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[PATV] Wednesday, April 3, 2013 - Extra Credits Season 6, Ep. 4: Raising the Dead
What was said at 3:07 about using action as a means for emotional tension rather then as a shot of adrenaline got me thinking about what people play games for, and specifically one way to tell if you're playing a game for an immersive experience, or just for "fun" game-play mechanics.
basically, if you want to know if you're playing an "action" game for the experience or for fun, ask yourself this question:
"When there is a dangerous/'action-packed' moment or scene, am I enjoying it or am I scared/nervous/panicking? When that moment is over and the danger is gone, am I relieved or disappointed?"
I would think that if you are enjoying the danger or disappointed when the danger has past, that you're playing for the fun game-play mechanics, and that if you are panicking/scared during the moment, and then relieved when it is over, you are playing for the experience.
Walking Dead is a great game that I felt did what it set out to do very well, but it ditched most adventure game elements in the way. I feel the game is a lot closer to a VN than an adventure game.
I have some very negative views on this "game" as it seems to be mostly cut scenes and clicking dialog. Especially in the beginning the so-called choices they give you are many times not choices at all. For example when the girl ask if there's anyone there. You're given a "choice" you can say Yes I'm here or not answer. If you don't answer the game can not progress. So why give you the option? It's funny because they go so far to give you a timer... so when you let the timer run out, she just keeps asking if anyone is there. So many times playing this when I tried to pick a an option given to me the game simply would keep asking until I clicked what it wanted me to; I felt like it should stop asking if it only wants a particular answer and just have the game beat itself for me. Too often a cutscene pops up. I felt this was more of a movie to click just to make sure you're there (sure they had some actual choices from time to time but so does an online survey and I wouldn't consider that a game).
How hard is to screw up this game? It should have been more like DayZ or WarZ because "The Walking Dead" is exactly what I thought of when I saw those games. Don't get me wrong the story seem great but how much actual gameplay is there VS. just following a script from A to B. The amount of interactivity was lacking.. I've played many adventure games (Sierra, Lucas Arts, etc) and although I didn't finish this game, after an hour I quit, in this amount of time it was no where near an adventure game. Maybe it magically becomes one later and actually lets you play than just watch cut scenes of a franchise I'm a really big fan of.
I look around and I see people including close friends that have the complete opposite reaction to this title. It's even won many accolades. As a gamer and game developer, I just don't get it... at all.
Well, you are right about Walking Dead not allowing that much freedom and many choices turning out to be fake or even Mortons Forks (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morton's_fork). Thats precisely why it is more akin to a VN than an adventure.
That being said, the way I read your post, a classical adventure game approach would not have fit your bill, either.
I for my part am grateful that they didnt do another DayZ/WarZ. Because we already have those.
No point in redoing them.
Since, honestly, if you dont count the characters themselves, then there is very, VERY little, difference in the various fictional Zombie settings out there. Just doing a DayZ/WarZ-like in the Walking Dead universe would have lead to something almost indisinguishable from DayZ/WarZ itself.
A thought- if everything said here is true (and I do agree), then why aren't the Sherlock Holmes games by Frogwares more popular? The character is from a well known licenses, it's well written, and while they do sometimes have overbearing puzzles it's arguably no worse than Walking Dead.
There's some other element which contributed to Walking Dead's popularity. Marketing? Media buzz? Distinctive art style? I dunno.
This video makes me wonder if I've been a bit harsh on The Walking Dead.
Like the posts before me here, I've been saying that The Walking Dead is a virtual narrative (or to my eyes, Choose-Your-Own-Movie) more than a game. But the video's got me thinking, how is this different from the other adventure games of yore?
Take for example Monkey Island, because it's great. Your main game mechanics were to explore dialogue trees and listen to all the hilarious banter, or inventory management puzzles that consisted of using every thing with every other thing, until something worked or you looked at a strategy guide, and then enjoy watching the hilarious ramifications of these actions.
There are no failure conditions, you're either stuck or progressing. And if there are failure conditions, like in the first one where you can't fight the Sword Master until after you win some fights, even if you know the vast majority of curses/responses at that stage, or if you lose the fight to her, you can just walk off screen and try again later. Admittedly you could lose properly by sitting at the bottom of the ocean for over 10 minutes doing nothing, but that's so silly and boring that you would not generally do so without intending on drowning in the first place.
But in the end, it's the same sort of formula. Sit through cutscenes and dialogue trees to watch your characters grow and interact, use puzzles and events to keep the player identifying themselves as the character instead of allowing the player to just be passive.
So while the formula may have changed slightly, quicktime events instead of puzzles, this is really no more a VN than the older games.
I'm just glad that Telltale ditched most of the puzzles for quicktime events, because, frankly, they're rubbish at puzzles.
While I agree to some extent, I can't really agree with your sentiments as a whole. I am really glad that storytelling focused games are back in the mainstream, but genre newer was dead or hibernating in the first place. Great adventure games kept coming out for computers even if they didn't really went triple A status. On the other hand, not counting Mist those games never sold like crazy since they always talked to limited audience and therefor fell by the wayside when console games started selling like crazy.
