[Game Design] Will Wright on Story and Game

[Sammael]

edit: never mind

 

[Reynard]

The DM not having a world with a) predetermined set of existing races and classes; b) predesigned cultures, deities and religion; and c) at least some history, current events, and organizations prior to character generation is not a game that I want to run nor one in which I want to play. Give me the DMs setting and let me use the races, cultures, history etc to give me a sense of an existing world and then let the DM and I work together to ensure I develop a background that grounds the character into the setting.

A quick story:

When i started my most successful D&D campaign ever -- this was in the days of 2nd Edition -- I started with a small village and its environs, with the intent of opening up the world as we played. my only real rules were "No Gnomes" (because I hates them), "No Elves" and "No Ninjas".

Well, once of my players decided right off the bat that he wanted to play an elf ninja. Against my better judgement, I relented. We discussed who he was and where he came from and how he fit into this little dark ages, germanic village.

And from that, the china-inspired elven nation that would drive so much of *two* campaigns, as well as the PC that would become one of the most important NPCs in the game, came into being.

 

[I'm A Banana]

As an aside, it also helps explain the frustration I feel when a player doesn't really step up and show any preference for anything the game. Nothing annoys me more than a player who stonewalls any attempts to find plots for him.

I wonder how much some people show up to a given D&D game just because there's some social pressure to game with your friends when their minds are completely elsewhere. And I wonder how much that disrupts everyone else's enjoyment. I wonder if it's possible to make a D&D where you don't NEED the same people to show up week after week, you don't need a core group, you can run it with whatever's there (or even solo? A DM-less D&D with only one player?)

"What do you do?"
"I dunno. What needs to be done? Where's our quest?"

See, it would strike me that this is a breakdown of Wright's system: when someone just plays the game because it's there, not because they want to frolick around in a fictional world. Someone who asks that doesn't really want to go on the quest (or they'd be LOOKING for what to do), they're just along for the ride, it would seem.

I mean, everyone has off days where they don't want to go chasing adventure carrots down, and some people don't have the confldence/courage/desire to make choices for their characters (they're more there to hang out with friends). To force it seems counter to the idea that you play a game because you want to do something other than real life for a few hours.

"You've each received a summons from the king. He explains how the kingdom needs your unique talents to retrieve the McGuffin of Destiny & save the realm."
"We say 'No, thanks. You're the king. Saving the kingdom is your duty.' Let's steal a ship, & go pirating!"

With the Wright school of game design, this really isn't a problem: they say go sail a ship, you go sail a ship. Of course, as a DM, it's your game too, so the enemy pirates they face and the nature of getting that ship is all in your hands. But you shouldn't, in this theory, ever say "No, you can't go pirating" or otherwise put roadblocks to that.

Make mine Miyamoto (or Lord British, for that matter), kaythanx.

But Mario (for instance) is just one big long obstacle course...there's not a whole lot of story in that game. It shows off game design quite well, but it doesn't tell much of a story. It doesn't let the user create, either, so it's pretty confined to "run this obstacle course." I mean, admittedly, running around a Mario obstacle course is some of the best fun that can be had with polygons and pixels, but it's confined to what it is.

Wright seems to be saying that if you'd like to design an ideal game, you'd be able to run players through an obstacle course when they want it, or give them a head-to-head reflex-testing fighting-game experience when they want it. You'd be able to see what the player wanted, and you'd give it to 'em.

That's why the D&D analogy I've drawn is a DM who doesn't design his setting before he has PC's. The DM's role shifts from setting the stage actively to simply reacting to what the players do. The game then becomes just a system of reactions.

 

[I'm A Banana]

The DM not having a world with a) predetermined set of existing races and classes; b) predesigned cultures, deities and religion; and c) at least some history, current events, and organizations prior to character generation is not a game that I want to run nor one in which I want to play. Give me the DMs setting and let me use the races, cultures, history etc to give me a sense of an existing world and then let the DM and I work together to ensure I develop a background that grounds the character into the setting.

