Gaming is popular for several reasons. The most basic is to pass time. Another is how it makes you feel - satisfied, excited, happy, sad, scared, competitive. Yet another is for socializing.
A game that gives you satisfaction only by succeeding through mechanical button presses is just one way to get that.
| mZuzek said: Yeah, you dragged on for a little bit too long in that OP, the point was already made well before the post was over. I disagree with story and cutscenes not being important. I for one can often feel engaged with a good story in a game, and sometimes a good cinematic moment can get me really pumped up. I agree with the rest, though - quicktime events and easy-to-perform crazy skills aren't fun. |
I found this one SO epic.
| Augen said: I do not mind it, but it is funny and frustrating when it goes "amazing action cut scene" to "boring walking interactive part" to "amazing action cut scene". Why have me walk that thirty seconds? Just make it all one cut scene. I remember Metal Gear Solid 2 doing this on the Shell section. |
Yeah, that's bad game design rather than being a cinematic game.
While I agree with the idea that the cut scenes shouldn't go on too long (and shouldn't do anything you can do yourself), I disagree with the idea that games shouldn't have stories
The Last of Us really shows you have to do a cinematic game. You get progression in the story through the general gameplay and then cut scenes. Those scenes can drag on a bit longer because you do care about the characters and they're well directed
In Shadows of Mordor, I just checked my phone during the (admittedly beautiful) cut scenes because I didn't care about the characters. But that was a game that suffered because it didn't have an interesting story. I got bored fairly quickly once I'd got bored of killing orcs. It just started feeling repetitive and pointless
I'm still confused by the thread and what games everyone is trying convey their replies about. Is this about Telltale games like "The Wolf Among Us" and "The Walking Dead"? I'm ok with having EZ games. In fact, I prefer them on the EZ side. I'm willing to try any game, but if the pain of playing is not worth the reward and pleasure. No problems moving on. Pretty much the rewarding part is just being entertained.
| JazzB1987 said: You can eat pizza at the same time. |
Fights are pretty much all QTE, infiltration is ultra scripted, and there are more cutscenes and dialogues early game than any J-RPG.
sundin13 said:
PS: Cutscenes aren't the only way to tell a story. I consider cutscenes to be like exposition dumps in books or movies... its just a lazy way of getting information to the player because you don't have the skill to work it in organically. There can also be voice acting in games without taking control away from you as the character. |
I think you misunderstood what I said. I didn't say that I don't care about gameplay at all; I meant that I care about those other things more than people that focus almost entirely on gameplay. It's like telling someone, if you care so much about music, why don't you listen to a song instead of playing video games?The answer is, why not both?
As for why not just watch a movie, I'm not sure if you're serious, but I'll answer seriously anyway. When you watch a movie, you have zero interaction with the characters and zero effect on the plot. You can literally go to another room, talk to your friends, text etc and not worry that something will happen when you are away. With many video games if you don't pay attention to the cutscenes, you won't be able to find a clue that you need to progress to the next level or you might answer incorrectly a question that a character asks you later. That sometimes has an effect on the story or your relationship with that character. I also found myself several times wishing I could pause a movie and turn it into a game where I get to do the actions scenes myself. You don't get the same satisfaction watching a movie as getting some of kind of control of the action.
I couldn't disagree more about the cutscenes being a lazy way to tell stories. Lazy is having walls upon walls of text as far as I'm concerned. They bore me to no end and I don't pay attention to them most of the time. Cutscenes cost a lot of money and require time. As for telling a story without them, I find the way that video characters in non-cinematic scenes moves unnatural and it's hard for me to take them seriously. The minute a cutscens stops but the story continues, everything seems awkward and fake so I lose my connection with the characters. This happened to me with Naruto: Ultimate Ninja Storm 2. The animation looked weird and I stopped taking it seriously.
