Literate Video Games?

Scalfin

Are there any "literate" video games? If yes, what? If no, what do we have to do, have a game where you play chess w/ death? Make a PAX: Harvard?

Munacra

I have no idea what you are talking about dude.

Munkus Beaver

Please explain what you are talking about.

DarkHawke

I was thinking he meant literary, but then he links to Ingmar Bergman, who was a filmmaker...

So I've no idea.

But I do think a game about Ulysees would be totally awesome. The perspective, graphics, controls and gameplay would be totally different every chapter.

Munacra

DarkHawke wrote: »

I was thinking he meant literary, but then he links to Ingmar Bergman, who was a filmmaker...

So I've no idea.

But I do think a game about Ulysees would be totally awesome. The perspective, graphics, controls and gameplay would be totally different every chapter.

A game about me would indeed be awesome.

Raziel

Curse your famous name!

So, OP, what you want is a little Hemingway in your Halo? A little Dickens in your Doom? You want games that tell a story? Or rather, games that tell a story that will resound through the ages such that they'll be found in the "Classics" section of the library a century down the line?

You're asking an awful lot from a medium that started with a pixel knight fighting a pixel duck/dragon.

Iriah

Munacra wrote: »

DarkHawke wrote: »

I was thinking he meant literary, but then he links to Ingmar Bergman, who was a filmmaker...

So I've no idea.

But I do think a game about Ulysees would be totally awesome. The perspective, graphics, controls and gameplay would be totally different every chapter.

A game about me would indeed be awesome.

A - Increase magical realism
B - Post in chat thread
X - Start literary adventure
Y - Create poor young protagonist
L bumper - Post in chat thread
R bumper - Cook
L trigger - Hobnob
R trigger - Post in chatthread/If hobnob is charged, summon Hemingway

Raziel

"O noes I have set me kitchen on fire!"
*Lose five whimsy points*
"Ernest Hemingway, you're just in time! Help me put this fire out!"
"A bitch is a bitch is a bitch."
"That isn't very helpful, Ernest. And you're drinking all me scotch."

Yeah, I'd play that. I just finished Oblivion, so I need a new diversion.

Munkus Beaver

Hotel Dusk is a lot like playing a book.

DarkHawke

It's a strange question though, because they're totally different media.

Liiterature in its widest sense is a linear sequence of words, and it makes use of that form to great effect. A video game is a new medium with it's own possibilities, trying to stick a novel in a video game (or a video game in a novel) doesn't work because they're different media. That's why films of books (and for that matter books of films) very rarely work. I haven't played hotel dusk, but even having any inherent interactivity at all makes it not a linear sequence of words and therefore not literary.

(That's not to say there's not interactivity in traditional literature, but that's mostly based on perception and life experience shaping one's awareness of the world and it's characters).

Having said that I feel compelled to mention the legacy of kain series, because they've got the same kind of narrative density you might expect from a series of books. Plus the dialogue and acting are awesome (<3 Simon Templeman)

Anonymous Robot

Killer7 is the closest I've ever seen, and it's similar to a postmodern sort of deal.

However, I don't think any game fashioned yet meets the level of a good book.

Also, "literature" and video games are totally different mediums, with totally different qualifiers. The increased interactivity of a game introduces a level of artistic potential never seen before. Now if only someone would use it to be thought-provoking.


(Everyone go play Killer7, it's the best thing to come out of the 'games as art' thing yet. Now if only it didn't get its budget cut and suffer from what many find to be lackluster gameplay, it would be the -perfect- game.)

ElJeffe

There's a scene in the end of Shadow of the Colossus that's interactive and manages to create a profound sense of empathy for and understanding of one of the characters. It lets you feel in a very real way the struggle he undergoes, and ultimately communicates the futility of that struggle far better than any book has or could. It's done in a way that simply would not be possible in a book, because a book can only tell you things, it can't let you do things for yourself.

I won't say that SotC in its whole is therefore better than any book ever written, but the story and the emotion is certainly on par with a good book, and that ending sequence is probably the most powerful communication of emotion I've ever seen in any medium, period.

So yeah, games are certainly capable of equalling or exceeding the impact of good books, it's just that the games need to be crafted to take advantage of the inherent strengths of an interactive medium. Most don't really bother, and the ones that try are usually ham-fisted.

Scalfin

I mentioned Igmar precisely because he's a film maker. He made movies "literate" (by which I mean anything that has the aspects associated with novels). He probably wasn't thew first, but I know him and that movie was a good example. It doesn't even need to be high literature. The Moonstone was a sensationalist novel, but it's still a classic (and a great read).
The game doesn't have to be anything like a novel except in the sense of what makes a book a novel/piece of literature, and what separates The Seventh Seal from The Amazing Colossal Man, Attack of the Crab Monsters, Not of This Earth, I Was a Teenage Werewolf, and the soon to follow James Bond series.
I have heard a novel defined as "a picture of life," so we could go with that if you want.
The closest I've seen is the Final Fantasy franchise, the seventh of which has some resemblance to A Farewell to Arms, though I am not a big video gamer by any means. There's also Xenosaga.

I hope Tycho spots this. This seems to be something he'd enjoy, in my opinion, and if we decide we need to find a way to make video games a valid medium in academic circles, nobody can rival him in the type of grass roots movement he could muster. But mostly because this topic seems perfect for him.

