is also interesting is these games have moved away from having you be a grunt among grunts, to being SEALS, SAS, JTF2, etc. Even Battlefield Bad Company has you part of a "rag tag" super squad...

In summation, since dropping WW2 as a setting, AAA campaigns have received much more criticism despite the fact that they are much more original than re-telling different aspects of WW2.

Why do you think we are less forgiving of modern campaigns, is it because there is no emotional connection like we are taught to have to WW2? Has the move away from having the player be a grunt among grunts taken away from the experience? Or does it lend credibility to the player's character having abnormal abilities?


*Disclaimer* Despite the fact that Call of Duty and MoH referred to the Afghan and Iraq conflicts, there were no campaigns involving real battles like Op Medusa, etc.

Disclaimer 2* Also, The CoD series while some parts take part in middle east, it uses the context of a war between Russia and USA, then South America and USA.

*Disclaimer 3 - MoH abandoned having the player be a common grunt and moved to SOF units operating, therefore avoiding the real war part as well

I agree. The games shouldn't make you the only competent guy on the field. And they should start looking into what war really is. Not just another excuse for gunning down people that look different.

I think it's all about the special forces thing. The true war experience comes from being a grunt rather than a badass navy seal.


The first opening scene of this game has more emotion and grittiness than any other COD game. It shows war for what it really is, people dying and explosions all around.

I agree with this also. They should put more time and effort into the stories. MAKE US CARE.

 

[Aesir23]

I think part of it also has to do with the fact that you have companies focusing much more on the multiplayer portion of the game so that, in a lot of titles, the single player campaign seems a bit half-assed. I know that people really like the multiplayer but I really wish they wouldn't treat the story as if it were a side-dish or the appetizer to the main course.

Also, at the risk of mimicking others, it seems to have lost the emotional grittiness that made some of the WW2 titles so great. I loved the Russian campaign in World At War because it was so intense and even emotional at times. It was the same thing with the earlier COD titles as well. It showed, to some extent, that war was downright hell.

Aside from World At War, the only recent military shooter that's had any sort of emotional impact on me was Medal of Honor.

 

[mirage202]

Wouldn't this also have something to do with most SP campaigns lately being little more than extended QTE tutorial sequences with the odd shooting arena thrown in?

Poor story telling could also be a symptom of that style of 'gameplay', why after all would they put serious money into a story for something little more than an interactive movie that was only created because someone in the food chain considers it to be an obligation.

 

[SinisterGehe]

What was the name of that game that tried to make authentic scenario from Iraq/Afghanistan war. But couldn't because the shit storm that ignorant people brewed of it? I honestly can't remember.

I think is the primary reason. WW2 is safe to chow since only people who might get offended really are German's. And even then it is only their censors. Far as I know, the people - especially gaming population - disagree heavily.

Because the primary consumer market and developers of these types of games are American. They go by the American culture standards. And if there are things that "Shouldn't be talked about in THAT fashion" or more or less buried completely. But thats just my opinion.

The reason why they have become more and more about being lonewolf and special operations is that. It is easier to make, when you don't need to take account friendly AI, which lets be honest, they rarely get right. Specially when they are required to do something more than run&gun, not careful Tactical gameplay. And I am not counting scripted sections.

And the fact that the primary market of teens think that is the cool thing to be. Doesn't not help the slightest bit.

Also I think they should stop the facade already. Make a multiplayer shooter, release single player as a demo or separate game - downloadable or something. Because lately there has been this atmosphere that the developers don't want to make it, or the publishers don't let them make it properly.

 

[Shoggoth2588]

I could be wrong about this but I think a factor is how Call of Duty and its peers have gotten popular to the point that other types of FPS aren't being made by big publishers anymore. Sure, a generation or two ago we were overrun with WW2 sims but they were offset by other games like Quake-sequels, Doom-sequels, Painkiller, Time Splitters, Red Faction, Shadow Warrior, Duke Nukem 3D...what I'm getting at is, there was more out there than just the realistic war sims. I'm not saying this past generation didn't have deviations either but there seem to have been far less this generation than in previous ones.