On the other hand, by removing puzzle solving from the game altogether you remove what is trademark of a genre. While still focused of storytelling this is much more like choose your adventure book than traditional adventures and games like that existed since the old 8bit computers. This is not future of adventure games, this is expansion of age old concept of storytelling where reader chooses where the story goes. We could have game on this level of freedom for quite a while but the amount of work for what looked like very limited potential for profit scared everyone away. For what they did I applaud Tell Tale games since they went with their strongest feature and made awesome game around it.
In conclusion, I loved walking dead, even if I never read the comic or watched the series. I loved the story, but never really felt like I played adventure. If I felt like I played adventure I would love the parts where I can roam an look for things, clues and interactions, but in this game that parts felt far worse than forced linear choose your adventure parts. Adventure games are alive an well, even getting huge attention these days and Walking Dead just doesn't fit that mold.
@Jubal DiGriz It probably comes down to the quality of writing on the project, they treated the game like a TV Series employing use of different writers for each episode with Sean Vannaman helming the project. Telltale has a track record of poor marketing budgets so I think it probably comes down to the fan's affinity with the IP and the quality of the product.
The art style was under the mercy of the fact that they had to release multi-platform for Ipad, Console and PC simultaniously, I think they did a surprisingly good job of it considering the polycount and texture size constraints. The animation quality took a hit probably because of the sheer amount of cut scenes required. But it did the job, hopefully next time they can bolster out their team with more developers.
My, bad, Double post. But that gives me a chance to address something else.
Once you said that we are only medium that divides genres by execution instead by themes and that should be changed. But this medium is also the only medium where your interactions are bulk of experience. That fact makes execution or mechanics much more important then themes. Player is much more likely to enjoy game of particular genre regardless of story themes or tone then game with different gameplay with same story beats. Players who like modern military shooters will more likely enjoy other methodical shooters regardless of tone or settings then, lets say turn based strategy or adventure game set in the same setting and with same storyline. That is why gaming genres are divided by mechanics and execution rather then by themes an tone of story.
@Jubal DiGriz It probably comes down to the quality of writing on the project, they treated the game like a TV Series employing use of different writers for each episode with Sean Vannaman helming the project. Telltale has a track record of poor marketing budgets so I think it probably comes down to the fan's affinity with the IP and the quality of the product.
The art style was under the mercy of the fact that they had to release multi-platform for Ipad, Console and PC simultaniously, I think they did a surprisingly good job of it considering the polycount and texture size constraints. The animation quality took a hit probably because of the sheer amount of cut scenes required. But it did the job, hopefully next time they can bolster out their team with more developers.
Great job with this episode! You pack some good insights into a short, snappy video here.
I think the resurrection of adventure games that you point to here is in many ways similar to the resurrection of Westerns in the film industry in recent years. With a few exceptions, by the late 90s Westerns were nothing but a tired series of surface elements reminiscent of those of the classic Western films. Then when people realized you could tell a Western story that engaged in the core experience of those classic movies while incorporating a modern artistic sensibility (The Assassination of Jesse James, There Will Be Blood, hell - even Firefly/Serenity) there was a creative resurgence. There Will Be Blood, especially, showed that you can even tell an entirely new kind of Western story that still recognizably fits into the genre.
Game: an organized competition which involves the use of certain skills to achieve a desired goal to win.
Like many have said here, The Walking Dead has an excellent story, but as game, it offers very little. Sure you can make choices (albeit some are completely pointless), but it doesn't feel like a game. I expect a game to present a challenge, a goal, a feat of some kind. The Walking Dead just continues to ask me "What should the characters do next?", rather than give me a goal to work towards. I agree with others here, it is certainly interactive and enjoyable, but I think it deserves a distinction from the word "game". It is not a game, it is an interactive story.
I think THIS is the reason Adventure Games were declared "dead". Because they are not games. Even the old adventure games, they didn't present a clear challenge or goal, it was just point and click. We need to stop using the word "game" to mean any interactive diversion, because that is not what people expect a game to be anymore. The word "game" has a much more specific meaning now, and it betrays the culture to label something as a game if it does not fit the definition. This also why the adventure game model included puzzles and challenges, because THATS WHAT PEOPLE EXPECT A GAME TO BE.
I've had this argument with people before about The Walking Dead. They'll mention that they just played an episode and say "I killed the zombie with a shotgun" and I always correct them "No, you didn't do that, the character did. You didn't aim the gun, you didn't reload the gun, you didn't even pick your target! How do you claim you shot something when the only choice you had was either SHOOT or DONT SHOOT?" This is the crux of the problem. The choices are 1 and 0, black and white. The consequences may be shades of grey, but the CHOICE is binary, and that is not a game. Games have choices that are almost always multiple choice, not binary yes/no. This is what makes a card game like poker so incredibly complex. The amount of options at your disposal every turn is enormous. The Walking Dead has nowhere near the same level of freedom.
I have not played the Walking Dead yet, but from what I have heard here, doesn't it make it rather similar on an aesthetic level to visual novels: something Japan has been doing for a very long time but never really caught on outside of Japan. The focus is on narrative, and requires you to have characters that are believable and likeable, due to how the core mechanics of the VN genre are choices, mostly pertaining to the characters.
