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Session Overview
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1. Fundamentals of Game Design
Story Telling & Narrative
Sayed Ahmed
BSc. Eng. in CSc. & Eng. (BUET)
MSc. in CSc. (U of Manitoba)
http://sayed.justetc.net
http://www.justETC.net
Just E.T.C for Business, Education, and Technology Solutions
2. Topics
Focus on story oriented games
How to weave a story into a game
Examine what makes a good story
How to keep the story from overwhelming the game play
Define interactive story and narrative
Discuss linear and non-linear storytelling and
mechanism
Scripted conversations
To participate in dialog with non-player characters
Discuss episodic story telling
3. Why stories in Games?
Some players want stories along with the game play
Some games require one
Adventure Games
Action Adventure
Role-Playing Games
Will story improve a game?
Depends on the genre of the game
How good is the story
How you tell the story
Four reasons to have stories in Games
Add significantly to the entertainment that a game offers
Stories attract a wider audience
4. Why stories in Games?
Stories help keep players interested in long games
Bejeweled, Checkers, Tic-tac-toe
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zAOA7TYtXTs
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QVlm2tuf_kg
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZbLFPl4A4fE
Stories offer novelty
A long game need variety
Compelling story provides the variety
Stories help to sell the game
Marketing
What is good storytelling?
Read creative writing books
5. Why stories in Games?
How stories can be incorporated into games
How interactive stories differ from traditional ones
What kind of entertainment experience you want to provide to the players
What kind of players you want to serve
Space invader – one line of story
Dreamfall and Discworld Noir – incorporates stories like a novel
Storytelling offers half the entertainment
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8XrkGztFr-0
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BGDHlRalQFE
Game play comes first than story
In some games, the story overwhelmed the game play
The initial games derived from movie or book franchise
Build player centric game
If it helps include, otherwise do not include..
6. how much story a game should include
Factors that affect
Length
Characters
Degree of realism
Ms. Pac-Man
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EOMa8i9w7-Q
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pac-Man
Emotional richness
Want to inspire greater variety of emotions – include a story
Single player gameplay seldom inspire any rich emotion
Other than
Pleasure in success, frustration at failure
Deeper emotions come only when the player identifies himself
With characters and problems – happens in well written story
Half-Life
7. Key Concepts
Story
Is an account of a series of events either historical or fictitious
Credible
Coherent
Dramatically Meaningful
Credible
People can believe the story
Coherent
Story must not be irrelevant
Must harmonize to create a pleasing whole
Dramatically Meaningful
Must involve something or someone the listener/reader cares about
8. Key Concepts
Interactive Stories
Stories are usually written in the past
Interactive stories are written in present
Game story are in present
Includes three kinds of events
Player events
Game events
Narrative Events
Player Events
Actions taken by the player as part of the Game Play
Actions involved to overcome the challenges
If the players’ actions can affect the plot and change it’s future – they are called dramatic
actions
Game Events
Initiated by the core mechanics
Can be response to the players’ actions
The user may be able to affect how these occur
9. Key Concepts
Narrative Events
Events whose content the player cannot change
May be able to control whether such events occur or not
Narrates some actions or story to the player
Players may not interact with this
Interactive Story
A story may be interactive even the players’ actions do not
change the game plot
Agency
The power to change the direction of the plot – future events
10. Key Concepts
Narrative
The text or the discourse produced by the act of Narration
In an interactive story
Narrative is the part of the story that as a designer you narrate to the players
Not the actions that the players take
Nor the events created by core mechanics
The Role of Narrative
Present events over which the player has no control
Usually – events that happen to the avatar that the player cannot
control/prevent
Events that happen when the avatar is not present
But we still want the player to know about the events
Scenes depicting success or failure are usually narrative events
11. Key Concepts
Role of Narrative
Show the prolog to the game or the current level
Introduces the player to the situation in the game
Create a background
Players who don’t like stories in Games can ignore