The thing is, a DM doesn't need to create an entire world to give players a sense of verisimilitude. All he needs to do is create the direct experiences of the PC's: the dwarf wizard needs a history and a context, but all that can come AFTER we have a dwarf wizard, and it can be tailored to what that dwarf wizard wants to accomplish. In my example above, where he wants to master some great magical apocalypse device, there's already setting material: the dwarves are at war, things might be looking desperate, maybe there is a lead on a scientific advancement (or maybe the dwarf is rebelling against traditional methods because those are getting his people killed). You've got at least two factions (dwarves + enemies), you've got the existence of advanced and dangerous technologies, you know at some point there's going to be a magical apocalypse device. You become the facilitator of the dwarf's story, and the details are left up to YOUR imagination to come up with.

It's a bit of putting the egg before the chicken, but Wright's philosophy seems to say that creates a better game experience because it's unlimited and unbound, totally able to run with whatever the player can come up with.

Y'know, KM, some DMs already have difficulty accepting the idea that the players ought to have control over their PCs' prestige classes and magical items. The suggestion that the players ought to have control over the campaign setting and plot as well might just be too much for them to handle.

I think ENWorld distorts things by having a preponderance of vocal DMs who really really need absolute control over their settings to have fun. That's cool, but I like that Wright is saying that abandoning almost all control over your setting (or what the player can do) is to give the players the freedom that they look for in playing a game in the first place.

...and looses the sense that you're WATCHING the characters, and embraces the sense that you ARE the characters.

And from that, the china-inspired elven nation that would drive so much of *two* campaigns, as well as the PC that would become one of the most important NPCs in the game, came into being.

D&D seems to be able to embrace these random awesome occurances (and even encourages them with the dice roll to a certain extent) really well. It's filled with examples of minor details that, when you run with them, become pretty amazing stories...just like the story of your custom-made dresser in the SIMS.

 

[Greg K]

A quick story:

When i started my most successful D&D campaign ever -- this was in the days of 2nd Edition -- I started with a small village and its environs, with the intent of opening up the world as we played. my only real rules were "No Gnomes" (because I hates them), "No Elves" and "No Ninjas".

Well, once of my players decided right off the bat that he wanted to play an elf ninja. Against my better judgement, I relented. We discussed who he was and where he came from and how he fit into this little dark ages, germanic village.

And from that, the china-inspired elven nation that would drive so much of *two* campaigns, as well as the PC that would become one of the most important NPCs in the game, came into being.

It is fine that you like that style of worldbuilding/game. It works for you. Personally, I would walk out of a game that built its world like that just as I would walk out of a game where the DM said build whatever you want I can fit it into my world. It is not the type of DND game that I am looking to participate in.

 

[jmucchiello]

...he goes to talk about Gated stories (do what you want, find the key, move on to the next part) and Branching stories (do what you want, it'll lead to the next part, but all this stuff I made is useless on the side). I find that I'm DMing a lot in the Gated story style, with minor points that Branch. My PC's do whatever they want in their playground, but talking to NPC X will get them closer to the nefarious plot. Branching seems to be what a lot of DM's do, a sort of "sandbox" approach where the PC's are plunked down in a setting, pick a path, and run with it. The problem with my approach is that it can lead to railroading. The problem with the other approach is that it can lead to a lot of wasted effort on nefarious plots that never get picked up on.

Actually, I prefer circular or directed graph approach. Call it railroading if you like but I create a boss monster, you will (for the most part) eventually face him. Whether now when he is 10th level or later when he's 30th level.

In the example of the king's quest being turned down, maybe the next time they return to the kingdom it is in shambles. The king died during a quest and evil has taken over. Tie that into a few of the characters' back stories and they will take up the mission. The King is SOL but still, they will face the BBEG.

Basically, I put out a few plots. Tackle them early and they aren't so bad. Let them fester too long and the world may suffer.

 

[I'm A Banana]

It is fine that you like that style of worldbuilding/game. It works for you. Personally, I would walk out of a game that built its world like that just as I would walk out of a game where the DM said build whatever you want I can fit it into my world. It is not the type of DND game that I am looking to participate in.