ElJeffe

Gabe and Tycho don't read the forums.

And every Final Fantasy except possibly VI has been pathetic compared to any halfway decent book. They contain decent storytelling by game standards, which is why they've received such acclaim. And they've been far surpassed by other, better efforts in the past several years. Final Fantasy games are about as brilliantly written as your average angsty anime series.

Munacra

Well, I suppose books excels at telling stories in their own way because the craft has been refined for what? The whole of human history?

Although the heart of telling a story remains the same in all mediums (character, conflict, motivations, motifs, etc etc etc) a medium has to adapt to be able to show that.

You don't want games to be literary. You want games to be able to tell stories better. So what? Fallout and Bioshock?

Spoiler for bioshock but relevant to my point

Spoiler:

I mean, bioshock did not have a surprise ending. It's twist was right in the middle. It didn't fall in the pit trap that games and short stories can sometimes fall into and it's decidedly amateur. The ending.

Scalfin

I guess they were just ahead of their times at the time. Asimov is similar: he was revolutionary, but is now often considered dated.

Munacra

Scalfin wrote: »

I guess they were just ahead of their times at the time. Asimov is similar: he was revolutionary, but is now often considered dated.

I have no idea what your point is.

Scalfin

No point. Just saying that, given its popularity, FF must have been good for its time.

Ruthven

I seem to recall a wierd game from a while back called the Dark Eye. It was basically an eerie claymation romp through several stories by Edgar Allen Poe. There weren't really any puzzles and there was really nothing game-like about it--it was simply a retelling of Poe in an electronic format.

But I don't know if that's what was asked. If you just mean a game with a strong grasp of the English language and I'd refer you to Planescape Torment for the sheer amount of text that's actually a pretty good read.

Munacra

The Storytelling method is constant from medium to medium. Literary techniques are for book, cinematic techniques are for movies and video games have their own techniques for telling a good story.

I don't think you'll get videogames in pure literary form or pure cinematic form. Nor should you. Videogames can tell stories in their own effective ways.

That's not to say you can't mix and match tecniques across mediums, but in my opinion this makes the storytelling suffer because it draws attention to its structure.

edit: although having gone on that rant, if something works so that it enhances the story, then it works and should be there.

oh great I just confused myself. :psyduck:

A Dabble Of Thelonius

Anonymous Robot wrote: »

(Everyone go play Killer7, it's the best thing to come out of the 'games as art' thing yet. Now if only it didn't get its budget cut and suffer from what many find to be lackluster gameplay, it would be the -perfect- game.)

Man...What? No...

Planescape: Torment. It's got better writing than at least 75% of the tripe that parades around on tv and theater screens. Hell, it's got better writing than most books.

Baron Dirigible

Better writing doesn't necessarily make a game more "artistic". But this is a silly, ridiculous argument that relies too much on semantics, so whatever.

Anonymous Robot

Talonious_monk wrote: »

Anonymous Robot wrote: »

(Everyone go play Killer7, it's the best thing to come out of the 'games as art' thing yet. Now if only it didn't get its budget cut and suffer from what many find to be lackluster gameplay, it would be the -perfect- game.)

Man...What? No...

Planescape: Torment. It's got better writing than at least 75% of the tripe that parades around on tv and theater screens. Hell, it's got better writing than most books.

I'm going to disagree with this comment, but I am not going to argue about it.

Munacra

hohoho Final Fantasy resembles A Farewell to arms?

No one get their berets up in a bunch.

Iriah

Hold X and B for misogyny

Orikaeshigitae

the best literary video games are text adventures

i'm serious

Baron Dirigible

Aisle!

Orikaeshigitae

Aisle!

Baron Dirigible

Aisle.

Spoiler:

Sleepers?

Iriah

I'm trying to pour a glass of water on a pot of hyacinths.

Wait, just one hyacinth. Whew. Glad I didn't make that mistake.

Orikaeshigitae

Make sure you fill it with something first.

Munacra

You have stopped your trolley next to the pasta section, bright plastic bags
full of pale skin-tone shapes.

There is a brunette woman a few metres ahead, filling her trolley with sauces.

>steal sauces
No. You don't want to steal anything.

What kind of story is this that I can't establish conflict?

Iriah

I did. Now I'm trying to vacuum.

and I'm completely engrossed

Orikaeshigitae

Yay! Another convert to the unholy cult of IF.

Iriah

Incidentally, did that helicopter have any significance? Should I have quickly typed "Fire RPG"? And why doesn't 'vacuum sand' vacuum the sand?

Edit: Never mind. I had to turn the vacuum on.

Orikaeshigitae

All will become clear in time.

e: well, mostly clear.

Iriah

crrreepy

Scalfin

Some things that worked were:
Put gnocchi in trolley
hello
look at sauces
go to next aisle
leave
sleep cry sing laugh
punch woman

Orikaeshigitae

Almost everything will work.

The last time I saw a complete list of all recognized commands it was something like six or eight pages.

Scalfin

I forgot damn.

It's funny that you can't ask the woman what she's buying.

Iriah

Woops, I'm an idiot. Ending speculation/spoilers.

Spoiler:

So he was at the 'Om' festival already and dehydrated and hallucinating. Probably. I assume the helicopter was a search party of some sort. But what was the figure? Was it just a hallucination?