At this point I really hope Titanfall does well enough to send the message that a multiplayer-only FPS can work. This will, hopefully, result in multiplayer focused FPS games being made less often but given tweaks and DLC while single player FPS titles can be their own thing again. Ideally though I'd rather the design philosophy of Time Splitters returns...big, insane, balls-to-the-wall FPS action featuring monkeys where you can play with friends offline or on...not gonna happen of course.

 

[Ubiquitous Duck]

It's the same criticism that gets levied at bog-standard action film flicks. So, like these, I don't necessarily see a reason why this would go away. There will always be the mediocre and the unimaginative, but they won't set the world on fire.

I think that there are failings with modern day shooters stories, but there are problems with all games stories, it's just a matter of how much criticism you think is due.

I definitely think we are leagues ahead of the days of Doom or Quake or Unreal Tournament. And I see no reason to naturally assume that all these WW2 flicks were so much better.

Part of the Modern Warfare revolution of the FPS genre was the story in its main campaign. Sure, subsequent ones haven't lived up to this (in my opinion), but these are post the WW2 era shooters with a much more interesting look at creating stories.

I never went to Medal of Honour for its story.

 

[MysticSlayer]

It has typically been a common criticism of First Person Shooters in the last few years that the campaigns seem cheesy and unimaginative.

I find this interesting because this criticism was not so common during the days when AAA FPSs were mostly set in WW2, and re hashing a well documented historical event is not the pinnacle of creativity.

They were heavily criticized for unimaginative scenarios, but not due to the historical nature. It was due to every game basically be the same few scenarios of the Americans in Western Europe, largely inspired by Saving Private Ryan and Band of Brothers. They had a massive war to work with, and they were limiting themselves to only a few scenarios. The same criticism is now being launched at modern shooters for having a vast array of stories to work with but being mostly limited to Americans versus Russians and Arabs.

Medal of Honor thrived when it was set in WW2 and CoD campaigns also thrived and got good reviews.

When MoH went modern day, it also was a soulless CoD rip-off that only had "authenticity" and "respect for the soldier" going for it, unlike its WWII days where they at least tried to do something unique.

In summation, since dropping WW2 as a setting, AAA campaigns have received much more criticism despite the fact that they are much more original than re-telling different aspects of WW2.

Actually, what is surprising, is that they still aren't that original. They are basically copy/pasting various scenes of movies with a particular emphasis on behind-enemy-lines and special forces operations, similar to all the WWII shooters copy/pasting various films and focusing on the O.S.S. and 101st. The storylines themselves also come from many of these films, and are basically Cold War fantasies mixed with some conspiracies (that aren't that hard to find if you look in Christian fiction) about Russia, Muslims, minorities, etc. They also take heavy inspiration from modern-day conflict. Really, it isn't that they are having any more a stroke of genius than the WWII writers did. They're basically following the same general outline.

We also aren't necessarily seeing more criticism. It's easier to find that criticism, and there's more people now that can throw criticism at the game, but I wouldn't necessarily say we are seeing proportionately more criticism.

*Disclaimer* Despite the fact that Call of Duty and MoH referred to the Afghan and Iraq conflicts, there were no campaigns involving real battles like Op Medusa, etc.

Actually, Medal of Honor was set in those conflicts. Basically the whole story was based off of accounts given by soldiers with potential security risks removed for safety reasons. They also took some liberty in order to try to chase the Call of Duty crowd, but MoH was not as far removed from modern-day conflicts as CoD or BF are.

*Disclaimer 3 - MoH abandoned having the player be a common grunt and moved to SOF units operating, therefore avoiding the real war part as well

Older MoH games were just as much about the special forces. Even when the player played a "grunt", they were often in a special unit most of the game that got to do special things. The only major exceptions are Pacific Assault and Vanguard/Airborne, and even those had a lot of behind-enemy-lines missions. After that, you almost always play as an O.S.S. agent. Actually, the 2010 reboot's emphasis on four-man squads was basically just them redoing what they had done in Pacific Assault's Makin levels.

 

[Hero in a half shell]

-snip-

Personally I think one of the biggest issues is the length. Modern games have campaigns of about 6 hours. The old games used to be around 10-15 hours long (8 hours would have been a short game!)

Some of the length was just having more, longer levels, and larger areas to explore, and part of it's length was down to gameplay mechanics.

