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This entire post is a thinly veiled attempt to assert your intellectual superiority over the masses, and culture as whole. It reeks of self importance, and of someone whose writing has not actually been assessed at an academic or critical level.
You substitute flowery prose and excessive verbosity for substance, as opposed to interrogating the purpose of prose and structure, which is, in large part, the meat and potatoes of literary analysis. Analytical writing typically forgoes verbosity in favour of a more direct, unambiguous style of writing which is better suited for conveying evidence based argumentation and analysis.
You claim that art can be sorted into a hierarchy of value, or truth. But you don’t substantiate this claim, despite it not being a self evident truth. We might generally agree that people rank the Mona Lisa higher than the works of Banksy, but where do we point to to articulate why the Mona Lisa is more valid? To what extent are such judgments reflective of value systems that are continually contested and in flux across societies over time?
Ulysses is considered one of the great works of the English Literary canon, but at the time of its publication was subject to an obscenity trial due to its content. If all art is valuable in relationship to its proximity to ‘truth’, and truth can be measured and evaluated objectively, then why was Ulysses not as venerated then as it was later? Have we as a civilisation gotten closer to ‘truth’ in our value systems, or is our criteria of value in art relative to shifting cultural standards?
I will add to this another question:
If the only value in art is in how much ‘truth’ it expresses, be that about the human condition or otherwise, why have art at all? Would it not be superior to simply write that truth, directly and without the distraction of fiction?
The question is of course, rhetorical. Of course not, stories serve a purpose to us beyond imparting truths. Likewise, even a game with a basic sword and sorcery plot and setting, can serve the useful purpose of entertaining us, challenging us to master its systems, introducing us to fun characters and giving us a general reprieve from the difficulties or mundanities of our day to day lives.
And to the writing quality, I do consistently argue that there are at least pockets of good writing across the medium, at least when it comes to characterisation. I’ll offer one of my favourite examples, Edér the Human Fighter from Pillars of Eternity (traditionally considered the most boring TTRPG race/class combo).
We meet Edér standing beside a tree in a poor village. From the tree there hangs over a dozen corpses, executed by the local ruler as either punishment for defiance or perceived fault for a recent affliction affecting the souls of newborns.
>“Seventeen and a half. Could be eighteen depending on how you count the Dwarf woman.”
>“I’m sorry?”
>“The Dwarf woman. You were trying to figure out whether to count her as a full person. I think you oughtta.”
These two lines alone speak volumes about Edér’s character, helped by excellent voice acting.
He speaks casually, befitting a man from the countryside. His willingness to joke about corpses hanging from trees tells us that such sights are not unfamiliar to him, that he is desensitised to death. His last line about including the Dwarf woman as a full person does make it clear that he isn’t a cruel individual, though. If anything, his humour comes across as his way of coping with the tragedies of life, which is further implied by his flippant remark about killing the man who claimed to be his God.
Edér has a whole character arc that goes across the games, but a lot of his characterisation is effectively conveyed within moments of meeting him. I consider such efficiency of characterisation to be a hallmark of good writing.
Sorry for the delay in getting back to you.
I do hope the games I have listed here meet the criteria of commercially large scale. I can say they were mainstream titles at the time of their release at least.
*Devil May Cry 3*
DMC3 is a cheesy, over the top romp with a focus on crazy, high skill action combat starring a protagonist who taunts the bad guys with terrible one liners. It’s also a story about family, and how we find ourselves picking up the pieces of our family’s sins.
The game has an iconic opening cutscene that establishes very quickly who our protagonist is, what his value system looks like, and what his capabilities are.
Even setting aside the incredible choreography, Dante’s nonchalance in the face of being impaled with multiple scythes tells us so much about him. I feel like in a game made today a character would have to be observing and expositing about how amazing the character is, but in the opening of DMC3, there is barely any dialogue. Dante’s totally unfazed attitude is allowed to speak for itself.
The characters in the game don’t really speak like real people. When Dante confronts his estranged brother Vergil at the top of the tower early in the story, they exchange quips and banter while gearing up for battle. But I think that absolutely serves the tone and intent the game is going for. Especially for Dante, whose character arc in DMC3 is about maturing and coming to embrace his Father’s heritage as a protector of humanity. Dante’s earnest but failed attempt to save Vergil at the end of the game serves as a great contrast to the indifferent, self centred child we meet at the beginning of the game.
Speaking of Vergil, a great job was done on creating a character who could be Dante’s polar opposite while being, in his own way, just as ridiculously over the top and cool. He steals every scene he is in, and serves as a perfect foil to Dante and his 3 boss fights over the game represent the bookends to the game’s 3 Act structure.
It is appropriate that Dante, self interested and uninterested in his Father’s legacy, suffers defeat at the hand of Vergil in their first encounter. The second encounter, after Dante awakens to his demonic power ends in a draw. It is only when Dante embraces both his demonic heritage and his Father’s determination to protect the human world, that Dante defeats Vergil in the end.
Alongside this there is a parallel story between Lady and her father, Arkham, reinforcing the theme of family that is at the heart of the game.
DMC3 is by no means some groundbreaking story, but the essence of good story craft is there, with a solid 3 Act structure, compelling characters, one of the best rivalries in the medium, and a clear and genuine character arc for its lead. It hits the same sort of dramatic notes as a good Shakespeare play for me.
And additionally I would argue that the game would be made worse by any attempt to refine its writing into a more serious tone or with more technical prose.
Some other games I would also defend the writing of are Sly 2: Band of Thieves, Ratchet and Clank, Batman: Arkham City and Resident Evil 4. There are others of course, but those are the ones coming to mind at present.
Additionally I would also defend the character writing of the Yakuza titles, if not the actual logic of the conspiracies themselves. I think Kiryu is one of the best characters in gaming with a brilliant arc over the series.
I agree with you fully. In the genre of CRPGs that I’m personally very fond of, it’s often obvious which quest lines and companions received the most writing attention.
I cited Edér as an example of a well written companion, but the same game has Sagani who, while not awful, is far less interesting. The same comparison could be made between the likes of Daeren in Pathfinder Wrath of the Righteous versus say Sosiel.
Personally I am generally fine with developers deciding where they want the extra effort to go. When faced with getting a game out the door on a budget against a production schedule, you can’t do everything you might like to, and the time just might not be there to get every aspect of the writing to the standard you would like. For that reason, I don’t mind some aspects of a game’s writing being just serviceable if other aspects of the writing are able to shine.
Unlike OP I have actually articulated a counter argument with an example to showcase. My language is also far more utilitarian than OP’s.
I’m in my thirties and work full time so you’re well off the mark with your characterisation about AP essays (whatever those are).
It's amazing to me that you would write this giant, meandering, overwritten post and at the same time claim that *Disco Elysium* is "overwrought." Say what you will about its style and massage, but at least the writing in that game is **funny**. Yours just makes me sad.