What's wrong with it, for you? Why distaste?

 

[MoogleEmpMog]

Actually, you're missing the point. In his games, the player makes the story, not the developer. Just because the player has freedom doesn't make them any less a "game", in fact, perhaps the opposite, they are more games designed to help the player make their own story as opposed to simply a way for the player to be told a story.

In a lot of ways, The Sims is the ultimate RPG (at least until Spore). You can create an entire town (well, suburbs, really) and its inhabitants, and control (or simply watch) them interact with each other, make your own stories and plots. Even people who aren't interested in traditional roleplaying do so (even though they don't know they are doing so).

No, I'm not missing the point.

I'm actively disagreeing with the point.

I want a story, I want challenges to overcome, I want goals to meet, I want an ending (and a damn satisfying one, too; nothing ruins a good game like a bad ending). I do not want to have to provide these things myself. If I wanted to create a story, I would write one, and often have; when I shell out money for a completed game, it had best either be billed as a construction kit (in which case the goal would be to create stories for other people as well as myself), not be the kind of game that has a story (not much pathos in Tetris, you know?) or tell me the best story the developers could.

 

[MoogleEmpMog]

I wonder how much some people show up to a given D&D game just because there's some social pressure to game with your friends when their minds are completely elsewhere. And I wonder how much that disrupts everyone else's enjoyment. I wonder if it's possible to make a D&D where you don't NEED the same people to show up week after week, you don't need a core group, you can run it with whatever's there (or even solo? A DM-less D&D with only one player?)

Yes.

Many RPGs are explicitly designed for one-shot play (Savage Worlds is one; Wushu is very vocally this way). They are not as successful as D&D, for whatever reason.

See, it would strike me that this is a breakdown of Wright's system: when someone just plays the game because it's there, not because they want to frolick around in a fictional world. Someone who asks that doesn't really want to go on the quest (or they'd be LOOKING for what to do), they're just along for the ride, it would seem.

I mean, everyone has off days where they don't want to go chasing adventure carrots down, and some people don't have the confldence/courage/desire to make choices for their characters (they're more there to hang out with friends). To force it seems counter to the idea that you play a game because you want to do something other than real life for a few hours.

Some people - and in this I would include at least 50% of all RPG players I've known and easily 90% of all people in general - are just looking to go along for the ride, TO BE ENTERTAINED. When they play and RPG they may want to contribute their character, or they may want to hang out with friends, but they don't come to tell a story. They come to experience one. I see nothing wrong with the experience these people are seeking, and am usually one of them. If I want to drive the course of a story, I'll either write one or GM a game with a strong story element.

But Mario (for instance) is just one big long obstacle course...there's not a whole lot of story in that game. It shows off game design quite well, but it doesn't tell much of a story. It doesn't let the user create, either, so it's pretty confined to "run this obstacle course." I mean, admittedly, running around a Mario obstacle course is some of the best fun that can be had with polygons and pixels, but it's confined to what it is.

Right. It's confined, but it's fun. Emphasis on the fun. It has a very specific goal and it executes it to perfection, like most high quality entertainment.

Other games (console RPGs from the '90s on, PC flight sims and RTSes of the mid-late '90s, older PC RPGs, etc.) do tell stories - stories the creators paid scriptwriters to produce, often with lavish care. The best of those stories are easily on par with a quality movie; the *very* best are arguably competitive with a quality novel. They are highly focused on delivering a good story and on merging story and gameplay in an appealing way.

I've seen the typical quality of user-created content; many of the most sparkling levels ever created for, say, Unreal Tournament have a 'story' that boils down to C&Ping a description from an official map and somehow managing to insert grammar and spelling errors. But of course, with the Will Wright model, you wouldn't even get that. Any story you get would be your own - meaning those who can't produce a decent story will never get one, and those who don't have the time/energy to do so won't, either.

Wright seems to be saying that if you'd like to design an ideal game, you'd be able to run players through an obstacle course when they want it, or give them a head-to-head reflex-testing fighting-game experience when they want it. You'd be able to see what the player wanted, and you'd give it to 'em.

