Slide 2 In order to design a game that includes a story, you must - PDF document

Slide 2 In order to design a game that includes a story, you must interweave the gameplay with the narrative events of the story. The events must feel related to each other and part of a single sequence that entertains the player. As shown in this diagram the storytelling engine is triggered by the core mechanics of the game or triggers the core mechanics of the game and the displays narrative events to the user interface. Slide 3 There are two main types of stories first is A linear Stories is when a player cannot change the plot or the ending of the story. However the player still faces challenges as they go through the story and is still an interactive story. God of war and the last of us being examples of linear stories. Slide 4 The pros of linear stories are: -It requires less content than nonlinear ones -storytelling engine is simpler -they are less prone to bugs and absurdities -they are cable of greater emotional power The con being that they deny the player agency Slide 6 Nonlinear stories allow the player to influence future events and change the direction of the story. The two most common types are foldback stories and branching stories

Slide 7 Branching Stories follow a similar format to the structure shown here, however a story can branch in any number of directions at any given point. The branch can go down or sideways, but never back up again. In other words the stories always moves forward in time and never passes through the same point twice. This enforces the rule that stories must not contain identical repeating events and helps avoid the risk of continuity errors. Different branches can merge, which means different plot lines can converge. A story can have several start points. Which is the case when a player makes a key decision before the story begins. For example choosing a specific avatar and or class can influence the start of a game. The disadvantages of the branching story are: They are extremely expensive to implement Every Critical event (those that affect the entire remainder of the plot) has to branch into its own unique section of the tree: for example there are two players that can die or live, A dies B lives needs a unique branch, B dies A lives needs a unique branch, A and B live needs a unique branch, and A and B die needs a unique branch And the player must play the game repeatedly if they want to see all the content. Slide 8 If an event in the game causes the plot to branch right away, that event has an immediate influence on the story. This is the most common and easiest to implement. Deferred influence is when a decision

make early in the game influences a branch point later on. Cumulative influence is when a player makes a whole series of decisions throughout the game that cumulatively affect a branch point. If using deferred or cumulative influence, you must make it clear to the player what the possible consequences of their decision will be. A tip that the books gives to lessen the frustration of a player is to allow the player to save the game multiple times. This way they can save the game prior to making critical decisions. Slide 9 Foldback stories are a compromise between branching stories and linear ones. The plot branches and number of times but eventually folds back to a inevitable event before branching again and then folding back again. Most foldback stories have one ending, but isn’t required. Slide 10 Emergent Narrative is the story telling produced entirely by player actions and in game events. There is no separate storytelling engine and no preplanned story structure, in principle anything can happen at any time so long as the core mechanics permit it. The sims can create emergent narratives because the game simulates the activities of a group of characters and contains no prewritten narrative blocks. The benefit of emergent narrative is that the sequence of events is not fixed by a linear or branching structure, so the player enjoys more agency. Slide 11 The ending of a story is one of its most critical emotional moments. Storytellers craft their endings to evoke specific feelings in the audience.

Interactive story can have multiple endings. This gives the player an outcome that reflects the dramatic actions they took throughout the story. Competitive games, those without stories at all, still offer more than one endings: you either win or lose. Slide 12 The only time to use multiple endings is when each way will wrap up the story in a way both dramatically meaningful and emotionally consistent with the player’s choices and play. If you give a player a lot of dramatic freedom or if it is important that the ending reflect the skill with which they played, then you should give them whatever ending their actions earn. You may have to create several endings. Slide 13 Granularity in the context of games that tell a story and refers to the frequency with which the game presents elements of the narrative to the player. Coarse Granularity is when Narrative blocks are infrequent For example StarCraft Fine Granularity is when Narrative block are frequent for example Indiana Jones Series Infinitesimal Granularity is when the Player is unaware of narrative events as separate from the rest of the game Half-Life comes close to this Slide 14 The storytelling engine causes the plot to advance. Different games use different triggers to tell the story engine to move forward.

For example: Succeeding or failing at a challenge Avatar’s journey Entering a room or area or time alone Slide 15 Is when the plot advances only when the player meets challenges or makes decisions. This system works well for games that involve no travel at all or those in which travel itself doesn’t affect the plot. For example war games or vehicle simulators. Slide 16 If your game involves a avatar on a journey, any RPG game, the avatar’s movemen ts will most likely trigger the storytelling engine to advance the plot. Games that use this approach almost always set up obstacles so the avatar cannot move through the game freely. For example brokers bridge in gta 4. The benefits of presenting a story as a journey are: It automatically provides novelty and it allows the player to control the pace. Slide 17 A small numbers of game treat the story as a drama that progresses at its own pace, advancing with time itself. The story takes place in real time. The two examples in the textbook are Night trap and Façade. In both this games the plot will advance even if the play does nothing.

Slide 18 Video games that don’t include a story, but only challenges and achievements limit themse lves to the thrill of victory and the agony of defeat or the frustration of repeated failure. With a story, you can create other kinds of feelings as well. Creating characters the player will care about and subtle relationships among those characters gives a chance to make the audience feel betrayal by a lover, satisfaction at justice, or protective instinct for a child, among other feelings as well. Slide 19 By offering the player the power to change the course of the story you agree to accept the player’ s decisions. You cannot guarantee that the player will experience the most emotionally powerful resolution you feel that your story offers. This is why designers often restrict otherwise nonlinear stories to a single ending in order to guarantee that the player experiences the emotionally meaningful outcome the designer planned. Slide 20 : In avatar based games the premature death has come to signify the player’s failure to meet a challenge rather than being an actual element of the story, so the death carries almost no emotional impact. In order to affect the player’s feeling with the death of a character you need to kill off one of the avatar’s friends Party-based models offer you more freedom to kill off members of the cast. XCOM does this well.