Sep
20

How can you say Xenogears is not a decent example of Narrative? I know I couldn't show it during class well, but the thing has an immense and involved story! Yes, it has no innovative way to tell the story, it is just your standard RPG in mechanics (cut scenes galore, which I actually like, but that's me) with some slight twists (oh, mech battles. Original, no?). Okay, I never said it was terribly original in mechanics but we were supposed to show narrative examples. Xenogears is an epic RPG in its story, which all things said is really an epic story. And yes, I agree that there should have been more games with more innovative ways of telling the story, but we were supposed to bring is ones that were an example of narrative and I am sorry but a RPG is a prime (the ultimate IMO) example of this. RPGs (well, most anyway. Diablo and its ilk are not, but I don't classify them as true RPGs) are all about story and characters. A RPG (a standard RPG anyway, as technically Kingdom Hearts is a RPG, but something more like an action-RPG) needed to be shown to represent the genre, or at least that was what I thought, and I did bring the best RPG I had in terms of narrative. I am terribly sorry I did not bring my memory card so I could actually show it properly (it was a last minute thought to bring the game as I ran out the door and I didn't even think of the card). I really am very sorry I did not show it well, I am very embarrassed about it. But the game is like 60 hours long chock full of story. It is a complex story though, and difficult to explain, but I enjoyed it a lot. And yes, I brought it because I love the game, but it is because I love the story, and this was a demo of narrative, which I take to mean story. I apologize again that I did not show it so you could understand how it is narrative. That is my fault, and I learned for the experience. The next one I do (for Race, Abe's Oddysee [not a spelling mistake]) I will go and play for a few hours again and get some useful saves that demonstrate race so I won't have the same problem.

Lifeline has a sad narrative but an innovative way of telling it, and interacting with it (voice controlled for those not in the know). As for Ico... it would have been shown but it takes like 15 minutes to get Yorda and my save spots are not right before any cut scenes that would tell you the story. In hindsight, I should have just showed the mechanics and explained the story, but I wanted to show that Yorda could not be understood yet the player has an emotional attachment to her (or at least a horrible fear that she is being sucked down the shadow-hole while you aren't looking. Silly Yorda, learn to run away from scary shadow creatures! The ultimate damsel in distress, really, but I won't get into that).

As for Kingdom Hearts. I love the game, but the narrative? King missing, world in danger, girlfriend missing & in danger, is not novel either. Except it is the weird combination of Square characters/ideas and Disney characters/worlds. Mind you, it works, however strange that may sound.

I agree about Grim Fandango and virtually any of the ol' great adventure games (Space Quest, The Secret of Monkey Island, what-have-you). But with no PC laptop, I couldn't bring any of them that I have (the Longest Journey being the best one I have for narrative).

And I agree with most of your post. God of War as a narrative? Its narrative is only a thin skeleton on which to hang the premise of fighting all over the place. It's a blast, I love it, but an example of narrative? Same with GTA, unless you are showing an example of episodic narrative (not an involved story at all, but since it is mission based, I think you could show it as an example episodic narrative). Katamari Damacy has no story, but it worked well for the class since one of the articles we read was the difference between play and game and Katamari is basically play. But it should have been presented as such, because to present it as an example of narrative is wrong, as you stated. I think it also served as something non-gamers could use as a comparison. I mean, you need to show a game with no story to compare with those that do, maybe? Although we didn't need so long watching it, the point is made after a minute of rolling the ball, IMO. And by goodness, am I glad we skipped Tony Hawk! No offense to Tony Hawk lovers out there. As for Unjammy Lammy, again I agree. Sure, it has a story, a very thin story, but nothing I would consider to show as a prime example of narrative.

I agree that the games do need to be picked better. Hopefully the other categories (time, race, forgot-the-rest) will lend themselves to being harder for games to fit into so that we see a better selection. Narrative is hard as you say because you play a game and most games have a story (no matter what the level of depth is) so they tended to bring the games they really like. I do not own many games that do not have a story and bringing in 30+ titles would not have worked :^) I tried to bring the ones I thought had a very good story (Xenogears as my RPG example) and ones that told the story in an innovative manner (Ico, for having the story come through despite the language barrier and the interactions with Yorda, and Lifeline, because it was voice-controlled).

Sorry if I am a little defensive about Xenogears. Know that I do not hold a grudge about your opinions, you are welcome to think what you want! I do not believe in game-wars or whatever you wish to call it. I am just sad that I did not present Xenogears well that its narrative was not able to be expressed. Although I must say that being such a long game, no full understanding of its narrative could be given in 10 minutes, and in this way perhaps I should not have bothered to attempt it. Perhaps I shall take solace in that :^)

Brandi Wilcox | Sep 21, 2007 at 9:39 AM

I hardly meant to disparage on Xenogears. I've never played it myself, but any and all accounts given on it declare it to have a complex storyline of epic proportions that is in all ways perfect.

But I hesitate to say that there's any particularly innovative way in which the story is delivered. This is my problem with most of the games that were demo-ed. Many of them may have fantastic stories, but what's interesting about the way they were told?

Like I said, I LOVE Okami as a game and I thought the story in it, while not completely original, was still very engaging. And yet, I would never cite it for being a game with interesting narrative, just because they deliver the story in such a plain joe way. Scripted dialogue and cutscenes.

