| In 1954, French film director and critic Francois Truffaut penned a seminal article in Cahiers du cinéma asserting the auteur theory: a director with a recognizable style can be considered as the author of his or her films. A similar revolution in video games is on the brink, as developers place greater importance on storytelling.
The technology of systems, be they consoles or computers, will only take games so far. Because at some point button mashing gets boring and because video games are, at their best, stories – stories in which the audience has an opportunity to interact and, increasingly, influence.
The popular Grand Theft Auto series has popularized the concept of non-linear narrative in video games. While the overall story has a beginning and an end, players progress through the story (or not) as they choose. The GTA games are nearly open-ended.
Good stories, regardless of what medium they exist in, share certain characteristics: they evoke emotion, they raise moral and ethical questions, they introduce complex characters who have to make choices.
Games such as Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic and Fable have brought moral consequences to bear: slaughter innocents and your character takes on the appearance of evil.
We've reached the point where the stories and characters on which games are constructed have become as critical as the visual fidelity of those games. Developers are now creating intricate plots for their games, finding different methods of conveying their plots, and working to make their games more intricate.
Ubisoft's award-winning Prince of Persia was, from the start, designed to be a trilogy. So is Sega's upcoming Condemned: Criminal Origins. Dave Hasle, Condemned’s producer, said the game was created as a long story told over successive games. More important for Hasle was to find a way to tell the story of an FBI agent from the Serial Crimes Unit without having to resort to traditional cutscenes. "The evidence you collect tells the story," he says.
Edmonton's BioWare Corp. was so intent on having its Jade Empire game be realistic that it pulled a Tolkien: University of Alberta linguist Wolf Wikeley was asked to create languages for the characters to enhance the authenticity of the game experience. Wikeley has since created four more languages for BioWare's Dragon Age.
As the video game audience grows to include a greater variety of people, and as the audience becomes more sophisticated and intelligent, video game developers must get off the technology rollercoaster and pay greater attention to providing content. It is possible to tell engaging and important stories with complex characters in an entertaining way, and game players should expect nothing less.
REVIEWS
· Advent Rising (publisher: Majesco; platform: Xbox; rated: teen). The plot for this game – about alien races trying to exterminate or save the human race – sets an interesting stage for the planned trilogy of games co-written by novelist Orson Scott Card. But the standard for games about humans in conflict with aliens has been raised – high – by Halo and Half-Life, and Advent Rising can’t help but seem derivative. The many glitches are so frequent they’ll have you screaming at the television. I suggest you soldier on, though, for two reasons. First, the developers have actually introduced some interesting innovation in the game play and in the storytelling. Second, the developers know damn well that the look and feel of this game doesn’t match with the story and character development, so they’re bound to work hard to make the second instalment that much better.
· Jade Empire (publisher: Microsoft Game Studios; platform: Xbox; rating: mature). Edmonton’s BioWare has made some brilliant games over the years and this may be the best yet. With a complex story and intricate character development, this role-playing game is set in an Asian-themed world of martial arts, magic and mythology. You pick your character’s gender, and proceed to save your country from those who would control it. Which path you take – the way of the open palm or the closed fist – depends on your actions and responses.
· Cold Winter (publisher: Vivendi Universal; platform: PS2, Xbox; rating: mature). Cold Winter is a perfect example of how a standard game can become something special solely because of the writing. A first-person action shooter, this is, in part, a reaction to the flashy James Bond games; darker, more gritty and harsh, a world in which actions have consequences. Warren Ellis, who made his fame in comics, was co-writer, and he leaves an indelible stamp on this game. Ellis has a dark, cynical view of society, and it bleeds into Cold Winter’s interesting characters, honest dialogue and conspiracy-riddled plot. |
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