Especially the comments about how it strips away the gimmicks and focuses entirely on narrative. Visual Novels are at thier heart a means of delivering narrative combined with a more engaging world due to choice. Which you could say was one of the things that was at the core of the AG genre, creating a narrative on par with other forms of literature, while giving the player freedom to explore the world itself.
On this note, why have VNs not really become as big of a thing in the west as they are in Japan. There is clearly interest, as companies such as JAST show by having official translations of (sadly mostly high profile) VNs, but this isnt a solution. Why has no company decided to take the VN genre and make thier own, a western one. Some credit goes to 4Chan's 4LS, by making Katawa Shoujo for a western audience, but sticks to the same tropes that most school-based VNs do, most likely to make writing the story a little easier. But what if say... Bioware made a VN based on the Mass Effect universe. They have the world. They have the skills to write it. They have the audience with a vested interest in the ME universe to maybe take a chance on the game. It could be amazing, and could inspire other people to do the same. Sadly EA would probably intervene, but it is just an example.
TL;DR: Visual novels are awesome and should take off in the west, as most things you described in this video also apply to visual novels. Could you please make an episode about why they have not yet taken off?
@Cyrith: I agree that VNs deserve more attention, but unfortunately I'm also deeply familiar with all their weaknesses.
But the first answer to your question is probably: because from an objective viewpoint, they never really "took off" in Japan, either.
Mind, I love playing them (I speak Japanese), but their appeal is quite specific. I mean yes, there are certainly hundreds of VNs churned out in Japan each year - but it would be wrong to assume that they have a mass audience. Despite making quite some money, their target group remains very, very specific. Basically this format is successful in a niche market (eroge) fully located -within- another niche market (otaku goods).
Also, despite having seen some awesome plots and characters unfold in VNs over the years, I still have this nagging feeling that you can't really "take out the ero" without actually destroying the overall mechanic. It seems to me that - generally speaking - without ero, VNs may have a hard time offering enough to keep a player going.
@Cyrith Arguably, Mass Effect: Genesis is a VN based on the Mass Effect Universe. It just tells the story of the first game in a condensed way to allow people to make their choices without having to play through it. On the subject of Western VN's, have you played Analogue: A Hate Story?
Personally, I don't think gaming as a medium needs to be beholden to certain traditional notions of gameplay or skill. An interactive experience like The Walking Dead or To The Moon is still recognizably using the unique advantages of the medium in a way which is impossible in other media. You couldn't make a Dear Esther movie or Choose-Your-Own-Adventure book, because neither of those media would allow you to examine your surroundings to your own satisfaction the way the game does.
@Cerrax: Your definition of 'game' is a bit restrictive, don't you think? In fact, if we went with your definition of a game, we have to fill the following criteria:
Organized
Competitive
Skills
Goal
Does Legend of Zelda hold up? Most people agree: Probably a game! It has rules and mechanics so that's a check if you accept that. It requires skills to make progress. And it has an end goal. It isn't really competitive though. So okay, 3/4 checks. Does that mean LoZ not a game? Is it 'mostly' a game? Is there a certain threshold of checks you need before you are accepted into the gaming kingdom?
So let's apply this to Walking Dead: It, too, is organized in having rules and mechanics. It isn't very competitive. It requires some minor amounts of skill (manipulating controls, making judgments) to make progress. And there is, in fact, a goal - to get to the end of the story.
So, 2 or 3 checks depending on what you consider a skill.
As for the binary options issue... How many choices do you need before it's a game? How different do those choices have to be? If you have a linear shooter where you have to kill a bunch of dudes to progress, is that a game? You don't get any choices with that! You just have to shoot people (or aliens, whatever). Perhaps what matters is how you choose to shoot them? So maybe instead of your dink-o-matic pistol you choose to shoot them with your super-BFG9000, or your sweet-ass zapmaster10,000 tesla cannon. You just had a ternary choice - 3 options. Does that make it 50% more of a game than if you only had two guns to pick from? Or is what matters the angle from which you shoot your gun of choice? It's all to the same end, really - either you shoot and kill the bad guys, or you lose: your binary choice.
My point is, we don't have a good definition of game and, where you seek to exclude things that don't fit your taste, I think we should be inclusive and have an honest discussion about what makes 'a game' instead of picking any of a million different interpretations of the definition and declaring ourselves the arbiters of game-ness. Given how long this discussion has been happening, I'm not convinced we'll get an answer, so how about we just decide that the label 'game' doesn't mean a thing and if you want to call a piece of interactive fiction or a walk-in-the-forest simulator or a spreadsheet manager a game, then more power to you. You don't have to be a dick and say 'well, that isn't really a game, so you don't actually play games like the rest of us.' Why would you even want to do that?
I've played Walking Dead and didn't care for it. Not my thing.
But I will tell you something interesting. I played demo for something that reminded me quite a bit of Walking Dead. Do you know what that game is? Mass Effect 2. It had the same basic gameplay just with a horrible shooting combat game tacked on.