Spoiler: Click for a boring summary of why old FPS gameplay made games longer than modern FPS gameplay - not necessary to read unless you want to

Health didn't refill automatically in the old games, so if you played badly you got punished until you played better. This also reduced the effectiveness of save scumming as you got to a point where you had 5 health, an entire Waffen SS sniper regiment lay between you and the next healthpack, and you were damned sure not going to restart the level to try again. You were reaching that healthpack. One. Bloody. Sniper. At. A. Time.
In Modern games as long as you survive you can continue unhindered by health

Add to that the difficulty gradually increasing throughout the game until the last few levels of the game were HARD (Even on easy) - The game made you play well or go nowhere. It was common to get stuck on difficult sections of the game for hours, maybe even days, just replaying a set of 4 or 5 rooms trying to memorise sniper spots, enemy spawn locations and numbers etc. until you were knowledgable enough and fast enough to beat them. And then you pwned everyone.
In modern games the difficulty is constant - if you can survive the first level you can survive the last. And because enemies spawn as infinite waves instead of set positions, the best tactic is bizarrely to keep moving forward as fast as possible instead of the old system of focusing on positioning, and slow methodical elimination of targets.

There was also a larger focus on exploration: Healthpacks and the best weapons were hidden around the levels, so in order to survive you needed sometimes to backtrack and explore to see what you missed (For example, in the last level of MoH Rising Sun you WILL run out of ammo before the end of the level unless you enter a sideroom at the beginning of the level and pick up some ammo crates there)

The first MoH I played took me a full year to complete (aged 12-13) When I finally managed it, I replayed the last level every day for about 2 weeks to celebrate because I was so pleased with myself.
Ask someone who played COD when they were 12 or 13 how long it took them to complete the campaign, and how they felt afterwards - it probably doesn't compare.

Asides from the length, I suppose the other issues would have been realism and suspension of disbelief (WW2 shooters seemed to stick pretty exclusively with actual events and situations - Normandy, Pacific Campaign, North Africa, Invasion of Italy, Russian Front, etc. etc. - realistic places, realistic weapons, fighters and locations.) whereas MMS tend to have made up wars with made up countries, and made up circumstances, which as the series have progressed become more and more sci-fi inspired and less grounded in reality, sometimes going too far such as the scene where the nuke taking out the International Space Station (which orbits 370 km above the earth!)

Medal of Honor thrived when it was set in WW2 and CoD campaigns also thrived and got good reviews.

When MoH went modern day, it also was a soulless CoD rip-off that only had "authenticity" and "respect for the soldier" going for it, unlike its WWII days where they at least tried to do something unique.

This is unbelievably true. The Medal Of Honor reboot was one thousand times more a COD sequel than a Medal of Honor Sequel. They changed everything to bring it in line with the COD MMS style of games - except they forgot how to make it good. It was MoH only in name.

 

[Radeonx]

I think you're right, but I also think that the current popular shooters don't really have room for deep in depth storylines anymore as they are far more focused on multiplayer and gameplay mechanics than an engrossing story. They've become what Transformers has for movies - an experience to relax and watch explosions and guns and high volume action sequences.

Do I think that a gritty, realistic portrayal of war would be a really cool experience in an FPS game? Sure, but I don't think that it is likely due to market structure and I certainly don't think that a game is going to be able to pull off a gritty, good story AND a good enough multiplayer to warrant anything of the sort.

 

[SonOfVoorhees]

Story is they are boring, go here and shoot that. Protect this area. etc etc You need something that holds it all together and says why this area is important and why i have to go their. I think thats why i loved the Cod games while they where set during WW2 and hated the modern set games. We know the background of WW2 so those games had history etc backing them. Now FPS games just have boring missions that have generic stories with no emotion.

 

[rasputin0009]

The modern shooter is plagued by the whole "Big set-piece that needs to blow up plot". Battlefield 4's story is literally moving from one set-piece to the next and blowing it up. There was some political side-story that could have been interesting, but since you can't blow up politics, they eventually just gave up on it.

And they also lack humour. We all love Transformers explosions as long as there's some wise-cracking between said explosions. The BF: Bad Company series didn't take themselves seriously, and they were more enjoyable than the heartless crap that was BF3 and BF4's campaigns.