them
But many players enjoy them a lot
12. Commonly Used Narrative Blocks
As an opening sequence to introduce the story at the
beginning
As an ending sequence
To wrap up the story when the player completes the
game
As an inter-level sequence
A briefing about the next level events
In the form of cut scenes – short non – interactive
sequences
Presented during play that interrupt the game
momentarily
13. Examples
Half-life
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3x3wQ7Opltg
The player’s avatar takes a tram ride through the research complex…
A voice explains why he is there
This opening sequence introduces the game world
Sets the stage for the experience to follow
Narrative blocks presented between levels usually
Last for 30 seconds to 4-5 minutes
Beginning and ending blocks can be longer
Provide important narrative bookends to the entire experience
Halo-2 the introductory scene is more than 5 minutes
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4P3Sry-SvGA
14. Narrative Blocks
Cut-scenes during play – should be shorter
As they interrupt the flow and rhythm of the player’s
actions
Fast-moving game players are annoyed (real time strategy
games, action adventure games)
Slower moving game players may like them
Adventure games
Role playing games
15. Forms of Narratives
A pre-rendered movie
A cut scene displayed by the graphics engine
Scrolling text that introduces a mission
Voice over commentary that explains the back
story of the game
Long monolog by a character
Individual lines of dialog are not narratives
Long interactive dialog between NPCs qualifies
as narrative
16. Balancing Narrative and Gameplay
Remember
The more narrative you include, the more the player
has to sit doing nothing
Games must find appropriate balance
Designer’s need to narrate and players need to act
Too much narrative = bad value of money for the
players
Players pay to act in a fantasy
Computer game is about interactivity
Provide enough narrative to enrich the game world
17. Dramatic Tension and Game Play Tension
Dramatic tension
What will happen next
Game Play tension
Desire to overcome a challenge
False analogy
19. Story Telling Engine
Game with story
Interrupt the story to introduce narratives/stories
Narrative events must be interspersed among the game play events
Storytelling engine does the weaving
Weaves narrative events to Gameplay
Core Mechanics
Oversee the players’ progress through the challenges
Storytelling Engine
Oversees progress through the story
They must work together to create a single seamless experience
Core Mechanics Manages
Player Events
In Game Events
Storytelling Engine
Manages the narrative events
Keeps track of the progress of the story
Determines what part of the plot should come next
Determine the story has reached a critical point and trigger the core mechanics to cause change to the internal
economy of the game
20. Storytelling Engine
Level designers are also involved
Triggering the cut scene
And the transfer of the Avatar’s property
21. Linear Story
Agency
Let the player change the game plot and also change the
outcome
Stories that player cannot change – linear
Stories that player can change – non-linear
Linear
Interactive but interactions are limited to contributing
actions
Half Life
Star Craft
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ipBCEZwbM0
22. Linear Story
Require less content
Storytelling engine is simpler
Less prone to bugs and absurdities
Deny the player agency
Are capable of greater emotional power
24. Nonlinear Story
Branching
Player have a different experience each time he plays the game
Offers many plots – that split from each other at different points
Responsibility of designers
What are the plots
How do they relate to each other
Storytelling engine keeps track what is the current plot
Core mechanics will send triggers to inform the next possible plots
Immediate, Deferred, and Cumulative Influence
Immediate: The event cause a branching immediately
Deferred: Early decision influences later events – deferred
Cumulative: Some decisions together defines the branching at a later point
26. Disadvantages of Branching
Extremely expensive to implement
Player must play the game repeatedly to see all
the content
Every critical event has to branch to it’s own
unique section of the tree
Plan out the structure in the concept stage
Resource requirements expand very rapidly
29. Emergent Narrative
Research problem
Does not contain narrative blocks created by the
writer
The story emerges from the act of playing games
Sims can create emergent narrative
The core-mechanics should be able to generate
coherent credible dramatic story
AI Research Field: Automated Storytelling
30. Game Story Endings
The ending of a story is one of the most critical
emotional moments in a game
Craft the endings to evoke specific feelings
How many endings should your story have?
31. Challenges and Choices
Games that include a lot of decision making esp.
