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Well, it’s safe to say video games have done well for themselves. No longer are they considered the “junk food” of entertainment. Nope, now slaying the dragon and saving the princess (or whatever you’re into) might be considered a literary genre.
The Guardian has an interesting article online that debates the integrity of sci-fi and video games. Representing the “for” side, Quin Parker points out that as video games become increasingly complex, the quality of the writing has to increase accordingly. Video games are showing a trend away from purely reactionary shoot-and-kill, and more towards truly interactive fiction. But then again, just how interactive do players expect their games to be? John Crace points out that he’s more interested in the interaction than the fiction, so he skips the dialogue and goes straight to the action. Storylines get cut in favor of the interactivity.
I wonder if there’s some sort of ideal balance that might be found in video games, wherein the narrative and the interactive elements are both essential to gameplay. Being not much of a gamer myself (unless I’m creating world peace in BoP, that is), I admit I can’t bring an informed set of examples to the table. Though I’ve heard a lot about video games that do heavily stress both the elements—Assassin’s Creed, a mind-bending, time-traveling mystery set during the Crusades, is such an example. Anyone else got any others? [The Guardian]
Hey cousin. I like this blog. My idea of a perfect video game narrative is Pac-Man. The ghosts try to trap and kill you, except during brief periods when you can trap and kill the ghosts. Nothing complicated about it, but it never gets old. I think there’s some ancient predator-and-prey stuff going on deep in the brain when you play Pac-Man. Also, the ghosts always win eventually. Pac-Man is like Tetris in that way: there’s no way to win. Just like life! My issue with big complicated narrative games like Assassin’s Creedis that they’re way too literal and representational, struggling hard to resemble movies. It’s like the way early “serious” movies tried way too hard to resemble theater. The narrative cutscenes are badly-written and acted animated shorts that distract from the actual gameplay. Good videogame narratives are inseparable from the gameplay.
This is an interesting subject matter – I teach high school English and I am always looking for new topics to get my students reading and writing, this might be the argument might be the rosetta stone. It helps that I’m young and not a stranger to the video game culture. I grew up in the 80’s with the original Nintendo and in the 90’s when PlayStation hit the scene ( I’m old enough to remember Genesis and TurbroGrafix 16). To answer you question “are there any other [games that feature a balance of interaction and storytelling]?”, yes – lots! Games that come to mind are Knights of the Old Republic, a massive multiplayer for the original XBox that features essential narrative scene cuts that require the player to choose responses to in-game characters from an expansive reply menu. Another game that has an excellent narrative is Prince of Persia (and subsequent sequels). Although, one could argue that that is not a balanced interactive/storytelling experience since it is possible to skip the cinematic scenes. Newer games such as Gears of War 1 & 2, The Resident Evil franchise, and even Batman Arkham Asylum feature compelling narratives as well, but again don’t require player/readers to view (or participate) in the storytelling. Video games may be the next medium to break into literary spotlight (consider how long graphic novels fought to be recognized for their artistic-literary merit), but they would need to create more games that require the player to make decisions about moving the plot along – preferably using some of their reading skills.
I agree, and I’d love to see more video games incorporating reading/literature. But the current model will have to be tweaked; namely, the ‘literature’ component of the video game is just as important as the interactivity, prompting less gamers to skip past the reading bits. I’m not sure how this could be done, though–I think part of the problem with gamers skipping ahead to the action is that reading/gaming tend to require separate mindsets. Gamers ready to interact and play tend to lack the patience to sit through the more passive reading parts.
But like you mentioned, video games are just waiting to break into the spotlight. I can’t wait to see what the industry turns out in the next few years.
Note: It would appear there is no edit feature for comments after you click “submit”. Typos are embarrassing… always proofread your work.