Games Are "Far More Powerful" Than Movies for Storytelling, EA CEO Says

The medium of video games is "far more powerful" than film in terms of storytelling potential. That's according to Electronic Arts CEO Andrew Wilson, who said this week during the GamesBeat conference in San Francisco that the power of the Xbox One and PlayStation 4 will allow developers to create richer and deeper characters and narratives.

"We're going to start to see much more believable characters and much more immersive storylines in the games that we make--even in sports games--by virtue of what these boxes can deliver," Wilson said. "And I think you start to see things that would have traditionally only have manifested themselves in film start to manifest in interactive, which is a far more powerful medium to tell a story."

Wilson went on to say that the three "core components" of building an immersive virtual world are: "A world that reacts like you would expect it react; believable characters that emote like you would expect them to emote; and then how you interact with them."

"We're going to start to see much more believable characters and much more immersive storylines in the games that we make" -- Andrew Wilson

Also during the talk, Wilson was asked how virtual reality and augmented reality could affect the way in which gamers become immersed in what they're playing. Wilson said both technologies are "multipliers." For consoles specifically, Sony is working on Project Morpheus for PS4, while Microsoft is tinkering with VR prototypes, and maybe even AR.

Despite his optimism for VR and AR, Wilson cautioned that developers need to be careful about how they approach the uncanny valley--the "creepy" psychological effect that occurs when graphics get too real. Wilson isn't deeply worried about this becoming an issue, however, as it represents yet another area that video games are better-suited to address than film, he argued.

"How we bridge that gap is going to really tell a lot about how creative our industry is," he said. "And I think we are better positioned by virtue of where we've come from to do that better than the film industry has."

What is your reaction to Wilson's comments about video games vs. film? Let us know in the comments below!

Eddie Makuch is a news editor at GameSpot, and you can follow him on Twitter @EddieMakuch