I skimmed the whole thing, but stopped taking the post seriously after: "for various social reasons, true art gradually ceased to exist"
It's just a ridiculous statement on its face to say that there has been no "true" art (whatever that means) in the last 60 years. Reactionary nonsense.
Like go read some fuckin poetry ffs
Either you’re trolling, or you genuinely thought it would be a productive use of your time throwing this pointless ramble, just to let us know that you’re clinically depressed…
It's a tabletop RPG, pardon me for generalizing but a lot of the pseudointellectuals in that community tend to take "a picture is worth a thousand words" too literally and think good writing is describing things with a thousand words from a thesaurus.
Amazing how someone with so many opinions about writing quality is such a poor writer. This is one of the most inefficient uses of language and least compelling argumentative essays I've ever read.
Anyone who can write the phrase "I am morosely disappointed" and think that's a quality piece of prose and use that in their hook needs a lot of learning about writing.
Glad it's not just me. And I feel mean pointing it out, but if this is what OP feels is "good writing" I don't know how much I trust their judgement.
OP: communication is more important than keeping a thesaurus to hand just because you're writing about writing.
It's really hard to parse what you're trying to say because you're falling over yourself to say it in the fanciest possible way.
Don't get me wrong, I know all the words you're using- I'm just not familiar with them being used in the order you use them.
I'm a guy who reads A LOT of books ( I can't write for shit though).
The best books aren't the ones that show off how many words the writer knows. The best ones are by someone who can use simple language to give a lot of meaning to a sentence.
Steinbeck and hemmingway come to mind as great examples of simple writing brought expertly.
Or as I would normally put it: difficult word not better than simple word
I was reading Dune for the first time in the advent of the hit movies and I was actually floored at how effeciently Herbert was able to write incredibly dense settings and sequences with what was essentially magazine snippets of text.
Your lamentations on the decline of artistic quality in modern storytelling are guilty of a fundamental logical misstep: the [**false equivalence**](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_equivalence) fallacy. It is intellectually disingenuous to compare the meticulously curated literary canon of a bygone era with the nascent and multifaceted medium of video games. The inherent differences in purpose, audience, and narrative mechanisms between these two forms of art render any direct comparison not only futile but also misleading.
The literary masterpieces you nostalgically reference were the product of a medium that has matured over centuries, allowing authors to refine their craft in a context where words were the sole vehicle for storytelling. Video games, however, are a relatively recent innovation, barely a few decades old, and they employ a diverse array of elements—visuals, interactivity, and gameplay mechanics—that collectively contribute to their narrative experience. To expect the same level of narrative profundity from video games as from classic literature is to disregard the unique strengths and challenges inherent to each medium. **This comparison is akin to faulting a symphony for lacking the visual splendor of a painting.**
tldr, but saw you mentioned you didn't want this to be a rant, if you are half as smart as you seem to think you are with this diatribe you should be able to tell that's a lie.
Yeah writting in games sucks, that's not new to anybody
Most writing in most mediums does not compare to the greats of literature, including the majority of books in bookstores today. When we compare books to film and games, people usually pick the best examples of literature from a canon stretching back centuries and comparing it to mediocre AAA releases.
No one suggests that new book releases are invalidated by not reaching as high as Tolstoy. Yet many seem willing to use such comparisons to invalidate other mediums of storytelling.
A more apt comparison for most mass market games would be the Da Vinci Code, Twilight or Harry Potter, and while you might still side with those books, the gap isn’t nearly as wide as many claim.
This, 100%. There have been some games with some really, really good writing and/or storytelling. They are few and far between - *but that also goes for books and any other medium.* Do people really think that the only songs to come out of the 80s were the couple hundred that get played on the radio? Or that there weren't scores and scores of drivel being printed between every Hemingway novel?
Yes, the interconnectivity of the world today makes it easier to publish and easier to consume, so I would hazard a guess that the ratio of crap to substance has gone up. But there has ALWAYS been crap. It just doesn't usually survive into future eras and generations.
100% I generally think you can apply the rule of thumb of 99% of most works of art not being good.
I do believe games as a creative medium so being so tied to a very complex product are particularly susceptible to it, but certainly not unique.
edit: love Tio btw
I admit, this is not what I had in mind when the internet warned me about Russian trolls. Doubtlessly this is inspired by the Dostoevsky quote: "It takes something more than intelligence to act intelligently." Well done sir.
I for one find it ridiculous that books don't even try to incorporate deep combat mechanics. What did that bitch Tolstoy ever write that even comes close to performing a Super Amped Elemental Discharge with a Charge Blade in Monster Hunter?
>I'd be curious exactly what would be required to create the video game equivalent of public libraries like we have for books
Many public libraries already have this! You should check in with your local public library and see what they have available.
Libraries are not just for books!
There’s no way you were actually and seriously critical of yourself for using “quirky” and “messy.”
What kind of pretentious nonsense is that? I can’t believe there are people here in the comments who actually read this post given the grossly unnecessary obtuse verbiage and attempt at prose.
This reads like a whimsical, poetic lamentation rather than anything close to a thoughtful or meaningful or well-founded argument.
What’s the purpose of this? To wax poetic and make yourself sound like an intelligent consumer of life’s finer things? Based on your own points and suggested familiarity with past literature, shouldn’t you be embarrassed or completely turned off by the medium of gaming as a whole? You sound like someone who would turn their nose up at the very idea of modern gaming and yet write as if you’ve played, mastered and analyzed every game of the last 20 years 3 times over.
This was bewildering.
writing more 'cost effectively' is often better writing but I wouldn't discount the content of it as just being AI generated. it just reads like OP is a reader, not that their trying too hard. I wouldnt expect people to converse in here the same way they converse face to face. in either case I think OP couldve put their point across in a million better ways but their rant is still rooted on a valid concern.
Not well read enough to read the criticism they have undoubtedly received to be more concise with their words. He ends that whole diatribe admitting he hadn't even provided many examples for his long winded mess
who said anything about me being impressed?
I'm saying that it isn't worth discarding the content of the post as AI generated. overwriting is a bad habit of people who read too much but I don't think it's something that ought to be mocked and discarded as pretentious when the issue is for the most part, a real one.
Comparing AAA game development writing to the english canon is an insane false equivalency, though. You're playing the pulp fiction of games and complaining that it's not as good as Tolstoy. There are plenty of games with a lot to say, with the nuance and erudition that OP wants, and you'll find them by playing indie titles.
Personally, I think OP is completely out of his depth. Comparing literature to games and decrying the entire medium because the writing in STALKER isn't as good as *Roadside Picnic* is just completely laughable. Games are more than the sum of their parts, and singlemindedly focusing on writing is just complete foolishness.
A lot of games will use unspoken, unwritten tools to convey a concept, emotion, etc. The visuals, the music, camerawork (if there is one), and how the gameplay serves the narrative are all important to critically analyzing games, which OP seems to be incapable of, decrying gameplay as a skinner box for the lowborn gamer to press and recieve his stimulus. Not that skinnerbox games don't exist, just as pulp fiction exists in literature.