I'm writing this before watching the entirety of your video, but if you had some point about Walking dead being different and unique, I fail to see your point because it seems like many so-called triple A games are pretty much the same. Just with terrible shooting.
@MattholomewCuppingsworth: I guess I should have specified those words. Sorry. By competitive, I mean that the game itself can be the opponent (such as LoZ or other single player experiences).
Also, as you pointed out, the use of skill in The Walking Dead is minor (and debatable if there is any at all). Choosing from a menu of choices is as much a game as ordering food at McDonalds.
Your example with first-person shooters misses a whole plethora of choices. Movement, aiming, head games, team tactics, as well as choice of upgrades and abilities that many shooters use now. There's a reason most shooters do not focus on single-player experiences, because it's not really a game unless you play it with other people (although advancements in computer player intelligence continue to strive for competitive computer players).
Maybe you can classify The Walking Dead as a game, but its a game in the same way that Tee-Ball is a sport, its got all the qualities of game, but its been reduced to an imitation of its parts rather than a true implementation.
I'm not trying to bash The Walking Dead or prove myself as "teh hardcorez". I simply don't see how making a few simple choices is considered a game. It's an enthralling interactive story, no one can debate that, but does it require anything from the player other than the ability to select a choice from a menu?
@Deacon
Mass Effect 2 is a rather bad comparison to The Walking Dead, although Mass Effect 2 had a good cast of characters, an interesting narrative but the dialogue choices were really bad, most - if not all of them, were Good(Paragon) or Evil(Renegade) choices, wholly unrealistic and rather boring at times and trust me, although the combat may be rather tedious at times, the game would be worse of without it.
The Walking Dead however, had choices that were neither Good or Evil, they were about choices governed by your reactions and actions at that current time and the time limit made sure that you were to act quickly.
This made it a game that I could safely say, had made me glued to the screen, reading and hearing every bit of text given so I could make the choices I really wanted.
The Walking Dead was unique because of that, rather than having dumbed down choices, they wanted the gamer to think and act, to feel and react.
Closest examples of games that I can compare The Walking Dead are Visual Novels, a form of story governed by the choices you make so as to reach a certain ending.
Of course I like evolved gameplay and if my favorite genre becomes more appealing to a larger audience - the better.
But then... I am from Germany and ye good olde adventure games are still produced here today, from one small, but well known studio and with the same old mechanics and the same emphasis on story, humor (in some cases) and so on. There was a stretch when the market looked bleak, but nope, that "old school"-gerne is still very much alife. They do not turn in a grand profit, but the fanbase and the creators are so intensely dedicated, that they get produced and shipped and bought today.
Maybe the margin needs to be bigger for something like this to exist in the US. I really wonder, what the difference is.
Nice to see Walking Dead getting more love. It was my personal Game of the Year, and though I'll admit that it wasn't perfect, it was a really great game.
@Cerrax: Your definition of 'game' is a bit restrictive, don't you think? In fact, if we went with your definition of a game, we have to fill the following criteria:
Organized
Competitive
Skills
Goal
Does Legend of Zelda hold up? Most people agree: Probably a game! It has rules and mechanics so that's a check if you accept that. It requires skills to make progress. And it has an end goal. It isn't really competitive though. So okay, 3/4 checks. Does that mean LoZ not a game? Is it 'mostly' a game? Is there a certain threshold of checks you need before you are accepted into the gaming kingdom?
So let's apply this to Walking Dead: It, too, is organized in having rules and mechanics. It isn't very competitive. It requires some minor amounts of skill (manipulating controls, making judgments) to make progress. And there is, in fact, a goal - to get to the end of the story.
So, 2 or 3 checks depending on what you consider a skill.
As for the binary options issue... How many choices do you need before it's a game? How different do those choices have to be? If you have a linear shooter where you have to kill a bunch of dudes to progress, is that a game? You don't get any choices with that! You just have to shoot people (or aliens, whatever). Perhaps what matters is how you choose to shoot them? So maybe instead of your dink-o-matic pistol you choose to shoot them with your super-BFG9000, or your sweet-ass zapmaster10,000 tesla cannon. You just had a ternary choice - 3 options. Does that make it 50% more of a game than if you only had two guns to pick from? Or is what matters the angle from which you shoot your gun of choice? It's all to the same end, really - either you shoot and kill the bad guys, or you lose: your binary choice.
My point is, we don't have a good definition of game and, where you seek to exclude things that don't fit your taste, I think we should be inclusive and have an honest discussion about what makes 'a game' instead of picking any of a million different interpretations of the definition and declaring ourselves the arbiters of game-ness. Given how long this discussion has been happening, I'm not convinced we'll get an answer, so how about we just decide that the label 'game' doesn't mean a thing and if you want to call a piece of interactive fiction or a walk-in-the-forest simulator or a spreadsheet manager a game, then more power to you. You don't have to be a dick and say 'well, that isn't really a game, so you don't actually play games like the rest of us.' Why would you even want to do that?
I've always liked Sid Meier's definition: "A game is a series of interesting choices".
Does it hold up for LoZ? I think so. You have to think if you should rush in with your sword or try to use one of the items. It's also true in your theoretical FPS, where maybe you should use the dink-o-matic instead of the better guns to save ammo for later, but maybe you need the firepower as they're killing you too fast.
