Quote:
Originally Posted by Marduk
How would you challenge the players mind further with story alone without creating a hostile ‘avant-garde’ (if the term can apply) feeling to the way we react to the story?
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My answer is clear (at least in my mind
): by giving the player an actual freedom of choice. Are you familiar with the old
Quest for Glory series? Let's say that you are in front of a locked door. Perhaps, you want to knock it down; perhaps, I want to find an alternate route inside (maybe breaking a window) and perhaps another player want to actually retrieve the correct key. In literature, the character is a complex amalgam of traits (psychological, emotional, historical - all things that the superior narrative of adventure games, if done well, perfectly conveys) but also of actions (choices, actual actions, decisions).
Now, I stand by my point that - no matter how elaborate the story of a FPS or RPG (I played Oblivion, Morrowind, The Witcher, Fallout 3 - just to name a few recent ones) can be - adventures, if done well, have a superior narrative, more intimate, more deep and poignant, thanks to their meditative (and
sometimes breath-taking or heart-pounding) pace and to their focus on character, plot, Spannung, dialogues, etc. If adventures can incorporate in this narrative multiple paths, even in the form of optional tasks (like GK3 or Under a Killing Moon, or Conquests of the Longbow), they will succeed in bring the story to the next level.
