| JinxRake said: This is fast becoming a discussion of its own. Your test is flawed by the fact that you are pitting together two different mediums of which only one will be able to perform on its strengths. If I put up Se7en versus Heavy Rain, I'm pretty certain not many will be impressed by the later. The scene where you saw off one finger, an action at a time, will be that much less dramatic simply because the audience is not part of it. Make the audience play the whole thing and have them do the deed and you may get very different reactions. My girlfriend is a squeamish person. She doesn't like horror films or gore that much, but she loved Heavy Rain to bits. Having asked her what she felt was more impressive, the head bit from Se7en or the finger bit from Heavy Rain, she always goes for the later.
It's apples to oranges here. You said we talk about stories and not interactivity...but interactivity determines story impact in games. I've had friends sit down and play Flower on my PS3 after they had watched me do the first levels. Their reactions quickly went from "Yeah, it looks pretty" to silent concentration as they played, to feelings of loss in the 5th level and a grand feeling of joy and elation as they reached the city. I've watched my friends go through curiosity of the first few levels, to smiles as they rode the wind, to a brooding concentration as they navigated the electric lines and finally to wide smiles as they brought the city back to life. Watching something and being part of it are two different things. That's why games cannot be measured on the same scale as films or books. They are not films, nor books, but their own thing with their own set of tools by which to engage the audience.
So I can't agree to your test because by taking away a game's interactivity - be it wide areas of exploration or simple quick time events -, you defang it and force it to be something it is not. |
I agree that my test will force something out of games that is part of the enjoyment. But this thread is about story/plot, and that is not ported through interactivity. Surely, to judge the game as a whole, you need all parts. But that's not the story. and that's what I'm talking about, the story of no game so far is as good as the stories presented in good movies or books. That doesn't mean games are inferior as a form of art. Poems, paintings or songs are not as good in presenting a story (even games are better at that), but that doesn't make them inferior forms of art. They have different strengths. That the same for games. Storytelling is not the strength of games. But I see some potential to become better at that front too. That's why I was interested in the interview (and felt letdown by the actual content).
