Narrative, Plot And Aimlessness In Game Design

Logic Bomb writes: "Feed is running a very well-written essay by Steven Johnson on game design that includes an interview with the designer of Oni. Johnson has some thought-provoking comments on narrative, navigation, and cheat sheets. Lots of room for discussion here: what balance do you like best between plot and action (i.e. Metal Gear Solid versus Quake)? Are cheat sheets just part of the game, or does needing one show bad game design? Anyone have comments on the system used by Oni discussed in the article?" Equally interesting to me is this other Feed interview with Warren Spector, designer of Deus Ex.

Agreed, with observation.

The point that you implicitly refer to, and was made throughout the article, is that the games that use cinematics to move the narrative along when you reach a certain juncture end up becoming games in which you simply play to get to the next cinematic. We want to be told stories, we don't want to necessarily put them together out of constituent parts. Part of the satisfaction of the narrative experience is its passivity, the pleasure of discovering a thing whole and formed.

However, I think this could be a feature, not a bug. If you don't try pretending that you are constructing the narrative, but are simply unlocking it as you play, the narrative becomes the incentive, like bits of kibble that reward achievement. You want to keep to a minimum, I think, the number of plot elements you have in mind at any given time to navigate the game; then you want a pay-off of narrative (and nice cinematics and sounds and such) that make you feel that you have participated in a narrative without having to create it.

er, okay

What was the first game to introduce on-line multiplayer play? What was the first game to use hardware acceleration? What was the first game to have a "sniper" view?

Ultima Undeworld came out a month before Wolf 3-d did, but you never hear people talk about it and how it had features that even DOOM didn't.

nettrek had been out for years allowing people to play online against multiple people.

Descent had true 3D long before Quake.

None of the game you list were TRULY innovative in and of themselves. They may have brought ideas to a new area but ultimately it was more than just the sum of their innovations that made them the names that you remember today.

BTW, the games I remember are C&C: Red Alert, Age of Empires 2, Duke Nukem 3D, Gabriel Knight. I don't remember them because they had innovations. I remember Duke Nukem 3D because I played that coop all the way through over a modem with my best friend one summer. I remember Red Alert because I spent a good chunk of my junior year playing it multi player with my friends. I remember Gabriel Knight because, even though it was extremely dated when I played it (1998) it had a great story and was a great adventure game.

Hamlet on the Holodeck

For anybody interested in the subject, I suggest they check out "Hamlet on the Holodeck" by Janet Murray. She discusses the history and future of interactive storytelling, and uses many well known games as her examples. The issues are all the same -- how do you direct someone through your plot while still providing the freedom of true interactivity? And how do you keep your tree from geometrically exploding?

Always remember that the solution comes from two directions -- what the player gets to do, and what the game does around him. A good example is the cliche of the dropped business card during a murder mystery. Sure, maybe you as the player forget to pick it up, and that's what cheat sheets are all about. But if you're in a truly interactive game where the plot hasn't been completely laid out in advance, then maybe the character in question doesn't drop it, and then what happens? How do you continue to direct the story? Make it mandatory that the character always drops it? Or have some sort of internal consistency checker that makes the game always solvable by shifting to some other story line and providing a different clue?

Re:Half Life

This was one of the things I really liked about Half Life: there was a story that you were a part of. Things unfolded, and you found things out by overhearing other people talking. That is, right up to the teleporter level. Then the story evaporated like Helium-II on a hot stove.

Choose the most likely explanation for this:

1. The aliens were communicating useful plot information - it's just that you couldn't understand them e.g. "Greeeeeep snurghhhhhhherrrrrr" = "Forget Freeman! He'll never make it to the Boss Level."
2. They weren't but mindlessly killing them all is the most entertaining plot possible for the Xen universe.
3. The game was late and needed to be shipped

It's the innovation, stupid

Just think of all the games that leave an impression in your mind and consider if it is memorable because it was well designed, or if it was the first to do something new. The ones I really remember are Wolfenstien (my first FPS), Doom (my first multiplayer game), Doom2 (my first multiplayer with more than 2 people, and it was the hack that made it extra fun), Quake (my first 3D FPS, but not really big until CTF came out), Warcraft (my first multiplayer realtime strategy game).