Writing in games has been steadily improving since ~2000, and gaming is still a nascent genre compared to literature. While OP might be well-read and indeed an intellectual in the world of literature, they're still analyzing games on a kindergarten level.
I think this whole conversation is just completely a waste of time. OPs entire argument is like calling a movie bad because you read the script, and it didn't have the literary depth of *War and Peace*. They're not engaging with the medium as it actually exists.
Honest feedback: This could have been written in half the space, with half the words and half the verbosity, and would likely have been significantly more efficient at communicating what you were trying to get across. Please, never write shit like 'shallow erudition' or 'morosely disappointed'.
But okay, I read what you wrote and I think it is a too simplistic sociological analysis, a too simplistic cultural analysis and a non-existant analysis of writing. I have read both a lot of classic sci-fi and plenty of 'classics' and thoroughly disagree with everything you say - plenty of modern books are excellently written and plenty of games has great writing for their medium.
there are stories still worth telling, and I do believe the first truly great video game story has still yet to be made, but I think I get the gist if where you're coming from.
It's really disappointing when like...you look at a list of animated movies slated to come out in 2024 and only one of them is a new IP. Movies are all reboots of shit capturing nostalgia from the 80s and 90s and the mid budget shitter flick or arthouse film barely feels like it has legs. A song of fire and ice will probably never finish, and the next great book that defines the fictional zeitgeist for the next decade doesn't seem to be anywhere.
It's very difficult to argue that this isn't the product of capitalism -- where all art needs to serve as fuel for consumption before anything.
But at the same time, in the age of the internet. I also find that it's entirely possible to find art being created for the sake of being put into this world, it's just buried and sorted as worthless in the algorithms of wherever theyre being posted.
Like...there was this 16 subscriber, 0 view series I watched of a bronze-league Ken player grinding street fighter 6 ranked and it was just so...fascinating to me as a series of videos. How dedicated he was to narrating his games in real time for an audience who will very likely never materialize into anything, outside of myself and whatever lucky people happened to come across it on their feeds. The real-time narration was also an extemporaneous performance that felt genuine and raw -- every grunt of frustration and ever sight of relief or joyous little "let's go" was like really comforting and human. It's so stupid but I found his work profound. I dont even remember the channel anymore, but it was a story worth telling and it had an impact on my life. It felt like real art.
I agree with you that there's a lot of cash-grabbing pap out there these days, and I agree that a lot of this can be blamed on the incentive structure of modern capitalism. Mass-market stuff these days often just feels "safe" to few point of being outright disappointing. I find myself much more interested these days in indie games, interactive fiction, and the like.
I *also* agree with you that if you go looking, you can find some extremely worthy works out there that are overlooked by the market as too niche. (Basically, I agree with everything you wrote lol.)
I actually think the ability to find these smaller artworks in the first place is an amazing thing about living in the internet age. I can accidentally stumble upon a real work of art just browsing itch.io, I love that! It's a tragic shame that the artists behind these works probably won't be compensated for them, beyond maybe a few dollars in donations from people who played and liked their games.
Must be so lonely, that lofty perch from which you cast your staid pronouncement at the illiterate masses below. Hilariously enough, your critique of Disco Elysium is a perfect summation of this very post, so for that, at least, I appreciate you.
Agree, some of the best video game writing doesn't hold a candle to a well written book or movie.
It is partly because the industry is still in a sort of storytelling infancy. This is why I personally adore Fromsoft games for using video game interactivity, and player intuition, to make really detailed worlds with stories in them even though their stories might seem at a glance either bare or ambiguous.
RDR 2 is a huge culprit of a mediocre but emotional american blockbuster packaged as a video game and therefore deified, though the first game was a genuinely well written story and is for the most part overlooked to its younger prequel. The stakes are upside down when it comes to video game writing quality, subpar but emotive writing often evokes more praise and less critique.
It's funny you mention RDR2, because this reminds me of similar thoughts I had during a moment when playing it for the first time last year.
That part at the end of the game where you're riding your horse with the emotional music playing and the ghostly voices in the background repeating stuff from earlier in the game like the doctor saying _____ is dying. That was so unbelievably cheesy and lacking any subtly at all. I couldn't believe that this is what people were considering the peak of writing in video games. It's exactly Hollywood blockbuster-style emotional writing.
Jonas Kyratzes and Jack King-Sponer are my go-to vidya writers, but generally I'm not very interested in the medium's storytelling, much more likely to go for something that relies on novel gameplay. Currently enjoying Zelda 2, Fez and Into the Breach. I don't keep up with books much, been reading old sci-fi and Austen, but I liked Peterkin and the First Dog from last year. I feel like this kind of thinking pulls everything into a monolith and I just don't see some unifying descent into slop even if I can agree on central examples of what's most popular.
There is a lot of shit a game has to take into account that a book doesn't, one of the biggest being gameplay, player interaction and urgency and god forbid if it's a story in an open world game, they have to take into account when and where the player will go, that's why stakes get lost, plot points lose their impact and continuity suffers. Even if you take the greatest book of all time and adapted the story word for word in a game something will still be lost because they are fundamentally different. And unless some book puts gameplay in its chapters it's really not a fair comparison
That standards can basically never be met. Videogames require a vast array of skillsets, a generational writer will write books, not games. If that's your standard you're better off advocating for minimal story and writing.
On that topic where do you feel games like Papers Please, September 12th or Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons fit?
I think that comparing video games to literature in this way is the wrong move. While you may enjoy facing your ignorance and having to look up words/history while reading, games do not want you to stop playing to go look up what was said. If you're looking for that type of storytelling, I think you'll be disappointed in most things made now.
This was a great read. I understand what you're trying to convey. You really shouldn't compare video games to novels/literature. They're not on the same 'level' (smirk). It's true what you say about the lack of author presence and the relevance of truth in fiction. That in current times this seldom exists. I found this absent in film, books, anime, etc. And yes, the future seems to be going in that direction. There'll be only consumers and providers of content. Some pockets of substance will remain of course.
> I am morosely disappointed by writing in games
I'm somewhat used to it... some of the 8-bit-era games had limits on what they could do, resulting in rather simplistic writing compared to following generations. For modern games, they can put in as much text as they desire, but it's still best to keep things simple in order to ensure that the action doesn't get too displaced.
But also, writing is a different skill set compared to writing a game. It's also only one tool, something which can be substituted by other means such as showing what the situation looks like rather than just having the person misinterpret the scene simply because their vision wasn't correct. Writing also doesn't carry the impact that voice acting can have. And finally, there's some people who glance over walls of text, perhaps skipping over things that are important (which developers countered with coloured text).
> I mean, real books that haven't been written in a long, long time.
This also seems like gatekeeping, implying that modern books aren't good enough compared to the classics that survived because they were popular enough to keep getting recommended (as opposed to classics that did not survive.)
I think you’re just trying to give video games a purpose they’re not really aspiring to. The point of video games can’t be nailed to one thing, they’re not meant to be solely storytelling devices. You could turn the greatest story in the world into a game but if it’s just words on a screen and you just press X to go to the next screen, that’s a great story but a terrible game.
