Kotaku podcast (Transcript)

By Curtis, Peter, Tom

Curtis
Hello! And welcome to our podcast of doom! Today we are going to be discussing whether games have a story, recently an article that appeared online from an discussion between Steven Spielberg and George Lucas, where they quoted that By its very nature there ca nnot be a plot in a game, Im joined with my good friends Peter and Tom who are going to be discussing whether this is true or not. While I do agree that games area obliged to have good stories, I highly disagree that they are unable to have good narratives.

Peter
Games are obliged to have a good narrative, yes; that goes with anything in the media now industry now. The only problem now is that films are more direct; films however introduce more variables, such as the player, time, and artificially padding out scenarios. There is also the disconnection between the narrative and gameplay; which can lead to many awkward situations like in Far Cry 3, where the player protagonist says he wont kill, but as the player I can kill easily. There is just a disconnect that doesnt happen in films.

Tom
While yes, cutscenes exist to make a game more cinematic, they are also necessary to enhance the gameplay and set the scene. Gamers tend to generally dislike games that have bad narratives as they are unable to engage or connect with the characters, such as Medal of Honor Warfighter that was panned by gamers due to having a story that was unable to follow, and as such gameplay that the player couldnt engage in. In this article I have here, there is a quote from George Lucas who has hardly got the best reputation for storytelling in recent years, where he claims that because of the "very nature" of a video game, it simply cannot have a plot which is something I completely and totally disagree with, as some of the most compelling stories of the past 30 years have been told in

video games such as Final Fantasy VII and Naughty Dog's 2013 Blockbuster title, The Last of Us. Both of these games are critically acclaimed for their plots, and the gaming community often uses these as perfectly valid examples of when storytelling in games can surpass film.

Curtis
There is a quote here that says telling a story is a very complicated process do you think this made harder when it comes to making a story for games which are interactive? Lets here Petes side first

Peter
As someone who has dabbled in an out of story development for both films and games, telling a story in a game is more difficult. There are a lot of inconsistencies that you have to account for, player interaction - you also have to make it fun as well. It can lead to a lot of break up between the gameplay and narrative merge; as I said earlier. For a film however, its a straight line, you tell the actor what to do, and the actors do it. The thing I understand from the article is how theyre professionals; theyve made great films in the past, like Indiana jones, like Star Wars 4, 5, 6. The reason why they havent gone into games is because its just not a good place to make stories. You mentioned earlier, The Last of Us. As someone who has played The Last of Us, the story is incredibly safe; it WILL work for a film, but not so much as a game. Because Im in control, Im no longer protecting the small girl Ellie, because I know shes hardcoded to protect herself, and avoid combat.

Tom
I mean obviously telling a story in a game is going to be a lot harder due to the fact that the medium is interactive, but I honestly see it as paving the way to much better stories than any non-interactive media could possible hope to achieve. The high degree of interactivity found in the Last of Us made the player feel truly involved in the story that the game was trying to tell. Even though the player isnt asked to make many decisions throughout the game, the game keeps the player feeling fully involved, and I consider that to be key to having a good story. The player isnt going through it because they "want to get the most points", but because they care about the events of the story, and the characters it involves. The game also aids it's storytelling by giving the player the option of how they handle a situation rather than forcing them down a narrow one, but always making sure that if the player succeeds the story continues exactly as intended.

Curtis
Do you think that, ultimately George Lucas and Steven Spielberg are acting nave? And do you think they truly know the games industry? Lets hear it from you first Tom

I honestly dont think that either Spielberg or Lucas truly understand the games industry, which I kinda find pathetic due to the fact they both have dabbled in the industry with their own game studios, and Spielberg has been game designer for a number of games. Considering that Spielberg is producing a TV series based off the narrative of a game which is within the realms of what he'd consider a "bad plot" I find his entire argument against games having good plots completely naive. This also means if he was to rework Halo's plot for the TV series, theres a high chance he will simply alienate the fans that he is meant to be appealing to, and entirely miss the point of how the players connect with characters such as Cortana.