Is it true for adventure games? I haven't played The Walking Dead, but I'm a big fan of Telltale's SBCG4AP and Sam and Max, so I'll use them as examples. Is there any interesting decisions in them? Not particularly. It's more about listening to the dialog and trying to figure out the puzzles. SBCG4AP does have the occasional mini-game, but it's still mostly dragging and dropping items.
To be honest, rather than 2 more episodes on TWD, I'd much rather have a multi-part episode on whether Adventure Games 'count' as games.
Adventure games are really the most accessible genre right now, I mostly play with my family as backseat gamers. Broken Sword and other classics being on mobile platforms really boosted their profile (Broken Sword sold half a million copies on mobile alone).
Thanks to Kickstarter, all the classics are coming back. Broken Sword, The Longest Journey, Double Fine Adventure, Jane Jensen.
All my most anticipated games for 2013 ARE adventure games:
- Gone Home
- Broken Sword 5
- Broken Age (Double Fine Adventure)
- more Kentucky Route Zero
- more The Dream Machine
- Papers, Please (right now has free beta; most unique premise of playing as an immigration officer in cold war era 1982)
- Beyond: Two Souls
- Ithaka of the Clouds (successor to The Sea Will Claim Everything)
@Magic Pancake: I would consider a game anything where you manipulate the elements (changing the environment, controlling characters, moving objects, dialogue choices, etc.) inside it. Whichever elements you manipulate determine what kind of game it will be. Action packed shooter (environment, characters), story based RPGs (characters, dialogue), RTSs (environment, objects), adventure games (environment, characters, objects, dialogue), or even Facebook games, I suppose (objects). The idea of how games should be made are constantly being questioned by indie developers.
This after you invested so much time in explaining why using genre to describe game play is a fool's errand? I'm a little disappointed. Adventure Game isn't a useful description of genre any more than FPS or RTS is. It's a mode of play. A mode of play that uncoupled from a period where the property in question is so popular and ubiquitous, or without the vast and growing casual gamer audience, this game would have been as dead on the vine as Back to the Future.
@digital_ronin - "That being said, the way I read your post, a classical adventure game approach would not have fit your bill, either."
That's true; as I said I would have liked to see a game more like DayZ or WarZ however if the game had been an adventure game I can't say for certain I wouldn't like it. Because I love adventure games.
Small nitpick for a great video: Telltale is NOT a AAA studio. Not by a LONGSHOT. AAA, we must remember, has nothing to do with quality and everything to do with budget. The Walking Dead might be an A title, but it is not, no matter how amazing, a AAA title.
I think the JRPG is rapidly heading in this direction, unfortunately. It's become so obsessed with the mechanical aspects of its own genre and recycling the same tired tropes and visuals that it's lost touch with what makes itself so interesting. Like adventure games, JRPGs have always been about telling a story. And like adventure games did for years on end, JRPGs have become too self-absorbed to realize how irrelevant they're becoming.
Sigh. Where's the Telltale Games of JRPGs when you need it?
@Sagerothe - They're not saying Boogerman is bad. They're just using it as an example of a lowbrow, marketed-to-kids game. Nothing wrong with slapstick and farts, but that's not all there is.
@Cerrax: There's a bunch of different definitions of "game" out there. Many of them include victory conditions as being a mandatory part of a game, but many people don't. James P. Carse coined a distinction between finite and infinite games. Jane McGonigal starts out "Reality Is Broken" by defining a game (I paraphrase) as a task with arbitrary rules that you engage in voluntarily.
So "Push This Button and See What Happens Next" is a game. Maybe that doesn't do it for you - in which case, you're not voluntarily engaging, so it isn't (wouldn't be?) a game for you.
Posts
basically, if you want to know if you're playing an "action" game for the experience or for fun, ask yourself this question:
"When there is a dangerous/'action-packed' moment or scene, am I enjoying it or am I scared/nervous/panicking? When that moment is over and the danger is gone, am I relieved or disappointed?"
I would think that if you are enjoying the danger or disappointed when the danger has past, that you're playing for the fun game-play mechanics, and that if you are panicking/scared during the moment, and then relieved when it is over, you are playing for the experience.
THIS IS NOT TALKING ABOUT THE WALKING DEAD SURVIVAL INSTINCT!
THIS IS ABOUT THE TELLTALE GAME RELEASED BEFORE SURVIVAL INSTINCT!
Fully agree about Walking Dead taking more inspirations from VNs than from adventure games. I had exactly the same feeling when playing.
But then again, there are not many people who play Visual Novels in the first place - so I doubt many others would notice.
How hard is to screw up this game? It should have been more like DayZ or WarZ because "The Walking Dead" is exactly what I thought of when I saw those games. Don't get me wrong the story seem great but how much actual gameplay is there VS. just following a script from A to B. The amount of interactivity was lacking.. I've played many adventure games (Sierra, Lucas Arts, etc) and although I didn't finish this game, after an hour I quit, in this amount of time it was no where near an adventure game. Maybe it magically becomes one later and actually lets you play than just watch cut scenes of a franchise I'm a really big fan of.
