If You Could Change Things In Games...

[Kriven]

Video games are still developing as a narrative medium... and I think, and studios are finally figuring this out, that the stories of the medium are usually better told in a less direct manner than we're accustomed to by novels and movies. Instead of following the linear storyline and the pacing being controlled by the author, games have the ability to throw you into a conflict or a world and allow you to travel at your own pace and explore, even if the game is structure in a way that drives you towards a single conclusion. Mario gets to be a badass action hero or a whimsical, meandering oaf depending on who's controlling him.

Anyway, it's a whole new way of actually crafting stories, and the authors are still trying to find their sea legs.

I think the unique method of storytelling and world-building in games is also part of why adapting them to film hasn't really worked out very well. It's difficult to create a situation out of Mario's first encounter with the Hammer Bros. when that isn't something which has been previously scripted, but something which the player orchestrated as they went along.

Edit: Actually, that's a bad example.

It's more like one version of the Mario story is a lengthy, grueling on-foot trek through a cursed kingdom crawling with koopa cronies, but if you tried to convey every stage as a straight narrative, it would become extremely stale. So much of games narrative is dependent upon the time actually spent playing the game in ways that just don't translate particularly well.

I'm not disagreeing with anything you said, Rapidkibry, just kind of exploring the idea of narratives in gaming since you more-or-less brought it up.