Peter
While I understand your point Tom, there are games which have been transformed into a film or game series, such as Forward unto Dawn. Then there are the companies like Quantic Dream, who have become famous for games like Indigo prophesy/Fahrenheit, Heavy Rain, and the recently released, Beyond Two Souls staring Ellen Page and Willem Dafoe. The thing about beyond, it is an interactive film, so there are gameplay interactions to the story. The story is mostly there, the issues are with David Cage insisting on having no failure state, meaning the player can do whatever they want with no penalty. For instance, on a train you can escape through a window, get caught, or up through an air duct on the top of the train. I personally dont like that; we have here a game which doesnt need a controller. So its a film? Wrong, there are still menial buttons to be pressed which have no use. For instance in an army training ground, you have to manually jump over a piece of cover with a button press, get into another piece of cover with a button press, and take out the bad guy with a button press. All of this feels so sluggish and horrible. It shouldnt be there, and it has no reason to be there, thats the problem with Beyond, its *THIS* close to being a film, and *THIS* close to being a game. But right now, its just stuck in a horrible limbo.

(Phone rings)

Curtis
Ok, just hang on one second there Pete. It appears we have a caller on the line, uhh, Hello caller.

Caller
Hi guys, I just wanted to say that I completely disagree with what Pete has said about Beyond Two Souls with regards to how it tells its own story. While it's good that he at least sees that the elements needed for a good story are there, I dont agree at all that it was told badly. I found myself completely and totally engrossed with all the characters and the events that happen in the story, and I felt a genuine attachment to Ellen Page's character "Jodie" thanks to her fantastic performance. I dont really feel that the gameplay detracts from the story, as David Cage as a game designer always tries to involve the player in everything that happens within the game, from the mundane to the exciting. Where Beyond Two Souls does it brilliantly is that it allows the player to put themselves into the position of the character and make minor decisions or mistakes, but the story always finds a way to get itself back on track so the constant narrative isnt disrupted. While some people found that this makes the game much harder to get into, I feel it's what makes it succeed at telling a story in the same way that a movie would, and I find that both Peter and Spielberg/Lucas fail to understand these things. (Phone call ends)

Curtis
Ok, well thank you for calling in, and now we go back to the questions. Do you think its harder today to please consumers with a good story than what it was during the height of Steven Spielbergs and George Lucass career? Lets listen to Pete first.

Peter
Well, time has changed for us to admire more different stories, thats why telling stories is more difficult. We want to have new perspectives, better outcomes, better plot twists. We want to explore more in narrative and telling of stories which is completely fine. Its more difficult yeah with the use of better characters, but thats all part of the challenge. Lets use an example, lets say Breaking Bad. Breaking bad is the story of a normal man to an antagonist; he goes fully to an antagonist. Thats what makes breaking bad so successful, the change of character. Now you wouldnt have gone that in Lucass and Spielbergs time Quotation mark because that just wasnt relevant. For a game, you could talk about Red Dead Redemption. Now, its a western redemption tale about a man cleaning up his past. You just wouldnt have gotten that in the olden days it would have just been a western bounty hunter taking down any odd gang. But in RD:R, there is more depth and layers, thats why its more difficult to tell stories, you have to keep on track of those layers. Story telling has advanced for the good. I am all for the more complex stories telling now than the time of yester-year.

I honestly think that Lucas and Spielberg's style of storytelling is from a bygone era, and this is another reason why it's good that Star Wars Episode VII will be made by a fresh mind, such as the new writer and director JJ Abrams. I think the directors that have achieved what Lucas and Spielberg did in the 70's, in the current era would have to be Quentin Tarantino and James Cameron. These two Pulp Fiction, the prior of which managed to break all box office records previously held by Spielberg himself. They both pioneered new ways of storytelling, such as Tarantino making the first truly successful non-linear movie since Citizen Kane, paving the way for other directors to do similar things with their own films, and even David Cage when creating the game Beyond Two Souls. This fairly new method of storytelling allows for the writer and the audience to explore the character in a very different way, as you see them at different parts of their life, usually in the wrong order. This makes for an exciting way of telling a story we just didnt get during the 70's and 80's. Though one major difference between Spielberg and Lucas themselves is that while Lucas generally fails to impress audiences anymore, Stephen Spielberg still manages to create movies loved by many such as Jurassic Park. I feel that video games also had a major part to play in the shift in storytelling, with games like Final Fantasy VII having such a deep and rich story that you would previously only find in a book. (Phone rings)