So basically it's not the overall game I base my appreciation on, it's the innovations they introduced that made them k-rad elite. This is why I've pretty much stopped playing them after Q2, everything's just more of the same but with insane hardware requirements. And when you think about it, it's not the stories that keep you interested (go play D&D if it is, or read a book) it's what's new and exciting. Now days all that's left is eye candy and complexity. But dammit, Doom on a 486 with no mouse was fun enough for me.

PS. if anyone knows a Q1 CTF league drop me a note. Once I get it to install under win2k I'm all over that...

Interactive Fiction is an Oxymoron

what balance do you like best between plot and action

It is critical to recognize that the notion of "balancing" these issues is subtler than it may seem at first. Once can have a simulation, or one can have storytelling, but it is in fact virtually impossible to combine (balance) the two without just plain lying with the suggestion that you are doing either.

This is because both simulation and storytelling place an unreasonable constraint on how time is "delivered" to the player. A story requires some application of the Poetics, an approach to the delivery of characters, their relationships, the staging and timing of events, the building of conflicts between those elements, the lifting of tempo until a climax, AND THEN (you simply can't skimp on this), a solid and unsudden denoument to a close. Tempo --an issue that is far more important than sequencing-- is critical in this regard. To the extent that the storyteller cannot control how the "story time" gets allocated to the real time of the game experience, the storyteller cannot deliver the fiction.

On the other hand, a simulation requires that the user is able to dictate the tempo of matters. This ability to control the timing --even moreso than controlling the sequence-- of events is critical to the sense of interactivity felt by the user.

In short, these are issues that really can't be balanced in fact. You must always cheat storytelling significantly to do any simulating, and vice-versa.

This is not to say that virtually every game purporting to be "in genre" doesn't try to do this. What I am saying is that it can't be done actually, and that the true miracle of a great game is not the "balancing" of these issues, but rather the capacity to use theatrical devices, smoke and mirrors, to cloud the player into feeling or having the sense that a storytelling game is interactive, or that a simulation is storytelling. One of the devices used in this regard is precisely the notion mentioned above, giving the user more control of sequencing to make up for the lack of timing -- which is the real tradeoff that is typically made. The best, and most creative games, are not just those which provide non-linearity, but which combine nonlinearity with other, often subtle, devices that "fake out" the user into thinking she is playing one type of game when she is actually playing the others.

IMHO, although this is not always the rule, those games that attempted to "balance" storytelling and interactivity directly, by going back and forth between the two styles, seem to fail dismally on both counts. For example, cinematics, one of the classic game design "dodges," while utterly goregous in modern technology, seem to detract from, rather than enhance suspension of disbelief in the simulation portion of the game rather. I have seen it get better, but I think the reason we haven't seen it done "great" is that, perhaps, it can't be done at all directly. The "smoke and mirrors" theatrics, on the other hand, can make for truly great simulations or storytelling games, and seem to get far closer to the "ideal" of Interactive Fiction.

Play to your strengths, and not to your weaknesses. Just another view.

Half Life

This was one of the things I really liked about Half Life: there was a story that you were a part of. Things unfolded, and you found things out by overhearing other people talking.

That is, right up to the teleporter level. Then the story evaporated like Helium-II on a hot stove.

I hope that HL2, when it finally does come out, will be able to have enough money to carry the story through the whole game. Of course, I'd like them to throw in a few different tracks for different styles of play (the "sneak&snipe" vs. the "Grond KILL"), and of course I want it under a REAL operating system, but I digress....

How Half-Life was made...

Valve's Cabal Process [gamasutra.com] - The Cabal: Valve's Design Process For Creating Half-Life

Dug this up from my bookmarks because I think some may find it interesting. Essentially Valve focused on making a specific portion as cool as possible, then they moved on, went back and made it as cool as possible again. I think it's a shame this isn't tried out more.

Considering that this is one of the little gems that has done things RIGHT lately, I should hope more people take note of HOW it was done right.

Yes!

I definitely agree. When I play a game, I want something exciting and interesting, where I'm in control. I don't want to recreate the experience of watching a soap opera.

Really, I feel the same way about tabletop RPGs. If your GM has a story he really wants to tell, you'll probably be railroaded and it very well may suck. If, on the other hand, the GM gives you the freedom to take it where you want to go, ahh, now that's more fun.

