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Is it commonplace to label videogame stories as 'shitty'?

How are videogame stories?

Results are only viewable after voting.
C

CrazyArcadia

Member
Make no mistake, there are some great deep stories and narratives in games... But usually IMO in genres that are not popular or within the usual blockbuster realm.

I'd say, the biggest problem for games which makes it super difficult to write an actually captivating story is that the most visible games are usually actionish games which receive stories that would make an ok-to-good 2hr summer cinema action blockbuster.. And then they have to stretch it up to between 10-30 hours or more. This leads to tedious dialogue, over-exposure of simple story beats and games just feeling, for a lack of other words, shallow. Of course there are a couple of exceptional games where the writing team instead tries to go for tv series style writing with arcs in mind and the like. Still, player interaction can not be 100% guided like a carefully crafted movie or book, so you can hide meaning in interactive sequences but they can be easy to miss if the player is too preoccupied with other details or doesn't pan the camera in the right direction or, well, simply ignores things. While you can rewind a video or reread a page, replaying will take far too much time usually, especially when there is not much in return (storywise. I love replaying games for more rewarding gameplay).

Meanwhile, the strength of the medium lies in experience, set pieces, feeling a singular character grow or themes being explored via gameplay mechanics. I think trying to marry games with movies isn't really the best idea. I mean, I get it, cutscenes once were impressive and a great way to show off the industry getting better at animation and framing action scenes. But for it to stand on its own as a medium, that is counterproductive at best.
 
joecanada

joecanada

Member
QuantumSquid said:
Most videogame stories are absolute garbage.
Click to expand...

I mean as simple as this is op asks for an explanation... Pick your poison video games have it all .

Plotholes
Nonsensical stories
Tropes
Bro isms
Poor voice acting
Bad lighting
Bad pacing

I mean there's probably more but.....

Most video games are probably better off with a short interlude/ cutscene and just focus on gameplay.

I mean have you played any shooter in the last 20 years

Whoa bro!
Bro nooooooo!
Yessss bro!

The end.
 
G

Griss

Member
There is definitely an assumption that stories in games are lesser because they're games. It's a shame, but it's probably a well-earned reputation by and large. The problem is when a game has a really good story and people still say 'Yeah, it's decent for a game'.

Two examples:
I recently watched Alien: Covenant, and it's utterly shit writing just drove home how immaculately Alien Isolation's writing (everything from the scenario to the characters to the actual dialogue) so perfectly captured the spirit and feeling of the original, and how that's obviously not easy or everyone would do it. That was a really, really impressive piece of writing, as far as I was concerned.

Secondly, I read Cormac McCarthy's "The Road" way back when, almost a decade ago now. It was alright, I didn't particularly like it. I found it dull, both the prose and the studious avoiding of any world-building / explanation of their situation. By contrast, I thought TLOU was a far better, more interesting, more believeable story in all regards. That's a game beating out a Pulitzer Prize winner in my eyes, which is pretty extraordinary, and just goes to show that you can't write off video game writing 'because it's just a game'.
 
S

SamNW

Member
That the Uncharted series is often held up as an industry leader in terms of story, writing, and character development says a lot, in my opinion. Both about the quality of the average video game story and about our tendency to focus too much on what's happening at the AAA level. I don't begrudge anyone who finds the stories of the Uncharted games compelling, but I think they're pretty poorly written. Uncharted 4 is a couple steps above 1-3, but I still don't think the writing is great. I'm hoping TLL continues the upward trend.

And, to be clear, I'm not arguing that stories in video games can't be good. There are a lot of strong examples. But there's still a ton of room for growth, both in terms of the stories themselves and in the way the medium is leveraged to tell stories differently.
 
Astral Dog

Astral Dog

Member
imo it depends, if you are trying to emulate a movie i will judge accordingly (along with the game mechanics) but a lot of videogames aren't even trying to be movies, they use fantastic(al) art direction, music and gameplay to convey feelings, Mario and SOULS for example.

In that case we should be forgiving of a mediocre (or none) plot as long as the other elements are superb.
 
J

jettpack

Member
That was super interesting. Great OP. It would be interesting go the story to address the possible conflict of having a Greek ruling class in Egypt. The Ptolemaic period is super interesting for that reason
 
B

bizzarewars

Banned
I honestly think that people should be more thoughtful with their criticisms of a game's elements in general.

But yeah, I do think that most game stories tend to be poor. I like The Last of Us alright, but the fact that the game gets so much critical acclaim and praise for it's story when it's nearly a carbon copy of The Road is kind of a bummer.
 
