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I've been wanting to open a discussion about storytelling in games. I've picked up a fews tips and insights about writing and video games used as a medium that I think could be helpful and worth repeating. Chime in with any thing you want to add or debate.
Conflict is the core of storytelling. The root of a ho-hum story is probably a lack of conflict. Conflict can take many forms. You might remember from English class: Man vs Man, Man vs Nature, Man vs Himself ect... but don't confuse conflict with "The Conflict". Fighting a hoard of evil might be "the conflict". Every scene -every conversation- should have a bit of conflict to make it interesting. A character going to school is not that interesting. Running to school because they're late, that's better. Late for school, and can't afford another late homework assignment is even better. See? Conflict. Make everything personal. Take a simple greeting with a store clerk. "Welcome". Boring. "Buy something or get out. Don't waste my time", that's conflict. It's not always mean or angry. "You looking to buy? Or just looking...at me *wink*". Awkward is still conflict, even if it doesn't go anywhere because the clerk is just an unimportant NPC.
Character creation. I've seen advice that if you create a personality, traits, quirks, the character will write it's self into the story. If you ask me, that's role-playing. I think it's poor advice and that the story and the characters should be tailored for one another- for effective conflict. The world is in danger and only YOU can save it; isn't that strong when YOU really means ANYONE and it's not personal. An elf with heterochromatic eyes armed with a bow made of sacred wood might as well be Bob from down the street.
Unless you have Sequences. Sequences might not be a universal term. The Sequences I'm talking about are scenes where a character reflects on events that just happened and you see how things have changed because of it. Sequences are important to make the character part of the story, their story, but it's usually missing in amateur games. Plus it can ruin the pacing without it. Someone you thought was dead is actually alive! If you don't show a sequence to let the revelation sink in then you'll lose it's dramatic effect. I hated in the teen titan comics how superboy was killed, the team struggled to cope for the next few issues, then superboy just shows up again later. How it happened is explained in the Superboy comic, but the team couldn't know and they just didn't react to the news, wonder girl was angry and only because she was team leader now and Superboy coming back was a distraction. You're old boyfriend came back from the dead, and that's a distraction? Well I certainly didn't see that coming. Which leads me to my next point.
Expect the audience to expect. Writing can be an adventure when you're making it up as you go but remember the story is ultimately going to be for the audience and you need to think about how they'll experience the story. The audience can be ahead of a character or the character can be ahead of the audience. It depends on how much information you give. The character picks something off the ground, but the audience doesn't have the information to know what that is. Suspense? Well, it might not have been revealed in the story yet but the audience can work things out. You typically have an idea of what a movie is about when you go see it, right? So if the character picked up an artifact that can control time and you already knew the movie was about time travel using an artifact, then you're just waiting for the story to catch up with what you already know. Hopefully you're not halfway through the movie at this point because that would be a pretty bad movie. The audience expecting what happens isn't a bad thing though. That means they're following the story, even when it's laughably predictable that they know what someone is going to say before they say it. Just be careful not to present any misleading information. If there's a dragon on the cover the audience will be disappointed when they get to the end and there is no dragon. They'll throw their hands in the air in frustration because they waited and expected to see one. A bad experience.
Game Overs are kind of a relic from arcade games. You don't need to insert more coins anymore. Its just bad design to mock the player with "you lose" and force them to go through the title and load screen to try again. A retry screen is the more modern approach but in terms of storytelling why not show the consequences of dying? Bad endings. It might be worth considering how the story would pan out if the characters die midway. If the evil master mind was counting on the Heroes to defeat the monster guardian; does that mean if you died his plans would be foiled?
Barks, as I've heard them called are bits of dialog that are triggered when you meet certain specifications. They're called barks because it appears as if characters start talking at random times unprompted. You're exploring a canyon and another character feels the need to explain how the canyon was formed, the legend behind it, or just comment on the scenery. You could also call them sequences and in fact they are a perfect way to have the characters ponder about what happens next. Or lead the player, "Over here" "Look" "Listen"
As amateur game creators, you might not have access to voice actors. Listening isn't as disruptive as stopping and button mashing through text boxes. But there are still places were plugging-in bark like dialog wouldn't be so bad. Like at the end of battles, after finding treasure or buying stuff at the store, entering another area. The Inbetween times when the player just finished something and hadn't yet started something else. If it's truly supplemental then add a skip option or keep a text log so that players can read later if they're interested.