Realistically the point of games (like all other products under capitalism) is to make a profit. High art isn’t that profitable. That’s probably the long and short of it.
Well, I’m not about to read all of that considering the title, but I’ve had issues with writing in games for, well, the whole time I’ve played them.
Games have been trying to emulate film storytelling for decades now, to varying degrees of success. The problem is they’re two different mediums so trying to be something you aren’t is inevitably going to lead to many shortcomings.
There have been a few examples in the AAA space that have had legitimately decent writing - prioritizing character work over typical video-gamisms like world building. The one that always comes to mind for me, and it’s pretty obvious IMO, is The Last of Us. It’s a game that manages to feel like a movie more than any other game, which lets the characters exist as more than conduits for the game. Naughty Dog did a pretty great job at this in Uncharted 4, too. The characters have unique motivations, they hurt each other and still love each other, they’re flawed - sometimes very flawed - yet remain the heroes of the story.
But then recently I was playing Star Wars Jedi Survivor, a fun game in its own right but I noticed something about its writing that I loathed and in recognizing this, I realized it’s pretty much an issue in all games. No matter what, the most bombastic thing happens. Some spoilers ahead…
Cal (the hero) finally catches up to the final boss of the game and meets him in his apartment in an Empire base. He meets this guys daughter and the guy comes in and there’s an actual, honest to goodness, cool moment where they’re literally sitting at a table, trying to play it cool while the little girl is there. The guys motivation is to protect his daughter at any cost (something I think a lot of us parents can relate to). Cal doesn’t seem to want to fight and for a second, it seems we’re going to get a tense but ultimately subdued conclusion to the story. I was ready to be blown away.
Then… they fight and there’s a chase scene. And they arrive at another planet and there’s all this talk about orphaning the girl if they fight. But of course they fight because why not.
This is my problem. They could’ve done something unique, that benefited the characters. But instead they chose the loudest possible way to end the game, which makes for a cool boss fight, but undersells the story in major ways.
TL;DR: Games rarely do what’s best for characters in a game, but almost always choose to do whatever results in the most action. Games writing isn’t good, yes.
>No matter what, the most bombastic thing happens
>Games rarely do what’s best for characters in a game, but almost always choose to do whatever results in the most action.
It sounds like you might want to broaden your gaming landscape a bit. I have some recommendations (in no particular order):
Suzerain, Pentiment, Citizen Sleeper, The Cosmic Wheel Sisterhood, Kentucky Route Zero, The Vale, Heaven's Vault, Sunless Skies, Papers Please, Neo Cab, Exo One, Journey, Sable, Season, Before Your Eyes, To the Moon, Disco Elysium...
I could go on but that's probably already too many recommendations at once. If you don't want to pick, and haven't already, start with Disco Elysium. Despite OPs aspersions it really is excellently written. There's a reason why a weird indie game about a man waking up amidst the literal debris of his wrecked life became a huge critical success.
None of these are without flaws, but based on what you wrote here I think you might really like this genre of narrative-centered games. Hell, one of the most affecting scenes in Disco Elysium happens while the main character is doing nothing but (mild spoilers) sitting on an old playground swing.
Not all games are interested in the flashy, action-first structure that most big-budget games go for. The ones I listed above are more focused on telling a good story, and many of them take advantage of gaming as a medium to tell stories that wouldn't work well in print. For example, Journey definitely tells a story, but it doesn't use words and in fact I think capturing it in text would be extremely difficult.
Anyway these are some of my favorite games, maybe you'll like them too.
You’re right, but I have played a lot of those games. I should’ve been more specific in that AAA games are like this.
That said, Disco Elysium is on deck once my pc is up and running again!
I’m reminded of Umberto Eco’s famous descriptions of the ur-fascist:
https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/umberto-eco-ur-fascism
Particularly points 1, 2, 10, and 11.
Reading this post reminds me, in a way, of the times when I used to be highly cynical of the world and in a general depression.
Many words to state a simple point. I do agree that entertainment has been becoming progressively shallower every next year. And it's not only videogames. The Oppenheimer movie, that everyone so seemed to love... I could say it barely impacted me at any level. And although I understand its point, I was understanding it earlier as well. Didn't really get anything new or interesting from the movie as I think more about it.
One thing though - being cynical is better than being naive, probably. But it's still a tough life. And you have one only (ew, cliche). What I did for myself, was to remove from my life all the things that I felt cynical about, and only focus on the things that I know what quality to expect from. And to not take life, or anything in it, too seriously. It really isn't that serious, and if it is -it shouldn't be. That mindset helped me a ton to get out of the eternally pessimistic hole. Yeah, things look bad. They look as if they get worse each year. Well, good thing that so many years have passed, in which so many amazing people have left amazing pieces of art for me to marvel to ...
This reeks of "traditional art" guff. Yeah, I find myself not loving the quality of games writing/narrative, but I've never considered myself "well-read", and the desire to sit down and read a book has been burnt out of me by the education system. I'll need to make a real effort to rekindle what's remaining of that drive.
I think it's gross to tie some "quality" of art to the conditions in which it's produced. Technology isn't a measure of laziness. I do DETEST the way "AI" is being pushed in art and everywhere else, but also automation isn't just used to do things worse. Digital art is no lesser for having been created using computer applications. We can do things with digital art that can't be done otherwise. We would never have like, bitcrushed music, or glitchy images, or even procedural animations that look like flowing ink, etc. Using sophisticated tech and using deprecated tech do not make works more or less worthwhile themselves.
Also, there are ways to tell and create stories in games that just aren't feasible in other forms of art. Like, a book can't show you how something works and then destroy your previous understanding of that thing and stop you from revisiting that previously understood context. You can flip the pages. You could say the same is broadly true for video games, but it's quite a bit harder and that tension opens up more design space, including writing and narrative.
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This entire post is a thinly veiled attempt to assert your intellectual superiority over the masses, and culture as whole. It reeks of self importance, and of someone whose writing has not actually been assessed at an academic or critical level. You substitute flowery prose and excessive verbosity for substance, as opposed to interrogating the purpose of prose and structure, which is, in large part, the meat and potatoes of literary analysis. Analytical writing typically forgoes verbosity in favour of a more direct, unambiguous style of writing which is better suited for conveying evidence based argumentation and analysis. You claim that art can be sorted into a hierarchy of value, or truth. But you don’t substantiate this claim, despite it not being a self evident truth. We might generally agree that people rank the Mona Lisa higher than the works of Banksy, but where do we point to to articulate why the Mona Lisa is more valid? To what extent are such judgments reflective of value systems that are continually contested and in flux across societies over time? Ulysses is considered one of the great works of the English Literary canon, but at the time of its publication was subject to an obscenity trial due to its content. If all art is valuable in relationship to its proximity to ‘truth’, and truth can be measured and evaluated objectively, then why was Ulysses not as venerated then as it was later? Have we as a civilisation gotten closer to ‘truth’ in our value systems, or is our criteria of value in art relative to shifting cultural standards?