Tom (Cont)
And hang on a second; I believe we have another caller

Caller
Hey, just wanted to call in and give my thoughts on the debate of how games can be just as good at storytelling as films and books, or even modern television. I'm of the opinion that some games can tell a good story, even without having one of their own right out of the box. Minecraft is personally one of my favourite games when it comes to allowing the player to do as they please and to go on their own adventure with their own stories, be that in prebuilt content made for the game, or simply exploring the sandbox. Theres a reason that so many people fell in love with this game, especially when custom "Adventure Maps" began to pop up, which use the games very rudimental but growing creation tools to make something grand and open. Often these can rival other games with the scope and size of the story that they tell, while some purely exist to entertain the player. Because the game has simple modding support, a lot of modifications for the game have been made to further enhance its capabilities as a storytelling game, such as having more NPC's in the game, or a means of coding events into the game to make it feel like a blockbuster. Considering the game has a very low price for entry, and the hundreds of hours the players will get out of their own adventures and other people's, I feel that this game alone can be used as evidence for games as a viable and successful means of storytelling, even though it might not be as powerful a tool as some other games. This style of game with sandbox creation tools, and allowing the player to create their own comparable narratives and adventures to the actual

game, are growing in popularity, with big titles like one of the biggest hits on PS3, LittleBigPlanet, revolving entirely around creating new levels and narratives and sharing them with the world. Project Spark one of the big titles talked about at E3 this year, revolved entirely around creating games and movies. Animate models, record audio, build environments and create items Share the full works and components online for others to remix and work with It'll be hard, if not impossible to emulate movies' story telling techniques in videogames fixed story not suited to a medium that allows player choice/agency either compromise on player agency and force the player's hand down a path (Beyond Two Souls) or have a weak story or embrace that agency the player has and build the story around it (Walking Dead, Mass Effect), or give the creative tools to the player (Minecraft, LBP) Thanks for listening!

Curtis
What do you think tells a story better, a video game or a Film? So for example well known films such as the shawshank redemption tell a fantastic story, can you guys think of any game that has conveyed a great story?

Peter
To answer your first question, films hands down tell a better story than video games, Ive already told you why due to its characters, development, pacing and general story cause its all controlled and done better. There are two games that Ive got that I think are incredible stories. The first one, as youve probably guessed, The Witcher 2. Its a dark, gritty, modern, mature story that deals with subjects like violence, language, sex and drugs; all told in a tasteful, mature, dark (but not to dark) way. The second game is the original BioShock released in 2007. The game is fantastic at telling a story. I have spent many hours binging on that game because of the story. There has been no other game that left me with chills running down my spine, listening to the dialogue of the characters. I binged on that game in two days because of the story; and the story was the key point of the game, it kept me hooked in from the start to the end of its 20 hour story. It is phenomenal as a game. And I might be the only one to say it can be done as a game, simply because of its time pacing, itll be to long for a film, it could work as a TV show easy, but not as a film.

So those are my two games which I praise for its story, The Witcher 2 and BioShock.

Tom
In Order to answer your question as to what I would consider to be a fantastic story that is found within a video game, I would call two specific examples to mind immediately. The first game I need to mention is Grand Theft Auto V, which was released very recently in September 2013 to record breaking sales. The story in GTA games has never usually been something I cared about due to the subject matter being far too depressing for me to get into properly but with 5, I found myself caring about everything that was happening, and I fell in love immediately with the fact the player controlled three protagonists instead of just one. Something I applaud Rockstar for in the creation of this narrative is how it continues when the player isnt within a mission, and simply switches to one of the other characters, usually greeted by a cutscene of them going about their daily life. Because of how the game did this, I found myself totally engrossed in everything that was happening and actually enjoying doing small side missions as each character. Another fantastic example of a game that has a great story would have to be the game that made me genuinely see games as being viable for storytelling, which is Uncharted 2. When I bought this game, I wasnt expecting too much as the first game generally didnt excite me too much, but what I got was both my favourite third person adventure game, and also my favourite actionadventure movie since the Indiana Jones trilogy (By Lucas and Spielberg!). The way the story was told was just fantastic, but even more brilliant was simply the relations between all the characters, and the way they talk both in and out of cutscenes. Even though you as the player know that everything being said was planned out, it still feels and sounds spontaneous thanks to how it reacts to the gameplay. Things like this generally make the story perfect for me, and the fact it managed to keep it's pacing going over its 22 hour long campaign just strikes me as being extremely impressive.

Curtis
Ok, so well a big thank you to Pete and Tom for the views today. So to conclude todays podcast we have had a large amount of views and opinions on the fact of whether games have a story. I myself support the fact that games have a story, I believe that games tend to get the bad end of the medias stick and articles like this te nd to frustrate me because Steven Spielberg and George Lucas never support their argument with examples of when games havent had a good story, There are many games out there that have a fantastic story, so for example Dark souls has become an incredibly popular game and the story and lore behind the game is fantastic, this can also be said for assassins creed franchise which has become a very popular series because of its story and the continuation of the plot as a whole. (Sign off)

Link: https://soundcloud.com/2o26769/podcast2-mixdown