Why Is Game Writing So Terrible? (2021)
shamusyoung.com
shamusyoung.com
How many more people would play video games now if they could really see them as non-linear interactive Scorsese movies instead of more akin to the plots their kids are watching in cartoons?
Also -- maybe there's some problem with how we think about traditional stories/writing where the author fully guides the reader and interactive experiences like video games.
The best video game stories I have as an avid lifelong gamer are from the emergent story games like Dwarf Fortress Rimworld caves of qud, kenshi, etc where I really feel ownership of the story and its not the same as everyone else's story who played the same game.
If the story quality in an 50 hour more story driven video game was higher though, I might still devote time to do that stuff these days, but as it is I almost never play story driven games except a few indie titles a year.
When I finally played it I couldn't believe that this was what people were holding up as being a master class of game writing.
It is on par with the Forgotten Realms young adult novels but that's not really a compliment.
Anyways, my main point is that standards for game writing is so low that really mediocre stuff gets a lot of praise by comparison to even worse stuff.
If there was some sort of writing Pulitzer prize just for world building, D&D would be up there.
When you're taking about the setting that D&D 5e uses, you're taking about a setting called The Forgotten Realms.
There are actually dozens of novels set in The Forgotten Realms, going back decades, which is part of why there is so much world building done.
And believe me that while many of those novels are fun reads, none of them are winning any prizes for writing.
Forgotten realms is just one "region" in the setting. It is one universe in a multiverse of regions. This multiverse is called Planescape. All d&d games that I know about utilize that setting. In Planescape any arch way or opening can be a potential portal to another realm. You just need the right key. The key could be an object, a leaf, or a childhood memory or a song that can take you to another world when you walk through the archway of which there are an infinite amount. The forgotten realms is one of these places. But I'm repeating myself. You played torment so you know this as it takes place in the city of sigil the city that lies at the nexus of the multiverse.
I mean there are books dedicated to just describing the d&d setting and if they gave out awards for settings, these books would win. The novels aren't part of this. That's what I'm saying.
I don’t think this sort of flexibility indicates great writing in the literary sense. It is like a better thought out version of Marvel’s multiverse stuff: a really functional way of giving somebody working in a setting the latitude to select parts of that setting as needed. It is designed by an organization to achieve a goal for the game system, not to be great art.
The amount of artists and writers who created it makes it art in my eyes. There's no other utility for it other than story telling either. If that's not art, what is it? The snobs at the Pulitzer who haven't even awarded a win to sci Fi novel may think otherwise but to each their own. In terms of the topic at hand, fantasy lore, there's few that can rival d&d.
Let's be real too. Baldurs gate and torment weren't made because of the great d&d gameplay system... The creators wanted to utilize the lore.
Anyway, I think the reason literary organizations don’t award settings is because they are generally interested in stores, and settings are just a component of that. I’m sure you could find some industry awards for setting development, and I bet Planescape stuff does well there. They are just not as interesting to outsiders.
Also I want to push back on your “the topic at hand.” I was talking about the stories themselves. You’ve changed the topic to settings. I’m not sure I want to come along on a tangent where we talk about setting in-and-of-themselves. The article was about why game writing is often bad. I think it is not settings, games often have great settings, but poor stories.
Agreed on your last part. Games have great setting and not as good stories.
But my point was d&d is great for what it is: settings for stories rather then the stories themselves. I think you disagree with this, and you think the setting is more subservient to the gameplay but I'll reference Warhammer then. Warhammer clearly has a focus on setting at many times over gameplay. And my argument is that d&d is largely similar.
The writing of PS:T is vastly better than an “Adventures of Drizzt Do’urden, part 153” YA fantasy novel or what have you. Perhaps it wouldn’t win a Pulitzer if it were a book, but for a computer game the writing is incredibly good.
But what’s really shocking about the writing is
1. How much of it there is
2. How well it showcases the utter weirdness of Planescape compared to your standard D&D settings like Forgotten Realms
3. How it subverts, inverts, lampshades or in any other way plays with every major high fantasy and D&D trope that you can think of. Whatever you have heard of the writing, there’s nothing generically “D&D” about it.