I look around and I see people including close friends that have the complete opposite reaction to this title. It's even won many accolades. As a gamer and game developer, I just don't get it... at all.
My apologies for trolling.
Well, you are right about Walking Dead not allowing that much freedom and many choices turning out to be fake or even Mortons Forks (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morton's_fork). Thats precisely why it is more akin to a VN than an adventure.
That being said, the way I read your post, a classical adventure game approach would not have fit your bill, either.
I for my part am grateful that they didnt do another DayZ/WarZ. Because we already have those.
No point in redoing them.
Since, honestly, if you dont count the characters themselves, then there is very, VERY little, difference in the various fictional Zombie settings out there. Just doing a DayZ/WarZ-like in the Walking Dead universe would have lead to something almost indisinguishable from DayZ/WarZ itself.
There's some other element which contributed to Walking Dead's popularity. Marketing? Media buzz? Distinctive art style? I dunno.
This video makes me wonder if I've been a bit harsh on The Walking Dead.
Like the posts before me here, I've been saying that The Walking Dead is a virtual narrative (or to my eyes, Choose-Your-Own-Movie) more than a game. But the video's got me thinking, how is this different from the other adventure games of yore?
Take for example Monkey Island, because it's great. Your main game mechanics were to explore dialogue trees and listen to all the hilarious banter, or inventory management puzzles that consisted of using every thing with every other thing, until something worked or you looked at a strategy guide, and then enjoy watching the hilarious ramifications of these actions.
There are no failure conditions, you're either stuck or progressing. And if there are failure conditions, like in the first one where you can't fight the Sword Master until after you win some fights, even if you know the vast majority of curses/responses at that stage, or if you lose the fight to her, you can just walk off screen and try again later. Admittedly you could lose properly by sitting at the bottom of the ocean for over 10 minutes doing nothing, but that's so silly and boring that you would not generally do so without intending on drowning in the first place.
But in the end, it's the same sort of formula. Sit through cutscenes and dialogue trees to watch your characters grow and interact, use puzzles and events to keep the player identifying themselves as the character instead of allowing the player to just be passive.
So while the formula may have changed slightly, quicktime events instead of puzzles, this is really no more a VN than the older games.
I'm just glad that Telltale ditched most of the puzzles for quicktime events, because, frankly, they're rubbish at puzzles.
On the other hand, by removing puzzle solving from the game altogether you remove what is trademark of a genre. While still focused of storytelling this is much more like choose your adventure book than traditional adventures and games like that existed since the old 8bit computers. This is not future of adventure games, this is expansion of age old concept of storytelling where reader chooses where the story goes. We could have game on this level of freedom for quite a while but the amount of work for what looked like very limited potential for profit scared everyone away. For what they did I applaud Tell Tale games since they went with their strongest feature and made awesome game around it.
In conclusion, I loved walking dead, even if I never read the comic or watched the series. I loved the story, but never really felt like I played adventure. If I felt like I played adventure I would love the parts where I can roam an look for things, clues and interactions, but in this game that parts felt far worse than forced linear choose your adventure parts. Adventure games are alive an well, even getting huge attention these days and Walking Dead just doesn't fit that mold.
The art style was under the mercy of the fact that they had to release multi-platform for Ipad, Console and PC simultaniously, I think they did a surprisingly good job of it considering the polycount and texture size constraints. The animation quality took a hit probably because of the sheer amount of cut scenes required. But it did the job, hopefully next time they can bolster out their team with more developers.
Once you said that we are only medium that divides genres by execution instead by themes and that should be changed. But this medium is also the only medium where your interactions are bulk of experience. That fact makes execution or mechanics much more important then themes. Player is much more likely to enjoy game of particular genre regardless of story themes or tone then game with different gameplay with same story beats. Players who like modern military shooters will more likely enjoy other methodical shooters regardless of tone or settings then, lets say turn based strategy or adventure game set in the same setting and with same storyline. That is why gaming genres are divided by mechanics and execution rather then by themes an tone of story.
The art style was under the mercy of the fact that they had to release multi-platform for Ipad, Console and PC simultaniously, I think they did a surprisingly good job of it considering the polycount and texture size constraints. The animation quality took a hit probably because of the sheer amount of cut scenes required. But it did the job, hopefully next time they can bolster out their team with more developers.
I think the resurrection of adventure games that you point to here is in many ways similar to the resurrection of Westerns in the film industry in recent years. With a few exceptions, by the late 90s Westerns were nothing but a tired series of surface elements reminiscent of those of the classic Western films. Then when people realized you could tell a Western story that engaged in the core experience of those classic movies while incorporating a modern artistic sensibility (The Assassination of Jesse James, There Will Be Blood, hell - even Firefly/Serenity) there was a creative resurgence. There Will Be Blood, especially, showed that you can even tell an entirely new kind of Western story that still recognizably fits into the genre.
Then Monkey island 3 smacked me straight in the face.
