What every Game developer needs to know about story

This was an especially interesting read for me and very helpful, what better example to talk about how story is written, formulated and implemented into games then referring WAY back to the 1920's and the beginning of cinema.

First of no matter how similar games and cinema are they also couldn't be more different just as movies are similar to plays but different. It needs to be said just as John Southerland put it.

"Games aren't movies and movies aren't plays."

Now that's out of the way to understand the success of movies we first need to know how and why they failed, because there can be no progress without failure, that's how we learn from our own and the mistakes of others, and it's just the way the world works.

So why did movies fail? the reason is simple. It's because at the time movies were seen as nothing more than a recorded play, I mean why would anyone want to pay to see a recorded show that is the same as going to watch a real play, people want to experience things and at that time you could always experience a play but never a movie. Why is this? well it's because the camera would be set in the centre of the audience would sit and the camera would "roll". However directors weren't aware that the human eye is always observing everything in their line of site and because films were made like plays the audience eyes would always wonder around the screen because there was nothing to keep their to focus on. Generally speaking they hadnt discovered what this story form was good at.

Until the arrival of ingenious camera angles, with camera angles in play such as panning, zooming and close ups the audiences eyes became focused on what was happening on the screen because the images were always changing, and later became used to enhance the emotional connection between the audience and the on screen characters.

Why are movies such a massive hit now? There are 2 reasons.

1) They are a form of story.

2) Their particular form of story differs from all previous forms of story.

The same thing is true for games.

So how do we form a script? We use the 3 act classical story.

Act 1.

1) He/She gets their life turned around by an exiting incident, coincidence or a twist of fate.

2) A gap opens up between an orderly life.

3) The hero tries to bridge the gap with normal means. It fails and the world pushes back to hard.

4) The hero then has to take a risk to overcome the obstacles pushing back.

Act 2. (Reversal)

5) Something new happens or the hero learns something they didn't know before and the world goes into chaos again. ( a second gap opens up)

6) The hero has to take a bigger risk to overcome the second gap. ( There is another reversal that opens a third gap)

Act 3.

7) The hero takes the biggest risk of all to prevail over the third gap and claim their reward.

Now that we have the formula to make a script I'll now explain what's happening.

After the first act we have a reversal and there are two types of reversal action and revelation. These are required to make reversals in order for the hero to progress.

Action- Someone gets shot and forces the hero into action.

Revalation- i.e. Darth Vader tells Luke Skywalker that he is his farther. (This is more powerful)

As well as reversals what's a story without conflict? There are 3 types of conflict internal, inter personal, and external.

Internal Conflict, which is what's going on in your head.

Inter Personal Conflict, which is between people.

External Conflict, which is conflict with society or the physical world.