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There has never been a game with even very good writing.

Curratum

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That's because games are games and not literature, you insufferable dullard.
 

JarlFrank

I like Thief THIS much
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Again one of those utter fucking retards who don't understand that games are their own medium with their own rules and workings.

"HURRRRR no game has ever reached a plot as good as [insert classic literature here], DURRRRRR [classic RPG] could have been a better story had it been turned into a movie."

Yeah. Games aren't novels or movies. The stories will never be comparable to literature and cinema as linear, author-tells-audience-a-story stories, because that's not what games are about. They're about player interactivity. That's the point of games. If you don't get to do shit as a player, the game sucks. If the game only tells you a linear fucking story, it should be a book or a movie. A game writer fails his job when he writes a strictly linear story with no active player involvement/choice/freedom. A game with mediocre main plot but excellent worldbuilding and plenty of sidequests for the player to tackle is a better-written game than one where the main plot is amazing but you can never stray from it and there is nothing else to do but the main plot.

Let's assume all those weeb kids are right and Final Fantasy VII is truly the most emotional and deep RPG ever written (it's not, but plenty of weeb kids seem to believe that). It would still fail as a game because the story is told in an entirely linear way through cutscenes and non-interactive dialogues with zero player choices. You don't participate in the story as a player, you merely watch it unfold with no input. It could be a good movie or novel, but it completely fails as a game because it doesn't provide the core element of computer games as a medium: interactivity.

And as long as game writers try to emulate novels and movies, games will never evolve into their own art form. The truly prestigious and revolutionary game writer will not be the one who writes a game story as good as a novel's or movie's, but one who writes a game story that is entirely appropriate for the medium of gaming, and wouldn't work in any other medium. That's why Planescape Torment is so good, for example. Not just because it's a good story, but because it involves the player and wouldn't work the same way if it were a novel or movie. If your story can be told the exact same way in a linear medium like book or film, it fails as a game story. If it can only be told in a game because it requires player interaction and involvement, then it succeeds as a game story.
 

J_C

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You're deluding yourself if you even try to defend one. Not only has there never been very good writing in a single game; no game has ever even managed, deliberately or even accidentally, to convey (on its own or within any length of series) any kind of compelling, well-told story.

You may have managed to boner any of your preferred D&D, or weeb, or testo-ball-clutching bullshit into something you cherish. Honestly, though, you'd be ashamed at trying to wrangle anyone else, other than your most trusted nerd-mate, into seeing it your way. (You probably don't have any other friends though...)

All those stories are garbage. They don't hold up to any kind of scrutiny within the context of the best literature and you know it. Games have always been shit at telling stories; it hasn't changed. Some games (especially those from our treasured past) were better at creating a world within which to imagine stories beyond that which were actually, lazily, barely written. That's the best you can hope for from a medium which doesn't even recognize games as a place to put their writing talents other than as a last resort.

That's what games are to writers: a last resort. There is no prestige here.

Until someone changes that...
Who gives a fuck? Good gameplay, visuals, sound and atmosphere elevate mediocre stories, and as a result you get an experience which might be better than a book/film with great writing.. Gaming has the adventage of being a complex medium, so they rely on different methods of communications. You have to look at them as a "package", not just the story.

If you just want a good written story, go read a book or watch a movie. But games offer more if done right.
 

turkishronin

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where the best is like the worst
Again one of those utter fucking retards who don't understand that games are their own medium with their own rules and workings.

"HURRRRR no game has ever reached a plot as good as [insert classic literature here], DURRRRRR [classic RPG] could have been a better story had it been turned into a movie."

Yeah. Games aren't novels or movies. The stories will never be comparable to literature and cinema as linear, author-tells-audience-a-story stories, because that's not what games are about. They're about player interactivity. That's the point of games. If you don't get to do shit as a player, the game sucks. If the game only tells you a linear fucking story, it should be a book or a movie. A game writer fails his job when he writes a strictly linear story with no active player involvement/choice/freedom. A game with mediocre main plot but excellent worldbuilding and plenty of sidequests for the player to tackle is a better-written game than one where the main plot is amazing but you can never stray from it and there is nothing else to do but the main plot.

