Storytelling in Computer Games

Cosmicbandito writes: "The latest issue of XYZZY News features transcripts and audio downloads of a 2 hour panel discussion titled "Storytelling in Computer Games Past, Present and Future". Scott Adams, the celebrated designer of classics like "Adventureland" and "Pirate's Island", described his experiences in the early days of the home game market, offered his opinions on the current crop of games, and made predictions about games of the future. Scott is credited with writing and marketing the first commercial computer game. Of special interest to Slashdotters, he is also an avid Everquest player. And no, he doesn't draw "Dilbert"." Think "pre-Infocom".

Comments

Re:Game creation tools..

[elmegil]

Sounds to me like Scott is reflecting his own career onto the industry, rather than vice versa. If you analyze his games (which I don't mean to imply are cookie cutter), he basically wrote an adventure game engine, and then cranked out games using that engine. That was the basis of his success. Up to that point, Zork and the original adventure game were all custom done jobs, which would have been prohibitive to do commercially (when Zork was adapted for the wider audience it was "ported" to Infocom or whoever's engine).

The videogames aesthetic

[the way]

A good game rewards the player to draw them in, making them think they've overcome the system, from the state where they're fumbling with the controls to the stage where the control has become transparent through practice

So true. But there's so much more that goes to make a 'good game'. In Trigger Happy: The Secret Life of Videogames Steven Poole (composer, Time Literary supplement author, and videogames enthusiast) sets out to answer the question 'What makes a videogame good?'. His attempt at understanding the videogame aesthetic does a great job of building a taxonomy of videogames and describing what makes a game enjoyable.

I couldn't hope to capture his findings in this brief post, but suffice to see that neither story nor game mechanics are of themselves enough to make a good game. Other elements discussed by Poole includes the importance of balancing the right amount of reality vs fantasy, the importance of frame-rate, appropriate graphics and sound, the use of rewards, the development of an immersive experience, and a whole lot more.

If anyone thinks that building a great game is easy and can be done by following a simple formula, I think you'll change you mind after reading this book.