Also, I want to be able to turn on a game and enjoy it immediately. I don't want to have to turn on a game and say, "that's right, I'm still looking for the Princess's MacGuffin!" or have to try to remember exactly where I was. But maybe I just don't have the right gamer mindset needed to appreciate long linear plots in video games.

Trans-gender storylines

"Oh my God, this guy is really the half-brother of that guy who is the sister of so-and-so,"

Game Design Tip #13 : Make sure your game heroes are somehow related to Boy George.

Games, Work, and HOW-TOs

I recently realized that, with the exception of Final Fantasy 9 (which is more of a story), I haven't played any games in a long time. "What am I doing?" I thought. I then realized that I was playing games, just other types of games: How can I help the Free Software movement, How can I maximize my contribution to society and self, how can I promote, learn about, and work on, groupware. Learning is also another type of game, that I play.

What's common to games? I liked the definition I read on the WorldForge project page: You've got a goal, you've got obstructions, and you try to meet the goal through the obstructions. And, that description matches the games that I play, video-game or otherwise (contributing, learning, etc.,.).

Now the question is: What seperates a game from Work? The description above seems to also describe work rather well. Almost by definition, I hate work, but I love games (Cosmic Encounters, for name-dropping). So what's the difference? For this, I draw on Taoism, that book "Flow" (John Carmak recently referenced it), and Miyamoto-sama, who emphatically repeated at GDC 1999 that the game-playing experience must be "comfortable". Perhaps the only difference between work and a game is that the game is comfortable, whereas the game is, well,... Work. I'm still working on this definition. (Mary Poppins said that with a spoonful of sugar, you just snap, and the job's a game. While I like this idea, I have trouble in the impementation; perhaps I'm just not snapping my fingers correctly. Maybe I need to meditate more.)

Given this description, what are the types of games that I'm interested in playing? Personally, I'm really interested in games that cross-over into the domain of my livelihood, and the livelihood of others around me. I'd like the principle of game-ness to shove out work-ness from my life. I wouldn't fret if work completely disappeared from my life. Computers fit the bill rather well. I've always considered the operation of computers to be something of a game, since I was a wee little one, and I've always had an intuition that it would pay the bills. (That intuition turned out to be right.) But still, there's a lot that's uncomfortable about it. It's just like when you're in the maze, and all the doors are locked, and there isn't a key in sight. You're absolutely stuck. You were slated to finish a programming task in 2 days, and it's taken you 2 WEEKS, and you still don't know how you're going to get out of it. This is an uncomfortable situation, and draws me out of the realm of the game, into the realm of work. Ugh. And I was trying so hard to get out of that realm. Where am I going with all of this? Well, I'm trying to establish the similarities and subtle differences between work and games, and then I'm trying to segue into how I think that we can structure things so that work can become more like a game. My ultimate goal is to get feedback from you, build interest in the subject, and have you send me links and other references to related lines of thought.

So, I've found this neat way of teaching that can make a game out of learning. It gives you immediate positive rewards, it helps out in the world (because you learn a valuable skill), and you don't get stuck with no keys and lots of locked doors, because it has a built in help line, that you can call on and get a quick piece of help.

The way I found I learned from Philip Greenspun [greenspun.com]. He uses problems and a community system as integral parts of the ArsDigita training program. It works like this: You have a number of problems, in gradually increasing difficulty, that the learner tackles. Lecture is rather secondary to the problem statements themselves. Lecture is useful, in so much as it helps with the problems. The problems are rather UNIX-like in that the goal is to teach the student one thing, and teach it well. Anyways, I've been working on installing the ACS, and it's been going well so far. Whenever I have a problem, I go to the web bulliten board, search for the problem. Most likely someone had it before, and I get the answer there. If not, I write an entry to the list, and within 5-15 minutes, get a reply. (Once I had to wait 6 hours, though...) The reply then goes on to the board, so that others can get the solution as well. In fact, it's like this with most of our online systems, except that the response time isn't as small, you have to sort through google entries, and usually you have to subscribe/unsubscribe to/from mailing lists, etc., etc.,.

Anyways, I've tried out the method of problem guides in the Fledging Unix Programmers class [speakeasy.org] that I teach, and it's had excellent results. Problems show up when the difficulty between problems is too high, so I subdivide those intervals. It works great.