Let's assume all those weeb kids are right and Final Fantasy VII is truly the most emotional and deep RPG ever written (it's not, but plenty of weeb kids seem to believe that). It would still fail as a game because the story is told in an entirely linear way through cutscenes and non-interactive dialogues with zero player choices. You don't participate in the story as a player, you merely watch it unfold with no input. It could be a good movie or novel, but it completely fails as a game because it doesn't provide the core element of computer games as a medium: interactivity.

And as long as game writers try to emulate novels and movies, games will never evolve into their own art form. The truly prestigious and revolutionary game writer will not be the one who writes a game story as good as a novel's or movie's, but one who writes a game story that is entirely appropriate for the medium of gaming, and wouldn't work in any other medium. That's why Planescape Torment is so good, for example. Not just because it's a good story, but because it involves the player and wouldn't work the same way if it were a novel or movie. If your story can be told the exact same way in a linear medium like book or film, it fails as a game story. If it can only be told in a game because it requires player interaction and involvement, then it succeeds as a game story.

Bro isn't the main plot of Baldur's Gate 2 also linear? Do you think it's bad just because of that?
 

JarlFrank

I like Thief THIS much
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Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag.
Again one of those utter fucking retards who don't understand that games are their own medium with their own rules and workings.

"HURRRRR no game has ever reached a plot as good as [insert classic literature here], DURRRRRR [classic RPG] could have been a better story had it been turned into a movie."

Yeah. Games aren't novels or movies. The stories will never be comparable to literature and cinema as linear, author-tells-audience-a-story stories, because that's not what games are about. They're about player interactivity. That's the point of games. If you don't get to do shit as a player, the game sucks. If the game only tells you a linear fucking story, it should be a book or a movie. A game writer fails his job when he writes a strictly linear story with no active player involvement/choice/freedom. A game with mediocre main plot but excellent worldbuilding and plenty of sidequests for the player to tackle is a better-written game than one where the main plot is amazing but you can never stray from it and there is nothing else to do but the main plot.

Let's assume all those weeb kids are right and Final Fantasy VII is truly the most emotional and deep RPG ever written (it's not, but plenty of weeb kids seem to believe that). It would still fail as a game because the story is told in an entirely linear way through cutscenes and non-interactive dialogues with zero player choices. You don't participate in the story as a player, you merely watch it unfold with no input. It could be a good movie or novel, but it completely fails as a game because it doesn't provide the core element of computer games as a medium: interactivity.

And as long as game writers try to emulate novels and movies, games will never evolve into their own art form. The truly prestigious and revolutionary game writer will not be the one who writes a game story as good as a novel's or movie's, but one who writes a game story that is entirely appropriate for the medium of gaming, and wouldn't work in any other medium. That's why Planescape Torment is so good, for example. Not just because it's a good story, but because it involves the player and wouldn't work the same way if it were a novel or movie. If your story can be told the exact same way in a linear medium like book or film, it fails as a game story. If it can only be told in a game because it requires player interaction and involvement, then it succeeds as a game story.

Bro isn't the main plot of Baldur's Gate 2 also linear? Do you think it's bad just because of that?

And yet the main plot of BG2 offered some degree of openness and choice, especially at the start. "Imoen got captured and is held in some wizard prison on some far off island. You need a boat to get there. It costs you 10k gold. Get 10k gold."
Literally the first main quest is about looking for random jobs and getting a set amount of gold. How you get that is up to you. There are plenty of quests to tackle - or ignore. The first chapter is very player-driven.
When you get to the underdark, a dragon wants you to infiltrate the drow city with a disguise and you have to act like drow or they'll realize you're phonies. If you get noticed, you don't have to reload but can just massacre your way through the city. OR you can ignore the quest the dragon gives you entirely and kill the dragon.

Plenty of choices and player-driven sections like that in the game.

Meanwhile the expansion, Throne of Bhaal, is just a linear series of maps and it's universally considered to be much worse than vanilla BG2.
 

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