This would certainly be terrible game design from a business perspective - why would anyone ever buy another video game (provided they had the desire to do this free-form story creation stuff; I'd keep buying Final Fantasies and Suikodens and Valkyrie Profiles to find out what happens to the casts the writers created)?

I'm willing to bet that it would be just as bad in the actual execution, though. If I wanted an open-ended city or suburban life sim, Will Wright would be just the guy I'd tap - but a console RPG? No thanks. A fighting game? His team has how much experience with the intricate tick-by-tick balance of those, again? None? Thought so. A turn-based-strategy game? I'll stick with Alpha Centauri, Civ IV, Heroes III, etc.

Unless all the great game designers in the world decided to come together and end their careers and their industry by producing this theoretical uber-game, it would end up as a great many poor games bundled as one game.

That's why the D&D analogy I've drawn is a DM who doesn't design his setting before he has PC's. The DM's role shifts from setting the stage actively to simply reacting to what the players do. The game then becomes just a system of reactions.

There are systems that do this better, primarily by shifting narrative control to the players via actual mechanical reinforcement. The cost of this is a great deal of deprotagonization; if you control the world to some extent, you're LESS in tune with your character-as-avatar. Either in spite or because of this, I've enjoyed some of those games.

However, D&D doesn't do this by the book and if I sign on to a D&D game and find it's a complete sandbox in which I'm supposed to user-create my content, I'll walk away and GM a game of my own. If I'm going to sandbox, I may as well create a sand castle others can play with.

 

[Celebrim]

Will Wright is innovative. I've got a ton of his work. But, he's just flat out wrong. It sounds really nice in theory, but it just won't and doesn't work in practice.

1) We don't demand or expect that of any other artistic media. We may select a general theme or style, but we don't expect when watching a movie or reading a book that the story conform to our wishes. We don't actually want stories that only have in them what we ask of them to have. We want stories that surprise us, sometimes shock us, and are frankly better that we ourselves imagined that they would be. We wanted to be delighted as well as satisfied. It's those stories where the author gave us something we didn't expect that we remember best and longest. And for most people who sit down at the table, that's what they are expecting.

2) There is a reason that there is one DM and many players. The problem with giving the players more story control than they already have - and they already have alot - is that no two players are necessarily going to agree over what the story should be. Only one player can really have the veto. Only one player of the game can really have full creative control. At the very least, someone has to break the ties.

3) Will Wrights games are great object lessons in why the approach he's always advocated doesn't really work in general. First of all, most of his games are pretty dreadfully dull once you get beyond the 'Gosh, look at the thing grow' stage. Will makes interesting toys that approximate something organic and alive. You play with it. You tend it, but it has more in common with gardening than gaming. Without the graphics that give you that sensation of watching something organic, what do you have? Also, Will Wrights games are so open ended as to go nowhere. I've never had the experience of playing Sim City and ever feeling like I accomplished something. I always plan to accomplish something, and look forward to doing it. But once done, it never seems to have the gloss I wanted. But even more to the point, Will Wright's games are fundamentally solo activities. The Sims are the only successful multiplayer game he has and even then, you don't so much have a game as a good looking chat room.

Of the prior comments, I think I most agree with RFisher. I do agree that the problem is not that the game can't be played by either party in a reactive role, but rather that there is a problem mostly when both parties (DM and players) try to forcibly take the same role.

For example, while I'm one of those DM's firelance complains about, I wouldn't have any problem per se with a group of players that wanted to steal a ship and go pirating. I've had players take the story in directions I've never expected before. But my experience with PC's that take the active role is that they generally don't make very good choices. For example, stealing a ship and going pirating is a fine choice for generating adventures, but since they are more or less declaring thier intention to take on the whole world single handedly, it might not be the best choice for generating sustained campaigns especially if the players plans turn out to be not the most well thought out. When players do that, its almost like they are insisting I allow them to succeed at anything no matter what they choose to do. At that point, I tend to wonder what they need a DM for.

I mean, while it's typically very hard to lose at one of Will Wrights games, it is often possible in theory - usually if you deliberately try to do so.