Dodo Blog

The story discussion continues.

Again, SPOILERS…

The heart of a good story are its characters. They don’t have to be likeable, but they have to be interesting and above all believable. Sometimes a character will say or do something that just seems wrong… People change, certainly, but you know that character would not make that choice at that point in their life…

For example, when Anakin turns to the dark side in Star Wars Episode 3 it seems hard to believe that despite all his fear and anger he would suddenly murder innocent children in cold blood. Darth Vader? Sure. But Anakin’s not there yet.

It hurts the believability of the character and makes it harder to buy into the story as a whole. If you want people to care about your story you can’t betray your characters.

But enough about movies… What of the troubled relationship between story and interaction? Staying true to character in games is a tricky one:

PLAYER/STORY-CONFLICT

Often referred to as “ludo-narrative dissonance“, it’s a fancy way of saying: the actions the player is encouraged to take do not mesh with the fiction of the game world. You play a likeable hero, but the gameplay is based around murdering hundreds of people. You’re out to save the universe, but you do it by stealing everything that isn’t nailed down… that kind of thing.

Not a new problem, but it has become more noticable as game stories develop a certain degree of subtlety. Nathan Drake may be a lovable rogue during cutscenes, but in the hands of the player he’s a ruthless killer. GTAIV may let you have a pretend social life, but on the way to your date you probably ran over twenty pedestrians.

It’s a difficult problem. The games that get it right – where what the player is thinking and doing matches the character – are all the more powerful for it.