i don't understand the hate for dredmor's graphics

I find the presentation of DoD charming. The art style is rustic in a good way, and the sprites are well-crafted. I especially like the little portrait that gives me doom flashbacks all the way through.
I actually prefer sprites and 2d artwork to CGI most of the time.

You should play "To The Moon". It's an amazing example of how a story can drive a game as much as gameplay can.

 

I don't debate the premise that story can drive gameplay. I just don't think most game storyies are truly as engaging as pure stories, where the writer doesn't have to worry about gameplay first and foremost- because games do. Any game with a good story but pathetic gameplay is only a could have been, while a game with great gameplay and virtually no story is still a great game. Thus why presentation is low on the list of things that make a game great, but still a part of what makes a game great.

 

Of course the best games would utilize the game-play and integrate it into the story. Video games are an interactive medium, and letting the player interact in the story that you have created is generally how one makes a story game, not a game where the player is forced to endure an info dump.

 

I agree that stories aren't really important for most games, if those games are well-made. For players, the story in the game should be just one of many answers to the question "why am I playing it?". It's nice when some game has a nice story, but to be honest, stories in games are only there to interact with the characters to increase the probability of the player getting attached to said characters and thus showing emotions that we want him to show.

As to why most games have uninteresting story lines, it's pretty simple. Just like with everything else, to create a story, one must have talent for that, or sufficient experience to emulate it. Yet, the companies regard the process of writing story lines to people who don't necessarily specialize in it, because they don't want the ability to get such people. Honestly, even there, how many of us can say that we'd be able to create a story that made sense for an entire game?

Yeah, it's a nice game, crafted to present a story.

At this point I wanted to recommend Quintessence: the Blighted Venom, but then I noticed that they're games by the same person.
Though I hesitate to call Q:tBV a game - it's more of a story with occasional gameplay. But it's alright, really.

Some campaigns in Battle for Wesnoth also have adequate stories, which is especially nice when you look at the fact that most campaigns interweave to create a history of the world.

And there's also Star Stealing Prince, which is short but has an, erm, nice story.

And Immortal Defence, even though the story is presented in a rather abstract way because of what our character is.

Basically, you can start by getting the hint that is the fact all of those games are indie games. There, the chance of people actually knowing how to write a story go up, because they don't make games for a living; they do a wide assortment of jobs, with some of them possibly being writers, and they just created games because they wanted to. That is not to say that games made by larger companies can't have good stories (Planescape: Torment, for all it takes, has a nice story even if not a great one).

 

Are people missing the * where it says that not all games need even have a story to be great games? In those that do, however, story is very high ranking for me.

If your definition of story is a linear line of text in which a story is told, well, obviously games cannot ever have great story, because they're interactive. That is a book. If your definition of story is an excellently crafted world (in the world development context) with an engaging plot with well foreshadowed, but not apparent twists and turns that takes the consumer on a trip through a different place and deposits him at the end, then any game with story has the potential to have great story. Do most games? Most unfortunately, no.

I can think of several games which I consider to have used the gaming medium to tell excellent stories, but I don't really wish to become embroiled in an argument of taste in absence of the point I am making.

I would also say 'presentation' (especially with the listed example of Bastion, which I agree with a lot) goes above originality and ease of use. How something is presented may involve a bit of story, art / graphics, sound and user interface, but it need not be 'original' to be presented superbly nor need it be the most intuitive in input. But, the most original, most easy to learn to play game which is presented terribly cannot ever be better than the least original, moderately easy to learn to play game which has the best presentation possible. I love originality, but I hate it at the expense of a fun game, especially when it gets hyped to death by the player base. I also HATE when the only thing people have to say bad (but loudly) about an incredibly fun game is how unoriginal it is.

 

Nay, we just want to discuss the whole thing thoroughly. And that means we started talking about "story versus no story" thing, too.

I think it's the latter. Definitely the latter.

I don't know. Though personally I would be glad if you chose to list those examples - maybe that way I'll find another game I'd love to play.

I agree with that. It's nice if a game is original, but it's not a requirement that always has to be fulfilled,

 

I think a good example of this was the Thief series, where it was a first-person game but unlike other FPs, it wasn't a shooter. Getting in fights was a good way to lose very quickly.

 

So I think we all agree that games don't need story, but it's nice to have a decent one when story is offered. BUT, as a writer, I feel compelled to reply to this:

It's true I happen to feel that books are the best mode of storytelling. If I didn't, I wouldn't be an author, now would I? But they're not the only one. Movies, music and stage plays all allow for storytelling as well. So do video games, monologues and conversations, and probably a lot of other things I'm not thinking of right now.

But some mediums are inherently better for telling good stories. A conversation or a monologue can get interrupted, music is constrained by rhythm and sometimes rhyme, movies and plays are only as good as their actors and producers (unless the script is worse, but see next). But they all have two limitations in common - they story is only as good as the storyteller's skill and the audience's imagination. That's the only real limits a book has.

Video games have three really major weaknesses that will always, always, make them worse mediums for storytelling than books.

1) A story is action. It's a main character deciding to do things, with every decision and its consequences carefully orchestrated to lead to character growth and build to climax of the story, where the protagonist's decisions are weighed against his antagonist's on the scales of circumstance and the outcome of the story is decided. Everything in the story fits together like a clockwork chainax and hums like thaumites at feeding time.

Games have a player, not a protagonist. Players are all different, and will make different decisions at least once during the game. As a result, the game's story must either be left untuned enough to adapt to whatever the player decides, giving things less weight, or the player's decisions can have no effect on the story at all. Which is lame.

