Games with player agency(or lack thereof)

cj iwakura

There'll be spoilers in this rant, so I'll mark them as needed.

I really hate games with the illusion of choice, games that seem to offer obvious branching paths yet funnel the player into one anyway.

Here's a few bad examples:
(Spoilers involved)

The Last Of Us
Probably the most recent.

You don't get control over Joel at all. Would you take the photo of his daughter?
Would you rescue Ellie or let her be operated on? It doesn't matter, you don't get a say. The devs know this, and the forced pause before key events like that almost seem to rub the player's nose in it. If you're going to create an illusion of choice and take it away, just make a film instead.

Binary Domain

Admittedly the game has multiple endings, so this could change, but one key scene irked me: when Faye is yelling at Dan, which side are you on!? You have to choose!
No, you don't. You fight her either way. Sure, it leads into some great plot twists... but again, illusion of choice.

Now, some GOOD examples:

Spec Ops: The Line

This game fumbles on choice on more than a few occasions, but you at least get to make decisions. Things will change, albeit slightly. Do you spare certain people? Do you kill yourself, or live with your sins? Etc. It at least allows the player some involvement.

Vampire: The Masquerade: Bloodlines

Want to tell NPCs to eff off? Sure, go for it. Call them out on their BS, refuse to help them, kill them if it makes you happy! You can even be dumb enough to join the Kuei-Jin if it strikes your fancy. Sure, you're gonna be proven for the moron you are, but it's a choice you get to make.

Growlanser II: The Sense of Justice

This deserves major props if only for letting the PC decide that, you know what, the bad guy kind of has the right idea. And Wein goes off and joins him.

Devil Survivor

Most SMT games are great at this, but DS goes above and beyond in a lot of ways. Your friends may all turn against you on one path. And if they refuse to see the light? Fine. DIE.

So do you think player choice is important, or is telling a direct, linear story is more important? Either way, share whatever examples come to mind.


I know if I ever make an RPG, I'll try to allow as much agency as possible, though it'll probably involve a zillion bad ends.

TDawg

I think that the illusion of choice worked really well in The Last of Us. It was incredibly frustrating, but that is the point- Joel does things that the player may never even consider doing. It really highlights those moments and forces you to scrutinize them. They jump up in your face, and it almost looks like you can have it some other way, but ultimately the game doesn't let you have it that way and drags you along with it. Your submission becomes active, versus a film's more passive, external experience. In my case there was a long period of rationalization and justification for Joel's actions, because even though I didn't want to do them, in a sense I had a hand in them.

Such an illusion of choice could be a bad thing in a different game, but I feel that TLOU used them to it's advantage.

override367

In Binary Domain

I never fought Faye, my dude stood up for her

I don't know what it's based on

but the part where they

arbitrarily declared that she was a robot because she was incubated inside of a robot was so asinine that it completely ruined the game for me

Botznoy

Last of Us talk in hurr

I agree that the Illusion of choice works to The Last of Us' advantage in that we are presented with these supposed choices that are meant to create a disconnect in the player towards Joel. In that this isn't the choice I would've made is used to relatively subtly tell the audience that this isn't about what you want the story to do, and what you want Joel to do rather that it is entirely about Joel as a character doing what he wants, and that what he does makes him a gigantic scumbag.

The Last of Us isn't about the player, it's about The Joel and The Ellie.

You also forgot Mass Effect for having a mind bogglingly huge number of choices as well as The Walking Dead

BYToady

The Stanley Parable was a good game about the illusion of player choice.

cj iwakura

Botznoy wrote: »

Last of Us talk in hurr

I agree that the Illusion of choice works to The Last of Us' advantage in that we are presented with these supposed choices that are meant to create a disconnect in the player towards Joel. In that this isn't the choice I would've made is used to relatively subtly tell the audience that this isn't about what you want the story to do, and what you want Joel to do rather that it is entirely about Joel as a character doing what he wants, and that what he does makes him a gigantic scumbag.

The Last of Us isn't about the player, it's about The Joel and The Ellie.

You also forgot Mass Effect for having a mind bogglingly huge number of choices as well as The Walking Dead

I haven't finished ME yet, but TWD goes in the bad category for me.

Little things, but nothing really changes. That person's still going to die if you still decide not to kill them. The old man for instance. Keep him alive? Nope, the other guy busts his skull. Be careful in 5? You're still getting bit.