Great episode
Like many have said here, The Walking Dead has an excellent story, but as game, it offers very little. Sure you can make choices (albeit some are completely pointless), but it doesn't feel like a game. I expect a game to present a challenge, a goal, a feat of some kind. The Walking Dead just continues to ask me "What should the characters do next?", rather than give me a goal to work towards. I agree with others here, it is certainly interactive and enjoyable, but I think it deserves a distinction from the word "game". It is not a game, it is an interactive story.
I think THIS is the reason Adventure Games were declared "dead". Because they are not games. Even the old adventure games, they didn't present a clear challenge or goal, it was just point and click. We need to stop using the word "game" to mean any interactive diversion, because that is not what people expect a game to be anymore. The word "game" has a much more specific meaning now, and it betrays the culture to label something as a game if it does not fit the definition. This also why the adventure game model included puzzles and challenges, because THATS WHAT PEOPLE EXPECT A GAME TO BE.
I've had this argument with people before about The Walking Dead. They'll mention that they just played an episode and say "I killed the zombie with a shotgun" and I always correct them "No, you didn't do that, the character did. You didn't aim the gun, you didn't reload the gun, you didn't even pick your target! How do you claim you shot something when the only choice you had was either SHOOT or DONT SHOOT?" This is the crux of the problem. The choices are 1 and 0, black and white. The consequences may be shades of grey, but the CHOICE is binary, and that is not a game. Games have choices that are almost always multiple choice, not binary yes/no. This is what makes a card game like poker so incredibly complex. The amount of options at your disposal every turn is enormous. The Walking Dead has nowhere near the same level of freedom.
Especially the comments about how it strips away the gimmicks and focuses entirely on narrative. Visual Novels are at thier heart a means of delivering narrative combined with a more engaging world due to choice. Which you could say was one of the things that was at the core of the AG genre, creating a narrative on par with other forms of literature, while giving the player freedom to explore the world itself.
On this note, why have VNs not really become as big of a thing in the west as they are in Japan. There is clearly interest, as companies such as JAST show by having official translations of (sadly mostly high profile) VNs, but this isnt a solution. Why has no company decided to take the VN genre and make thier own, a western one. Some credit goes to 4Chan's 4LS, by making Katawa Shoujo for a western audience, but sticks to the same tropes that most school-based VNs do, most likely to make writing the story a little easier. But what if say... Bioware made a VN based on the Mass Effect universe. They have the world. They have the skills to write it. They have the audience with a vested interest in the ME universe to maybe take a chance on the game. It could be amazing, and could inspire other people to do the same. Sadly EA would probably intervene, but it is just an example.
TL;DR: Visual novels are awesome and should take off in the west, as most things you described in this video also apply to visual novels. Could you please make an episode about why they have not yet taken off?
But the first answer to your question is probably: because from an objective viewpoint, they never really "took off" in Japan, either.
Mind, I love playing them (I speak Japanese), but their appeal is quite specific. I mean yes, there are certainly hundreds of VNs churned out in Japan each year - but it would be wrong to assume that they have a mass audience. Despite making quite some money, their target group remains very, very specific. Basically this format is successful in a niche market (eroge) fully located -within- another niche market (otaku goods).
Also, despite having seen some awesome plots and characters unfold in VNs over the years, I still have this nagging feeling that you can't really "take out the ero" without actually destroying the overall mechanic. It seems to me that - generally speaking - without ero, VNs may have a hard time offering enough to keep a player going.
Personally, I don't think gaming as a medium needs to be beholden to certain traditional notions of gameplay or skill. An interactive experience like The Walking Dead or To The Moon is still recognizably using the unique advantages of the medium in a way which is impossible in other media. You couldn't make a Dear Esther movie or Choose-Your-Own-Adventure book, because neither of those media would allow you to examine your surroundings to your own satisfaction the way the game does.
Organized
Competitive
Skills
Goal
Does Legend of Zelda hold up? Most people agree: Probably a game! It has rules and mechanics so that's a check if you accept that. It requires skills to make progress. And it has an end goal. It isn't really competitive though. So okay, 3/4 checks. Does that mean LoZ not a game? Is it 'mostly' a game? Is there a certain threshold of checks you need before you are accepted into the gaming kingdom?
So let's apply this to Walking Dead: It, too, is organized in having rules and mechanics. It isn't very competitive. It requires some minor amounts of skill (manipulating controls, making judgments) to make progress. And there is, in fact, a goal - to get to the end of the story.
So, 2 or 3 checks depending on what you consider a skill.
As for the binary options issue... How many choices do you need before it's a game? How different do those choices have to be? If you have a linear shooter where you have to kill a bunch of dudes to progress, is that a game? You don't get any choices with that! You just have to shoot people (or aliens, whatever). Perhaps what matters is how you choose to shoot them? So maybe instead of your dink-o-matic pistol you choose to shoot them with your super-BFG9000, or your sweet-ass zapmaster10,000 tesla cannon. You just had a ternary choice - 3 options. Does that make it 50% more of a game than if you only had two guns to pick from? Or is what matters the angle from which you shoot your gun of choice? It's all to the same end, really - either you shoot and kill the bad guys, or you lose: your binary choice.
