Games Aren't Numbers

Story in a game is like a story in a porn movie. It's expected to be there, but it's not that important.

GameSpot AU featured an article about videogame narratives, which gives a very simple overview of the topic and seems to present narratives as a problem needing fixing. The feature introduces itself with the question, “are video games an effective storytelling medium?” I loathe questions like these. “Are videogames art?” “Can a videogame make you cry?” Let's just say the answer is no, and maybe everyone will stop trying to theorize games into irrelevant concepts and we can all just appreciate them in their own context.

Do, for example, illustration websites run features asking “is an illustration an effective storytelling medium?” Of course not, since I imagine illustration artists generally feel pretty secure about their craft and don't feel like it has to answer to another medium's standard. And besides, everyone agrees you can tell a story with a picture anyway. So why do discussions like these consistently come up in gaming communities? There are plenty of games with effective narratives (whatever an “affective” narrative is). I simply don't see the need to have these kinds of discussions. Interestingly, a lot of games most recognized for their narratives, for example The Last Express and Killer 7, are absent from GameSpot's article.

And while I'm on the subject of things that irk me, here's the description of the second person that article interviews: “Denis Dutton, professor of philosophy at the University of Canterbury in Christchurch, New Zealand... spent some time with Grand Theft Auto and BioShock to get a sense of how stories in games develop and work alongside gameplay.” Maybe I'm crazy, but I can't imagine what the point of including the opinion of someone who has “spent some time” with two whole games, much less taking that opinion seriously. Reading further, his understanding of videogames reflects his experience:

There’s a deep division between the concept of a story as it has come down through tradition and the concept of a story as it is in video game...they are, at their very heart, games and not stories.

video games combine these traditional elements with interactivity.

Other storytelling mediums draw us into the inner lives of other people. Video games must learn to do the same. We as players must become completely absorbed in the fate and lives of the fictional characters on screen. It remains to be seen whether game developers can achieve this.

I'm sure not everything he said made it into the final edit, so here's what I imagine some of the deleted content looked like:

Indeed, the many minutes I spent toying with the popular video games Grand Theft Auto and BioShock have led me to believe that video games are, in fact, interactive. The real question is, can developers create a game without the inclusion of firearms? Based on my observations the answer is a resounding 'no.'

Indeed, thank you for that insight.