PS:T can win a Hugo. The Hugo award is something that gets it right. They can admit they're awarding stuff to a narrow genre while the Pulitzer is deceptive in the sense they don't ever admit to the narrowness of their decisions. I don't think a Sci Fi has ever won a Pulitzer.
That attitude is representative of a lot of what's going on in this thread. This sort of snobbishness where people mistake good writing and bad writing for what is in actuality genre preferences.
I also wouldn't advertise the setting of PS:T too much. Yes it's unique, but that's only a small part of the reason why it's good. Torment's informal sequel: Tides of Numenera had the same unique setting but wasn't nearly as good because it lacked the core. Torment was good because it was compelling and haunting. The setting is just icing on the cake.
Torment can win a hugo if it was a book. It's that good. Better than a lot of hugo winners too.
I get where you're coming from though. Planescape has elements of a YA novel, it's designed to be a page turner and the like. The setting is also very unique and fantastical and that gives it a bit of a YA novel flavor because people conflate this for the reason for why it's good in their "rave reviews". Like "wow! such an imaginative setting for an adventure!" and that kind of thing.
But make no mistake the game is haunting. When you finish it you're different. It's def not just some typical adventure story in some wildly fantastical setting. Read this review, (the first part before she gets in to deep into the fantasy elements and side characters) she couldn't have put it better:
https://tap-repeatedly.com/2003/02/planescape-torment-review...
"If computer games developers ever hope to stake their claim in the mature artistic mainstream alongside painting, music and literature, it won’t happen by coming up with ever more capable engines, sweeter eye candy or addictive gameplay, though it won’t happen without them either. It will happen by drafting all of the above into the service of compelling characters such as these, characters who make you care about them, characters who send you pawing for the reload command because you simply cannot possibly conceive of moving another inch without them. Planescape Torment accomplishes all this and more, capturing the player’s heart and intellect, taking him on a long, fraught journey through one of the most unique settings I’ve experienced in any medium and wrapping it up in a stunning, jaw-dropping finale."
"Don’t approach this CRPG too lightly. It’s the gaming equivalent of War and Peace, slow to start, frustratingly obscure at times, yet once that great narrative engine finally revs up, it moves the player along with breathtaking authority. I’ve only played it once so far. Usually I play a game twice before sitting down to review it, but I’m not ready to reenter the world of Planescape Torment just yet. There’s something about this game. It’s disturbing, haunting and heavy. I’ve never seen anything quite like it."
Like her I was never able to play it twice. I was left in something of a state of awe when I finished the game, but not really... I can't describe it.. It's that same feeling when you finish a really good book.
It's unfortunate that it's wrapped up in the skin of a YA novel. But in actuality the skin only adds to it and makes it better, but at it's core it stands above that. Way above that.
This is another absolutely baffling statement people keep making about Baldurs Gate 3.
CRPGs have done nonlinear gameplay narratives for decades at least.
Hell, even Larian's previous games do exactly this same thing. Baldur's Gate 3 has a ton of the same story beats and gameplay structure as Divinity Original Sin 2, even down to starting the game in a shipwreck!
The idea that there's not really anything else like it is just plain wrong.
Look I'm glad that so many people got their first exposure to CRPGs with Baldur's Gate 3 and think they've experienced something amazing.
I think I just finally understand how my Dad felt when my sister was trying to tell him about this amazing band called "The Beatles"
The writing is excellent. The plot is generic. A generic plot isn't necessarily a bad thing either. Some of the best movies follow a generic arc, Star wars the MCU are all good because of the genericness. A lot of people are just snobbish. Not you, but I feel that's where a lot of the judgement comes from.
Dragon age had this a decade ago
> Many don't allow you to just kill every single key character and still maintain narrative flow
I am skeptical that Baldur's Gate 3's scripting is actually this resilient. Regardless, games like Fallout had this sort of behavior two decades ago.
> The writing is excellent. The plot is generic
The writing will wind up seeming better depending on how you play.
Spoiler ahead:
For example, Shadowheart has a big decision to kill or not kill an enemy of Shar at the end of act 2. My friend loved this moment because he let her choose and she chose to abandon Shar because she felt it was wrong, despite all of her firm claims to be absolutely devout. He felt it made Shadowheart nuanced and like she knew the right thing to do despite her indoctrination.
