GameSpotting


 Bruce Geryk
GameSpot Contributor
Now Playing: International Cricket Captain, Squad Battles: Vietnam, Space Empires: IV

Recent Favorites: Starfleet Command 2, Combat Mission

 All-Time Favorites: Seven Cities of Gold, M.U.L.E., Eastern Front 1941

Why Are Game Stories So Bad?

I'm going to save you a lot of time and energy by stating right off the bat that I don't have the faintest idea what the answer to the above question is. Actually, I should say I know what the answer is, but I'm not about to say it, because it's not something many of you are going to like.

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Max Payne: A morality play in three parts? Or just a good-looking shooter?
One thing I've learned about writing about computer games is that you always give the people what they want, which is to simply confirm what they're already thinking--or at least to say something vague enough that it probably can be construed as validating their opinions. For example: "This game has both good and bad points, but if you're the type of person who likes this kind of game, then the good points will probably outweigh the bad." I just wrote a free computer game review for you. Insert whatever the title of whatever game you're thinking of buying in place of "this game," put Adrenaline Vault or PC Gamer or Time Magazine at the top, and you've just read an accurate review of most of the computer games you could buy at the store today. Go ahead and buy one. Even if you only play it for an hour, that is infinity times the number of times you watched the last two DVDs you bought. Both of those things cost $40. This conclusively proves that any random computer game is worth infinitely more than Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon plus some anime film.

 
 Do you think great games require great stories?

Yes
No
Doesn't matter

 
Recently, I've been hearing a lot about how some game called Max Payne has a good story but bad dialogue, or a bad story and terrible dialogue, or how 45 out of 50 reviews like the dialogue pretty much, which is good enough for Scott Miller, thanks. I haven't played the game, so I'm sure all these opinions could be right. But I get a kick out of hearing how the game would be better if the game had a good story, as if that were even possible.

When someone asks me if I want to check out an interesting story with great dialogue, the first question I ask is not, "Which computer game are we going to play?" The best computer game story I've ever seen was the one where my orc-man kept getting extra strength and dexterity points, or whatever. There was some kind of rationale for this, but since the rest of the game just consisted of me clicking my mouse as fast as I could for about five hours, it didn't really make a whole lot of difference. Still, I didn't need a really clever reason for the fact that two strength points from now I would get to use a cool new sword, because that in itself was pretty much good enough for me.

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Women gamers could identify with the strong, memorable title character found in Ms. Pac-Man.
If you ever talk to a computer game intellectual (or someone who plays adventure games, which is the same thing), you'll eventually get a lecture about how games need to transcend gaming clichés and have real stories that are on par with those of great literature. Of course, these great stories account for the overwhelming popularity of great literature today, so it's only natural that game designers and their midget henchmen want to get in on a bit of this action for themselves. Pac-Man was good, but once Ms. Pac-Man came along to give the whole ghost-chasing and fruit-eating story some emotional depth and context, the franchise had to be taken seriously as art. And since turning computer games into art is the ultimate goal of anyone who has ever made it to the end of an adventure game, it's easy to see how the stakes can quickly rise to dangerous levels.

Games don't have interesting stories because they don't need them. When I'm playing a computer game, what I'm really doing is pretending that there is no anatomy skills exam on Monday and that it is just as important to infiltrate the gnoll stronghold as it is to know whether or not neuroligin-1 induces synaptic differentiation. In fact, I'm not even thinking about that complicated stuff because games exist to make me forget that it even exists. I don't need some literary device to distract me from the fact that I haven't studied neuroanatomy in two weeks. Clicking on the blood hawk things every two seconds will do just fine.
 

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