Gameplay Cutscenes -- Yea or Nay?

[Talmun]

I've played under a DM who used them, and it was very cool - added to the story and the feel of the game.

Everytime I try to use them they fall flat. Maybe my players, maybe my DM'ing style...eh, my game goes great without them.

 

[Ruined]

I recall a thread or two like this recently. As I said then:

I have a friend who runs an awesome Star Wars game, and he makes great use of cut-scenes. It works well for the genre. But like many others have said, they wouldn't work well in my game. I like the characters to experience the plot as it comes to them, not vicariously through some meta-knowledge. That's what story hours are for.

 

[gizmo33]

I'm with Lemmy on this one - I say NAY. Either you wind up scrapping half of your cut scenes after the players do stuff, or the players quickly get the sense that their actions have no effect on the events of the game. And in either case, I believe in giving information to players based on their characters actions - and this breaks that rule.

The First and Last Cut Scene I'd Use in My Game:

"Mwa ha ha. If only those foolish heroes realized that they could blow up the Death Star by pulling that lever on level 6. We really got them on that one, huh Vader? Mwa ha ha... ha .... er. what? Aaaaaaah!"

 

[Jdvn1]

I'm hnot a huge fan of cut scenes that cut to other locations, usually, but they can be useful if they don't take away play choice. They're good for exposition and description, I think.

 

[Cergorach]

I'm using this technique, not during the session, but between sessions. We're currently playing only once a month and this is a great way to create suspense, give a bit of background info for the players, and a preview of what's to come. We have a group website, where everyone can post, i've posted a couple of 'cut-scene' stories that add to the feel of the campaign, my players love it. It keeps them interested in the game and when posted at just the right time everyone is ready for more when we start playing (usually a couple of days before we play). I've even done a preview, a scene where the players were (will be) present, but interaction won't matter all that much, the players found it awesome. Probably because they also realised that if it was roleplayed in game, it wouldn't have the impact it had now. (A bit of background: The party is fleeing their own reality through something called 'The Eight Gates of Fate', they've just entered medieval scotland 1000AD were humanity rules and has no idea of the fantastic world that is all around them. The group doesn't have that much info yet, and this is the scene that's intoducing their primary source of information for the comming sessions.)

Humanitas Morality Manifest...
Comming sunday morning, TGE* proudly presents episode three of the "Gates of Fate" continuing saga. Now a preview:

[Fade in as our brave heroes enter the tavern.]

It's a dark and smake filled place, as far as you can see only humans populate this hole in the ground. But it's a full hole in the ground, it looks like half the town is in here. You feel something brushing past you legs, it's a cat, a black cat. It moves between the regulars, dodging the feet that might crush it, it's going towards a corner. To the only table that still has sitting room left, were a single dark cloaked and hooded figure is sitting alone, apperently bowed over something of great importance. The cat jumps up the sitting booth and further up the top of the bench, where it apperently roosts regulary, as it wraps it's tail around itself.

Somehow you feel drawn to the booth in the corner, as your feet move before you realise they did. As everyone squeezes into the booth (barbarians ain't made for small spaces!), and your gazes are drawn to the apperation infront of you, a mature voice full of wisdom rolls across the table.

"Welcome weary travellers, what is your pleasure? A charm for an aching hart? A trinket for the misses? Or... Some information? Yes... You look like the folks that require information. I haven't seen you here before, must be new to the region." You can't make out a face in that dark hood, but he sure seems to know what he's talking about. He's reading you like an open book. "Wait a minute, you smell... Asif your not from around here. And when i say 'not from around here' i mean that in the 'not of this earth' way. Hmm... Travelers from far away indeed. That means your like newborn kittens playing in the stables were untamed horses dwell." It really is disturbing how he knows, or deduces your recent background with such ease. "You'll need information, and you've come to the right place for that alright. I'll give you a smithering of information for free, the rest you'll have to pay for."

"In this realm the concept of alignment as a means of identifying evil or good is virtualy unknown. What is 'good' or 'evil' is defined by the church and country, and as such subject to whimsical change instead of the inmutable laws of 'good' vs. 'evil'."

