David Cage, maker of such laughable trite as Heavy Rain and Indigo Prophecy, just gave a speech at GDC.
http://kotaku.com/#!5775640/a-plea-for-games-to-grow-up
He said absurd, stupid, insane things, but he’s always done that. That isn’t what makes this a sign of the industry’s imminent death. What does that is, even if Kotaku is embellishing in reporting, the developers attending all ate out of the palm of his hand. They loved it. They took notes, they cheered, they applauded. They heard this swan song and leapt to join in the chorus.
This is it. No one can possibly believe the industry isn’t two steps from death. Even the hardcore gamers who flock hang around Kotaku are chewing Cage out in the comments. What Cage said, what our ‘wise developers’ were overjoyed to agree with, is hated even by the most blindly loyal customers the industry has. Perhaps what’s most depressing though, is this bit:
“Across the hall from his speech I went, to one made by a designer at LucasArts named Kent Hudson. The Game Developers Conference is an embarassment of braininess, and I believed I’d made the right call as Hudson tried to explain the better way to tell game stories. Hudson noticed that many game designers create some exceptionally visually impressive areas of their games, areas so attractive that they signal that they are the locations that matter, the places where important things happen in the game. They are, he said, “a subtle dis to the player,” a reminder that what the gamer does in the game isn’t as crucial as the narative the game creator made. It’s a problem, Hudson was saying. It tells the player: “the story is important; you’re not.” That was good stuff, but the Twitter buzz from Cage’s room across the hall was strong.”
All of this is completely true, it’s exactly what people need to hear. It’s what deserved the hushed reverence and note taking. Instead, they rushed for the exact opposite with open arms and gushed about what a repeat-failure developer said they should do.
I know I shouldn’t be stunned, but even now this still stuns me. And with Nintendo looking like they’re going completely off the rails, what could gaming possibly have left after the end?
I like how Totilio writes that Heavy Rain is a ‘hit’ with almost 2 million sold. So, by those standards, should Luigi’s Mansion be considered a ‘mega-hit’ since it sold more than 2 million? With all the hype and heavy marketing, Heavy Rain’s sales are definitely not ‘hit level’. A ‘hit’ is Wii Sports. A ‘hit’ is Mario Kart Wii. A ‘hit’ is Tetris. A ‘hit’ is Grand Theft Auto 3. Let’s not call games that escaped bombing ‘hits’.
Cage is telling these developers exactly what they want to hear (which is why developers HATE us as we say things they do NOT want to hear). Game developers only want to hear one thing: that they need to be creative angels and put aside the ‘rules’ of gaming (because creative angels transcend rules, right?).
People say the Game Industry has ‘grown up’. I disagree. The Game Industry is still in the child-like stage similar to the dreamy eyed creative-writing student who ‘has a story inside him waiting to be told!’.
Video games are not my business. I’m just writing about them as a quaint observer. However, story telling is more my turf. Hearing game developers talk about doing ‘stories’ is like hearing a ditzy blonde say she wishes to be an engineer but not learn the ‘math’.
The reason why there are so many crap stories out there in movies, television, books, and even games is because there is no appreciation for the craft. In fact, storytelling is not even considered a craft by these people. They think that just because they can make a game means they are qualified to be a story teller. “Programming a computer is harder than being a story teller, right?” It isn’t. Here’s the proof.
Writing is a skill that everyone in an educated nation can do. It is mainstream. Yet, despite that, very, very few people can write a story that sells for money. Stephen King remarked that if you could write a story, sell it, and use the money to pay your electric bill, then he would consider you talented. The competition is fierce and the craftsmanship often takes a lifetime. Just because someone can write doesn’t mean they can tell a story. Despite that, the competent storyteller talent is only developed by around 0.001% of the population.
Video game developers are such a small percentage of the population. The odds that such a small sample would also be able to be competent storytellers is too small to count. Video game developers should focus on making video games instead. They would make more money and wouldn’t annoy the customers.
If someone was actually serious about storytelling, wouldn’t they realize, “This seems to be a rare success. This means that the popular thoughts about storytelling must all be wrong or else there would be more successful storytellers.” But they never think this.
I think this is actually a bigger and broader issue than we think. What I believe is going on is that these people have frustrations in their own lives and believe the only way to be fulfilled is to ‘unleash their creativity’. This problem isn’t just with game developers or even with the entertainment industry. It has spread to professions such as scientists. Imagine that! A scientist who wants to be ‘creative’ (not meaning in the ‘clever’ context). You would only end up with the destruction of science. It is the mistaken notion that in order to be a fulfilled human being, one must be ‘creative’. One must become the ‘artist’ to truly be Human. What horseshit! All the ‘great artists’ didn’t believe in creativity as is defined today. The modern notion of creativity is modern. It came into widespread use only around fifty or seventy years ago.
In the 1980s, the people who went into video games were engineers and mathematicians. Part of this was because only they could understand and program the computers at the time. But also, it was because gaming was seen in a very mathematical way. Think of the earliest RPGs where everything was stats heavy with little to no “story”. Today, the Game Industry is unfortunately infested with hordes of “I-have-a-story-with-me” types. They do not wish to make games but only to make experiences. Woe to us for the definition of RPG now means ‘story telling’. The results are the wonders such as Final Fantasy XIII. Miyamoto has said in public that his staff keeps trying to insert story into games like Mario. In some instances (such as Galaxy 1), the story is inserted behind Miyamoto’s back. If someone understands how to make video games, it would be Miyamoto. But even his own staff defies him. This problem is out of control.
(What I find interesting is that the most popular RPG game in the world is still World of Warcraft [which is heavy on the math/balance and very light on the ‘story’].)
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