Several months ago I started a thread (for quest purposes) boldly claiming that "Stargate" the movie was better than "Stargate: SG-1," despite never seeing the show beyond catching a few moments here or there. My experience with it when thusly -
Guy pulls out laser pistol, laser pistol makes dumb noise and sticks up like a cobra, adhering to "snake" and "egypt" aesthetic. me: "that's the dumbest thing i've ever seen." *click*
Then my wife suggested we watch the show (she being a long-time fan of the series) in earnest. I take her up on the challenge, and netflix having recently put the entire 10 season run up on instant watch was happy to take our 9 bucks a month and oblige. We just started season 5. I am legitimately hooked on this show. Richard Dean Anderson *owns* that role. and I am so very close to getting my wife to wear an airforce jumpsuit like major carter. for halloween. next year. your gross.
The film still holds a special place in my heart for being awesome and spawning this ruthless bastard. But I'm definitely eating my words here.
I'll try to keep this post shorter. despite the fact I have so much crap to say on the matter.
If theres one thing that can make or break a story for me its the motivations of the antagonist. There are so many games out there you'd think that more than a few of them would deviate from the "rule the world/ immortality/ change the world because of revenge for loss/ etc" motivation set. I can understand how naturally you can build a game around a threat stemming from villains whose motivations consist of "RULE THE WORLD! ARGH!" And I can see the allure of the clear-cut good vs evil themes that come from those particular motivations. I can also see how easily accepted and instantly recognizable those themes are to the audience in this day and age (what with the over-saturation of said themes and all). So I understand how they are so prevalent in video games and stories. And since the interwebernets grant me a big fat virtual soapbox i'll boldly as why.
So the writer has been given a task to create this narrative that is intended to do many things: Build an appealing world, create appealing characters, and move the plot forward in a fluid and engrossing manner. To me the most important question is "how come this stuff is happening?" I'm an artsy guy, so I can really appreciate the work thats gone into the aesthetics and stylish design of the worlds and characters. As a computer animator, I cant help but dig myself into the animation of all the characters, the subtle nuances in the cutscenes, the acting choices and posing, how BA it looks when that dude's axe of contemptuous tastelessness shears the carapace of a giant scorpion that has boobs for some reason. But without some sort of motivation its all just a tech demo. or an alpha build at best.
this is coming out short at all. sorry, I'll try to get to the dang point.
I think ruling the world is a stupid reason for somebody to strive for power. Why would you want to rule the world? You'd be responsible for everyone on the planet. Every little BS thing that goes wrong is either because of you, or you're expected to fix it. And you might think "well, who cares about the peons? let 'em rot! I'm KING, baby!" which is a definite stance to take. But to what end? the peons "rot," and end up killing themselves. and the planet goes to chaos all around you while you're sitting in your tower not DOING anything. pretty soon its just you in a pretty place. congratulations, you've reduced your world to a tech demo!
Maybe I'm exaggerating, but it seems that these conquering villains havent thought this thing through very well. They love that goal-orientation of "conquer this, then I conquer THAT! and then muhahahahah!" Sure, that journey can be exciting. but its a journey that ends. It ends with you in a lonely tower, ultimately king over a people of one. unless, you know, you WANT to help settle land disputes and office worker grievances for the rest of your life. and oh, whats that?
you also cant friggin' die?
Immortality is even more ridiculous. ESPECIALLY when paired with ruling the world. Twilight is dumb, but I think stephanie meyer nailed it when she showed just how effing BORING everything is. living forever is boring. twilight is BORING. dakota fanning looks like a MR F with her off-center red contacts.
the riff-trax for the twilight flicks are very choice, btw.
I'll spare you any more and expound on this later, since I'm a long-winded kind of fool.
23 Comments
If theres one thing I love and also lament about the current plethora of moral choice in video games, it's that its so black and white. You're either good or you're bad. In gaming terms the accomplishments are appropriate; you want to save the world and get the blue sword of awesome righteous judgement (for +100 moral halo points). Or, F all you polygonal tertiary characters, I'm going to rule this land with my red axe of contemptuous tastelessness! White hat, or black hat.
It used to be you were always good, no matter what. Thats what games were- hero tales, with you as the savior of princesses or whatever. This is a concept we're all intimately familiar with, and its ground I wont bother covering. Except to mention that as a personal theory, games with that motivation have programmed me to (despite my overt attempts not to) always be a good guy. This isn't necessarily a bad thing, in the real world. I'm a nice guy. My mommy's proud of me.
I'll cut to the chase. I'm unimpressed with the rate (or lack thereof) of general character development in games. They are either simplified to either target young children; new gamers, or to hit that nostalgic nerve for older gamers. Or they are overly contrived and focus-grouped to hit that "adult" market. the 18-49 demo that makes or breaks a game's success. I've only played the first Gears of War, and i thought it was a great game, a lot of fun to play!i like shooting things and dystopic, other-worldy battlegrounds with huge monsters. But I was not interested in the plight of Marcus Fenix and his motley crew of jacked bros. (the cole train made me laugh tho, admittedly. he was my favorite.) Its not simply because i couldnt "relate" to the characters or not. Thats a pretty poor assessment, since im a 20-something white kid from the midwest. Theres nothing i have in common with the people on screen other than the fact that (according to the characters bio) we both have boy-parts in the pants region.
I admit things are always getting better in the gaming world. The inclusion of choices an multiple endings that reflect those choices is a huge step-up in storytelling. or at least, in immersion. Though some could argue that choice within games shackles the game writers, and instead of writing a coherent story with a well-defined and clearly displayed arc for the main protagonist they're stuck writing the same story a half-dozen times, each with a slightly altered (though ultimately the same) ending. This catering to the 'choice' mechanic, if not handled wisely, can really muck up a game's story. And it could possibly really make an exciting tale of damsel-rescue with an exciting "alternate castle" twist nearly impossible to understand. Motivation for a character is as important in video games now as it was in cave drawings back in the 70s or whenever.
I'm rambling. But what i want to say is that i would like to see more grey characters in games. Grey characters are the Wolverines, the Malcom Reynolds, the... I cant think of any others at the moment. And that could be another problem. In any case, these are the characters that make "neutral" not such a lukewarm, wishy-washy word.
Episode 4 Han Solo! there we go.
Perhaps its too much to hope for at this time. Perhaps asking for an end-game ultimate weapon that reflects your moral ambiguity (spear of meh? flail of indecision?) is too much. Maybe an ending where both good AND bad things happen, a bittersweet "save-the-world, lose the cheerleader" ending is too difficult to incorporate into a game thats already 40+ hours of "smack the old man and take his wallet or give the old man flowers and cancer cure."
I like morally grey characters. I think they're far more interesting than the sensitive good guys and the cruel, sadistic pricks that choice games have generally been corraling us into being. I know as games get more elaborate and complex these things I want will come to pass. probably. hopefully.
Log in to comment