R

Rncewind

Member
Videogames, especially popular big ones, are generally a creation of many many people and a lot of compromisses. Also its a medium where story, lore and character arcs can take a back seat and can still be labeled a good and wellcrafted piece of art cause gameplay.

So yes, while i think "shitty" is a bit hyperbole, its common sense and reality that the vast majority of games have either paper thin narratives or some giant fuck fest of tropes throws in together. There were/are alot of shitty movies before also for example we got sci fi movie what would be considered a "good" story and not schlock.


And there is also the factor that even if you had a good script/story there are additional challanges to implement this in videogame form then lets say a book or movie, because its a game. This often invokes the Gameplay and Story Segregation trope, to state one example.
 
R

Rizific

Member
what if you dont care enough to even listen to the story and skip every cutscene/dialogue? is it still fair to label the story shitty?
 
F

Fou-Lu

Member
I don't think the majority of writing being called 'trash' or 'shitty' is limited to the video game medium. I admit that there is more of a prevalence in video games to call ALL stories shitty, but most movies get this criticism leveled at them at some point, especially those from Hollywood. Similarily, in the literary community almost all genre fiction is preemptively considered tropey trash. I do think it is true that video games face different difficulties when it comes to telling and writing stories than other mediums that many developers still haven't figured out how to deal with yet (eg. pacing, player agency, ludonarrative dissonance, being written by multiple people, etc.) but I also don't think that writing and story have a 1 to 1 correlation. The story can be good despite the writing being lack luster and vice versa and this is often the case in video games for me.

PS. Please stop with the using anime as an adjective thing, kthnx.
 
G

Griss

Member
I get frustrated when people say the writing in Uncharted isn't good because of various plotholes or the ridiculous nature of some of the action. Writing should be judged by what it's trying to be. Uncharted is trying to be a "Boy's Own Adventure", an Indiana Jones for our time. It absolutely nails that, and that's much, much harder than it sounds.
 
D

dracula_x

Member
Honestly, stories in video games are still better than in majority of modern Hollywood movies. And same for dialogues and writing.

Typical american movie for example:

tumblr_inline_oqaep9YjfN1udyefo_540.gif


^ William Shakespeare would be jealous
 
manfestival

manfestival

Member
the problem is that there is always someone that thinks writing in one game is amazing or that it is awful. If you want proof just read the earlier posts. Commonplace around here and in the industry? yeah
video games tend to be a subjective matter entirely.... even for critically acclaimed titles since they only get that way from... people's opinions.
 
R

RRockman

Banned
On average? They are OK and getting better with each passing day. There may be some trash thats popular now, but if you dig a little you can find some very worthwhile experiences that wouldnt be out of place in books or movies, which is just like any other medium.
 
M

Marcel

Member
Griss said:
I get frustrated when people say the writing in Uncharted isn't good because of various plotholes or the ridiculous nature of some of the action. Writing should be judged by what it's trying to be. Uncharted is trying to be a "Boy's Own Adventure", an Indiana Jones for our time. It absolutely nails that, and that's much, much harder than it sounds.
Click to expand...

I think a more accurate comparison is that Uncharted is trying to be the Romancing the Stone of our time with the romance and roguish criminal elements. Indiana Jones is a much more memorable and compelling character than anyone in Uncharted so that's a comparison you probably want to avoid.
 
P

Phrozenflame500

Member
Most of them are shitty. Like even the Uncharted series is pretty much just a very pulpy action movie with decently likable characters (although I'll give TLoU some credit here it was pretty well-written).

I think part of the problem is the best video game stories can't be easily compared to film, TV or literature because they're heavily interwoven into the game mechanics and simulation.
 
P

PMS341

Member
Griss said:
I get frustrated when people say the writing in Uncharted isn't good because of various plotholes or the ridiculous nature of some of the action. Writing should be judged by what it's trying to be. Uncharted is trying to be a "Boy's Own Adventure", an Indiana Jones for our time. It absolutely nails that, and that's much, much harder than it sounds.
Click to expand...

There are quite a few weird story choices in Uncharted 4, but we know how the story and script were affected with that one.
 
E

E_Darkness

Member
The story is there to facilitate the plot. It's why video game stories aren't usually good because they don't need to be.

That isn't to say game stories can't be good, they just usually take a back seat.
 
T

tearsintherain

Member
Most western movies nowadays have shitty writing - There were 729 Hollywood films released in 2016, and you could probably get a consensus of under 50, probably under 20 movies that would be considered "not shitty writing". Thats just an amazingly wretched ratio.

