Storytelling in Games

So you have this great story. It has interesting characters, clever twists, and asks deep and profound questions that make the person who finally receives the story really think. Then, random game pundits in the massive chunk of oddness that is the realm of cyberspace completely forbid the idea of offloading your story to a bunch of cutscenes. "After all, this is an interactive medium," we say, "If we wanted to watch a movie, we would. We are here to play." And no, we-ahem-they don't like the idea of you making the player sit through a bunch of audio logs or pause to read giant chunks of text either.

"Okay, fine!" you say, throwing your hands up as part of your sarcastic concession. "How do I get this amazing story into the game? How can I narrate it? How can I get all of this exposition out without making the player sit through cutscenes or read walls of text?" First, I congratulate you for being truly unique in that you are willing to write a good story for your game, and then be willing to try to find the best way to express it. Second, I would like to answer your question by writing about it in the time when I'm not busy doing school, producing music, creating videogames, experimenting with electronics, or saving the world from trans-dimensional jelly toads.

Mass Effect 3 - Extended Cut

Awhile back when I did a from-the-hip-by-the-seat-of-my-pants review of Mass Effect 3, I spent an entire paragraph explaining how I wasn't going to talk about the ending. There is plenty of hate for it and some pretty awesome critiques of it that I can't touch. Then, along comes the extended cut. There is also a lot of good writing about the extended cut, but I have a few reasons to want to write about it myself. Before I get into those reasons(and before you hit the Read More button and blind yourself) I would like to warn you that the remainder of this post will obviously contain spoilers for the entire Mass Effect series and universe.

Conversation in Deus Ex: Human Revolution

I know that the conversation mechanics in DX:HR(yes, that's how I'm abbreviating it from now on) got a passing mention back in my broad analysis of the game but I never really took the time to give the them a more focused and in depth analysis. I want to look at the large number of things this game does right in this area. These are things that I think we should be emulating and learning from. I'm also going to turn a critical eye on the game to see if we can't also scrounge up some places they may have been improved.

Gameplay vs. Story

I've done an awful lot of writing about game design. I kind of assumed this was a given, but I've never really stated it before: I think videogames should be an artistic medium. I don't agree with a lot of videogame artists on many points, but we all agree on this one. I think a lot of us also agree that being an artistic medium, it's unique story telling abilities are something we can't give up. This is the driving force behind this post. How do we use gameplay to tell a story anyway?

Choice in Gameplay

There has been a TON of talk about videogame choice and how it should be done. I have no particular reason to believe that what I have to say hasn't been said before, but even if it has been said a thousand times my repeating it can only add pressure toward applying it. That said, I want to talk about implementing choice in terms of gameplay mechanics and systems. I'm not here to talk about the artistic or writing side this time.