Conflict is the core of storytelling. The root of a ho-hum story is probably a lack of conflict. Conflict can take many forms. You might remember from English class: Man vs Man, Man vs Nature, Man vs Himself ect... but don't confuse conflict with "The Conflict". Fighting a hoard of evil might be "the conflict". Every scene -every conversation- should have a bit of conflict to make it interesting. A character going to school is not that interesting. Running to school because they're late, that's better. Late for school, and can't afford another late homework assignment is even better. See? Conflict. Make everything personal. Take a simple greeting with a store clerk. "Welcome". Boring. "Buy something or get out. Don't waste my time", that's conflict. It's not always mean or angry. "You looking to buy? Or just looking...at me *wink*". Awkward is still conflict, even if it doesn't go anywhere because the clerk is just an unimportant NPC.
Character creation. I've seen advice that if you create a personality, traits, quirks, the character will write it's self into the story. If you ask me, that's role-playing. I think it's poor advice and that the story and the characters should be tailored for one another- for effective conflict. The world is in danger and only YOU can save it; isn't that strong when YOU really means ANYONE and it's not personal. An elf with heterochromatic eyes armed with a bow made of sacred wood might as well be Bob from down the street.
Unless you have Sequences. Sequences might not be a universal term. The Sequences I'm talking about are scenes where a character reflects on events that just happened and you see how things have changed because of it. Sequences are important to make the character part of the story, their story, but it's usually missing in amateur games. Plus it can ruin the pacing without it. Someone you thought was dead is actually alive! If you don't show a sequence to let the revelation sink in then you'll lose it's dramatic effect. I hated in the teen titan comics how superboy was killed, the team struggled to cope for the next few issues, then superboy just shows up again later. How it happened is explained in the Superboy comic, but the team couldn't know and they just didn't react to the news, wonder girl was angry and only because she was team leader now and Superboy coming back was a distraction. You're old boyfriend came back from the dead, and that's a distraction? Well I certainly didn't see that coming. Which leads me to my next point.
Expect the audience to expect. Writing can be an adventure when you're making it up as you go but remember the story is ultimately going to be for the audience and you need to think about how they'll experience the story. The audience can be ahead of a character or the character can be ahead of the audience. It depends on how much information you give. The character picks something off the ground, but the audience doesn't have the information to know what that is. Suspense? Well, it might not have been revealed in the story yet but the audience can work things out. You typically have an idea of what a movie is about when you go see it, right? So if the character picked up an artifact that can control time and you already knew the movie was about time travel using an artifact, then you're just waiting for the story to catch up with what you already know. Hopefully you're not halfway through the movie at this point because that would be a pretty bad movie. The audience expecting what happens isn't a bad thing though. That means they're following the story, even when it's laughably predictable that they know what someone is going to say before they say it. Just be careful not to present any misleading information. If there's a dragon on the cover the audience will be disappointed when they get to the end and there is no dragon. They'll throw their hands in the air in frustration because they waited and expected to see one. A bad experience.
Game Overs are kind of a relic from arcade games. You don't need to insert more coins anymore. Its just bad design to mock the player with "you lose" and force them to go through the title and load screen to try again. A retry screen is the more modern approach but in terms of storytelling why not show the consequences of dying? Bad endings. It might be worth considering how the story would pan out if the characters die midway. If the evil master mind was counting on the Heroes to defeat the monster guardian; does that mean if you died his plans would be foiled?
Barks, as I've heard them called are bits of dialog that are triggered when you meet certain specifications. They're called barks because it appears as if characters start talking at random times unprompted. You're exploring a canyon and another character feels the need to explain how the canyon was formed, the legend behind it, or just comment on the scenery. You could also call them sequences and in fact they are a perfect way to have the characters ponder about what happens next. Or lead the player, "Over here" "Look" "Listen"
As amateur game creators, you might not have access to voice actors. Listening isn't as disruptive as stopping and button mashing through text boxes. But there are still places were plugging-in bark like dialog wouldn't be so bad. Like at the end of battles, after finding treasure or buying stuff at the store, entering another area. The Inbetween times when the player just finished something and hadn't yet started something else. If it's truly supplemental then add a skip option or keep a text log so that players can read later if they're interested.