Very little actually changes. More illusion than choice.

ME seems to be good at it so far, though. It'll likely be on Bloodlines' level, though I suspect the endgame won't be.

Botznoy

I don't agree with your categorisation of The Walking Dead. You're not wrong about that there are numerous set events but the choices in The Walking Dead aren't about the players ability to affect the story or the over arching narrative, but rather the choices focus on the interpersonal elements which is the real meat of the game. Not plot points and mcguffins

Vic

Botznoy wrote: »

I don't agree with your categorisation of The Walking Dead. You're not wrong about that there are numerous set events but the choices in The Walking Dead aren't about the players ability to affect the story or the over arching narrative, but rather the choices focus on the interpersonal elements which is the real meat of the game. Not plot points and mcguffins

What you are saying is true, but I think it is very fair to be frustrated by the lack of agency in The Walking Dead. Sure, they probably had a very limited budget, and I would not have expected them to create a branching story path anywhere close to the complexity seen in, say, Alpha Protocol, but they could have done more, and should have done more. The fact that they constantly try to trick you into thinking you had a choice only makes it worse, after a while it almost feels like the writers are taunting you.

LoveIsUnity

I'm glad someone brought up Alpha Protocol.

CJ, I am pretty sure I know your taste in games, and I'm pretty sure you will play an hour of Alpha Protocol and hate me. It is the game that you're looking for, though, in terms of player agency and choice.

SummaryJudgment

Spec Ops is great because it both gives choice, and denies choice - or, in a meta sense, gives you the choice to stop playing if you reject the choices offered (war crimes vs. dying and being unable to progress past a certain point.)

SummaryJudgment

Oh, and seriously, the grandfather of this whole thing:

Deus Ex

You killed Agent Navarre!

RoyceSraphim

I got angry at I am Alive for teasing out the choice to kill in the trailers and then forcing me to execute a soldier for his machete in the tutorial.

Taramoor

I think my favorite game for this topic is Dragon Age II.

The player can make any number of decisions and choices that affect the game and how it plays and who is there, but there are plenty of events that you simply don't have the power to prevent. I like the mix.

Even if having to do both ending fights is bullshit.

Burnage

SummaryJudgment wrote: »

Oh, and seriously, the grandfather of this whole thing:

Deus Ex

You killed Agent Navarre!

I think the best part of Deus Ex's branching is how organic it is. How many players don't even realise that you can

kill Anna early on or save Paul?

The Ender

The lack of choice in Spec Ops is sort-of the point of the experience.

You already made your choice - the one choice, in the opinion of the developer, that mattered - well before you even popped the disc in the tray: the choice to buy a game whose source of entertainment is shooting people. Lots and lots of shooting people.

The way the game treats branching is a commentary on how vapid it is to consider branching narrative paths a 'morality system' or insist that they represent meaningful decisions.

cj iwakura

The Ender wrote: »

The lack of choice in Spec Ops is sort-of the point of the experience.

You already made your choice - the one choice, in the opinion of the developer, that mattered - well before you even popped the disc in the tray: the choice to buy a game whose source of entertainment is shooting people. Lots and lots of shooting people.

The way the game treats branching is a commentary on how vapid it is to consider branching narrative paths a 'morality system' or insist that they represent meaningful decisions.

But I think Spec Ops does it right. You do get to affect things, and they do affect the end. There's no major branching paths, but you do get to make slight differences.

Whereas in TWD, they make you think you'll get to affect things, but nothing really changes at all, for a game that makes such a big deal out of 'your choices matter'.


Another good example is, of course, The Witcher. You can totally turn quest objectives on their head if you decide the quest giver was full of it, or you'd rather side with your target.

LoveIsUnity wrote: »

I'm glad someone brought up Alpha Protocol.

CJ, I am pretty sure I know your taste in games, and I'm pretty sure you will play an hour of Alpha Protocol and hate me. It is the game that you're looking for, though, in terms of player agency and choice.