To me the writing is shitty if I keep getting pulled out of the world by the characters saying things that seem inauthentic to that world. Lincoln Clay and all the white guys saying racist things to him in Mafia 3 was immersive because it felt true to the world they built up and introduced to the player. Mass Effect Andromeda had all these stupid zingers and one liners that just made you cringe because no normal human being would talk like that and these were all supposed to be normal humans.

Its one of the reasons why I have problems with some Nintendo and japanese games, when the characters say nonsense words or whatever even though they were fully voiced a minute ago because this just happens to be playful NPC talk, not major plot point time. It immediately yanks me out of the immersive world and reminds me this is a video game.
 
7

7Th

Member
Most video games stories are bad because they don't actually use the medium to tell a story; at most they just exist in a dichotomy between the game element and the movie element.

A Yume Nikki has more artistic value than 40 AAA cinematic shooters.
 
M

Marcel

Member
7Th said:
Most video games stories are bad because they don't actually use the medium to tell a story; at most they just exist in a dichotomy between the game element and the movie element.
Click to expand...

This is why Yoko Taro is a brilliant artist in the world of games. He actually uses the medium of video games to play with your expectations in the telling of his stories.
 
W

waitwhat42

Member
99% of writing/narrative in games is trash, which is why when a game makes an actual attempt at character development and pathos and actual storytelling people go crazy over it.

The last game campaign I finished was Wolfenstein:TNO which was much better than I expected. The main attraction is the gunplay but the quailty of the writing and the voice work in the cutscenes actually convinced me to play it twice to see the stuff for both timelines.
 
G

Griss

Member
Marcel said:
I think a more accurate comparison is that Uncharted is trying to be the Romancing the Stone of our time with the romance and roguish criminal elements. Indiana Jones is a much more memorable and compelling character than anyone in Uncharted so that's a comparison you probably want to avoid.
Click to expand...

Yes, Indy is a much better character than Nate Drake, but you can't compare everything to the best a genre has to offer and decide that it's no good. Hollywood has been trying to create a new Indy for decades and failed, and I'd argue that Nate, while blander than Indy by leagues, is a damn good effort for our era. And he certainly has far superior supporting characters / sidekicks, imo.

Granted the backstory introduced in 4 pretty much ruins him, but until then... he was pretty damn good.

PMS341 said:
There are quite a few weird story choices in Uncharted 4, but we know how the story and script were affected with that one.
Click to expand...

Yes, Uncharted 4 struggles a bit because they tried to pivot away from that serial novel adventure style to something a bit more profound and the tone suffered. They then bailed out on following through with that idea at the end which was disappointing. Uncharted 2, on the other hand, was perfectly judged.

tearsintherain said:
Most western movies nowadays have shitty writing - There were 729 Hollywood films released in 2016, and you could probably get a consensus of under 50, probably under 20 movies that would be considered "not shitty writing". Thats just an amazingly wretched ratio.

To me the writing is shitty if I keep getting pulled out of the world by the characters saying things that seem inauthentic to that world. Lincoln Clay and all the white guys saying racist things to him in Mafia 3 was immersive because it felt true to the world they built up and introduced to the player. Mass Effect Andromeda had all these stupid zingers and one liners that just made you cringe because no normal human being would talk like that and these were all supposed to be normal humans.

Its one of the reasons why I have problems with some Nintendo and japanese games, when the characters say nonsense words or whatever even though they were fully voiced a minute ago because this just happens to be playful NPC talk, not major plot point time. It immediately yanks me out of the immersive world and reminds me this is a video game.
Click to expand...

Agree with all of this, especially the 'inauthentic dialogue' part, that's a huge bugbear of mine and you've correctly identified ME:A as one of the worst offenders. Like you I also struggle with inauthentic sounding originally Japanese dialogue in RPGs, which is why I tend to only enjoy them when they're being overtly silly as then the context and authenticity no longer matters.

Honestly, I tend to find more writing in games that I enjoy than in mainstream movies these days. There's just more space for it to breathe.
 
2

2+2=5

The Amiga Brotherhood
Most videogames have bad stories, but in their defense gameplay is what matter the most(unless we are talking about visual novels and similar), in fact some of the most iconic games don't even have a real story: Tetris, Pacman, Asteroids, Space Invaders etc
 
R

Rncewind

Member
2+2=5 said:
Most videogames have bad stories, but in their defense gameplay is what matter the most(unless we are talking about visual novels and similar), in fact some of the most iconic games don't even have a real story: Tetris, Pacman, Asteroids, Space Invaders etc
Click to expand...

Thats because of the technology tho. You can also not make a kubrick movie with 1900 technology
 
V

VegiHam

Member
There's good stuff out there. Stanley Parable and Depression Quest, for example, tell good stories. I dunno, it varies so wildly across the industry that I don't think it's fair to use, say, Uncharted as the barometer for quality in a videogame stories in general.
 
