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Exposition in videogames.

BiGBoSSMk23

A company being excited for their new game is a huge slap in the face to all the fans that liked their old games.
Have you ever played a section of a game where you're being fed exposition that could have been enjoyable had it not been ruined by unnecessarily ominous music blaring in the background or some other distracting element, like a giant gameplay set piece taking place over the dialogue? Or those not-really-cutscenes in certain games that are poorly framed and staged, with music cutting in and out, and boring camera angles?

My question is (and this is coming from someone who genuinely enjoys reading newspaper entries and "logs" in videogames), what are good examples of engaging, effective exposition in games?

I can give a bad example off the top of my head, and it's Prince of Persia (2008).

Many people thought Elika was a bore of a character with as much personality as a plank, but had her background story been more intrinsically integrated into the game's narrative (visual and otherwise) and not limited to the player's willingness to break up the pacing (which is what's good about this game, it's Journey-esque flow), then maybe we'd have had a better time relating to her, or hell, caring at all about their world and what they're supposedly getting back to once everything is fixed.

Disclaimer:

This is not a thread where on-rails, "cinematic" games get praised/torn apart (I like and dislike many aspects of the Uncharted-type games). I wanna see how (and which) games characterize their worlds without boring the player while engaging them with convincing dialogue and acting interwoven with rich, player conscious gameplay design.
 

Savantcore

Unconfirmed Member
I love Assassin's Creed to death, but the whole series has been so guilty of this.

- Having a conversation while a random NPC shouts "THAT THIEF STOLE MY BAG WON'T SOMEBODY HELP ME" at the same volume as the main characters speaking.

- The you-follow-while-we-talk bits, where the crowd gets in the way, background noise drowns them out, and the worst fucking thing where your walking speed is slower than the person you're following, but your running speed is ten times too fast.

Shit like that ruins it for me.
 

BiGBoSSMk23

A company being excited for their new game is a huge slap in the face to all the fans that liked their old games.
^YES.

AC got me to make this thread. Which, I have to add, has the worst fucking framerate judder I've ever experienced on consoles. (PS3 AC1)

I actually dig the story with the animus, so far. But the game seems to be torn between trying to tell me something deeply rooted in history, and something science-fiction-y. And so much exposition like this is actually the reason why I've taken so long to jump on the AC wagon.

It's fucking dull.
 
By far the worst are sections where your character's movement speed is slowed to crawl while listening to an NPC deliver dialogue. Gears of War did this, I believe, as a way to hide the fact that it was loading the next section or level in the background, but what excuse does a game like Arkham City have to do the same thing? That game loves to make you stop until the characters have finished talking, even when there's nothing to load.

For someone who's so good at everything else, you'd think Batman would be able to do something as basic as walk and talk at the same time.
 
I can give a bad example off the top of my head, and it's Prince of Persia (2008).

That makes a lot of sense! I remember hating the little I played because I thought the pacing was horrible, due to the need to stop to enjoy their interactions. It stroke me weird when people said the flow made it awesome. Probably I should've played it more free flow, like Journey, instead of stopping to check out their interactions. I would have probably enjoyed it a lot more. Too bad my "OCD" doesn't let me.
 

BiGBoSSMk23

A company being excited for their new game is a huge slap in the face to all the fans that liked their old games.
That makes a lot of sense! I remember hating the little I played because I thought the pacing was horrible, due to the need to stop to enjoy their interactions. It stroke me weird when people said the flow made it awesome. Probably I should've played it more free flow, like Journey, instead of stopping to check out their interactions. I would have probably enjoyed it a lot more. Too bad my "OCD" doesn't let me.

The absolute worst part about that is that they made her dialogue location-specific, so even if you wanted to just parkour through an entire hub and talk to her after, she'd skip anything she had to say and just default to telling you to get a move on. Ugh.
 

Kinsei

Banned
The "cut-scenes" in Half-Life 2. It would be so much more enjoyable if they either had real cut-scenes or had it happen during actual gameplay. Locking me in a room until people stop talking is the quickest way for me to stop giving a fuck about your story and just start fucking around until the talking heads decide to shut up.
 

BiGBoSSMk23

A company being excited for their new game is a huge slap in the face to all the fans that liked their old games.
The "cut-scenes" in Half-Life 2. It would be so much more enjoyable if they either had real cut-scenes or had it happen during actual gameplay. Locking me in a room until people stop talking is the quickest way for me to stop giving a fuck about your story and just start fucking around until the talking heads decide to shut up.

Well, at the time it was a step in the right direction.

But if games like Battlefield 4 are still doing it, (cutscene with player controlled camera masquerading as "interactive storytelling") then yeah, I agree.

The fact that moments where gameplay services storytelling are rare only tells me game design is in dire need of a shake up.

We need a game that massively elevates these standards, which have become tropes by now. Sure, games will take longer to make, but at least the annualized franchise tumor will be uprooted.
 
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