Game Story Ideas

[Erez]

Hi everyone. I wish to start my post with stating, that after playing many of obsidian games, you are the only company I have seen who constantly delivers great and rich stories. (Cd Project is also heading in the right direction and I hope they keep it up.)

 

I have a few unique story ideas that I believe would blend perfectly with the kind of games you usually make, I was wondering where would be the best place to pitch them.

 

Thanks.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Bryy]

http://www.obsidian.net/jobs/open-positions

 

They don't seem to be hiring writers, and even then, you'd need a resume. 

[Erez]

Thanks for replying, my English writing skills are miles off from being sufficient to be hired as a professional writer, anything I will write in the near future will require extensive revision of writers programs and human editors.

I just want to pitch in some ideas I have which I believe could turn into very interesting and unique stories.

 

For further story flair information, you are welcome to check my alternate mass effect 3 story site. (content was created with the aid of fellow fans) http://ekpowder.wix.com/masseffectreimagined

 

The ideas I have, are completely unrelated to anything produced by the entertainment industry in recent years.

[rjshae]

We all have ideas. It's implementing them in an enjoyable way that's the hard part.

[Bryy]

We all have ideas. It's implementing them in an enjoyable way that's the hard part.

That's a very, very good point.

 

Writing for video games is unlike any other form of writing, let alone any form of creative process. It's possibly the only writing job where the words are not yours. They belong to every department, and have to match up with what they are doing. You are limited by not only time, but also by budget. Each word has a real world dollar value attached to it.

 

Let's get away from the nebulous team effort of writing for a game and just for a minute talk about HOW to write for a game.

It's not linear.

It's not neat.

Usually there are multiple files separating dialogue, action, and description. These are all strewn together like one giant Choose Your Own Adventure. And when writing character dialogue, you need to also write a description about how to say the line. 

 

If you do it poorly, you end up costing the group a whole lot more work than they could have had. 

[Walsingham]

Write your ideas up as a short story or two. Don't get fixated in a medium.

[Orogun01]

Write your ideas up as a short story or two. Don't get fixated in a medium.

As Bryy pointed out a game story gets around, so writing a story exclusively for a game makes for a better in-game story. Particularly because games are not a good medium for storytelling since they requires interactivity. Is like writing for an action movie, or a porn movie, or any kind of movie where the story is secondary to the action, it just blends better if it's written to compliment the action rather than to get around it. 

Coincidentally I have now gotten curious about the existence of a Hamlet porn parody....

 

"Alas poor Yorick! I boned his sister, Horatio "

[Bryy]

One of the things I hated writing for my project was every possible conversation you could have with any possible party combination at any given moment.

 

Thank God I was only working with a total of seven characters. 

[DarthDeven]

i wanted to start my company of games or join another that's good enough,if i could i would join Obsidian,and work with Chris Avellone for Kotor 3
i've wrote a handful amount of stories and had a good idea about a  new possible franchise,concept of game mechanics to fit them into,only that i need more education about the game industry and how it works,but i'm looking to fix this soon,but the other is that i would like to have people to confront my ideas with and assemble a group.
OP i've wrote too Mass Effect 3 stories,it's what made this part of me emerge,i believe to fit into story writer than a character writer,but it would be fine anyway
feel free to PM me OP and tell me more about your ideas,

[Erez]

Thanks for responding, I have just recieved a little vacation back to real life after extremely being busy for almost a month.

Once I have completed writing a short story, where would you recommend I post it in order have Obsidian look it over?

 

DarthDeven, I am a little afraid of posting my ideas online for everyone to see, but if I will reach a dead end with Obsidian i will be more than happy to share it with you. 

[DarthDeven]

Thanks for responding, I have just recieved a little vacation back to real life after extremely being busy for almost a month.

Once I have completed writing a short story, where would you recommend I post it in order have Obsidian look it over?

 

DarthDeven, I am a little afraid of posting my ideas online for everyone to see, but if I will reach a dead end with Obsidian i will be more than happy to share it with you. 

great,i'll be looking forward to exchange ideas

[anubite]

Video Games aren't suited to telling stories. Obsidian is all about letting players tell their own stories.

 

The best example of properly using stories I can think of is Dwarf Fortress - Toady and his brother think up stories they want players to experience spontaneously in their game. They write these stories and build game mechanics from them, so that those stories can occur dynamically without a script.

[Erez]

Video Games aren't suited to telling stories. Obsidian is all about letting players tell their own stories.

 

The best example of properly using stories I can think of is Dwarf Fortress - Toady and his brother think up stories they want players to experience spontaneously in their game. They write these stories and build game mechanics from them, so that those stories can occur dynamically without a script.

You tell your own story within the limits of the stories the game developer gave you, the only true sandbox is a true MMO. right now all the popular ones theme parks or theme parks in disguise.

 

By branching out too much you reduce the quality of your product, my favorite rpgs in recent years were: Mass effect 2, Witcher 2, deus ex and New Vegas.

When I think about a story fitting for a game I am thinking about something that could work like those games, my current idea story telling mechanic is mostly like new Vegas which is why I thought it could benefit Obsidian the most.