I picked up Alpha Protocol for $5 a while back. It's definitely on my list, and I have high expectations based on what I've heard.

mnihil

My experience has been that choice in games is statistically largely meaningless - and if it isn't, any more significant branch in a game summons my neuroses, making me fret about parts of the product I'm missing. The variables are copious, so it depends on what I'm playing, but as a sweeping generalization, I am perfectly happy with player agency being reduced to how I play the challenge the story puts before me, which might be as trivial as assembling an adept outfit to fight a battle in an RPG. I absolutely feel that choice is an element that can negatively affect a narrative-driven game. It may, however, write the narrative for a largely open game, through emergent gameplay, and the narrative of the gaps that you fill with your version of the character.

Personally? I decidedly dislike Spec Ops: The Line - I felt it had nothing to offer me and was pretentious and vapid. I don't want to dwell on negatives, though, and instead try to explain why I like The Walking Dead:

Whereas in TWD, they make you think you'll get to affect things, but nothing really changes at all, for a game that makes such a big deal out of 'your choices matter'.

One thing that irked me in the past about choice in games was PR. The way PR always touted how their game was about choice, and all that. Again, my experience has me jaded in that regard. Choice almost can't matter, especially not in a series. If a game requires directorial control and rails and focus, every choice would risk all those elements; in such games, there is no... organic development from your choices, and if a designer/design team didn't work out your path, which is more likely the more different variables/choices are included in a game, it'll end up feeling cheap. Mass Effect 2 certainly did feel cheap in that regard to me.

The Walking Dead makes choices matter more as narrative moments, in their immediacy, rather than their consequences. It's counter-intuitive, at least to me, but what else can a game do? Account for all the variables? The Walking Dead allowed me to immerse myself in that world and story, so that the repercussion of the choice alone was enough to make an impact. Ultimately, that game's first season culminates in an ending that has more meanings than could have been designed, because you infuse it with your own story; with your own interpretation of events and the way you coloured them. And the way it succeeded, I think, is because it's intimate, and a manageable landscape, where characters aren't disposable and, ideally, choices make you feel - that's the consequence right there, and I don't really need any more than that.

RoyceSraphim

mnihil wrote: »

My experience has been that choice in games is statistically largely meaningless - and if it isn't, any more significant branch in a game summons my neuroses, making me fret about parts of the product I'm missing. The variables are copious, so it depends on what I'm playing, but as a sweeping generalization, I am perfectly happy with player agency being reduced to how I play the challenge the story puts before me, which might be as trivial as assembling an adept outfit to fight a battle in an RPG. I absolutely feel that choice is an element that can negatively affect a narrative-driven game. It may, however, write the narrative for a largely open game, through emergent gameplay, and the narrative of the gaps that you fill with your version of the character.

Personally? I decidedly dislike Spec Ops: The Line - I felt it had nothing to offer me and was pretentious and vapid. I don't want to dwell on negatives, though, and instead try to explain why I like The Walking Dead:

Whereas in TWD, they make you think you'll get to affect things, but nothing really changes at all, for a game that makes such a big deal out of 'your choices matter'.

One thing that irked me in the past about choice in games was PR. The way PR always touted how their game was about choice, and all that. Again, my experience has me jaded in that regard. Choice almost can't matter, especially not in a series. If a game requires directorial control and rails and focus, every choice would risk all those elements; in such games, there is no... organic development from your choices, and if a designer/design team didn't work out your path, which is more likely the more different variables/choices are included in a game, it'll end up feeling cheap. Mass Effect 2 certainly did feel cheap in that regard to me.

The Walking Dead makes choices matter more as narrative moments, in their immediacy, rather than their consequences. It's counter-intuitive, at least to me, but what else can a game do? Account for all the variables? The Walking Dead allowed me to immerse myself in that world and story, so that the repercussion of the choice alone was enough to make an impact. Ultimately, that game's first season culminates in an ending that has more meanings than could have been designed, because you infuse it with your own story; with your own interpretation of events and the way you coloured them. And the way it succeeded, I think, is because it's intimate, and a manageable landscape, where characters aren't disposable and, ideally, choices make you feel - that's the consequence right there, and I don't really need any more than that.

While I enjoyed the story of Spec Ops, if you didn't or had gone through narratives before that, I could understand your feelings.

Fencingsax

A man chooses, a slave obeys.

TolerantZero

Devil Survivor did branching paths really well. The setting really came together for me after

Tadashi killed Keisuke in my playthrough. I wasn't able to distract them in time to avoid their fight, which gave me the impression afterwards that I really was pressed for time.

