@blueinheaven said:
Not really we can all see defining points in videogame history. Why has nobody mentioned space invaders? Some games DID change how we view entertainment. There actually was a time when videogames weren't a 'thing'.
Edit: just noticed the huge space invaders screen shot lol. I fail epicly at being pretentious.
I was being a bit pretentious myself by posting that huge Space Invaders screenshot... because no one else was mentioning it.
Glad to see it getting more mentions now. Space Invaders was arguably the most revolutionary video game of all time.
@funsohng said:
So FF7 is the game that started the whole "cinematic" trend? And people call it the "elevation of storytelling" in the medium, not "that fucking game that started the whole cinematic-bullshit-cutscenes-galore bandwagon"?
Let me give a filmic example of "elevation of storytelling," since you all seem to be so enamored in the concept of "cinematic-ness". Basically, the revolution came when Griffith (or Porter, but I personally think he was more transitional figure) used cinematographic close-ups and elaborate editing within scenes to tell the story. Before then, stories were presented like a theatre production, but captured on camera, with dialogues replaced by intertitles, and not shown through visual representation.
Same with gaming. The true elevation of storytelling should be not when it barely copies another medium in a very rudimentary fashion (compared to its source of inspiration), but when it actually tells story through the medium's actual strength, i.e. the ability for the audience to directly interact. If narrative gaming has one thing to learn from cinema, it's the philosophy of focusing on the medium's strength.
Also your point about the whole psychological storyline is not "storytelling," it's just the narrative content.
Popularizing the cinematic trend is still revolutionary in itself. Before FFVII came along, cinematic games were seen as a joke, especially after the Sega CD era, when the industry had enough of FMV gimmicks. But then FF7 came along and used FMV to actually enhance the game rather than just use it like a gimmick. For example, the way in which you move around the 3D polygon characters over an animated FMV background was a revolutionary technique at the time. The script was also huge for its time, with a total word count exceeding most novels and rivalling even the LOTR trilogy when taking into account all the different possible dialogues and side-quests through the game. After FFVII, cinematic games began to be taken seriously. It doesn't matter whether it's a good or bad thing. Many have argued that the likes of Wii Sports and COD4 have had a negative influence, but that doesn't change the fact that they were hugely influential last gen.
But if you meant interactive storytelling, then FFVII did elevate that too in various ways. For example, the Aerith death scene I was referring to earlier. A big reason it was so effective was because of how much the player invested into her development. After spending dozens of hours developing her, it made her death feel like a huge loss to the player. Also, the death scene itself wasn't just cinematic, but also incorporated gameplay. Before her death, the player is struggling to save her, preventing Cloud from being mind-controlled into killing her. After the player finally succeeds in saving her, the player's agency is then denied by a cut-scene that kills her off. The struggle to prevent her death, followed by the denial of the player's agency, and then the huge loss felt after investing so much time and effort into developing her, all added up to make it gaming's most famous death scene.
Other ways in which FFVII used player interaction to elevate the storytelling include things such as the dating sim elements, where the way you respond to and react to fellow party members influenced who Cloud goes on a date with and various other character dialogues along the way. If you chose to focus on dating Aerith, the impact of her death felt even bigger (and there was also even a bromance option with Barett). Another exapmple is the way in which the game starts off in a mostly linear fashion in the closed environment of Midgar, before opening up into a huge (for its time) open world, giving both the characters and the player a sense of being freed from an almost prison-like, dystopian cyberpunk city. And the many different interactive mini-games along the way were also integral to the story, with interactive mini-games often taking the place of dialogues or cut-scenes. The combination of big-budget cinematics with interesting narrative content and player interaction all added up to an overall package that forced the wider industry take notice of the medium's storytelling potential.
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