Thursday at the Austin Game Conference

Much talk yesterday in Austin centered around Rob Pardo's keynote, but there were several other events you might be interested in. Dell Chairman Michael Dell talked about that company's gaming plans in a 'fireside' chat. Movie producer Jon Landau spoke on the role of gaming in the entertainment industry. Gamasutra has several pieces from smaller talks, with titles like The Death of Cinematics, New Models for Game Stories, and Writing for Digital Actors. Finally, Raph Koster offers an ultimatum to the games business: evolve or die. From that article: "The end result, according to Koster, is the current hit-driven state of the game industry, which focus on the top 20 percent of games. 'The particular adaptation that we've made to this is to not bother making or stocking or selling the other 80 percent,' Koster said. 'So when you walk into your friendly neighborhood GameStop, you won't find the game that is 21 on the charts. Because of limited shelf space, they just don't want it around. It's just not worth having it compared to game number 20 twice, or better yet, The Sims and all of its expansions.'"

Comments

Game stories!

[andrewman327]

I read the article about new game stories. I believe that there is a definite need for better storylines in games. It seems that the industry is hellbent on finding that "next big thing" that works and beating it into the ground. A good example is GTA genre of urban games.

From TFA:

Sutherland suggests game writers concentrate on allowing players to make more choices and more important choices. He says writing has always been about choice, whether we take our inspiration from Dostoyevsky or the Surreal Life. We need to be open to inspiration where it comes from, and choice of any kind has conflict inherent in it. This will help connect the game with people. He also suggested avoiding formulas when approaching game writing. This includes avoiding laundry lists of dramatic requirements. He says formulas from other media especially don't translate directly, and the art form of games is so new experimentation is critical just to find the boundaries of possibilities. It's the only way we'll know what works and what doesn't.

This is what gamers have always wanted. D&D had the ultimate in user selection and gamers loved it. The industry needs to learn that pretty graphics are not the only way to sell games and are, in fact, usually not the most important element.

Re:Game stories!

[UbuntuDupe]

That kind of reminds me of an idea I've been wanting to explore in simpler games I write. (This has to do with storylines.) I want a game where, as much as possible, it prevents you from being able to "send information back in time" so to speak. (I prefer the term "causal game".) In most games, you can exploit your advance knowledge of where stuff is and who will betray you when. In a causal game, the internal logic wouldn't even determine that stuff until it either happens, or you observe evidence that it will happen.

(Simple example: if there's treasure hidden somewhere, its location won't be assigned at all. You will have a small chance of finding it wherever you dig. If you unsuccessfully dig, it "collapses the probability bubble", for lack of a better term, and makes it so the only possible location is somewhere else. Also, if someone tells you where it is, the game then "decides" that it is now there, and nowhere else -- but that information won't be useful in other playthroughs or even if you reload without saving!)

With plot elements, the game would not set the story so that character X betrays you until it happens. Its probability of happening would be partly determined by whether you have observed evidence it is likely to happen.

This certainly involves a break from reality in some respects. In the real world, treasure is where it is. Your knowledge has no impact on that. The world doesn't disappear while your eyes are closed. However, causal games would be *more* realistic in that, as you live your daily live, you can only base decisions on what you know. This kind of game would force you to endure the real uncertainty you face in everyday life by making "acting without knowledge" just as dangerous as it is in real life.

And, of course, have great replay value ;-)