"What does that mean to the spelcaster among you? Any spells that detect alignment simply do not work, spells that depend on alignment still work though. It seems that, whatever the human's god did, hid the emissions of the alignment 'tags', resulting in alignment detection spells failing. The 'tags' are still there, it's just that no one can see them, thus spells that only work on a certain alignment still work. But there's a catch, whatever's suppresing the emissions of the 'tags' also resulted in certain tags getting corrupted. So one 'tag' might actually be 'evil' but spells that target the 'evil' alignment don't work, sages theorize that between 5-10% of all tags have been corrupted, some say more others say less, we just can't be sure. The upside is that 'tag' corruption is across the board, so spells that shouldn't work on a certain alignment have a 5-10% of actually working on that alignment."

"Just between you and me, there are rumours of experiments that make it possible for a mortal to change an alignment 'tag' however temporarily. Some whisper that some powerful beings can even alter it permanently."

"Now that was my onetime freebee, for more you'll have to pay me. Hmm... I actually forgot to introduce myself, my name is trebtac, at your service. Now if your interested in working with me, it might be prudent to discuss our arangements elsewhere. If you'll follow me..."

The hooded figure before you moves... His head slips from his hands were it was holding his head up, falling in to the much coveted cup of wine, a loud snoring ensues...

The black cat jumps down to the floor and moves off to the exit, it looks over it's shoulder once. You've never seen a cat smile, but if it could, it just did. You better follow it...

[Fadeout to commercial.]

 

[Kae'Yoss]

If it is like the Movie-Scenes from Star Wars games, it could work. Something that happens far away, something the characters cannot manipulate, something they don't understand yet. A little like prophecy: They see it, but not with their eyes. (Or the characters don't see it, the players do).

But I really don't like the BBEG-Speech. It's overdone. You can do it once or twice, but not every time. And especially if the players already know who it is and have worked for months to stop.

I remember a situation where we had that, not too long ago. Our enemy would talk for quite some time, and when I said "I had enough of his gibberish, I waste him." the DM got indignant and angry and said "no, you don't". That was that for me. I started moving my left forefinger up and down in the air, and when someone asked me what I was doing, I said: "I'm pressing Esc to get this damn cut-scene to go away." IMO, it's railroading.

 

[BSF]

I first heard about Cut Scenes in the 1st Ed Star Wars book from WEG way back when. I didn't like the concept at the time. Years later, I decided to try it out without stepping on all the things I didn't like about them. I have used them to really fill out my games since then.

Cut scenes that serve to only let the audience know what is happening on the other side of the field or to arbitrarily railroad in a story plot are not my style.

I use cut scenes to show different parts of the campaign world without revealing crucial. They are great for establishing an ambiance to an event. They are also mostly for the enjoyment of the players. As an example, the PCs in one game knew there was an army of undead on the march. I knew the army was going to assault a city. The PCs were not near the city and were uninterested in visiting. When the invasion hit, I described it cinematically as a cut scene. Later that session, the PCs met the refugees that had managed to flee the city. I was able to portray the refugees as shocked and overwhelmed so the PCs would know what happened and have empathy toward the NPCs. The cut scene allowed me to prep the players with the scale of the invasion. There wasn't any information in the cut scene that the players picked up that the PCs didn't pick up in the same session, but the RP impact of the night was improved because the players were better able to envision the carnage.

Later in the game, the PCs were able to stop the army before it invaded their base of operations. This helped my play up the impact of heroes saving the world. Places that didn't have heroes were hurting and that was part of my theme for the game.

Overall, I was quite pleased with it. But I do try to keep in mind a few things before I use a cut scene.

What information will this convey (and what information will I avoid conveying)
How do I present a context for that information to reach the PCs in the game
Will the players enjoy the cut scene more than playing that extra 5 minutes or so

If I can't address these points, then the cut scene is the wrong idea at that time.

 

[ThirdWizard]

Not in the traditional cinematic sense. It throws off suspenstion of disbelief for me, as its a meta-game element, and we tend to avoid such things. It also blurs the line between character and player knowlege, so it would require a group of really good roleplayers.

However! adding in things through dream sequences, stories, scrying, and other in game elements where the characters are actually aware of these sequences, they can offer forshadowing and at the same time give PCs hints as to what is going on around them.

 

[Ralif Redhammer]

There was a lot of good advice in the West End Games Star Wars book, but I didn't really take a liking to cut-scenes.

Foreshadowing is good, but to me cut-scenes feel like I'm giving something away. They increase the tension and cinematic feel, but they also can ruin the element of surprise. Ultimately, it's a question of storytelling vs. game-playing.

 

[the Jester]

I tried out a cut scene not so long ago. It worked pretty well.