We've already heard a lot from Pendleton Ward, creator of the hit show Adventure Time, about his interest in making a game based on the property. Up until now, I was excited about the prospect of an Adventure Time game. Now I'm not so sure.
Previously, Mr. Ward said that he wanted to make an Adventure Time game that's like a cross between Katamari Damacy and Monster Hunter. That sounded awesome. Now he's saying that he "... think(s) games are amazing for telling stories. I don’t think that people do that very often. I think story isn’t always the most important thing to game designers, but I wish it were. I think that the best games have stories, and when I eventually make games, story will be front and center." Quite a not-awesome contradiction, considering that Monster Hunter and Katamari Damacy don't have real storylines.
Read on for a brief write up on why Mr. Ward's focus on story has me a little worried.
Adventure Time creator sings the praises of games wants to make an A.T. Game [GoNintendo]
I don't know what it is about people who work in television and film that makes them want to shoehorn story into gaming. I think it must have to do with the storyteller's culture in those industries, the ingrained belief that stories are what matters most, not all the other things that make film great. Sadly, it seems a lot of these brilliant creative minds don't understand what makes their own work worthwhile.
Adventure Time is a perfect example. For the most part, the show doesn't have much of a story. In fact, some of the best episodes of Adventure Time (like the one with the horse, the one where the Care Bears party in the body of a giant weird thing, and of course, the videogame episode) have almost no story. In fact, it's the near-nonexistence of plot in these episodes that allows you to just focus on being with the characters, sort of like My Dinner with Andre for fans of cartoon surrealism. Narrative and plot take a backseat, so the show's incredibly charming, genuine, and good-natured characters, and the imaginative and unpredictable world they live in, can take the spotlight.
The same is true of most of my favorite videogames. The fact that the story of Monster Hunter dictatea that you have to catch a wild Ludoth, or that the story of Katamari Damacy dictates that you roll up a wad of crap the size of a continent, is almost immaterial. It's the fun that you have in the process of making all that amazing stuff happen that makes those games tick. That's true of most of my other favorite games. The explicitly told narratives of Super Meat Boy, Animal Crossing, the Mario games, the Zelda series, Pac-Man, River City Ransom, the Resident Evil titles, Chrono Trigger, all don't really mean that much to me. It's the gameplay, the characters, and the world that they inhabit that matters.
That's also true of some of my favorite films and TV shows. The events that occur in the Star Wars movies, the films of Studio Ghibli, and shows like Arrested Development and FLCL are almost inconsequential when taken on their own. In fact, you can sum up the events in some of those stories in a few sentences.
In Star Wars, a guy meets some droids and an old man. His aunt and uncle get murdered, so he goes on a rescue mission in space with the old man, the droids, and a jerk who wears a leather vest. They save a princess, then the old man gets killed. That probably should be the end of the story, but then they tacked on an extra scene where the guy blows up a big moon-shaped spaceship. The End.
In Totoro, two kids run around the town and in the woods, where they meet cute furry things of various sizes. Later, one of the girls goes missing. With the help of a giant Catbus, they find her. Then their mom comes home from the hospital. The End.
Those stories don't mean much on their own, do they? It's the worlds that those characters exist in, the significance of the characterization of each principal player, and the way they interact with each other that stick with you (not to mention the amazing music, acting, direction of photography, and editing that make them come to life). If you tried telling the story of Star Wars or Totoro with different characters, with different music and art direction, and in alternate worlds, you'd have completely different (and probably worse) movies on your hands. Again, that goes triple for most videogames.
I hope Mr. Ward keeps that in mind if and when an Adventure Time game ever happens. I'd love to play an Adventure Time game that lets you revel in the characters of Finn, Jake, and the rest of the land of Ooo. I'd love to interact with those characters like I would if I knew them in real life, while inhabiting their world and going on adventures of my own design. What I don't want is to necessarily have another Adventure Time story spoon fed to me in a semi-interactive format. If that's what I wanted, I'd just... watch Adventure Time.
Why waste the opportunity to utilize the superior medium of videogames, where the shackles of linear narrative can be easily broken, by intentionally weighing it down with more linear narrative?
Contest:
5:30 PM on 09.24.2011 | 
I agree with Pendalton Ward. I like a game that has a story behind it. One of the reasons I've never like Mario titles is that there is nothing to make me care. I also don't understand why, when someone says "I want to have a good story", some people automatically believe that good gameplay will be cut. In my opinion, the best games have both.
I don't really understand the Totoro analogy, either. Totoro absolutely had a story, and it was instrumental in instilling a sense of wonder into this secret world that adults can't see. Without a story, it would simply have been a bunch of owl-bears laying around sleeping. The story was the process of discovering something special hidden in the world around us.
[Spolier-ish?] So, Ooo was created by the after affects of the 'Great Mushroom Wars' (Nuclear Holocaust). Finn, along with the underground colonies (Susan Strong) and Billy are some of the only humans left. Everything in Ooo are after effects (prolonged radiation sickness) of the Mushroom Wars, saying that the explosions 'made a ripple in the space time continum, releasing magic and enhancing any dormant magic left on the earth.' That ripple also made doorways to other Dimensions, such as the Lumpy Space dimension, the place where Magic Man is from, and the Underworld.
....that was really more like an origin story, wasn't it?
[End spolier-ish]
A good story in a game is like polish.
A game doesn't necessarily need an epic sonnet driving it, sometimes it just needs a bit of glue & string to hold it neatly together. Sorta like Shadow of the Colossus, there really wasn't much to the story but it really managed to drive the game.
A game without any sort of story or plot is just disjointed, it can still be a good game but it has to really shine.
However a great story/plot will always make a good game better.
*nope.jpg*
Um...guess you must he a CoD fan?