O

Oberon

Banned
Marcel said:
This is why Yoko Taro is a brilliant artist in the world of games. He actually uses the medium of video games to play with your expectations in the telling of his stories.
Click to expand...

After playing Drakengard 1 I totally agree. I thought I would be playing a fun game, but what I got was a hot mess of a story and shitty gameplay

To be on topic:

Video games are unique in the media because they're interactive. They can get away with bad/no story as long as the gameplay makes up for it.
I wouldn't say the story are bad for every video games, it's just they can get away with much more so that's why sometimes they don't have to try, simple as that

Marcel said:
If you're going to hold up Yoko Taro to the obvious faults of Drakengard 1 this many years later without acknowledging his great storytelling successes in NieR and NieR Automata then I don't really know what to tell you.
Click to expand...

I was being provocative on purpose, only because it's the only Yoko taro game I've played. So I can't help but associate him with hours of pain.
I am sure he's gotten better at it
 
joecanada

joecanada

Member
Griss said:
I get frustrated when people say the writing in Uncharted isn't good because of various plotholes or the ridiculous nature of some of the action. Writing should be judged by what it's trying to be. Uncharted is trying to be a "Boy's Own Adventure", an Indiana Jones for our time. It absolutely nails that, and that's much, much harder than it sounds.
Click to expand...

I somewhat agree although as another poster pointed out the Indiana Jones character is pretty well written and acted so tough act to follow. However Indiana Jones also , even if you found the story a bit cheesy, still has top of the line action, screenplay, effects , etc , etc . Uncharted is pretty good ....for a game lol.
 
M

Marcel

Member
Oberon said:
After playing Drakengard 1 I totally agree. I thought I would be playing a fun game, but what I got was a hot mess of a story and shitty gameplay
Click to expand...

If you're going to hold up Yoko Taro to the obvious faults of Drakengard 1 this many years later without acknowledging his great storytelling successes in NieR and NieR Automata then I don't really know what to tell you.
 
G

ghostjoke

Banned
They're trying to ape films while making games the length of a TV season. Not that they should be copying how TV does things either, but it would be better for the pacing problems. They amplify every other issue with video game writing for me. That wise-cracking lead in a film become an unbearable ass when you're spending more than two hours with them. That montage become a prolonged grind. Characters start to feel inconsistent and like they're dawdling.

And, of course, the novel idea of interlocking gameplay and the story would be nice to see more of. And no, that doesn't mean stripping down the gameplay to emulate a film. I'm currently totally absorbed with Pathlogic because of how it blends gameplay and story.

First thing: the script is... strange. Maybe it's amazing in Russian, but even with the HD version, it's has so many issues in English (maybe some are intentional). However, every part of the game compliments the basic premise of "disease outbreak in isolated town". Every day the town becomes more dangerous. Disease spreads bringing with it even more problems than infection. Items increase in price as they run out. The powerful families have their own motives to keep their power, which might go against what is best to stub the spread of disease. At night, thugs roam the streets searching for others to kill/rob. Weapons are scarce and degrade rapidly. If you have a gun, you are a god but only until you run out. It also has the dreaded survival aspects, but it works because everything about the game is a struggle. You're never 100% - you're either hungry, exhausted, suffering from infection, or low on health - but you have to keep going.

I'm nearly out of money atm, at least until another round of nighttime bum fighting, but that's risky because if I get damaged, I'll have to get healing supplies. I'm trying my best not to resort to crime, but it's becoming more and more likely with each day. There's a timer and I can't wait around scavenging supplies in a lawful way.

The game has problems (which will hopefully be fixed in the remake without compromising the design), but it nails using gameplay and story to reinforce one another. It's not a "fun" game but thoroughly engrossing.
 
S

Spudnik Sweetheart

Member
I think some games have great little stories within them. Deus Ex: Mankind Divided has rooms which tell great little stories. There's no (or very little) text to this though. I wish game devs told more stories in this manner, with a focus on developing and playing to the strengths of the form. Nier: Automata does this quite a bit too and is all the better (imo) for it.

In regards to traditional dialogue and written elements, a lot of games do feel kind of lacklustre. There's definite room for improvement there, although I don't think it's all bad really.
 
L

Lunaray

Member
To be completely honest, I do think that video game storytelling has a long way to go.

