Keith Stuart presents this special discussion programme on stories in games, recorded at the National Media Museum for the Bradford Animation Festival.
Video game narrative is put under the microscope – how far has storytelling come in game design over the past 30 years, and has it come far enough? Are there lessons to be learned from the animation and comic book industries, both of which have provided visual inspiration to game developers?
Veteran game designer Charles Cecil – famous for the Broken Sword adventures, as well as the BBC's brilliant new Doctor Who games – details what it was like working with the programme team, and how parts of the new Tardis were designed purely for the game.
We also welcome Kieron Gillen, once one of the most respected games journalists in the world before he packed it all in to write comic books for Marvel.
And we hear from Dan Pinchbeck, an experimental game developer and senior lecturer at Portsmouth University, where he specialises in the significance of narrative within video games. He discusses how putting yourself in a game using new technology, such as Microsoft's Kinect, might not be ideal: "If I pick up a novel, I don't want a blank space and a paragraph for me to fill in the main character."
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Comments in chronological order (Total 3 comments)
16 November 2010 4:32PM
It's a shame I'm at work and can't listen to this. Don't suppose someone could post the entire conversation for me to read in the comments could they?
18 November 2010 12:20AM
I'd love to read it too, or more likely scan it and pick bits out, but I'm not going to spend 35 minutes on it. I'm sure people do listen to podcasts, but I'm not one of them.
Is there any chance we could do away with that word, anyway? I suppose it's probably too entrenched now.
18 November 2010 4:31AM
I like these podcasts of the Guardian and this topic of discussion is for anyone interested in games, so fascinating and atm story has a very very rosy future in games I'd say.
However, this talking-heads episode is about 2% helpful. There's too much philosophy and high-level waffle and flashing credentials to talk about said topic and no flare here whatsoever.
There's nothing imo that this discussion imparts of much insight to stories. I could not see answers here to:
Charles Cecil says nothing of interest except where he suggests games are associative as opposed to empathetic link to gamers for the avatar they are playing. Repeated too for good measure.
Later the notion that dev costs in the 80's were cheaper and this promoted creativity/risk and now there is a problem for publishers due to higher costs, was also interesting.
Finally, there is more waffle on some story or other concerning imaginative and ambitious and fundamentally and always nice to see... blah-blah-blah
Why did Uncharted 2 "nail it"????
Overall the tone of conversation is very bland here and not invigorating at all!
Games have loads of potential for story but it's not here.
- Measuring a game story at the 90mins mark and how to monetize that is a good point, finally @ 29mins.
- MMOs and Story is very good topic at 30mins but not explored. wtf!
Best google for more on game stories...