But what I'm really looking for is for other people to do the same thing.. There are a lot of times in my life where I have 2-3 hours spare, and I'd like to play a game in that time. I'd like a good set of 3-5 problems, workable within 2 hours total, that increase my knowledge about the Linux Kernel, PHP, How to use databases, link things up, make a small game, play with networking, etc., whatever. Do you know what I mean? (Please answer.) So what I'd like to have is, not so much HOW-TO's, but PROBLEM-GUIDE's. And support lines consisting of other people who are interested in the subject, and have completed the guides themselves. Well balanced problem guides. That way, I can play games on a daily basis that are comfortable, educational, and most importantly, fun.

"One of the best fundamental principles that anybody ever expressed to me about game design is that games should teach you how to play them."

Plot v. Action and Cheats

My comments on two of the discussion-starters:

1) Plot v. Action: Depends totally on the game. If it's a game where you need to "figure stuff out" (e.g. Myst) then plot is a necessity. If it's a shooter, plot is OK, but please, please let me skip the cinematics if I want to.

2) Cheats: If you have to have them to make the game worthwhile, it's a badly designed game. I view cheats primarily as a way to jump in and start really playing a game without investing the (often copious) time required to get good. Beating a game without cheating provides a sense of accomplishment; cheating trades that feeling for saved time.

This is why I play thought and strategy games...

...like Starcraft or Sim City. In Starcraft, the learning curve is pretty, steep, but once you have that mastered the gameplay is in the strategy. It's learning the best tactics to beat the computer and/or your neighbor. The narrative is there, but I've played 'Brood War' for hundreds of hours without ever touching the included campaigns. In Simcity, the learning curve is also pretty steep, and you continue to learn every time you play. That's the point of the game, learning how the game works. EQ players will recognize that they have a mix of tactics and 'cheatsheet' style games. The bulk of Everquest is played learning the best tactics and strategy, while the backstory is created with detailed maps and long quests, 99.9% of which are documented online.

The Best Games

The best games are not the ones with a linear, complex, plot (Metal Gear). All too often, the story takes over the game and we begin playing just to see the next cinema scene. Usually it devolves into a movie with a crappy interactive sequence in between each scene. There is promise in games like Deus Ex, but they still ignore the fact that games can be much more enjoyable if players are allowed to create their own story.

For example, some of my experiences playing UT or Tribes have rivaled action movies in excitement and drama. But since I'm taking part in it with other people, rather than following a predetermined path, the excitement is increased because I know that my next move determines what happens. If given a choice would you rather see through Superman's eyes or BE Superman. That's the difference in choice between these two game types.

Response to cheats being bad gaming?

One of the more intresting/frustrating parts of games without cheats is the lack of continually enjoyable game play.. A good example is Worms 2... Even though the game is enjoyable and addictive the lack of weapons (i.e. weapons only available with cheats) is somewhat disagreeable. The only way to obtain the cheats is through beating the actual 1 player game, which is extremly hard.... A counter example would be Civilization 2... Even though the cheats are readily available for use (on the game menu itself) it is not that enjoyable to use b/c it simple defeats the entire purpose of the game, regardless of the humor of multiple nuclear missles being launched into third world countries like Canada..... A good programing creed would be simply to use cheats as a method of continuing game play and allowing more intresting interaction... Not simple for functional purposes but to expand the gaming experience itself...

--- My Karma is bigger than your...
------ This sentence no verb

Plot and Action.

For myself, I am a fan of plot, but only if it does not intrude on the game too much. It must provide an interesting extra dimension to a game, whilst not obscuring the essential qualities and reasons why we play a game - that of solving puzzles, shooting bad guys, whatever it may be.

I think that most action games tend to have terrible plots, that are totally unbelievable, but that does not matter for most people because they only play the game for the action anyway. A good example might be Quake III - plot is meaningless.

Personally, I would like to see more professionally done plots for games. Why not hire people who know about plot, and developing an interesting story, according to the timeless rules involved? An English graduate or a professional writer or someone could I think work well with the people who typically create games.

Already most games companies employ musicians, actors, and artists as well as programmers. Why not bring some literary experts in too, to cover the plot side, so that you have a good combination of the visual, aural, logical and literary arts?

I think it would help improve the depth of games that bit more.
--
Clarity does not require the absence of impurities,

fun, plot, and realism *all* ORTHOGONAL

Just my $0.02 as a game programmer....

Realism and Plot are independent of a fun game...