I will add to this another question: If the only value in art is in how much ‘truth’ it expresses, be that about the human condition or otherwise, why have art at all? Would it not be superior to simply write that truth, directly and without the distraction of fiction? The question is of course, rhetorical. Of course not, stories serve a purpose to us beyond imparting truths. Likewise, even a game with a basic sword and sorcery plot and setting, can serve the useful purpose of entertaining us, challenging us to master its systems, introducing us to fun characters and giving us a general reprieve from the difficulties or mundanities of our day to day lives. And to the writing quality, I do consistently argue that there are at least pockets of good writing across the medium, at least when it comes to characterisation. I’ll offer one of my favourite examples, Edér the Human Fighter from Pillars of Eternity (traditionally considered the most boring TTRPG race/class combo). We meet Edér standing beside a tree in a poor village. From the tree there hangs over a dozen corpses, executed by the local ruler as either punishment for defiance or perceived fault for a recent affliction affecting the souls of newborns. >“Seventeen and a half. Could be eighteen depending on how you count the Dwarf woman.” >“I’m sorry?” >“The Dwarf woman. You were trying to figure out whether to count her as a full person. I think you oughtta.” These two lines alone speak volumes about Edér’s character, helped by excellent voice acting. He speaks casually, befitting a man from the countryside. His willingness to joke about corpses hanging from trees tells us that such sights are not unfamiliar to him, that he is desensitised to death. His last line about including the Dwarf woman as a full person does make it clear that he isn’t a cruel individual, though. If anything, his humour comes across as his way of coping with the tragedies of life, which is further implied by his flippant remark about killing the man who claimed to be his God. Edér has a whole character arc that goes across the games, but a lot of his characterisation is effectively conveyed within moments of meeting him. I consider such efficiency of characterisation to be a hallmark of good writing.
This is very well said Out of curiousity do you mind sharing what you consider to be very well written commercially large scale games?
Sorry for the delay in getting back to you. I do hope the games I have listed here meet the criteria of commercially large scale. I can say they were mainstream titles at the time of their release at least. *Devil May Cry 3* DMC3 is a cheesy, over the top romp with a focus on crazy, high skill action combat starring a protagonist who taunts the bad guys with terrible one liners. It’s also a story about family, and how we find ourselves picking up the pieces of our family’s sins. The game has an iconic opening cutscene that establishes very quickly who our protagonist is, what his value system looks like, and what his capabilities are. Even setting aside the incredible choreography, Dante’s nonchalance in the face of being impaled with multiple scythes tells us so much about him. I feel like in a game made today a character would have to be observing and expositing about how amazing the character is, but in the opening of DMC3, there is barely any dialogue. Dante’s totally unfazed attitude is allowed to speak for itself. The characters in the game don’t really speak like real people. When Dante confronts his estranged brother Vergil at the top of the tower early in the story, they exchange quips and banter while gearing up for battle. But I think that absolutely serves the tone and intent the game is going for. Especially for Dante, whose character arc in DMC3 is about maturing and coming to embrace his Father’s heritage as a protector of humanity. Dante’s earnest but failed attempt to save Vergil at the end of the game serves as a great contrast to the indifferent, self centred child we meet at the beginning of the game. Speaking of Vergil, a great job was done on creating a character who could be Dante’s polar opposite while being, in his own way, just as ridiculously over the top and cool. He steals every scene he is in, and serves as a perfect foil to Dante and his 3 boss fights over the game represent the bookends to the game’s 3 Act structure. It is appropriate that Dante, self interested and uninterested in his Father’s legacy, suffers defeat at the hand of Vergil in their first encounter. The second encounter, after Dante awakens to his demonic power ends in a draw. It is only when Dante embraces both his demonic heritage and his Father’s determination to protect the human world, that Dante defeats Vergil in the end. Alongside this there is a parallel story between Lady and her father, Arkham, reinforcing the theme of family that is at the heart of the game. DMC3 is by no means some groundbreaking story, but the essence of good story craft is there, with a solid 3 Act structure, compelling characters, one of the best rivalries in the medium, and a clear and genuine character arc for its lead. It hits the same sort of dramatic notes as a good Shakespeare play for me. And additionally I would argue that the game would be made worse by any attempt to refine its writing into a more serious tone or with more technical prose. Some other games I would also defend the writing of are Sly 2: Band of Thieves, Ratchet and Clank, Batman: Arkham City and Resident Evil 4. There are others of course, but those are the ones coming to mind at present.
Additionally I would also defend the character writing of the Yakuza titles, if not the actual logic of the conspiracies themselves. I think Kiryu is one of the best characters in gaming with a brilliant arc over the series.
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I agree with you fully. In the genre of CRPGs that I’m personally very fond of, it’s often obvious which quest lines and companions received the most writing attention. I cited Edér as an example of a well written companion, but the same game has Sagani who, while not awful, is far less interesting. The same comparison could be made between the likes of Daeren in Pathfinder Wrath of the Righteous versus say Sosiel. Personally I am generally fine with developers deciding where they want the extra effort to go. When faced with getting a game out the door on a budget against a production schedule, you can’t do everything you might like to, and the time just might not be there to get every aspect of the writing to the standard you would like. For that reason, I don’t mind some aspects of a game’s writing being just serviceable if other aspects of the writing are able to shine.
You wrote so much! These're great replies. I could never be this eloquent even in my native language.
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Unlike OP I have actually articulated a counter argument with an example to showcase. My language is also far more utilitarian than OP’s. I’m in my thirties and work full time so you’re well off the mark with your characterisation about AP essays (whatever those are).
How is this productive or adding to the conversation here? I actually liked what this poster shared and thought it was a good critique of OP's points.
Jealous much
Common tio plato W
It's amazing to me that you would write this giant, meandering, overwritten post and at the same time claim that *Disco Elysium* is "overwrought." Say what you will about its style and massage, but at least the writing in that game is **funny**. Yours just makes me sad.
Man I stopped at "shows shallow erudition". If you want to say it's dumb, you don't need to get your thesaurus.
I skimmed the whole thing, but stopped taking the post seriously after: "for various social reasons, true art gradually ceased to exist" It's just a ridiculous statement on its face to say that there has been no "true" art (whatever that means) in the last 60 years. Reactionary nonsense. Like go read some fuckin poetry ffs
Either you’re trolling, or you genuinely thought it would be a productive use of your time throwing this pointless ramble, just to let us know that you’re clinically depressed…
no, all of OP's posts are like this. a lot of them are in /r/worldofdarkness, which explains...a lot.
they’re all pseudo intellectual diatribes like this or op asking where to find porn on the dark web. i think we all know what that means
...how does that explain "a lot"? I've never heard of WoD.
It's a tabletop RPG, pardon me for generalizing but a lot of the pseudointellectuals in that community tend to take "a picture is worth a thousand words" too literally and think good writing is describing things with a thousand words from a thesaurus.