The thing is, though, I get that people prefer manga over anime, books over movies. I don't criticize them (nor did the OP apparently) because I know that they like using their imagination. My problem is that people don't seem to get that just because they find cutscenes not a good fit for video games, cutscenes are necessarily bad and people who like them are wrong. There is no or right here. Simply people with different tastes. No matter how long the cutscenes are, the gamplay is always there whether it is pressing x or having a deeper combat system.
| naruball said: I think you misunderstood what I said. I didn't say that I don't care about gameplay at all; I meant that I care about those other things more than people that focus almost entirely on gameplay. It's like telling someone, if you care so much about music, why don't you listen to a song instead of playing video games?The answer is, why not both? As for why not just watch a movie, I'm not sure if you're serious, but I'll answer seriously anyway. When you watch a movie, you have zero interaction with the characters and zero effect on the plot. You can literally go to another room, talk to your friends, text etc and not worry that something will happen when you are away. With many video games if you don't pay attention to the cutscenes, you won't be able to find a clue that you need to progress to the next level or you might answer incorrectly a question that a character asks you later. That sometimes has an effect on the story or your relationship with that character. I also found myself several times wishing I could pause a movie and turn it into a game where I get to do the actions scenes myself. You don't get the same satisfaction watching a movie as getting some of kind of control of the action. I couldn't disagree more about the cutscenes being a lazy way to tell stories. Lazy is having walls upon walls of text as far as I'm concerned. They bore me to no end and I don't pay attention to them most of the time. Cutscenes cost a lot of money and require time. As for telling a story without them, I find the way that video characters in non-cinematic scenes moves unnatural and it's hard for me to take them seriously. The minute a cutscens stops but the story continues, everything seems awkward and fake so I lose my connection with the characters. This happened to me with Naruto: Ultimate Ninja Storm 2. The animation looked weird and I stopped taking it seriously. The thing is, though, I get that people prefer manga over anime, books over movies. I don't criticize them (nor did the OP apparently) because I know that they like using their imagination. My problem is that people don't seem to get that just because they find cutscenes not a good fit for video games, cutscenes are necessarily bad and people who like them are wrong. There is no or right here. Simply people with different tastes. No matter how long the cutscenes are, the gamplay is always there whether it is pressing x or having a deeper combat system. |
It was a question out of curiousity...I was mostly just wondering how you would answer it and your answer was interesting. I personally don't dislike narrative in games, the problem is with "cinematic" games and I think that is an important distinction. Narrative can be presented in an infinite number of formats...it can be presented in the gameplay or through dialogue or through the environment you are in. The cinematic approach to narrative is the approach that focuses on turning the game into a movie where the player typically doesn't have much agency in the story and your actions play a more passive role than an active role. I don't think anyone has complaints about narrative, the complaint is with cinematic games.
That complaint flows into the problem with cutscenes. First of all, I would like to say a few things. Yes, walls of text are lazy, but they are essentially the antiquated/low budget way of doing cutscenes. They both serve to dump the story on the player while leaving the player as a passive observer instead of an active participant. I really think the comparison with exposition dumps is spot on, because, while it may be important information, if it was worked into the game more organically, it would be better for everyone. Also, I need to make the distinction that when I say it is "lazy" I mean that strictly from a storytelling perspective. Cutscenes may cost tons of money and take tons of time to animate, but the overall design is lazy.
It can also be seen as a bit of a lazy solution for a problem you mentioned yourself...mediocre animation in gameplay and a lack of parity between cutscene quality and game quality. Using cutscenes is a simple way to control these parameters, and it doesn't work as well from a gameplay perspective, however, it is a makeshift solution to this problem. The true goal should be improving the in game animations and making them more organic and realistic. I personally love small details like when a character runs its hand along a wall they are walking next to, or when they move in a way that is indicative of some physical problem. I think the movement in Evil Within is really interesting and The Phantom Pain trailer (before we knew it was MGS) in the hospital is an extremely interesting way of allowing the player to try to move around with a character who is physically impaired (I'm not sure if it was actual gameplay, but I'm making the assumption that it is). I think that is so much more powerful than just showing the player something.
Additionally, cutscenes are often used to present dialogue. I don't see any reason why this requires a cutscene. Why do we need to lose control for some characters to talk? Games like Mass Effect can get away with it because the player is actively engaged in that dialogue and the control is required to be on selecting dialogue options instead of just listening to characters talk, but that isn't really a cutscene... Additionally, there are so many ways to tell a narrative in games without resorting to dialogue.