However, Devil Survivor also has an example of illusion of choice during

the mission where you could try and help Honda break out from the circle or stop him. If you try and help him, even though you escape, everyone else in the circle gets smited and that "ending" counts as a Game-Over, rather than an actual ending. It seems odd to me that they would give you the option to leave, only to throw you a "No, you can't do that" afterwards. If I knew, full well, that everyone else would get smited from leaving (Atsuro even mentioned it beforehand, so it's not like you weren't reminded), and I wanted to go through with it, why not have that as a possible ending?

I've really enjoyed games that give you options. Having an illusion of that would be like going to a fast food place, choosing french fries instead of tater-tots but getting the tater-tots anyway. I wanted fries, dammit. If I wanted something else, I'd have ordered it.

CaptainNemo

I think that a controlled narrative and a narrative with player choice are both equally valid when done correctly. To me, Bioshock Infinite is just as good an experience as, say, Fallout or Mass Effect. I think it all hinges on the type of story you want to tell.

DarkPrimus

Alpha Protocol is a brilliant branching story design wrapped in a dated and clunky game.

SoundsPlush

I've grown to think the illusion of choice and its narrative quality matter more than actual choice. The Walking Dead enthralled me because it successfully convinced me that my actions had consequences and I felt aligned with Lee's experience. That's ultimately surface-deep, as a second playthrough would expose, which is why I've never done one—I maintain the illusion of that first run as canon without competition. On the other hand, Alpha Protocol fell immensely flat with me, because while it's filled to the brim with reactivity and choices, very little of the plot or characters mattered to me, so it was a branching spiderweb filled with lifeless nodes—if the story doesn't matter to me, any number of choices won't, either. The worst of course would be to pretend to offer choice and then have none while also not telling anything interesting.

But videogames are as much product as art, so I cut them some slack in expectation—a game with nice voice and visuals vying for mass market has to make sacrifices somewhere, and it's probably going to be the area that only 20% of their player base will ever see. Tell me a good story and I won't mind the particulars.

CaptainNemo

Alpha Protocol is an odd bird. I mean, I have a copy, but it's one of those games I don't enjoy playing most of. Because the gameplay is worse then Mass Effect 1. It's shooting feels godawful, the customization on Thornton is hilariously bad, and you never get that feeling of being a spy the way John Marston feels like a cowboy gunslinger, or how Edward Kenway feels like a pirate. You just feel like a schmuck.

But the choices. Good god, the premutations that game can have are incredible. I just wish I could skip the gameplay for the dialogue, you know?

DarkPrimus

Narrative difficulty mod for Alpha Protocol please

Botznoy

I finished Alpha Protocol! could do with being like 4 hours shorter. But yeah gotta echo this thread in that it is fucking nuts with in game consequences of your actions

Nocren

Oh yeah. Nothing like saying the right thing to the guy talking to you.

Only he's pissed because you screwed up two missions ago and are still on his shit list.

Mr_Grinch

I'm all for the more limited, tightly wound narrative with fewer choices, I can't help but feel, in general, they're better crafted for it. I.e two games that have been listed as 'bad', The Walking Dead and The Last of Us, are undoubtedly two of my favourite games in recent memory.

I admire how The Walking Dead does decisions though, you always feel like you're in control, like the story has been personalised for you, it's only really on multiple play throughs, or through discussions with others, that you realise in general, regardless of what you do, the plot is roughly the same.

pirateluigi

I loved the way Okage: Shadow King dealt with the lack of player agency. The main character was meek and generally ignored, so whenever you chose an option to object going along with the insane story, everyone would just ignore you. It was simple but it made me laugh every time.

DemonStacey

Going to have to disagree with the Last of Us assessment.

A game doesn't need player agency and choice to be a game. It still gains a lot by being a game instead of a movie. Controlling the character through such a scenario... through THEIR scenario is kind of the point I'd say. You are not the character. It was never a choose your own adventure style game. The character is Joel. He is who he is. The big choices he makes are based upon what he would do not what you would do.

But being behind the controller still adds a level of tension to the overall atmosphere and understanding to the character that it is very important to the experience.