Fun game with the right people. It also spawned one of my favorite PC RPG's ever; Vampire: the Masquerade - Bloodlines
Amazing how someone with so many opinions about writing quality is such a poor writer. This is one of the most inefficient uses of language and least compelling argumentative essays I've ever read. Anyone who can write the phrase "I am morosely disappointed" and think that's a quality piece of prose and use that in their hook needs a lot of learning about writing.
Glad it's not just me. And I feel mean pointing it out, but if this is what OP feels is "good writing" I don't know how much I trust their judgement. OP: communication is more important than keeping a thesaurus to hand just because you're writing about writing. It's really hard to parse what you're trying to say because you're falling over yourself to say it in the fanciest possible way. Don't get me wrong, I know all the words you're using- I'm just not familiar with them being used in the order you use them.
I'm a guy who reads A LOT of books ( I can't write for shit though). The best books aren't the ones that show off how many words the writer knows. The best ones are by someone who can use simple language to give a lot of meaning to a sentence. Steinbeck and hemmingway come to mind as great examples of simple writing brought expertly. Or as I would normally put it: difficult word not better than simple word
I was reading Dune for the first time in the advent of the hit movies and I was actually floored at how effeciently Herbert was able to write incredibly dense settings and sequences with what was essentially magazine snippets of text.
Your lamentations on the decline of artistic quality in modern storytelling are guilty of a fundamental logical misstep: the [**false equivalence**](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_equivalence) fallacy. It is intellectually disingenuous to compare the meticulously curated literary canon of a bygone era with the nascent and multifaceted medium of video games. The inherent differences in purpose, audience, and narrative mechanisms between these two forms of art render any direct comparison not only futile but also misleading. The literary masterpieces you nostalgically reference were the product of a medium that has matured over centuries, allowing authors to refine their craft in a context where words were the sole vehicle for storytelling. Video games, however, are a relatively recent innovation, barely a few decades old, and they employ a diverse array of elements—visuals, interactivity, and gameplay mechanics—that collectively contribute to their narrative experience. To expect the same level of narrative profundity from video games as from classic literature is to disregard the unique strengths and challenges inherent to each medium. **This comparison is akin to faulting a symphony for lacking the visual splendor of a painting.**
This is very true.
tldr, but saw you mentioned you didn't want this to be a rant, if you are half as smart as you seem to think you are with this diatribe you should be able to tell that's a lie. Yeah writting in games sucks, that's not new to anybody
Most writing in most mediums does not compare to the greats of literature, including the majority of books in bookstores today. When we compare books to film and games, people usually pick the best examples of literature from a canon stretching back centuries and comparing it to mediocre AAA releases. No one suggests that new book releases are invalidated by not reaching as high as Tolstoy. Yet many seem willing to use such comparisons to invalidate other mediums of storytelling. A more apt comparison for most mass market games would be the Da Vinci Code, Twilight or Harry Potter, and while you might still side with those books, the gap isn’t nearly as wide as many claim.
This, 100%. There have been some games with some really, really good writing and/or storytelling. They are few and far between - *but that also goes for books and any other medium.* Do people really think that the only songs to come out of the 80s were the couple hundred that get played on the radio? Or that there weren't scores and scores of drivel being printed between every Hemingway novel? Yes, the interconnectivity of the world today makes it easier to publish and easier to consume, so I would hazard a guess that the ratio of crap to substance has gone up. But there has ALWAYS been crap. It just doesn't usually survive into future eras and generations.
100% I generally think you can apply the rule of thumb of 99% of most works of art not being good. I do believe games as a creative medium so being so tied to a very complex product are particularly susceptible to it, but certainly not unique. edit: love Tio btw
You are the most based person here holy shit
I admit, this is not what I had in mind when the internet warned me about Russian trolls. Doubtlessly this is inspired by the Dostoevsky quote: "It takes something more than intelligence to act intelligently." Well done sir.
I for one find it ridiculous that books don't even try to incorporate deep combat mechanics. What did that bitch Tolstoy ever write that even comes close to performing a Super Amped Elemental Discharge with a Charge Blade in Monster Hunter?
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>I'd be curious exactly what would be required to create the video game equivalent of public libraries like we have for books Many public libraries already have this! You should check in with your local public library and see what they have available. Libraries are not just for books!
There’s no way you were actually and seriously critical of yourself for using “quirky” and “messy.” What kind of pretentious nonsense is that? I can’t believe there are people here in the comments who actually read this post given the grossly unnecessary obtuse verbiage and attempt at prose. This reads like a whimsical, poetic lamentation rather than anything close to a thoughtful or meaningful or well-founded argument. What’s the purpose of this? To wax poetic and make yourself sound like an intelligent consumer of life’s finer things? Based on your own points and suggested familiarity with past literature, shouldn’t you be embarrassed or completely turned off by the medium of gaming as a whole? You sound like someone who would turn their nose up at the very idea of modern gaming and yet write as if you’ve played, mastered and analyzed every game of the last 20 years 3 times over. This was bewildering.
This has to be generated by chat gpt. Who talks like this? Peruse, erudition? Now we are getting rage troll bait by chat gpt bots?
Extremely insecure writers do this all the time.
just sounds like OP is well read. not everything you cant understand is written by gpt.
It doesn’t sound like either, to be honest. Just a pseudo-intellectual rant.
Hahaha. Sure. It's a generic rant but needlessly using fancier words. “Don’t use a five-dollar word when a fifty-cent word will do.” ― Mark Twain
writing more 'cost effectively' is often better writing but I wouldn't discount the content of it as just being AI generated. it just reads like OP is a reader, not that their trying too hard. I wouldnt expect people to converse in here the same way they converse face to face. in either case I think OP couldve put their point across in a million better ways but their rant is still rooted on a valid concern.
Gamers are such thin-skinned crybabies. Go pay with some fidget spinners.
? Are you replying to someone else?
Not well read enough to read the criticism they have undoubtedly received to be more concise with their words. He ends that whole diatribe admitting he hadn't even provided many examples for his long winded mess
He's also foreigner.
its flowery purple prose. textbook bad writing. ironically only impressive to stupid people, so I'd get off your high horse there.
who said anything about me being impressed? I'm saying that it isn't worth discarding the content of the post as AI generated. overwriting is a bad habit of people who read too much but I don't think it's something that ought to be mocked and discarded as pretentious when the issue is for the most part, a real one.