2) Stories chase the protagonist up a tree. Then they throw rocks at him. The main character should always be under pressure, always be looking for a new solution, and always facing uncertainty and changing circumstances. There can be no mercy, no relent and no lucky break. This is how you build narrative tension up to that climax. The audience demands a logical, consistent story, and they demand that the protagonist make his own breaks by skill and/or persistence.

Games need to offer a degree of certainty, need mostly consistent rules and should offer a catch-up so that less skilled players can still enjoy the game. That's why there's powerups left lying all over the place, or slapping a bandage on your arm will heal a gut-shot. Video games just aren't flexible enough to offer every possible out to the player, they're programmers would never get them done, so instead they offer totally illogical catch-ups. Supply drops. Conveniently unguarded sewer grates. Bullets that magically pop out of half spent clips and into a huge pool of ammo that is always in entirely full magazines for later use. On the whole, you spend the majority of time in most games feeling collected and in control of your situation. And who would want to play them if you didn't? But that doesn't make for stellar storytelling.

3) This one's more technical and less overarching, and some games can overcome it, but stories need dialogue and interaction. The characters have to interact with each other. A lot. The parts of a story that would be interaction in a game typically wind up being gameplay. After all, games need gameplay to be a game. Otherwise you just have a movie or a graphic novel (I'm looking at you, Xenogears disc 2).

Some games can be entirely about dialogue and interaction. And I guess they overcome this problem. But a part of me recoils from really calling this a game. It strikes me more as a choose your own adventure story. I read those in middle school, and they were fun and all, but I've kinda outgrown them.

Now that I've spill all those pixels and lost a tiny portion of my life to growing carpal tunnel, let me say that I'm not opposed to stories in video games. Quite the opposite. I love video games with stories. I just don't feel that there will ever bee a video game on my top ten stories list. I'm OK with that. I understand that the game makers have other priorities than making a perfect story, and sometimes those priorities will conflict with good story. When that happens, I smile to myself and give them props for making the right choice - Gameplay first.

 

I kind of realized we're way off topic (since this thread was about graphics, not the mechanics or merits of story in games, heh), so I think I'll refrain from anymore discussion besides to say that I think you bring up good points but I don't entirely agree with all of your conclusions.

 

*likes Dungeons of Dredmor's graphics and art style... likes NetHack's "graphics" and "art style" too*

 

I wrote an article a year or several back about this sort of thing.

http://geekmontage.com/texts/modern-games-verses-real-games/

 

Most "modern" games with 1337 upgraded aw3s0m3 graphix pale in comparison to some of the stuff indie companies and devs put out for fun factor alone. Minecraft is one of the most successful examples of recent origin. It has a simple premise, but it is fun and totally addictive to play. Dungeons of Dredmor brings together EVERYTHING I personally like about Roguelike games, and the art style was a big plus for me as well, since we have something brought to the table that isn't all ASCII art (not that it makes a difference to me; I just find it very refreshing from ASCII art and sprite packs.) Most "modern" games are hardly any good as far as playing is concerned. I wouldn't touch many of THEM with ten foot poles. I would happily play older games with their own flaws just because they're more fun for me. I still play 2D platformers for the same reason.

Graphics do not make a game but they shouldn't hurt the eyes either.

 

Infinitely correct.
IMO Graphics should:

A) Convey what is happening in the game to you.
B) Not distract from the actual gameplay.
C) Not cause your eyes to implode.

 

I dunno, I see plenty of people still insist on not counting the Wii as a console.

 

To be fair, about graphics, I really don't care about them at all.
I like games in the same way as pointed out above.

However, they still have to be games I want to play, before I'll use the criteria.
Spacechem is not one of them sadly.

Also, regarding Crysis, my computer is a piece of crap that can barely run Diablo 3, and I could run Crysis.
It's also 3 years old, Crysis came out in 2008. I'd be a sad panda if my computer couldn't run it.

There are only certain games that appeal to me. Graphics are not why I don't choose games, after all, I like Roguelikes, and have been playing them since at least 1997. Thank you, AOL game download section way back when.
Also, damn you, Laguf the Snaga for killing me all the time in Angband.

 

Eh, I put up with the "graphics" on the Atari 2600, Atari 5200, and the Colecovision in my youth.

Compared to that, everything looks damn good these days.

I'll agree with what others have said: it's not about hyper-realism or how many polygons each model has - it's about having a cohesive, recognizable aesthetic that you stay true to.

See: Psychonauts, a 8-year-old (or so) game for the original X-box. But, since it uses a hyper-deformed, cartoony style for its characters, they still look good, even today.

 

Really?

Most of the hate I've seen for Dredmor has actually come from the roguelike community, oddly enough - allegations that it isn't a roguelike due to it using sprites instead of ASCII, that GLG is greedy for charging for their roguelike when other roguelikes are free... it's just funny that you see complaints that are literally the exact opposite of the ones I see.

EDIT: Also want to agree that if you're into games where story has the spotlight, To the Moon and Q:tBV are awesome. Kan Gao is awesomely talented and deserves more recognition.

 

I have played Rogue. I actually hated it. But the point is that realism and sprites need not get in the way of fun. DoD has plenty of Fun. It does not matter if a bunch of crazy people decided that DoD is not a Roguelike because it is not what they wanted. They can go bitch about how great Chengband and Angband are while the rest of the entire Earth's populace continues to ignore them and recognize the roots of DoD as a Roguelike.