Of the top of my head, the few games I hold up as exemplars of good storytelling are, in no particular order, The Last of Us, the Mass Effect Trilogy, Planescape Torment, Chrono Trigger and Final Fantasy VI. Even then, I think my opinion of the latter three are colored by nostalgia goggles. The Mass Effect trilogy is a very by-the-book hero's journey; what made the series compelling was the characterization, not the plot. The Last of Us is the only one I'd say is really good for what it is, but even then, I question whether it would work better as a film rather than a video game.
 
M

Mr. Phellps

Member
Quality is subjective, but people love to exaggerate their opinions, hence when something is mildly bad or average, most will gravitate toward "It's shitty".
It's widespread enough that most think a 7 on Metacritic means the game is completely unworthy of their time.
 
J

jtb

Banned
Yes, because they are. The standard for video game storytelling is so far below the standard for quality storytelling in any other medium it's embarrassing.

If TLOU was a novel, for example, it would just be another dime-a-dozen YA dystopian fiction. In gaming, it is the paragon of all that is good and holy.
 
Rellik

Rellik

Member
jtb said:
Yes, because they are. The standard for video game storytelling is so far below the standard for quality storytelling in any other medium it's embarrassing.
Click to expand...

I don't like books, movies or TV so I'll stick with my interactive stories thanks.

I'm bored after 20 minutes into a movie and pull my phone out. At least a game can keep my attention with its story.
 
S

Shanlei91

Sonic handles my blue balls
Writing in video games has to pay awful - right? That has to be the reason it attracts such rubbish so consistently. The majority of video game story telling is on par with awful fan fiction.

Though Amy Hennig is a treasure to the industry.
 
J

jtb

Banned
Rellik said:
I don't like books, movies or TV so I'll stick with my interactive stories thanks.

I'm bored after 20 minutes into a movie and pull my phone out. At least a game can keep my attention with its story.
Click to expand...

...

read a book

it's good for you

i promise

2+2=5 said:
Yeah but most Nintendo games for example have basic stories but they always get great scores.
Click to expand...

this gets to the root of the problem: video games don't exist to tell stories.

(and games don't care when they constantly get shoveled shit into their mouth)
 
A

Aters

Member
The story itself? Definitely shitty. You have to make boss fights, you have to have a certain number of characters, you have to keep the length in a certain range. Many times videogame writers have to do what game designers tell them to do, not what they really want to do.

Can it leave a deep impression on player? Yes, it absolutely can. Nier Automata's story won't look too good on paper, but how it is presented in the game is great. The medium alone brings in new possibilities that can enhance the narrative.
 
N

Nheco

Member
Isn't easy to create a good concise history in an interactive media (and history generally ins't a game big seller point). So yeah, most of games, but not all of then, have shitty history.
 
J

jtb

Banned
dracula_x said:
Honestly, stories in video games are still better than in majority of modern Hollywood movies. And same for dialogues and writing.

Typical american movie for example:

tumblr_inline_oqaep9YjfN1udyefo_540.gif


^ William Shakespeare would be jealous
Click to expand...

Aliens shits on every space marine trash videogame story that has come since. Bad example.

Not to mention, it created the cliches (!). James Cameron writes better screenplays in his sleep than the best the combined efforts of Naughty Dog and David Cage (lol) could put together across decades of work in the industry

Zoz said:
Isn't easy to create a good concise history in an interactive media (and history generally ins't a game big seller point). So yeah, most of games, but not all of then, have shitty history.
Click to expand...

Most videogame stories aren't interactive, though. They're linear as can be.

The bigger problem is building a story around repetitive gameplay loops that aren't conducive to storytelling (i.e. Nathan Drake killing X randos, then having to justify that) imo. The games that actually do care about branching/interactive storytelling generally do a decent job of it - because they've made it a conscious priority
 
Bakkus

Bakkus

Member
A controversial opinion, but I honestly don't feel like most video games have worse stories than the average movie/tv show. In fact a lot of movies and tv shows which has been given so much credit for having such great writing, I personally find to be dull and often overly contrived scenarios. Not to mention blatant plot holes.
 
O

Orb

Member
jtb said:
Aliens shits on every space marine trash videogame story that has come since. Bad example.

Not to mention, it created the cliches (!). James Cameron writes better screenplays in his sleep than the best the combined efforts of Naughty Dog and David Cage (lol) could put together across decades of work in the industry



Most videogame stories aren't interactive, though. They're linear as can be.

The bigger problem is building a story around repetitive gameplay loops that aren't conducive to storytelling (i.e. Nathan Drake killing X randos, then having to justify that) imo. The games that actually do care about branching/interactive storytelling generally do a decent job of it - because they've made it a conscious priority
Click to expand...
Last of Us is better written than literally any Cameron movie lmao
 
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