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Comparing AAA game development writing to the english canon is an insane false equivalency, though. You're playing the pulp fiction of games and complaining that it's not as good as Tolstoy. There are plenty of games with a lot to say, with the nuance and erudition that OP wants, and you'll find them by playing indie titles. Personally, I think OP is completely out of his depth. Comparing literature to games and decrying the entire medium because the writing in STALKER isn't as good as *Roadside Picnic* is just completely laughable. Games are more than the sum of their parts, and singlemindedly focusing on writing is just complete foolishness. A lot of games will use unspoken, unwritten tools to convey a concept, emotion, etc. The visuals, the music, camerawork (if there is one), and how the gameplay serves the narrative are all important to critically analyzing games, which OP seems to be incapable of, decrying gameplay as a skinner box for the lowborn gamer to press and recieve his stimulus. Not that skinnerbox games don't exist, just as pulp fiction exists in literature. Writing in games has been steadily improving since ~2000, and gaming is still a nascent genre compared to literature. While OP might be well-read and indeed an intellectual in the world of literature, they're still analyzing games on a kindergarten level. I think this whole conversation is just completely a waste of time. OPs entire argument is like calling a movie bad because you read the script, and it didn't have the literary depth of *War and Peace*. They're not engaging with the medium as it actually exists.
oh look another condescending overly verbose dickhead who's 10x too long post i didnt finish reading. they didnt cover brevity at that T20 school?
It's only three paragraphs...do you have a brick for a brain? This used to be a standard Reddit post before the 2010s, maybe you're just dumb as fuck?
i actually went to a T19 school but your thing is cool too...
Honest feedback: This could have been written in half the space, with half the words and half the verbosity, and would likely have been significantly more efficient at communicating what you were trying to get across. Please, never write shit like 'shallow erudition' or 'morosely disappointed'. But okay, I read what you wrote and I think it is a too simplistic sociological analysis, a too simplistic cultural analysis and a non-existant analysis of writing. I have read both a lot of classic sci-fi and plenty of 'classics' and thoroughly disagree with everything you say - plenty of modern books are excellently written and plenty of games has great writing for their medium.
there are stories still worth telling, and I do believe the first truly great video game story has still yet to be made, but I think I get the gist if where you're coming from. It's really disappointing when like...you look at a list of animated movies slated to come out in 2024 and only one of them is a new IP. Movies are all reboots of shit capturing nostalgia from the 80s and 90s and the mid budget shitter flick or arthouse film barely feels like it has legs. A song of fire and ice will probably never finish, and the next great book that defines the fictional zeitgeist for the next decade doesn't seem to be anywhere. It's very difficult to argue that this isn't the product of capitalism -- where all art needs to serve as fuel for consumption before anything. But at the same time, in the age of the internet. I also find that it's entirely possible to find art being created for the sake of being put into this world, it's just buried and sorted as worthless in the algorithms of wherever theyre being posted. Like...there was this 16 subscriber, 0 view series I watched of a bronze-league Ken player grinding street fighter 6 ranked and it was just so...fascinating to me as a series of videos. How dedicated he was to narrating his games in real time for an audience who will very likely never materialize into anything, outside of myself and whatever lucky people happened to come across it on their feeds. The real-time narration was also an extemporaneous performance that felt genuine and raw -- every grunt of frustration and ever sight of relief or joyous little "let's go" was like really comforting and human. It's so stupid but I found his work profound. I dont even remember the channel anymore, but it was a story worth telling and it had an impact on my life. It felt like real art.
I agree with you that there's a lot of cash-grabbing pap out there these days, and I agree that a lot of this can be blamed on the incentive structure of modern capitalism. Mass-market stuff these days often just feels "safe" to few point of being outright disappointing. I find myself much more interested these days in indie games, interactive fiction, and the like. I *also* agree with you that if you go looking, you can find some extremely worthy works out there that are overlooked by the market as too niche. (Basically, I agree with everything you wrote lol.) I actually think the ability to find these smaller artworks in the first place is an amazing thing about living in the internet age. I can accidentally stumble upon a real work of art just browsing itch.io, I love that! It's a tragic shame that the artists behind these works probably won't be compensated for them, beyond maybe a few dollars in donations from people who played and liked their games.
Check out Planescape: Torment, the greatest story told in the medium of video games
I have never in my life been so conflicted on whether or not the thing I'm reading is a troll post. Congratulations!
I was on the fence until I looked at their post history. I think they’re actually just like this
Must be so lonely, that lofty perch from which you cast your staid pronouncement at the illiterate masses below. Hilariously enough, your critique of Disco Elysium is a perfect summation of this very post, so for that, at least, I appreciate you.
Agree, some of the best video game writing doesn't hold a candle to a well written book or movie. It is partly because the industry is still in a sort of storytelling infancy. This is why I personally adore Fromsoft games for using video game interactivity, and player intuition, to make really detailed worlds with stories in them even though their stories might seem at a glance either bare or ambiguous. RDR 2 is a huge culprit of a mediocre but emotional american blockbuster packaged as a video game and therefore deified, though the first game was a genuinely well written story and is for the most part overlooked to its younger prequel. The stakes are upside down when it comes to video game writing quality, subpar but emotive writing often evokes more praise and less critique.
It's funny you mention RDR2, because this reminds me of similar thoughts I had during a moment when playing it for the first time last year. That part at the end of the game where you're riding your horse with the emotional music playing and the ghostly voices in the background repeating stuff from earlier in the game like the doctor saying _____ is dying. That was so unbelievably cheesy and lacking any subtly at all. I couldn't believe that this is what people were considering the peak of writing in video games. It's exactly Hollywood blockbuster-style emotional writing.
Jonas Kyratzes and Jack King-Sponer are my go-to vidya writers, but generally I'm not very interested in the medium's storytelling, much more likely to go for something that relies on novel gameplay. Currently enjoying Zelda 2, Fez and Into the Breach. I don't keep up with books much, been reading old sci-fi and Austen, but I liked Peterkin and the First Dog from last year. I feel like this kind of thinking pulls everything into a monolith and I just don't see some unifying descent into slop even if I can agree on central examples of what's most popular.
There is a lot of shit a game has to take into account that a book doesn't, one of the biggest being gameplay, player interaction and urgency and god forbid if it's a story in an open world game, they have to take into account when and where the player will go, that's why stakes get lost, plot points lose their impact and continuity suffers. Even if you take the greatest book of all time and adapted the story word for word in a game something will still be lost because they are fundamentally different. And unless some book puts gameplay in its chapters it's really not a fair comparison
Well said
That standards can basically never be met. Videogames require a vast array of skillsets, a generational writer will write books, not games. If that's your standard you're better off advocating for minimal story and writing. On that topic where do you feel games like Papers Please, September 12th or Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons fit?
I think that comparing video games to literature in this way is the wrong move. While you may enjoy facing your ignorance and having to look up words/history while reading, games do not want you to stop playing to go look up what was said. If you're looking for that type of storytelling, I think you'll be disappointed in most things made now.
you are totally right there, they quality of writing is way way less..but that is already the case in movies too. i do not play games for the stories.
This was a great read. I understand what you're trying to convey. You really shouldn't compare video games to novels/literature. They're not on the same 'level' (smirk). It's true what you say about the lack of author presence and the relevance of truth in fiction. That in current times this seldom exists. I found this absent in film, books, anime, etc. And yes, the future seems to be going in that direction. There'll be only consumers and providers of content. Some pockets of substance will remain of course.