You can have games with 100% realism, and 0% plot -- that are fun (flight sims or shooters, ala Rogue Spear or Counter-strike come to mind) Basically anything with mindless destruction ;-)

You also can have games that have 100% plot, 0% realism, and are fun -- Myst (as easy as it was) or adventure games, like Grim Fandago, Monkey Island (awesome memories plaything those with a friend)

And then we get odd ball games, that rock. Like "SOUL CALIBER" No blood, no cutting off of limbs or apendages, or guts. Just a nice background story, and a blast to play. Realism? Sort-of. Plot? Sort-of. Fun? Hell, yeah!

BUT ... realism and plot are tricks we can use to make the game more interesting. After all, the key issues in game design are FUN, and BALANCE.

Game designers abstract the "tedious" stuff out, so as not to make the game boring.
e.g. I just use this health pack, from 20% health right back up to 100% health, *riiiiiiiight* ;-) or I could wait 5 months, for my body to heal naturally. *boooooooring*

Lots of people complain about the "linearity" of single player games, but I treat it like a movie. I play it once, have a fun time, and enjoy the next game. Thief 1 & 2 were definately something I had a blast playing -- late at night, lights out, 3d sound on -- the physical environment set the perfect mood! ;-)

What some people find fun, may be boring to others.
e.g. some find chess/go to be be "lacking."
Others live for card games. Others want to frag their buddies 24x. Other's love the strategy of RTS's. I loved teamplay for ages. Some find virtual craftsman and selling to be fun.

Games are starting to do a good job on "representing realism" via 3D graphics, 3D sound, and force feedback.

But plot on a LARGE scale, is still a VERY hard problem to solve.

We see that stories and books have been around for thousands of years. The "general plot" is nothing new. So we see singler player action/adventure games, are like an "interactive" book. Drakken , Tomb Raider, Thief were cool - because the story didn't advance until I did.

There is a reason we haven't seen massive multiplayer games with a good plot. Because it's dam hard to have *everyone* be able to effect the outcome. It's WAY easier to "guide" someone thru a linear story.

Fun in games: Games have been fun from the start.

Realism in games: We arrived there when Mortal Combat had the "bloody" FINISH HIM.

Plot in games: We're only 25% way there...

Putting a "ban" on "familiar" game design elements, like orcs, character classes, etc, won't really "solve" the problem of having a game with more plot.

Plot?

Ok, I'm going to get flamed here, But I don't care about plots in games. PONG had no plot, But i loved the game.

Pong: Don't let the ball go past you

Breakout: Hit the blocks, don't let the ball go past you

Pole Position: Don't drive your block (a.k.a car) out of the lines.

I had a great time with those games. Getting the magic diamond to kick the galactagoid's ass isn't entertaining to me. All that gets in the way of "hit the bad guy with your weapon"

aimlessness

One thing I've certainly noticed is that there is a lot more aimlessness in games nowadays. It goes under a lot of other names: interactivity or perhaps realistic action. However, what it really shows is one of the fundamental weaknesses of telling a story interactively. Anyone who have ever Game Mastered an RPG is aware of this problem. Most story telling is done in media like books, movie, or theater where the author has complete control over everything. Every thought of every character. Every action of every person. Once you distribute that control it becomes significantly harder to weave an interesting plot.

For instance, imagine you have a game world that is completely interactive. I mean, 100% immersive. Say it's a Blade Runner game. Remember the part where Harrison Ford just "happens" to find the snake scale? What are the chances of that actually happening if the author doesn't make the character notice that.

It's similar to the problem that a lot of sports and driving/flight simulators are having nowadays. They have become so realistic that they often become devoid any actual fun.

Now you have games like Baldur's Gate where you move your cursor over every square inch of the game screen hoping to find that elusive treasure hidden somewhere. Imagine a character in a book taking time from his quest to avenge his step-father's murder to comb every square inch of land for 40 miles looking for a magic ring that may or may not be there. Talk about tedium.

I dunno about most people but I find "open ended games" over-hyped. People often complain about "linear" plots but I think linearity has gotten a bad rap. The problem isn't linearity or non-linearity of plot. It's bad game design and weak story lines.

When was the last time you read a book and the main character picked up everything that wasn't nailed down "just in case" he needs it 60 days later to vanquish the evil demon hordes?