I rolled persuasion to convince her not to kill the person, and it made her seem absolutely player-centric and super easy to convince to turn her back on Shar. It was terrible writing.
But I didn't want her to kill the person. And I was honestly surprised that was her default action if you let her choose.
Vastly different experiences, one seems like good writing, one seems bad.
Fine maybe not the only one. But very very few are like it.
>I am skeptical that Baldur's Gate 3's scripting is actually this resilient. Regardless, games like Fallout had this sort of behavior two decades ago.
No fallout doesn't come close. Fallout is structured so you can't kill critical main characters until it's time. They structure the script in a way where it's impossible. This is way better than putting up invulnerability guards the way most games do.
Bg 3 solves the issue by using replacement characters. You kill off a critical person to early another person will take his place and fulfill his role.
I suspect the developers have some sort of plot hole static checker similar to type checkers that allow them to fill every possible hole.
> Vastly different experiences, one seems like good writing, one seems bad.
You are conflating bad writing with personal preference. Whether a character makes one choice or the other the writers narrate both options the quality of the narration is not what you're commenting on. You're commenting on your preferred choice. Not agreeing with a choice or even not agreeing with writing is not bad writing. For example, I wouldn't call the mien Kampf poorly written even though I disagree with it.
I mean read what you wrote. Where in any of your paragraphs was writing actually commented on? You are commenting more on plot and choices.
Seems like a silly thing to say. Of course what is good or bad writing is a matter of personal taste. I'm not conflating anything.
> No fallout doesn't come close. Fallout is structured so you can't kill critical main characters until it's time. They structure the script in a way where it's impossible.
> Bg 3 solves the issue by using replacement characters. You kill off a critical person to early another person will take his place and fulfill his role.
That's effectively the same thing. One just feels more video-gamey, but the game's linearity
What happens if you kill the replacement? Does it generate a new person to continue? Seems silly to me.
> This is way better than putting up invulnerability guards the way most games do.
That's just, like, your opinion man.
> I mean read what you wrote. Where in any of your paragraphs was writing actually commented on? You are commenting more on plot and choices.
Plot and choices are part of writing, no? This seems seriously nitpicky.
Writing isn't just "the act of putting words into a sentence", it's all of the decisions that led to that sentence existing.
If I complained that the dialogue often sounded like it came from a high school student (Karlach doing fist pumps and shouting "Hell Yeah" whenever she likes something, for example) would you similarly complain that I'm not talking about the "writing" but the "prose"?
By the way, I didn't disagree when Shadowheart seemed so easily swayed. I just thought she was a poorly written character to have her strong convictions overruled so easily.
Same with Lae'zel when she turned on the Gith queen basically because I told her to.
Two characters that never once expressed any doubts about their divine missions, both turned away from them based on a single choice I made.
That seems like weakly written characters to me.
It's not silly because there's no point in talking about writing quality if 100% of it was opinion based and wildly different among everyone. Obviously we're talking about a common shared opinion on what good writing is. What I'm saying, again, obviously, is that your opinion, is NOT part of the shared opinion. But do I really need to spell it out? No. This is pedantry. Details only alluded in response to your mechanical retorts. You're fully aware of what I'm saying here but likely were unaware of what you're doing. It's fine I'm redirecting the conversation back on course.
>That's effectively the same thing. One just feels more video-gamey, but the game's linearity
Of course it's effectively the same thing. It's like saying python is the same as rust if the program output is the same. As for the linearity, there's more branches in the BG3 version, but less branches in the fallout version. Generally though the branches for both games converge on a single ending. But even BG3 here as many many more permutations on that ending. It's uncountable I believe.
>That's just, like, your opinion man.
No it's the shared opinion. Which your opinion is not a part of. Man.
>Plot and choices are part of writing, no? This seems seriously nitpicky.
Nope it's not nitpicky. You can have good writing for a shit plot and bad writing for a great plot. Bad writing includes things like grammar, poor word choice, miss-spellings poor descriptions. Plots can be made without writing. For example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WIPV1iwzrzg This is an example of a plot with no writing.
>Writing isn't just "the act of putting words into a sentence", it's all of the decisions that led to that sentence existing.
