Author Archives: Alexander M. Freed

Gameplay, Challenge, and Narrative Integration in Adventure Games

This post isn’t about adventure games. It only reads that way.

For four decades, the adventure game genre has been practically synonymous with “story-driven” video games. In the early 1980s, Infocom was trading in thought-provoking, experimental text-only narratives while pioneering role-playing game series like Ultima and Wizardry were still fumbling with the basics. (We won’t even talk about contemporary narrative in other genres.) By the 1990s, non-adventure games had become more competitive in the storytelling sphere, but companies like Sierra and LucasArts were still where gamers went when they wanted “pure” interactive narrative that eschewed complex combat mechanics or action sequences.

Times have cha Gabriel Knight: Sins of the Fathers nged. The adventure game genre is still around, but is no longer a dominant industry force. Now even first-person shooters and other action games are marketed with a strong emphasis on story.

What hasn’t changed is the way story and gameplay are separated in most games. We continue to see games structured as a sequence of story moments broken up by gameplay challenges (or vice-versa), whether those challenges are comprised of elaborate combat systems, exploration and discovery, or object interaction puzzles. Sometimes the line between story and gameplay is perfectly blurred or the transition made seamless; more often, it’s stark. Continue reading →

The Family Thing: Why Killing My Wife / Husband / Child / Dog Doesn’t Motivate Me

We’ve seen it over and over again: Our wife dies in our arms, or our brother is brutally gunned down, or our mother is eaten by monsters. This tragedy provides the impetus for our journey into adventure–an adventure that could last years or, more likely, 20-80 hours (depending on our completionist tendencies). It’s a tragedy that will remain burned in our minds for every one of those hours until we finally confront those responsible.

Or, more likely, not. Continue reading →

Character Differentiation in a Cast of Thousands

I’ve totally neglected my game writing posts, of late–I’ve got a number of articles half-composed, with titles like “Writing for Failure” and “Complex Stories and Atomic Narrative Theory.” Unfortunately, paying work has taken precedence over more complex pieces, so let’s do something simple: Back to writing fundamentals!

Games–especially open-world action-adventure games and role-playing games–tend to have extremely large casts. This is partly due to length (you can cram a lot of characters into a 40-hour game), but mostly due to mechanics: If every quest requires a unique quest-giver, or if every town needs to be populated with a dozen or more conversable NPCs, or if every item seller needs dialogue attached, you’re going to end up with vastly more characters than the narrative really warrants. When it comes to speaking roles, a game like Dragon Age: Inquisition makes the entire Lord of the Rings trilogy look intimate and focused by comparison.

Let’s forget mitigating this fundamental issue for now (and there are ways to design games to reduce this problem) and focus instead on how to handle all those characters. We’re not just dealing with a cast of thousands, but a cast of a thousand walk-ons–characters who appear for one scene, serve one purpose, and then may never be seen again. Continue reading →

New York Comic Con (and Twilight Company preview)

Back to self-promotion for a spell. It’s been a busy few months and I haven’t had a lot of time to add new game writing articles, but I’ve got a few in various stages of completion. More soon, perhaps.

Meanwhile, I’ll be attending New York Comic Con this week! I’ll primarily be doing promotion for my novel Star Wars: Battlefront: Twilight Company, which comes out November 3rd, but I’m happy to chat about writing, games, past projects, roller derby, or whatever else. Come by and say “hello!”

My schedule is as follows, though (of course) subject to change:

Friday, October 9th

11:00am – 12:00pm: Star Wars: A Galaxy of Fandom panel (Room 1A24)

2:00pm: Signing at Del Rey booth (#2205); free giveaway of Star Wars: Battlefront: Twilight Company posters

Saturday, October 10th

11:00am: Signing at Del Rey booth (#2205); free giveaway of Star Wars: Battlefront: Twilight Company posters

Sunday, October 11th

12:00pm – 1:00pm: Lucasfilm Presents: Star Wars: A Galactic Reader’s Theatre panel (Room 1A21)

2:00pm: Signing at Del Rey booth (#2205); free giveaway of Star Wars: Battlefront: Twilight Company posters

Other Information

I may pop in briefly to the Star Wars: The Old Republic community event (and cosplay contest!) to say hello to old friends and colleagues, but I won’t be there in any official capacity or representing BioWare. Nonetheless, feel free to say “hi” if you spot me.

In addition to the poster giveaways, the Del Rey team will be giving away nifty Twilight Company patches to anyone who swings by the booth and shows a pre-order confirmation for the book (just show an e-mail confirmation on your phone). You can get the patches at any time, not just during the signings.

I’ll sign anything I’ve worked on–if you want to bring one of the Dragon Age comics or whatever else, feel free.

Twilight Company Excerpt

Finally, there’s now a 70-page preview of Twilight Company up at the official site. If you’re interested but not completely sold or just want an early peek, go take a look.

Six Metrics for Better Game Narrative

Understanding your audience will make your writing better.

That’s not a statement that should need much explanation, but in brief: Storytelling is communication. It’s about reaching out to strangers and presenting ideas to them in a compelling, resonant fashion. You wouldn’t write a television show for 10-year-old American children the same way you would write for Japanese senior citizens. You likely wouldn’t refuse to revise your Broadway-style musical if most of the audience wandered out midway through your dry run.

Game metrics are nothing more or less than a way of increasing your understanding of your audience. They’re not a magical means of producing an engaging story–no one’s suggesting that if players respond positively to orcs and plot twists, every game should feature an orc Player Character and a major plot twist every 15 minutes–but they are a powerful means of understanding how players experience narrative.

Continue reading →