I'm not really saying that cutscenes are bad, just that they can (often) be replaced with something better than can make narrative based games even more engaging. Cutscenes do have a place, generally in level intros/outros and when the character you are playing has no physical control for one reason or another, however they are so often used in ways that make me feel like "there is so much more you could do with this scene". I gave an example in a discussion of The Order before, saying how much more powerful that first meeting with a Lycan would be if you the player got to experience that fear and mystery and confusion of how to handle this situation. Giving the player options makes them think about how the world works and come up with solutions to problems on the fly and see the game's reaction to that problem. It can still be a linear experience and send the player down the same path no matter what(although variation is an obvious bonus), but it would give the player the illusion of choice if not giving choice itself and make the player think "what if I reacted differently". All of these emotions are lost in cutscenes, which can just say "this is how you should be feeling and this is how you should be reacting". So often cutscenes and the general desire to make games more like movies, just feels like wasted potential and that makes me think about all the things the game could have been if it used the tools at its disposal instead of trying to fit a square peg (movies) into a round hole (games).
As always, Extra Credits has a great video on cutscenes which discusses a lot of the complaints that I've made: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sGXIR2dlktc
| sundin13 said: It was a question out of curiousity...I was mostly just wondering how you would answer it and your answer was interesting. I personally don't dislike narrative in games, the problem is with "cinematic" games and I think that is an important distinction. Narrative can be presented in an infinite number of formats...it can be presented in the gameplay or through dialogue or through the environment you are in. The cinematic approach to narrative is the approach that focuses on turning the game into a movie where the player typically doesn't have much agency in the story and your actions play a more passive role than an active role. I don't think anyone has complaints about narrative, the complaint is with cinematic games. That complaint flows into the problem with cutscenes. First of all, I would like to say a few things. Yes, walls of text are lazy, but they are essentially the antiquated/low budget way of doing cutscenes. They both serve to dump the story on the player while leaving the player as a passive observer instead of an active participant. I really think the comparison with exposition dumps is spot on, because, while it may be important information, if it was worked into the game more organically, it would be better for everyone. Also, I need to make the distinction that when I say it is "lazy" I mean that strictly from a storytelling perspective. Cutscenes may cost tons of money and take tons of time to animate, but the overall design is lazy. It can also be seen as a bit of a lazy solution for a problem you mentioned yourself...mediocre animation in gameplay and a lack of parity between cutscene quality and game quality. Using cutscenes is a simple way to control these parameters, and it doesn't work as well from a gameplay perspective, however, it is a makeshift solution to this problem. The true goal should be improving the in game animations and making them more organic and realistic. I personally love small details like when a character runs its hand along a wall they are walking next to, or when they move in a way that is indicative of some physical problem. I think the movement in Evil Within is really interesting and The Phantom Pain trailer (before we knew it was MGS) in the hospital is an extremely interesting way of allowing the player to try to move around with a character who is physically impaired (I'm not sure if it was actual gameplay, but I'm making the assumption that it is). I think that is so much more powerful than just showing the player something. Additionally, cutscenes are often used to present dialogue. I don't see any reason why this requires a cutscene. Why do we need to lose control for some characters to talk? Games like Mass Effect can get away with it because the player is actively engaged in that dialogue and the control is required to be on selecting dialogue options instead of just listening to characters talk, but that isn't really a cutscene... Additionally, there are so many ways to tell a narrative in games without resorting to dialogue. I'm not really saying that cutscenes are bad, just that they can (often) be replaced with something better than can make narrative based games even more engaging. Cutscenes do have a place, generally in level intros/outros and when the character you are playing has no physical control for one reason or another, however they are so often used in ways that make me feel like "there is so much more you could do with this scene". I gave an example in a discussion of The Order before, saying how much more powerful that first meeting with a Lycan would be if you the player got to experience that fear and mystery and confusion of how to handle this situation. Giving the player options makes them think about how the world works and come up with solutions to problems on the fly and see the game's reaction to that problem. It can still be a linear experience and send the player down the same path no matter what(although variation is an obvious bonus), but it would give the player the illusion of choice if not giving choice itself and make the player think "what if I reacted differently". All of these emotions are lost in cutscenes, which can just say "this is how you should be feeling and this is how you should be reacting". So often cutscenes and the general desire to make games more like movies, just feels like wasted potential and that makes me think about all the things the game could have been if it used the tools at its disposal instead of trying to fit a square peg (movies) into a round hole (games). As always, Extra Credits has a great video on cutscenes which discusses a lot of the complaints that I've made: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sGXIR2dlktc |
Posts like this are the reason I still visit vgchartz/gamrconnect. Very well put. Now I know what you mean and agree with many of your points.
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