My point is, we don't have a good definition of game and, where you seek to exclude things that don't fit your taste, I think we should be inclusive and have an honest discussion about what makes 'a game' instead of picking any of a million different interpretations of the definition and declaring ourselves the arbiters of game-ness. Given how long this discussion has been happening, I'm not convinced we'll get an answer, so how about we just decide that the label 'game' doesn't mean a thing and if you want to call a piece of interactive fiction or a walk-in-the-forest simulator or a spreadsheet manager a game, then more power to you. You don't have to be a dick and say 'well, that isn't really a game, so you don't actually play games like the rest of us.' Why would you even want to do that?
But I will tell you something interesting. I played demo for something that reminded me quite a bit of Walking Dead. Do you know what that game is? Mass Effect 2. It had the same basic gameplay just with a horrible shooting combat game tacked on.
I'm writing this before watching the entirety of your video, but if you had some point about Walking dead being different and unique, I fail to see your point because it seems like many so-called triple A games are pretty much the same. Just with terrible shooting.
Also, as you pointed out, the use of skill in The Walking Dead is minor (and debatable if there is any at all). Choosing from a menu of choices is as much a game as ordering food at McDonalds.
Your example with first-person shooters misses a whole plethora of choices. Movement, aiming, head games, team tactics, as well as choice of upgrades and abilities that many shooters use now. There's a reason most shooters do not focus on single-player experiences, because it's not really a game unless you play it with other people (although advancements in computer player intelligence continue to strive for competitive computer players).
Maybe you can classify The Walking Dead as a game, but its a game in the same way that Tee-Ball is a sport, its got all the qualities of game, but its been reduced to an imitation of its parts rather than a true implementation.
I'm not trying to bash The Walking Dead or prove myself as "teh hardcorez". I simply don't see how making a few simple choices is considered a game. It's an enthralling interactive story, no one can debate that, but does it require anything from the player other than the ability to select a choice from a menu?
Mass Effect 2 is a rather bad comparison to The Walking Dead, although Mass Effect 2 had a good cast of characters, an interesting narrative but the dialogue choices were really bad, most - if not all of them, were Good(Paragon) or Evil(Renegade) choices, wholly unrealistic and rather boring at times and trust me, although the combat may be rather tedious at times, the game would be worse of without it.
The Walking Dead however, had choices that were neither Good or Evil, they were about choices governed by your reactions and actions at that current time and the time limit made sure that you were to act quickly.
This made it a game that I could safely say, had made me glued to the screen, reading and hearing every bit of text given so I could make the choices I really wanted.
The Walking Dead was unique because of that, rather than having dumbed down choices, they wanted the gamer to think and act, to feel and react.
Closest examples of games that I can compare The Walking Dead are Visual Novels, a form of story governed by the choices you make so as to reach a certain ending.
But then... I am from Germany and ye good olde adventure games are still produced here today, from one small, but well known studio and with the same old mechanics and the same emphasis on story, humor (in some cases) and so on. There was a stretch when the market looked bleak, but nope, that "old school"-gerne is still very much alife. They do not turn in a grand profit, but the fanbase and the creators are so intensely dedicated, that they get produced and shipped and bought today.
Maybe the margin needs to be bigger for something like this to exist in the US. I really wonder, what the difference is.
I've always liked Sid Meier's definition: "A game is a series of interesting choices".
Does it hold up for LoZ? I think so. You have to think if you should rush in with your sword or try to use one of the items. It's also true in your theoretical FPS, where maybe you should use the dink-o-matic instead of the better guns to save ammo for later, but maybe you need the firepower as they're killing you too fast.
Is it true for adventure games? I haven't played The Walking Dead, but I'm a big fan of Telltale's SBCG4AP and Sam and Max, so I'll use them as examples. Is there any interesting decisions in them? Not particularly. It's more about listening to the dialog and trying to figure out the puzzles. SBCG4AP does have the occasional mini-game, but it's still mostly dragging and dropping items.
To be honest, rather than 2 more episodes on TWD, I'd much rather have a multi-part episode on whether Adventure Games 'count' as games.
Thanks to Kickstarter, all the classics are coming back. Broken Sword, The Longest Journey, Double Fine Adventure, Jane Jensen.
All my most anticipated games for 2013 ARE adventure games:
- Gone Home
- Broken Sword 5
- Broken Age (Double Fine Adventure)
- more Kentucky Route Zero
- more The Dream Machine
- Papers, Please (right now has free beta; most unique premise of playing as an immigration officer in cold war era 1982)
- Beyond: Two Souls
- Ithaka of the Clouds (successor to The Sea Will Claim Everything)
That's true; as I said I would have liked to see a game more like DayZ or WarZ however if the game had been an adventure game I can't say for certain I wouldn't like it. Because I love adventure games.
On a side note...
Disney shuts down LucasArts
http://kotaku.com/disney-shuts-down-lucasarts-468473749
Sigh. Where's the Telltale Games of JRPGs when you need it?
So "Push This Button and See What Happens Next" is a game. Maybe that doesn't do it for you - in which case, you're not voluntarily engaging, so it isn't (wouldn't be?) a game for you.
For the uninitiated, I bring you one of our time's greatest Games With No Victory Conditions. http://principiadiscordia.com/book/73.php