Those decisions don't have to lead to writing. See above. writing is about conveying the intent. The act of conveyance is complex and nuanced. It can mask and influence the intent. For example the English translation of popular wushu novels just don't carry the same weight in the US as they do in China.
>If I complained that the dialogue often sounded like it came from a high school student (Karlach doing fist pumps and shouting "Hell Yeah" whenever she likes something, for example) would you similarly complain that I'm not talking about the "writing" but the "prose"?
Prose is part of writing. But prose refers to like the "flavor" more. Writing in general also encompasses structure, detail, descriptions outside of the flavor. Like for example imagine you have chatGPT generate a picture of a flower. Then you have chatGPT generate the same picture of that flower but as a water color paining. Two different flavors. But the angle of the camera and the time of day of capture and the details in the foreground or the background would be the "writing". Plot requires a middle beginning and end which most pictures don't have but some pictures can have an aspect of it.
>By the way, I didn't disagree when Shadowheart seemed so easily swayed. I just thought she was a poorly written character to have her strong convictions overruled so easily.
It was probably by design. They wanted a feel good story where she ended up taking the redemption route. In that case I would say the plot was also excellently designed. I think although they allow for the existence of alternate paths, they have the choices designed in a way where you are a bit funneled down a most probable path. That path is shadowheart being redeemed. It just wasn't designed for the kind of high brow ultra realistic character studies you seem to like. If you want something catered to your tastes try Disco Elysium if you haven't already.
>Same with Lae'zel when she turned on the Gith queen basically because I told her to.
It's done purposefully as I said. There's still randomness here. I only got all the characters to do what I want because I was save scumming like a mad man. The save scumming is permitted which is ALSO a design choice. The plot is engineered well, but likely not for you.
>Two characters that never once expressed any doubts about their divine missions, both turned away from them based on a single choice I made.
I believe most people were supposed to Fail that persuasion check with shadow heart. I saved scummed it like crazy so I got passed it like you did. But the algorithm wanted to bend the path in that direction anyway. You COULD convince her to kill, but you might have to save scum that too. It depends.
We have no common ground for a discussion to matter.
Have a great day.
To explain I only raised the temperature because you said what I said was silly and because you mocked me with the whole, "man" thing. Did not appreciate that all and I thought it was fucking rude. Wasn't that offended by it though, but I did raise the temperature in kind.
Just saying all this in case you're leaving because of that. I wanted to explain my side. If you're not leaving because of that please ignore. Good day to you too either way.
There is a difference, and it's important. If you think someone is silly, then you won't respect anything they say. You can respect someone's opinion and still think they say some silly things.
I do not think you are silly. I apologize if you got that impression.
I do think you have a very different perspective of what makes for good writing than I do though, and I don't think there's any point continuing to discuss the matter. That's all.
CRPGs have done the illusion of nonlinear gameplay narratives for decades. Baldur's Gate 3 simply has a vastly more polished version of it, rather than paying lip service like recent, mainline RPGs - anything from Bethesda for example.
Actually, kinda worse than that, because good and evil are more-explicit in BG3.
It presents an illusion of much greater depth than it actually has.
(I did enjoy it, and finished it, but have found much of the praise for it more confusing than something I can relate to)
I would agree with that. I just was disappointed because I had been led to believe it was transcendent.
Maybe if I hadn't had my hopes up, I wouldn't be so critical of it now.
Interesting. What games in your mind is a master class of game writing?
For a fantasy adventure story taking place in the setting of the forgotten realms the writing can't actually get better imo.
I guess your thinking of something like Last of us? Is last of us or last of us 2 truly better than BG3 in terms of writing? I would say it's equivalent. It's just a different genre. If you want deep compelling character studies with the backdrop of a typical YA setting then Last of us, Planescape torment or disco elysium is right up your alley.
These are just different genres. People often conflate good writing with the genre. It's why science fiction rarely if ever has won the pulitzer prize.
Most likely you have a genre preference in the same away the academy awards have a genre preference.
My genre preference is exactly the genre Baldur's Gate 3 is, I've played dozens of CRPGs and that's why I'm so convinced it's not anything special.