This is why I thought Kingdom Hearts was interesting, as well. Clearly the story there is not original. Majority of the characters also were not original. But it was interesting (to me, anyway) how the game writers rescripted the familiar Disney storylines to make it fit with overall plot. And they did it in a "surprisingly non-cheesy way", as someone else aptly put it. I thought Kingdom Hearts was going to bomb when it was first announced... it just sounded like a terrible idea. But they really pulled it off and it's one of the very few crossover games out there of its kind.

I suppose my problem with the majority of games is that I was under the impression we were supposed to bring games with INTERESTING narrative and not just any game with a story. I can understand the fact that the classic RPG is done through scrolling text and cutscenes... okay. We can use ONE of those to demonstrate... and whether you use Okami or Chrono Trigger or Final Fantasy # or Xenogears to do it, fine. I'm okay with that. But we only really need one example of it, since it's pretty cut and dried. :P

As for Unjammy Lammy... I disparaged it before, but I would take it back if the story were actually, truly, GENUINELY delivered through the song lyrics. The one example I read seemed to have nothing in it but nonsense, however, so I'm not terribly impressed. :P

SotC/Ico... yes, as I said, I think both of those games would have been more deserving of a demo than some of the ones shown. They do not have a complicated storyline, but they are very compellingly told. Again, I'm not sure if this is because of interesting narrative -- really, how DID the plot progress in those games? you just played -- or because of their very powerful immersive elements.

At any rate, I could share in some of the blame. I really should have brought a LucasArts point-n-click... Grim Fandango or Sam 'n Max or one Indy/Atlantis. Last night, I also thought that I hella should have brought in Lego Star Wars. >_<; Arrrgggh, the missed opportunities. Oh well.

Cynthia Nie | Sep 21, 2007 at 10:52 AM

I get where you are coming from, and I agree, but I will also say that it should have been made clear that games should be brought with interesting ways of telling their story besides just having a great story. I also think that someone needs to pre-approve the games to be demoed (Steve, if you read this, perhaps you would like to enlist the aide of those of us who know games? Maybe it is presumptuous of me, but I think some quality control needs to be enacted. I will mention this to you as well in case you don't read this). In this manner, a handful of games can be demoed (giving them the ability to strut their stuff) and to best give an overview of the topic at hand. There will need to be more than one person on the committee though, as otherwise their own prejudices will taint the pool.

If there were less games and therefore more time, Ico and Shadow of the Colossus could have been shown (I believe SotC was not shown because you can only save at the temple-place and therefore we would have to watch the whole riding your horse bit before a fight could be shown and lets face it, its boring to watch). If we had the ability that one person could get a game ready (by riding the horse, so to speak) while another is presenting, this would fix the problem but logistically I am not sure it can be done (well, we could bring in a small tv or monitor with RCA input and a second game console) but I doubt it can work.

I also think that it is just difficult to demo a game on narrative because narrative is often such a large part (like what I said about Xenogears). Your idea about showing how games present their narrative/story is much easier, and also more helpful. I mean, the non-gamers could care less about what stories are being told most likely. But seeing how stories can be told in a game medium is, I think, useful even for the production people. I didn't understand that before, and I appreciate you pointing it out.

Oh, and Cynthia, if you are interested and have the means, I can lend you Xenogears. It suffers in the second act in terms of how the story is told (becomes way too controlled, restricting your access to go where you please for a long time) but it really is a great game. Not for everyone, but those of us who like the story, it is (some people do not like the religious connotations of the game, so I warn you against it if you don't like such things).

Brandi Wilcox | Sep 21, 2007 at 11:33 AM

For SotC, there are actually a bunch of little temples all over the place that serve as save points, so someone could easily go onto a colossus and just save nearby, before going into it.

Usually, though, when I demo SotC (and I've done so many times, cuz I <3 that game) ... I just show the beginning part -- though not always the whole thing -- and then do the first colossus... cause he's close by and then you can show the sword-directing-light thinger, too. :x

Then I switch to a save game and show a more complicated colossus via Time Attack. :P

Cynthia Nie | Sep 21, 2007 at 12:08 PM

You're right! I forgot about that! I played it a long time ago and haven't gotten around to purchasing it now that it is cheap :^) I love crawling around on the colossi too. I think you needed to be the one to demo it! You must find another topic it applies to and bring it (is Body one of the topics we get to bring games for??).

Brandi Wilcox | Sep 21, 2007 at 12:26 PM

I'm glad to see such impassioned responses to the game demos yesterday. I think the wild range of examples were a result of two things (both of them my responsibility!). First of all, we did not manage to have a lecture/discussion on game narrative prior to the demos -- if we had set up some terms and parameters for what to think about in a game narrative, this would have guided people's choices more. Second, the request for demos was not specific enough -- all I asked for was a quick game demo and some commentary on its narrative aspects. Practically anything can be understood in terms of narrative. Since we didn't get a chance to discuss the games as they were presented, I'm hoping this will happen next week, sort of like what we do when we have film screenings. Sometimes it is useful to have some time to digest and think before discussing in class -- exactly the way you two are doing now! I believe our next game demo theme of race may lend itself to a more focused range of examples (though we may very well need to work on focusing the selections for the time week). In any case, thanks to both of you for your feedback!

Steve Anderson | Sep 21, 2007 at 2:54 PM