 

[Easton Dark]

What was the name of that game that tried to make authentic scenario from Iraq/Afghanistan war. But couldn't because the shit storm that ignorant people brewed of it? I honestly can't remember.

6 Days in Fallujah.

Spoiler: Search it in google images and this is the fourth one

About the games, I've noticed more pretty explosions and less gameplay lately, something that I don't think many WW2 era games could pull off, because the explosions when those were popular were about as good as the ones in Goldeneye, so the actual gameplay was the focus. Shooting game vs. Action-movie-Schwarzenegger game I think.

Also, you can't really screw up WW2's story, it's already written and believable because it happened. The british held this town, the germans won this air battle, etc. "Oops, we made the Germans win in a convoluted way" doesn't happen.

 

[BlumiereBleck]

You know Red Orchestra II: Heroes of Stalingrad's campaign of you have no idea who you are or why you're here but you get great narration(at least for the German campaign) as to why you fight as a grunt. It's perspective. Several guys here have mentioned it. I find it boring to play as the specialist, ya know? I'd rather play as a grunt because they're an everyman.

 

[Bocaj2000]

Meh. Modern shooters suck at storytelling, and have always been even in more story-based experiences like Halo and Gears of War. The reason is because developers focus more on multiplayer, which often has more depth, nuance, and creativity than the single-player.

If you want a real single-player campaign, try the Mass Effect trilogy, which is actually a shooter/RPG hybrid rather than a full-blown shooter, period. It has more lore than Halo, Half-Life, and Gears of War combined, and you carry around squadmates who are represented in a huge variety of ways, including race, gender, powers and weapons, personalities, and story-arcs. Sure, BioWare was forced against their will by EA to include a multiplayer component, almost at the expense of a good ending. However, the Mass Effect trilogy was one of those rare examples of good storytelling and characterization in a shooter, let alone a shooter/RPG hybrid.

That, and Mass Effect 3: Citadel, where Shepard and his entire squad celebrate all the good times they had together in the whole trilogy!

I agree with you. Story has never been a huge component in shooting games, but that's not the way it has to be. Many shooters have pulled brilliant stories, such as Alpha Protocol, Bioshock, Deus Ex, Half Life 1 & 2, Hotline Miami, Speck Ops: The Line, and, of course, Mass Effect 1. They exist, but just not in great numbers. I wouldn't exactly call Mass Effect the shining champion of interactive storytelling in shooters, especially ME2 and ME3, but it still earns its place. My personal favorite is Alpha Protocal in which the plot actively works against you at every turn and is filled with deception, manipulation, and betrayal. It's a shame that the only other game like it is Deus Ex: The Conspiracy.

 

[exobook]

You know Red Orchestra II: Heroes of Stalingrad's campaign of you have no idea who you are or why you're here but you get great narration(at least for the German campaign) as to why you fight as a grunt. It's perspective. Several guys here have mentioned it. I find it boring to play as the specialist, ya know? I'd rather play as a grunt because they're an everyman.

Red Orchestra 2 is an interesting example of telling story through actions and settings rather than plot and characters. The grinding perverseness of it as you charge into that machinegun nest again and again to take it out is a great way of bringing across the bleakness of war and the fragility of the soldiers. That being said it not something with that much depth either, a great experience that doesn't attempt to do anything.

 

[Sarge034]

Snip

I think it's less about if you play a grunt or not but the transition to modern conflict. In WW2 you did have huge open warfare with people doing all sort of diverse and crazy shit, but not so much in modern conflict. Modern conflict consists of driving around waiting to get blown up and then ambushed. Needless to say that would make a shitty game so they became grandiose by necessity. And make no mistake, it's cool that grandiose games are out there because if they weren't we would be having the same conversation but with "hyper-realistic" thrown in the title. As much as I love Spec Ops: The Line I would hate for every game to be like it.

 

[senordesol]

A lot of the CoD stuff suffers from 'blockbusteritis' wherein they try to turn their singleplayer campaigns into cheesy summer action movies.

MW1 actually had something to say in terms of 'creating our own political problems', but MW2, Blops, MW3, and Ghosts had nothing to say. Blops II kind of had a message but I think they missed their own point (i.e.: maybe having an army of remorseless kill droids isn't a good thing).

It all boils down to the basics of storytelling: 'What are you trying to say and why should I give a damn?'