I'm also fairly convinced that the hype for it is largely from people who aren't familiar with the genre and think games are still only FPS games. Hopefully they will discover that there exists a wealth of other CRPGs out there for them to experience. Better ones.
Jade Empire
Fallout 2
Pathfinder: Kingmaker
Neverwinter Nights
Divinity Original Sin (1, not 2)
Dragon Age: Origins
I was hesitant to share my own picks because I feel that it's only inviting criticism, but I decided to assume good faith and trust that you are genuinely curious and not just looking for ammunition to nitpick me.
I will freely admit that most of these don't have the most incredible stories either. But they are all CRPGs I enjoyed vastly more than Baldur's Gate 3.
The below would match a more common ranking that most people would have: https://youtu.be/jGT0YlNYpmQ?si=0J8aTlWIoiCuSklf
The writing is good, especially for a fantasy video game, and the story branches and voice acting is incredible, but the entire game is just absolutely unbelievably amazing.
I loved how when it released a lot of game studios were putting out news stories trying to lower the public's expectation for other games.
I feel more like it was just one of the few games where they really made it for the users -- and like you say all the data even said they wouldn't make that much money. Everything now not even just in video games is just about how to leech more money or attention out of people, and I think that's part of why it stood out too.
You: What's a "contact microphone"?
Acele: A contact mic records sounds from inside things. Like this ice.
Encyclopedia: Your mangled brain would like you to know that there is a boxer called Contact Mike.
You: Yeah? Any news on my wife's name? How about my mother?
Encyclopedia: Nope. You're welcome.
--
Inland Empire: What if you only appear as a large singular body, but are actually a congregation of tiny organisms working in unison?
Physical Instrument: Get out of here, dreamer! Don't you think we'd know about it?
Volition: If it were true those organisms would not be working in unison.
Endurance: That's because some of them just don't have the best interests of the colony in mind.
Electrochemistry: Hey, maybe if the rest of you took a chill-pill every now and then, they'd be more motivated?
Perception: Shut up, we can't hear what he's saying!
In a movie or a novel, the authors have full control of the story, every choice the characters do can be set to best advance the story, to create dramatic tension, etc... Same thing for how skilled the character is, the outcome of fights, etc...
In a game, at least some aspects are decided by player actions, all of them need to be taken into account. So authors essentially needs to write much more than it is seen, and some of them may be hard to make exciting. Of course, games use all sorts of tricks to give the illusion of choice so that the story is going the way the authors want while at the same time the player thinks he is doing something. But it also adds to difficulty.
And not only that, when you are reading a book, you are expected to read, when watching a movie, you are expected to sit down and watch, but when playing a game, especially an action game, you are supposed to play, and reading lots of text and watching long cutscenes is annoying to many players. So you have to either integrate the story to the action or pack a lot of information in as little as possible dialogue or short cutscenes. Again, it adds to the difficulty of story writing.
Several solutions here. Either you go the visual novel route. Some are games in name only, where the player has effectively no agency. And unsurprisingly, with that pesky player out of the way, the good ones make for the best stories. Some games focus on agency, making your choices matter, but often the story and other aspects of the game are limited. It can also result in really expensive games, which matters because when you are making an expensive game, you have investors who want a return on their investment, and you usually have to play it safe and can't really try wild ideas that may fail commercially. And there is the "Doom" approach, where there is a "story", but it is designed to be as unobtrusive as possible not to distract from the main objective of the game, that is shooting stuff.
Good writing is often challenging, and pairing that intellectual challenge with the tactical/strategic/visceral challenge of gameplay can be overwhelming. Spec Ops: The Line is a good example of this: players work their way through a grueling gauntlet only to be asked to deeply question their efforts, and even their enjoyment of the game itself. You just expended a massive amount of effort to do what the game told you to do, and now the game is telling you, the player, off for it. If art is a matter of curation of experience, then such an approach is maximalism that's bound to turn some off.
There's 'terrible' writing in a lot of high budget, usually mass-appeal market games.
I would argue that's true of any medium -- films, books, theater, even music.
If you want to tell the story, tell it in engine in an interactive exciting way. You're in an interactive medium.
Having a cutscene in a game is like having a text scroll in a movie. It's lazy, it's awkward, and it's a step down the media ladder that screams we had something we wanted to say but didn't want to pay to do it right.