moral choices, which feel dramatically important
Should be non-linear
Offer multiple endings
Choice and actions should reflect the endings
Good acts should result to positive endings
32. When to Use Multiple Endings
Each one should be dramatically meaningful and
Emotionally consistent
If not much dramatic freedom – multiple endings
not required
33. Granularity
Frequency with which the game presents elements of the
narrative
Star craft
Tells a long story
Presents narratives only between missions
Coarse Granularity
Coarse
Fine
Infinitesimal granularity is the target
Avatar and his actions (half life)
No sitting and watch – but play where stories also evolve consistently
Granularity is Relative
34. Mechanisms for Advancing the Plot
The story as a series of challenges and choices
The story as a Journey
The Story as a Drama
Challenges and choices
Advance only when the player meet challenges or make
decisions
Plot change and Game story movement
Wing Commander - leads to different story
Story as a journey
Avatar’s movement trigger the storytelling engine to
advance the plot
35. Story as a Journey
Benefits
Provides novelty
Continuously sees new things
Experience fresh and interesting
Allows the player to control the pace
But can be time limited
One way door concept
Role playing games
Stories as journeys
But highly non-linear stories
36. Story as a Drama
Advances with the passage of time itself
Story takes place in real time
No trigger from the core mechanics to the
storytelling engine
Night Trap operates as a drama
Protecting teenagers from monsters
Facade
37. Emotional Limits of Interactive Stories
Story less Games
Don’t try to arouse complex emotions
Thrill of victory
Agony of defeat
Frustration of repeated failure
With story, you can create
Create characters that the players care about
Subtle relationships among these characters
Betrayal by a lover
Satisfaction at justice done
Protective instinct for a child
38. Emotional Limits of Nonlinear Stories
May not always lead to most powerful emotional
experience
Non-linear stories sometimes restrict the ending
to a single or multiple emotionally meaningful
endings
39. Emotional Limits of Avatar Based Games
The Avatar must be alive until the end of the game
But player can reload the game if the avatar dies
No emotional experience at the death of the Avatar – the
story ends
If you want to affect the player’s feelings with the death of
a character your game can kill a side character
Avatar’s friend
Planet Fall: Sidekick
Final Fantasy Vii: The player’s allay
Party based games
Provide more freedom to kill off members
Other characters can take the story forward
40. Character Archetypes
Allies
Those that help the hero
Shadow
The main enemy that must be defeated
The ultimate evil
Does not have to be a character
Sometimes more important than the hero
Can be very present or hidden until the end
41. Scripted Conversations and Dialog Trees
A scripted conversation
Allows the player to engage in conversations with
non-player characters – storytelling games
Special mode
All other activities are unavailable
Chooses a line of dialog
Never winter Nights 2
42. Structure of a Dialog Tree
The Dialog Tree Data Structure
Same sentences with different emotions
As a designer you should provide the dialog tree
as well
43. Design Issues for Dialog Trees
Conditional branches and exchanges
Another approach
Flexible list of options
44. Benefits of Scripted Conversations
It produces a sequence of plausible remarks and replies
Illustrate the personality of the Avatar and the NPCs
Wise guy – Phrase Monkey Island Games
Guybrush
It’s a real part of the story
The player’s choices can have effect on the story
as well
45. When to Write the Story
Story should be written in the elaboration stage
Not in the concept stage
Concept stage
Define the player’s role
The kind of game play he will experience
A list of levels or episodes that you may want to
include in the game
46. Other Considerations
Frustrated Author Syndrome
Giving the player no freedom
Episodic Delivery
Selling Player’s entertainment a few hours at a time rather
than a long story
Unlimited Series
A set of episodes
Each consisting of a self-contained story
The plot is introduced and solved
A single theme or context runs through the entire series
Stories exist so independently that you can play each episode in any
order and still makes a sense
A through introduction…
47. Serials
Infinite sequence of episodes
Episodes are not self contained
Ends at a critical event to create a strong desire
to see/play the next episode
Get players hooked in a story and pay episode
after episode
48. Limited Series
Features from both unlimited and serial
Single episode introduces and solves one plot
But with other plot lines it can be carried over to
the next episode
49. Potential and Limits of Episodic Delivery
Industry already makes games in the unlimited
series
It may start to make games in the limited series
And encourage to buy the whole set
Harry Potter series of games
May work well with the internet models
PC or console games
Do not leave the story unfinished
50. Summary
Most video games will benefit from a coherent and dramatic
story
Designer should remember the interactivity
Do not write novels
Linear, no-linear, multiple ending
Will depend on the genre
And Game play
For more engaging, deeper emotional response, greater
satisfaction
Designer should maintain Good story that maintains player interests,
shows character growth, balances narrative elements, remains
enjoyable to play
51. References
Fundamentals of Game Design, 2nd Edition,
Ernest Adams, Prentice Hall, 2006, ISBN-10:
0131687476. ISBN-13: 978-0131687479
http://computer.justetc.net