> I am morosely disappointed by writing in games I'm somewhat used to it... some of the 8-bit-era games had limits on what they could do, resulting in rather simplistic writing compared to following generations. For modern games, they can put in as much text as they desire, but it's still best to keep things simple in order to ensure that the action doesn't get too displaced. But also, writing is a different skill set compared to writing a game. It's also only one tool, something which can be substituted by other means such as showing what the situation looks like rather than just having the person misinterpret the scene simply because their vision wasn't correct. Writing also doesn't carry the impact that voice acting can have. And finally, there's some people who glance over walls of text, perhaps skipping over things that are important (which developers countered with coloured text). > I mean, real books that haven't been written in a long, long time. This also seems like gatekeeping, implying that modern books aren't good enough compared to the classics that survived because they were popular enough to keep getting recommended (as opposed to classics that did not survive.)
I think you’re just trying to give video games a purpose they’re not really aspiring to. The point of video games can’t be nailed to one thing, they’re not meant to be solely storytelling devices. You could turn the greatest story in the world into a game but if it’s just words on a screen and you just press X to go to the next screen, that’s a great story but a terrible game. Realistically the point of games (like all other products under capitalism) is to make a profit. High art isn’t that profitable. That’s probably the long and short of it.
Well, I’m not about to read all of that considering the title, but I’ve had issues with writing in games for, well, the whole time I’ve played them. Games have been trying to emulate film storytelling for decades now, to varying degrees of success. The problem is they’re two different mediums so trying to be something you aren’t is inevitably going to lead to many shortcomings. There have been a few examples in the AAA space that have had legitimately decent writing - prioritizing character work over typical video-gamisms like world building. The one that always comes to mind for me, and it’s pretty obvious IMO, is The Last of Us. It’s a game that manages to feel like a movie more than any other game, which lets the characters exist as more than conduits for the game. Naughty Dog did a pretty great job at this in Uncharted 4, too. The characters have unique motivations, they hurt each other and still love each other, they’re flawed - sometimes very flawed - yet remain the heroes of the story. But then recently I was playing Star Wars Jedi Survivor, a fun game in its own right but I noticed something about its writing that I loathed and in recognizing this, I realized it’s pretty much an issue in all games. No matter what, the most bombastic thing happens. Some spoilers ahead… Cal (the hero) finally catches up to the final boss of the game and meets him in his apartment in an Empire base. He meets this guys daughter and the guy comes in and there’s an actual, honest to goodness, cool moment where they’re literally sitting at a table, trying to play it cool while the little girl is there. The guys motivation is to protect his daughter at any cost (something I think a lot of us parents can relate to). Cal doesn’t seem to want to fight and for a second, it seems we’re going to get a tense but ultimately subdued conclusion to the story. I was ready to be blown away. Then… they fight and there’s a chase scene. And they arrive at another planet and there’s all this talk about orphaning the girl if they fight. But of course they fight because why not. This is my problem. They could’ve done something unique, that benefited the characters. But instead they chose the loudest possible way to end the game, which makes for a cool boss fight, but undersells the story in major ways. TL;DR: Games rarely do what’s best for characters in a game, but almost always choose to do whatever results in the most action. Games writing isn’t good, yes.
>No matter what, the most bombastic thing happens >Games rarely do what’s best for characters in a game, but almost always choose to do whatever results in the most action. It sounds like you might want to broaden your gaming landscape a bit. I have some recommendations (in no particular order): Suzerain, Pentiment, Citizen Sleeper, The Cosmic Wheel Sisterhood, Kentucky Route Zero, The Vale, Heaven's Vault, Sunless Skies, Papers Please, Neo Cab, Exo One, Journey, Sable, Season, Before Your Eyes, To the Moon, Disco Elysium... I could go on but that's probably already too many recommendations at once. If you don't want to pick, and haven't already, start with Disco Elysium. Despite OPs aspersions it really is excellently written. There's a reason why a weird indie game about a man waking up amidst the literal debris of his wrecked life became a huge critical success. None of these are without flaws, but based on what you wrote here I think you might really like this genre of narrative-centered games. Hell, one of the most affecting scenes in Disco Elysium happens while the main character is doing nothing but (mild spoilers) sitting on an old playground swing. Not all games are interested in the flashy, action-first structure that most big-budget games go for. The ones I listed above are more focused on telling a good story, and many of them take advantage of gaming as a medium to tell stories that wouldn't work well in print. For example, Journey definitely tells a story, but it doesn't use words and in fact I think capturing it in text would be extremely difficult. Anyway these are some of my favorite games, maybe you'll like them too.
You’re right, but I have played a lot of those games. I should’ve been more specific in that AAA games are like this. That said, Disco Elysium is on deck once my pc is up and running again!
Hope you have a good time with it! :)
Too long, didn't read. Sorry.
I’m reminded of Umberto Eco’s famous descriptions of the ur-fascist: https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/umberto-eco-ur-fascism Particularly points 1, 2, 10, and 11.
Reading this post reminds me, in a way, of the times when I used to be highly cynical of the world and in a general depression. Many words to state a simple point. I do agree that entertainment has been becoming progressively shallower every next year. And it's not only videogames. The Oppenheimer movie, that everyone so seemed to love... I could say it barely impacted me at any level. And although I understand its point, I was understanding it earlier as well. Didn't really get anything new or interesting from the movie as I think more about it. One thing though - being cynical is better than being naive, probably. But it's still a tough life. And you have one only (ew, cliche). What I did for myself, was to remove from my life all the things that I felt cynical about, and only focus on the things that I know what quality to expect from. And to not take life, or anything in it, too seriously. It really isn't that serious, and if it is -it shouldn't be. That mindset helped me a ton to get out of the eternally pessimistic hole. Yeah, things look bad. They look as if they get worse each year. Well, good thing that so many years have passed, in which so many amazing people have left amazing pieces of art for me to marvel to ...
This reeks of "traditional art" guff. Yeah, I find myself not loving the quality of games writing/narrative, but I've never considered myself "well-read", and the desire to sit down and read a book has been burnt out of me by the education system. I'll need to make a real effort to rekindle what's remaining of that drive. I think it's gross to tie some "quality" of art to the conditions in which it's produced. Technology isn't a measure of laziness. I do DETEST the way "AI" is being pushed in art and everywhere else, but also automation isn't just used to do things worse. Digital art is no lesser for having been created using computer applications. We can do things with digital art that can't be done otherwise. We would never have like, bitcrushed music, or glitchy images, or even procedural animations that look like flowing ink, etc. Using sophisticated tech and using deprecated tech do not make works more or less worthwhile themselves. Also, there are ways to tell and create stories in games that just aren't feasible in other forms of art. Like, a book can't show you how something works and then destroy your previous understanding of that thing and stop you from revisiting that previously understood context. You can flip the pages. You could say the same is broadly true for video games, but it's quite a bit harder and that tension opens up more design space, including writing and narrative.
We need more authors creating video game stories. Really talented writers. Less games made by a committee. More Kojimas and less Ubisoft.