If I have to sit and watch a movie just to get back to the game at large, that's not fun. Tell the story through important missions, in-game dialogue.
Heck, at the very least Metal Gear Solid 4 let me adjust the camera during cutscenes so I could zoom in and look at things, look for things off screen. That kept my attention. Do anything other than just making me just watch a movie.
Even the much maligned QTEs at least manage to keep my eyes off my phone.
If I wanted a non-interactive medium I've got plenty of better options.
Amusingly, I didn't used to be a person who defended games with elaborate non-interactive cutscenes, and I thought they were ridiculous. In my old age, I realize that on the infinite parameter-space of artistic expression, there's a wide spectrum between "100% passively-consumed movie" and "100% interactive game". There's no reason to put interactivity on a pedestal; works of art (yes, I'm being generous by blanket-describing games as works of art, but it's true) are free to express themselves in a wide variety of ways, and while I think it's still folly for AAA gamedevs to chase Hollywood out of a lack of creativity, I no longer believe that cutscenes are inherently a bad thing.
Same here and this also means that your unskippable scenes are my instant refund request.
I’m playing a game as my own character, who goes around doing things, and has the reactions I do. It is not a story that would be a good book, but books are a different medium. The main character is mostly a bloodthirsty maniac, but there are also quiet moments enjoying a view or puzzling out ambient storytelling. It is great when you come across a story built into the scenery: a camp site containing an open cage, dead guards scattered about, hunters patrolling the woods, and blood streaks heading toward a cave. Who needs a cutscene?
The you get a little movie about a different character who has your character’s face, but is for some reason thrown into moral turmoil by the decision to kill the big bad who’s been tormenting them for ages. After butchering their way through innocent guards. OK game, sure, which button skips?
I keep asking myself, are these companies hiring 15yo children to write content for their Billion dollar projects? Because everyone is talking like they are teenagers.
It takes exceptional skill to make a multi-layered script that talks at various levels. It’s rare enough that we’re shocked when we encounter it - perhaps in older kids movies, maybe in things like the Lego movie.
It’s much easier to rewrite various similar stories with various tropes mixed in. Not to say these are not enjoyable! Many times you just want to see the same story different this time.
Think of all the romance novels pumped out that have the same basic plot, but the people who read them demand more and more.
MCU is good writing. Tony Stark especially is just well written.
The movies are obviously not works of literature. Super heros are a genre and within that genre the writing is excellent. The writers fulfilled the role well.
But probably this also means more opportunities overall, even if there isn’t as much harsh selection at the top end?
The idea older movies were better is just selection bias.
Pauline Kael said: “If you love movies you must love trash because most movies are trash” (I’m paraphrasing).
There are “golden times” when a lot of good directors and writers were allowed to make great work - often because their work was profitable - and then times where the corporate machine took over. But that’s geofenced. Hollywood was creatively strong in the 70s and oppressive in the 80s, but Honk Kong was killing it in the 1980s.
It is what it is.
People will watch 1960s French movies and praise them “How wonderful etc”, “they don’t make movies like that anymore!” but if you tell them to watch French movies of the 2020s or more famously Korean movies and TV shows a lot of people won’t budge, even though Korea is clearly the alternative powerhouse in the industry right now and the “equivalent” let’s say to the French New Wave.
[0] You can watch the whole plot summarized here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uByUCXJ9Aj4
[1] https://www.gamesradar.com/how-gearbox-is-writing-an-interac...
This isn't quite what Harrison Ford meant, but it feels like a lot of writing feels worse when it has to be acted and performed. When I just read it, my mind fills in the blanks, so to speak, and the "performance" feels more natural.
This is also a bit of an aside, but I also find it incredibly distracting when people in some made-up fantasy world happen to emote and speak just like trendy people today. "Oh, these hardened warriors, who have had a life wholly unlike anything I've ever experienced speak just like American actors in a movie made after 2020."
Also, as a foreigner, it’s funny when I watch dubbed movies that have an actor from my country: either the actor does the dub and it sticks like a sore thumb (or rather, makes the others sound fake), or they get a “pro” that doesn’t sound like a normal person (and being familiar with the actor makes it harder to watch).