CaptainNemo

Botznoy wrote: »

I finished Alpha Protocol! could do with being like 4 hours shorter. But yeah gotta echo this thread in that it is fucking nuts with in game consequences of your actions

I don't really care about runtimes as long as the gameplay is good. Sadly, as noted, in AP it veers between bland and stupid. But, and this is a big one, the characters are diverse and memorable, the story is interesting, if confusing, and it's fun to just replay it and do slightly different choices just to see how wildly different some of the outcomes are. Obsidian in general is a studio I have super mixed feelings about, especially with regards to the topic at hand. While they do an excellent job wit providing the player with choice, a lot of their's games suffer from super shitty gameplay. And when their writing is bad, hoo boy, is it pretentious shit. And don't even get me started on Jeyne Kassynder.

Drez

I think it's unfair to lump The Walking Dead in because in my opinion the game is explicitly about how people deal with a ultimately hopeless situation. You are given a tremendous amount of agency within the body of the game. I think it would have been a mistake to offer branching events or endings because NOT doing so hammers the point that these characters, not the zombies, are the walking dead, that ultimately nothing they do really matters in the grand scheme of things, and that all that really matters is what you do between yesterday and tomorrow.

I'll agree that some of the events are so contrived that it is unlikely that the main character acting in two totally different ways would bring the same events about, but it is what it is.

There's also an old adage in writing: Character or Plot. Make one your focus. Obviously, the overarching focus in The Walking Dead is the characters. I think they did OK with the plot too even if it is just a series of contrived situations designed to get the characters interacting with one another.

Drez

CaptainNemo wrote: »

Botznoy wrote: »

I finished Alpha Protocol! could do with being like 4 hours shorter. But yeah gotta echo this thread in that it is fucking nuts with in game consequences of your actions

I don't really care about runtimes as long as the gameplay is good. Sadly, as noted, in AP it veers between bland and stupid. But, and this is a big one, the characters are diverse and memorable, the story is interesting, if confusing, and it's fun to just replay it and do slightly different choices just to see how wildly different some of the outcomes are. Obsidian in general is a studio I have super mixed feelings about, especially with regards to the topic at hand. While they do an excellent job wit providing the player with choice, a lot of their's games suffer from super shitty gameplay. And when their writing is bad, hoo boy, is it pretentious shit. And don't even get me started on Jeyne Kassynder.

Game length matters to me. I can deal with 4 hours of bloat, but Deus Ex should have been about 15-20 hours shorter. I liked DX but it was too goddamned long and the gameplay fails to evolve after about 10-15 hours and the whole game drags on after that for another 15-20.

With regard to this topic, sure, Deus Ex offers you a lot of agency and choices have real weight but I just get lost after a while.

Telltale should make a Deus Ex game.

Drez

The Last of Us: I'm glad for the lack of agency. But I don't remember the pause mentioned? I played it once at launch and I'm waiting for the remaster. Can someone fill me in? I don't remember ever feeling like I had any way to influence the plot or events.

Viskod

I just started Dragon Age Origins due to liking the Mass Effect Trilogy (aside from how it ended) and I'm already liking how Dragon Age seems to give me more dialogue options than just Nice, Indifferent, and Mean.

Sometimes I've got upwards of 6 different responses to use that let me steer conversations different ways. Even if I'm being steered toward one singular conclusion it's nice. A lot of the time in games like this I find myself thinking "Well, crap. Why can't I mention X, or ask about Y" and Dragon Age actually seems to cover those basis somewhat with a wider variety of choices.

DarkPrimus

Viskod wrote: »

I just started Dragon Age Origins due to liking the Mass Effect Trilogy (aside from how it ended) and I'm already liking how Dragon Age seems to give me more dialogue options than just Nice, Indifferent, and Mean.

Sometimes I've got upwards of 6 different responses to use that let me steer conversations different ways. Even if I'm being steered toward one singular conclusion it's nice. A lot of the time in games like this I find myself thinking "Well, crap. Why can't I mention X, or ask about Y" and Dragon Age actually seems to cover those basis somewhat with a wider variety of choices.

That's a remnant of Origins' extremely long development cycle, unfortunately. It started in the age where unvoiced protagonists in WRPGs were the norm still. Having the main character be voiced just doesn't allow for that range of dialogue choice any more.

Rhan9

I would definitely argue that Spec Ops did not do agency well at all.

