Video Games To Tell Stories
Connor Strange
Staff Writer
She hides, bow drawn to full and warm breath frosting the winter air. Twang! the arrow whispers at it shoots forward to bury itself in the flank of a buck.
This is one of the many scenes in Naughty Dog Entertainment’s “The Last of Us”, an adventure game that follows a smuggler named Joel in post-apocalyptic North America. His task is to smuggle a mysterious young girl out of a quarantined zone to a group of freedom fighters, but the seemingly simple task develops into a cross-country trek during which Joel gathers a fatherly love for the strange girl.
Naughty Dog’s writers are experts at storytelling after their successful “Uncharted” series, and it shows again in “The Last of Us” throughout the entire experience. All of the characters are convincing in their own way, the dialogue is phenomenal and the plot is riveting with an ending that leaves the player morally conflicted. The game is one of the best I’ve played in years, telling a story that stuck with me far more than that of any blockbuster film in the last few months. Even better, I was privileged to be a part of that story by controlling Joel.
“The Last of Us” isn’t the only impressive feat of writing in gaming. “Dishonored” from Arkane Studios exercises the possibility of multiple endings with an amazing fluidity, yet the gameplay remained too fun to put down. Neither books nor films come with the variation in storytelling that these video games bring to the table; “The Stanley Parable” was a quirky indie game with over 20 endings and a hilarious narrator to boot.
A lot of games don’t even need dialogue to tell engaging tales, where most films and books do. “Shadow of the Colossus” shows a boy named Wander, armed with only a sword and a bow, take on giant, enigmatic enemies the size of skyscrapers to save his dying love. Not a word is said by Wander (aside from yelling his horse’s name), yet the player has a deep desire for the boy to succeed against all odds.
“Journey” by Thatgamecompany is perhaps an even better example of plotline without words. It takes a little less than an hour to complete the entire game, but it was praised from head to heel for its ingenuity. All the player knows at the start is that he or she controls a little person made of cloth, and that it needs to reach the peak of a distant mountain. From only that information and a few vague visions, a very interesting world is formed.
Other successful titles have explored the idea of open, explorable worlds with hardly any limitation. Bethesda’s “The Elder Scrolls” series uses that theme in its five installments. None of those games have a particularly strong central plot, but the story is crafted by the controller’s adventures. No one person has the same tale to tell after sinking countless hours into the world of Tamriel.
Voice acting is generally quite important in larger story-based games like “The Last of Us”, and it has reached a point at which a good voice actor entirely immerses players in the fictional web being spun. Troy Baker starred in both Naughty Dog’s latest title, and “Bioshock: Infinite”, which also received praise for its engrossing plot.
Success in video games is becoming more and more focused on who can tell the best story. Sure, there are still a lot of games with no plot--those which work on the playing rather than the telling. However, the ones with the most critical acclaim prove that games can flesh out their stories better than any other medium.
Video games shouldn’t all be looked upon as mindless, violent murder-fests. A lot of them show character development and heavy moral decisions. The mindlessly violent ones are pretty fun, though.