Since the inception of video games, story has been a driving force in games. Story has spawned whole genres (metroidvania, RPGs, etc). Hell, one of the most legendary FPS's of all time was entirely story-based. (Half Life 2 of course)
And if you think that Adventure Time has no story, you're sadly mistaken.
Any time something is established, it's brought into the story. Characters are introduced, and some of them make reoccurring appearances.
Get that multiplayer-only bullshit out of here. We have enough MMO's, and I'd rather have a game stand on it's own merits than rely on a "make your own adventure" game.
TLDR: I'm looking forward to whatever Pendleton Ward makes.
Also I think it would look terrible in 3D cell shading rendering simply will not cut it
The answer is Werewolf Queen! It's always Werewolf Queen!
And when I finally meet the Werewolf Queen, she will take me on as her royal consort and we will rule in blood!
Perfect way to put it.
And if you're right? So what? Good story does not preclude good gameplay. I think you're in the minority of hardcore gamers when it comes to a dislike of story anyhow.
Pretty much everything you mentioned has a pretty huge emphasis on "story", whether or not you think it does. Not sure if that word conjures up unskippable cutscenes in your mind or tons of dialogue or quest boxes full of text or if you got a papercut while turning the page of a dictionary with the word on it, but jeez.
Some of the best games of all time have great stories.
It Came from the Nightosphere. Mortal Folly/Recoil. Too Young.
Some of the best Adventure Time episodes have great stories.
@Holmes I agree for the most part that games do not require a story to be fun, but they can tell great stories.
Most of the games and films mentioned still have stories that are more coherent than abstract, some are simply more subtle or place less import on it..
I don't think Pendleton would allow a bad Adventure time game to happen.
At least I hope not...
I would think it would be more a case of being wary of someone outside the games industry being interested in making a video when they have no real business doing it. I think skill sets from other industries can overlap (television to literature to film etc. etc.) but rarely do they ever do well in video gaming other than in voice/motion capture realm.
He should make an Adventure Time game like the Way of the Samurai series: plenty of fighting, optional grinding/collecting, and short individual playthroughs with a strong emphasis on repeated playthroughs to build up your guy and find new stuff.
Now that the defense of Mr. Ward is over, the thoughts you presented here are quite valid-- games that put story front and center, but have horrid gameplay, aren't all they're cracked up to be.
While I agree that story isn't necessary for a great gaming experience and in several instances a shoe-horned story has gotten in the way of a good experience (the non-RPG Mario games shouldn't even pretend to have a story), I don't think that P-Money Ward should be discouraged from trying to include a potentially killer story in his possible game. Also, as Phoenix Gamma mentions, putting "story" front and center doesn't necessarily mean a Kojima-esque plot. Do we know how Pendleton even defines "story"?
I think his argument is that there's too much focus on multiplayer over singleplayer but story doesn't mean boring TALK TALK TALK that we see in RPGs or Metal Gear or something. Shadow of the Colossus tells a touching story with maybe one page of dialog and you feel like it's complete at the end.
To me, it's not that narrative games are bad, but they don't often feel like they fully utilize the medium, or that they *need* to be video games. Often it feels to me almost like watching a movie while you're playing a game that's totally separate.
It can be a style over substance kind of thing and completely not in a negative way in regards to well-crafted memorable storytelling.
Take a licensed game like say the Futurama one; it may not have some epic RPG storyline but because it outright copies and leverages the show's format and style for its storytelling it does make what is there memorable and enjoyable.
I would hope that Mr. Ward is speaking of and looking to something of that nature when it comes to translating Adventure Time into a game. And all that my post did was made me realize how much I want an Invader Zim game and how anxious I am to get my hands on Ninokuni.
It boils down to being about how you say something and not just what you say...something which Studio Ghibli knows and does quite well.
also plot and story are not the same thing
Story coming before gameplay makes me think of Heavy Rain and Enslaved which really isn't a good thing.
But still I keep my fingers crossed; Adventure Time is an excellent show the guy is not stupid lets give him some time and see what he will come up with, I just hope his voice will be loud enough in the middle of a development team he would be probably throw in.
Aw well let's have some faith.
It ends when she's still at the hospital.
Sorry, I had to °_°
Just wanted to be a little annoying =P
@Pittanza:
In the official words of the director, the ending credits' pictures ARE part of the ending (whether you feel it or not) and the mom DOES officially come home cured. Check out "The Art of Totoro" book and you'll that he confirms the credits as part of the story.
Don't think of story as a sprawling epic tale. Think of story as meaningful interaction between characters, down to King Dedede does bad things for good reasons, and kirby doesn't get this. Or how the scout eats the heavies sandwiches. Hell Portal 2 has an amazing story.
Please stop misunderstanding story and sending the message it's okay to underutilize this basic structure of entertainment.
Which is part of the storytelling :/
I think you missed something crucial here Holmes. A story in games isn't a set script for the main story. It's so much more than that.
Those characters, the world and everything revolving around them and your interactions to them are all part of the storytelling. Without that story to flesh out the characters and the world, you just don't have those characters or that world. They become meaningless.
Characterization is a key part of the story.
Ok, look at FF6 (or 3, depending). What if we removed the story altogether. Now what do we have? JRPG turned combat and...what? Nothing. The characters are part of the storytelling. As is the background history, the world and so on. Without that you have basic gameplay elements.
No Kefka, no memorable moments, just a generic, bland game.
Same for 7, 8, 9 and so on.
Or look at the Elder Scroll series. Oblivion has a main quest, but that's only a small piece of a large game. But the level of storytelling is undeniable. You have dozens and dozens of unique characters and stories that flesh out the world and make it feel alive.
Even Batman Arkham Asylum has a story. Very few games don't. What you seem to be thinking of is "just" the idea of a main campaign story and nothing else like a Hollywood script or something.