SummaryJudgment wrote: »

Spec Ops is great because it both gives choice, and denies choice - or, in a meta sense, gives you the choice to stop playing if you reject the choices offered (war crimes vs. dying and being unable to progress past a certain point.)

The meta choice to stop playing is a crock of pretentious shit. That "choice" exists in every game ever made, hell, every form of media ever made. It requires zero effort and zero thought from the developer to "create", and acts as an all covering excuse out of any argument about the game. It's quite possibly the laziest, most vapid semi-philosophical dingleberry I've come across in gaming.

DiannaoChong

Rhan9 wrote: »

I would definitely argue that Spec Ops did not do agency well at all.

SummaryJudgment wrote: »

Spec Ops is great because it both gives choice, and denies choice - or, in a meta sense, gives you the choice to stop playing if you reject the choices offered (war crimes vs. dying and being unable to progress past a certain point.)

The meta choice to stop playing is a crock of pretentious shit. That "choice" exists in every game ever made, hell, every form of media ever made. It requires zero effort and zero thought from the developer to "create", and acts as an all covering excuse out of any argument about the game. It's quite possibly the laziest, most vapid semi-philosophical dingleberry I've come across in gaming.

As much as I liked spec ops, I have to agree. If the argument is that you have a choice to stop playing a game, then a majority of gamers already make this choice every day, people on average do not finish their games. It's not something they have to point out as making their situation high art.

Part of the turn in the game, and why the agency fails, is that you are supposed to see what happens because of your actions, but also that it was an accident, and preventable. But even a little thought while playing would tell you know what is about to happen, and its not going to let you stop from doing it. Turning a game off, vs 'be forced into a horrifying scripted event' isnt a choice it's 'sigh, lol video games /click to perform war crime'

Rhan9

DiannaoChong wrote: »

Rhan9 wrote: »

I would definitely argue that Spec Ops did not do agency well at all.

SummaryJudgment wrote: »

Spec Ops is great because it both gives choice, and denies choice - or, in a meta sense, gives you the choice to stop playing if you reject the choices offered (war crimes vs. dying and being unable to progress past a certain point.)

The meta choice to stop playing is a crock of pretentious shit. That "choice" exists in every game ever made, hell, every form of media ever made. It requires zero effort and zero thought from the developer to "create", and acts as an all covering excuse out of any argument about the game. It's quite possibly the laziest, most vapid semi-philosophical dingleberry I've come across in gaming.

As much as I liked spec ops, I have to agree. If the argument is that you have a choice to stop playing a game, then a majority of gamers already make this choice every day, people on average do not finish their games. It's not something they have to point out as making their situation high art.

Part of the turn in the game, and why the agency fails, is that you are supposed to see what happens because of your actions, but also that it was an accident, and preventable. But even a little thought while playing would tell you know what is about to happen, and its not going to let you stop from doing it. Turning a game off, vs 'be forced into a horrifying scripted event' isnt a choice it's 'sigh, lol video games /click to perform war crime'

Incidentally, that very event was extremely jarring because I figured out what was going to happen in advance, but the game railroads you in such a transparent fashion into doing what the devs want, that it just breaks any immersion. Not seeing it coming probably makes the same event fairly powerful though.

DiannaoChong

I think it would have been. Maybe it was one of those moments forced on the player as part of the delusion "this part is so bad, if I noticed this, surely a soldier would have" actually meant to be "why didnt the soldier see this" and then

"oh wait, its because hes already gone crazy" from the reveal.

I don't want to give it that much credit, but I'd put it as a possibility?

I think it would have been less obvious, if

on the interface you saw, it wasn't a gigantic blob, but more spaced out blobs. Like people weren't shoulder to shoulder. You confuse them for soldiers legitimately. And it would have had the same end effect, because the phospohorus was shown to fill the entire ditch that they were crowded into for some length that you couldnt see.

Emperor_Z

I don't think every video game needs to have a story that emphasizes player choice. To use TLOU as the example, Joel is his own character. He is not the player. We don't get to make his choices for him. I don't think this is a bad thing. We play as him to empathize with him, to experience what he experiences. Could you make TLOU a movie? Sure, but I think something is lost in the areas of survival and protectiveness by being a passive observer, rather than exploring, dealing with enemies, and guiding Ellie yourself.

You may disagree with Joel's choices, but the story isn't about you, it's about him, and I don't see why that shouldn't be allowed in a video game.