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Book Excerpt and Review - Game Writing: Narrative Skills for Videogames Using the Tools the Game ProvidesDifferent game types support different techniques for advancing the narrative. The cRPG Neverwinter Nights, for example, uses many approaches: dialogue with NPCs, in-game artifact texts, character advancement, and cut scenes, just to name a few. Horror-shooter Cold Fear (Darkworks, 2005), on the other hand, sticks primarily to cut scenes and in-game artifacts to inform the player. This choice should be made deliberately based upon the goals of the game. Neverwinter Nights is an open, exploration-based experience wherein the player is encouraged to go everywhere and do everything, and where the player is rewarded for exploring. If the player does not go into the cave, they do not meet the friendly dragon that can provide assistance. If the player doesn’t read the in-game artifact book, they do not learn an interesting fact about the face of ancient lizard-beings that are trying to take over the world. Cold Fear, on the other hand, is a claustrophobic, tightly controlled experience punctuated by sudden violence. In-game artifacts are kept short and sweet to reinforce the feeling that the player could be ambushed at any moment, and are done in a format that reinforces the decaying, monster-ridden setting. Conversations are limited to cut scenes to prevent slowing of the pace or the possibility of interruption by enemies. In both cases, the narrative interacts with the central thrust of the game, taking its shape from and reinforcing the game. Trying to shove a lengthy conversation tree into a horror-shooter would be frustrating for the player who feels taken out of the action, whereas removing long conversations from a cRPG could be equally annoying to a player who wants to explore the world and its background. WHAT ARE THE TASKS INVOLVED?There is no single thing that can be described as game writing. A videogame, after all, is a wildly complex combination of code, art, sound, and myriad other elements, all of which combine to make a game. As such, writing is used in plenty of ways to help produce the game, in tasks ranging from the big-picture creative to detailed and technical. StoryThe most glamorous part of game writing is creating the story. Coming up with what happens is what many people view as the core of the writers’ art and task, and in many cases, story gets inextricably intertwined with core design. DialogueDialogue is what’s said in the game. Superficially similar to a film script, dialogue lists the lines that are played in-game. These are generally created in conjunction with the game designer, who outlines what dialogue is needed, and the sound engineer, who establishes the technical constraints. Dialogue is not written in a vacuum. For financial and technical reasons, word and line counts are carefully controlled. Because it’s not a script that will be filmed, dialogue also needs to be written with context. The entire cast won’t be in the recording studio trading lines back and forth. Usually, one actor at a time records his or her lines, which means every line needs to be established in terms of tone, mood, location in the game, and purpose. (As ever, there are exceptions, and dual recording sessions are not uncommon.) Writing dialogue is, in the end, a much more complicated process than just composing the dialogue. Supporting TextsThe game writer’s task can extend outside of the game itself. World bibles, character descriptions, teaser fiction, and other similar texts are all potentially important. They’re useful as reference to the team—for example, the character artists need to Cut Scenes and Scripted EventsThe scripts for cut scenes and scripted events need to be created by writers in conjunction with the rest of the team. Contrary to popular belief, there are limits to what can be created with CGI, and those limits are frequently found in the schedule and the budget. The cut scenes need to balance the needs of the narrative on one end and the availability of resources on the other. As such, cut scene writing is often iterative, with the phrase “we can’t do that” scribbled in the margins by someone else on the team. Other TasksNumerous other tasks are involved in generating the writing for a game narrative. In-game artifacts need to be generated with an eye toward the game’s central idioms—there are no emails in World of Warcraft (Blizzard, 2004), for example, and no elvish ballads in Doom 3 (id, 2004). Game manuals often support the narrative, with expository or in-character sections serving to help create the world for the player. |
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