Who's doing the talking?

[Schazzwozzer]

So the argument being set forth is that a story with good characters and effective relationships is the best way to establish a sense of personal investment between the player and the game? Well, it certainly does work. However, the issue seems to arise that its success is almost entirely dependent on whether or not the player enjoys the characters and storyline. It's very hit and miss and I think that this is finely illustrated in the fact that some loved Final Fantasy X and some didn't. Personally, I found that I simply could not identify with the central character, Tidus, or even any of the supporting cast. Similarly, I really dug Metal Gear Solid, but I wonder just how much a female player would enjoy taking on the role of the gruff super spy man.

 

Personal investment can also be established, however, by giving the player control and responsibility over a part of the game. This is why players become invested in games like Civilization, The Sims, and Pokemon, where character relationships and storyline are rather muted or even nonexistant (maybe less so in the latter example). Indeed, this is also at play in your average PC RPG, in that the player has a large amount of control over how the character develops and interacts with the game world. This method is also much more intrinsic to the video game medium. No movie or book can give the player the sense of being directly involved that a game can.

 

I do agree with the sentiment that most RPG dialogue is trash though and, too often, only serves to bog down the pace of the game. I certainly wouldn't mind giving up some freedom in order to have dialogue that is enjoyable and rich. Indeed, the freedom afforded in, for example, the BG series, is ultimately rather extraneous. Sure, you can create a character that is an Elven Necromancer, but does it actually ever feel like you are an Elven Necromancer? The option is there, but it's not really supported in-game, most notably in dialogue. So, certainly, shave off some of those options if it will make for tighter dialogue. Please don't define my character too sharply for me though. Truth be told, I'd rather have a character with no personality (a la Chrono Trigger or the Zelda series) than someone to whom I can't relate at all.

 

This, of course, changes for games where action and gameplay take the center stage. In such a case, I'm playing because the gameplay is enjoyable, not in order to immerse myself in a fictional world.

[Aaron Contreras]

...what about if you had a main character you didn't like - Tidus from FFX - but were given a wide array of 'toybox' options inspired by Civilization, the Sims, Pokemon and so on?

 

Would one balance out the other? Assume the designers aren't creating a snotty little brat PC to piss you off on purpose - the target market for Tidus was Japanese teenagers, 'course. Also assume that the player controlled aspects of the game are pushed to be as important as possible without breaking the critical path - stuff that really impacts combat or adventure and might just tweak the ending.

[Mercer]

In response to ~Di:

 

If VO doesn't add quality, why do cash strapped developers pay for it? and why do so many gamers want it?

 

I also find it ironic that you take a cost vs. utility approach to try and say it doesn't necessarily when you figure in the cost, when you don't even know how much it costs in comparison to other inputs! When I read your refute of my argument (or more precisely a premise to my argument), all I see is a bunch of business no-brainers that don't even begin to support an argument that I am wrong to assume that (and let's be reasonable about this) generally speaking, VO adds quality to a game.

 

MGS is Metal Gear Solid (my bad for assuming everyone knew, sorry). If you want to be a designer or even just want to be able to talk about design in an informed way, educate yourself on what you are missing man. Console games are the majority of quality games on the market. Go to any website or magazine that covers all platforms and you will see that the number of 4 star (or whatever they use) games for consoles games outnumber pc ones vastly. You sound like a true connoisseur of the beautiful art that is videogames. If so, you are missing out bigtime by not playing any console games!! Go buy yourself a PS2 and look up on gamespot for all the 8.5 and above games that interest you for the PS and PS2, and go play some. The older ones are dirt cheap and you will never have to buy an expansion, or download a patch, or wonder why your graphics card doesn't like a game. And don't forget to pick up a copy of Final Fantasy Tactics and Castlevania, Symphony of the Night. They are over ten years old, but I still pull them out sometimes.

 

And by the way, this is the "Developer's Corner." We are here to throw around ideas on how to make games better and how to better make games. What good does it do us to throw our hands up to the invisible hand and take polls on what people want in our games? We are artists. If we were simple slaves to the dollar, and only cared about what upper management and market strategists say, Obsidian would not exist.

[Mercer]

Personal investment can also be established, however, by giving the player control and responsibility over a part of the game. This is why players become invested in games like Civilization, The Sims, and Pokemon, where character relationships and storyline are rather muted or even nonexistant (maybe less so in the latter example). Indeed, this is also at play in your average PC RPG, in that the player has a large amount of control over how the character develops and interacts with the game world. This method is also much more intrinsic to the video game medium. No movie or book can give the player the sense of being directly involved that a game can.

 

I do agree with the sentiment that most RPG dialogue is trash though and, too often, only serves to bog down the pace of the game. I certainly wouldn't mind giving up some freedom in order to have dialogue that is enjoyable and rich. Indeed, the freedom afforded in, for example, the BG series, is ultimately rather extraneous. Sure, you can create a character that is an Elven Necromancer, but does it actually ever feel like you are an Elven Necromancer? The option is there, but it's not really supported in-game, most notably in dialogue. So, certainly, shave off some of those options if it will make for tighter dialogue. Please don't define my character too sharply for me though. Truth be told, I'd rather have a character with no personality (a la Chrono Trigger or the Zelda series) than someone to whom I can't relate at all.

I think this neigh unto schizophrenic opinion (though I think an intelligent and well thought out one), is almost poetic in illustrating the difficulty if finding the sweet spot for an rpg.

 

As you say Schazzwozzer, that sweet spot is dependent on the game's focus, but I think in general we are discussing rpgs (though what exactly that is in video games today is certainly a subject of debate). And what I am saying to community is what you also feel: "I certainly wouldn't mind giving up some freedom in order to have a dialogue that is enjoyable and rich." The only change I would make is changing "freedom" to "illusionary freedom." I think we can cut a lot of fake freedom and improve the game without making much impact on real freedoms that the character has, and improve the depth and color of the story quite a bit.

[Schazzwozzer]

I think this neigh unto schizophrenic opinion (though I think an intelligent and well thought out one), is almost poetic in illustrating the difficulty if finding the sweet spot for an rpg.

[Gromnir]

start by making the protagonist incidental. sure, some number of your actions should have impact on game, but your moral perspective should not matter, and there should be no attempt to write your character's story. ask a writer to make a game that focuses on a character that he not know and is cautioned