STORYTELLING

Game design: theory & practice / by Richard Rouse III.

©2005, Wordware Publishing, Inc.
“
Strictly speaking, computer games do not need to tell stories.
Over the years there have been plenty of fabulous games that
offered very little in the way of storytelling.

Games certainly do not need stories, but it seems that when

employed properly, stories can make games that much
stronger.
“
 MAIN TOPIC

Place of Story Telling Game Stories

Designer Linear with Pitfalls The Dream

vs
Player
(story)
Designer vs
Player
(story)
Designer’s Story VS Player’s Story
“ The ideal for interactive storytelling is
to merge the designer’s story and
the player’s story into one ”
 Place of
Storytelling
 Place of StoryTelling

#1 #2 #3
Out of In-Game External
Game Material
Place #1 of Storytelling
Out of Game
Cut Scene
01 What are commonly referred to as cut-scenes use cinematic
techniques to communicate a narrative to players.

Text
02 Many games use text to describe the story or to give players
goals for the upcoming mission

Images
03 Sometimes players are presented with simple images that
communicate some part of the story line

Audio
04 Sometimes players are given directives that are spoken dialog
or other audio.
 Place #2 of Storytelling
In Game
Text
01 These can be signs explaining directions

Level Setting
02 setting can also be key to telling more complex game stories.

Dialog
03 Dialog with NPCs during gameplay is another massively
powerful tool that designers can use to great storytelling
effect.

NPC Behavior
04 NPC should perform actions that back up the story line.
 Place #3 of Storytelling
External Material
“Some designers used manuals to communicate the
game’s back-story, writing a narrative”

HESOYAM
Linear with Pitfalls
 Linear Writing Pitfalls
“One of the primary story problems that many
computer games have is that their stories are
written by people who wish they were
writing in a more linear medium.”

The first problem is forcing players to

experience the story in only one
predetermined path.
13
 Character Personality

“
Linear writers also often try to force the player’s
character to have a strong personality.
There is a popular trend in game design that says
gamers want to have main characters with strong
personalities for them to control

”
Paul Phoenix Ling Xiaoyu KING Hwoarang Eddy Gordo
Pro-Wrestling Taekwondo Capoeira
Modified martial arts Baguazhang and
based on Judo Piguaquan based
14
Chinese martial arts
Game Stories
 Game Stories

“games are already much more

interactive than television, and
therefore it makes sense that
game storytellers would not
tell the audience every last
detail of a plot”

16
 Game Stories
1. Non-Linearity 2. Working with Gameplay
non-linearity can be used to “One of the most important
enhance players’ gaming parts of creating a story for a
experience. computer game is to match the
story with the gameplay as much
“ the goal of game as possible”
storytelling is to create a
story in which players feel
they can play a significant
role that may affect the
outcome. ”
The DREAM
 The DREAM
One could say that the goal of gameplay
is to allow for different player strategies
to lead to variable types of success, to
reward player experimentation and
exploration, and to empower players to
make their own choices.

“All of these factors allow players to craft

their own unique stories when playing your
game.”
ANY QUESTION ?