The Last of Us and Witcher 3 also have excellent writing.
Kentucky Route Zero is maybe the most literary game I’ve played, if that makes sense. Damn good.
Raymond E Feist became one of my favorite fantasy authors for a long time because of Betrayal at Krondor
I don't know about the Witcher 3: it basically opened with softcore porn and I was immediately too turned off to continue with it. Several people who are huge fans of it later told me the wank bank material is pretty much an essential part of the Witcher experience, so I filed it away as a similar cache of any number of romance books on Amazon. Which, to be clear, makes a ton of money, isn't easy to pull off consistently as a product, etc etc. I just don't know if I would consider it great literature.
[edit] also I think there are a lot of different definitions of “good” in this thread. The average HBO show probably does have better writing than 99% of narrative-presenting video games.
If you can't tell me the story well in the actual engine then I don't really care to count it.
But I also do think this might explain a lot about people's different opinions on videogame writing. The people who run around getting 100% of the lore tidbits and piece it together will often think the writing is much better than the people who are just trying to experience it through gameplay
Games can put a lot of world building into optional areas or pieces of content that e.g. would never fit into a movie or even a TV series.
There are some very interesting characters and lore tho that make it worth it.
I read his stuff for years and years, listened to a podcast he had with a couple of people. I fell off a while ago but I didn't know he died.
That's awful news to me.
> a whole lot of paragraphs just to make their opinion seem 'right'
Yes, that's the process by which people use essays to make arguments.
Is anyone supposed to now be convinced that writing in games is bad?
I was sad when he died.
I was so happy when I saw update on his YouTube channel after a long, long while. Then I realize it was his funeral. Man the gut punch hurt me physically.
This series genuinely changed how I look at videogame writing and while I still enjoy games like Mass Effect 2, I don't think I would ever try and defend their writing.
Rpgs do not universally have good/bad writing. And FPSs like BioShock and soma don't all necessarily have less writing..
(Even narrative-heavy FPSs like Bioshock have an order of magnitude less writing than most RPGs.)
This isn't a mistake I'm making. Less writing isn't better writing and more writing isn't better writing either. I think you're one of those people who just likes things extremely plain. Basic text that's less wordy is usually an example of bad writing imo. This kind of writing is good for research papers but for stories it's not a good thing.
Anyway here's an example of the "good writing" you're talking about in pokemon:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YxeU3WwbaqQ
Most people would disagree with you and agree with me. All the writing in there is pure garbage. I don't understand how you can call that "good" other then if you have a preference for simple sentences.
You appear to have linked to an anime. We’re discussing video games.
The anime is called Pokemon. This is the source material for which all the Pokemon games are derived from and strive to imitate in style.
Any writing in a video game on Pokemon is equivalent (or worse) in quality and style to the original anime which all Pokemon games are based on.
>Simple sentences are great for simple ideas. Most video games, including most RPGs, only have simple ideas.
Writing isn't only about ideas. That's what research is about. Presenting facts, figures, results and ideas. For stories there needs to more irrational fluff. The writing needs to be immersive, emotive and vivid, eloquent, etc. Most people would agree with me on this matter.
I would say you're the one who has a different preference here.
I linked to the anime as an example of the writing to prove you wrong. The anime is childish and the games reflect that in the writing.
Maybe you're too young to know this. The anime just had its last episode 2023. It's been around for 25 years. Or maybe you're trolling. Pikachu is literally in that video. The information is quite obvious.
It's a sign of the decadence we find ourselves in that the pretense becomes honestly mistaken for the actual purpose, rather than something that merchants say and customers smirk at. Even worse, since the vast bulk of the information we have about the past comes from marketing material of various sorts, we simply assume that the world was populated by rubes who just slurped it up.
They weren't as shrewd as we are, wondering why the plots of video games are stupid. I can't wait until generative AI eliminates the entire narrative industry: "Alexa, tell me a story about the war that glorifies the EU and also implies that the CIA is the shadowy unappreciated force that is holding together an unruly human race." "Cortana, make me a zombie video game that's really about depression, but offers no answers."
At this point, it's a settled question whether people are putting effort into games as art, and the only real question is "which games succeed?"