I’ve posted the first quarter of the plot in the Writing section. It’s definitely a rough draft screen play, some of it is more filled in than other parts. You should not read it if you want to play the game without spoilers—it isn’t a teaser, it’s the draft I’ll be using to produce the game.

A few notes:

I am going to storyboard pretty much everything. Right now there are descriptions that are fairly specific, but I have pictures in my mind of exactly how everything will look. I’ll be coming back through and creating something like a comic book of each scene.

Some parts are not fleshed out. There are vague portions in which I say what should be there, but don’t actually have the detail, especially bits of dialog. The dialog currently there is all placeholder. Dialog is tricky to get right, especially in epic fantasy.

I am going to color code sections. Right now it’s all black, but I’ll be color coding the text to mark cut scenes, playable areas, scripted sequences, and script direction.

There are time continuity problems in this draft. You’ll notice from one scene to the next, the sun and moon are in nonsensical positions. One reason is that the story has moved around a lot. Another is that I tend to write visually: I imagine the action taking place as though I’m watching it, and in doing so I tend to capture the mood by the lighting I see, which depends on the time of day. So if I think something is ominous, I’ll make it dark. If I need a triumph then someone gets back lit by the sun. When you put it together, it doesn’t make sense. I’ll work that out in the next draft.

Here’s the link to the first scene, and you can follow the links at the bottom to see all the scenes that are posted:

Kōtiro Script: The Normal

(You should read my primer on character archetypes if you haven’t already)

Many flat stories, especially in games, are about a bad guy who wants control and a good guy who doesn’t want to be controlled. The reason it’s flat is not only that it has been done to death, but that there is no real conversation going on. Rarely does the “bad” guy have a chance to explain what’s so great about control and how it could help. Rarely does the hero have any qualms about stopping him.

Interesting conversations have meaningful arguments in them that take time to explore and explain. Both sides have compelling points and often there is only a tentative resolution. Maybe we ultimately decide that freedom is better than control, but we also realize what benefits we’ve left behind that control could have offered, so we have mixed feelings about our “victory.”

Imagine having a conversation to the effect of:

Friend: Control is bad, freedom is good.
You: Yeah, totally.

Then imagine stretching that conversation over the course of 5, or even 50 hours. That’s the recipe for pretty much every game with a lame storyline.

The Story as a Conversation

I’ll quote from the character primer:
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Game settings and back stories often read like mythology. This is a problem.

What is Mythology?

Mythology is a narrative explaining how the world came to be in its present form. This is also the frame most authors are writing from when they develop their back story: how did the setting get the way it is?

The difference is that the events in a myth are metaphors, whereas a back story is supposed to be a self-consistent historical account.
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Here’s a taste of what drama actually is, how to achieve it, and how it relates to game writing.

At its core, drama is about conflict. Tension between one force and another must exist to generate interest. We build characters that the audience can relate to in an effort to invest them in the conflict that arises out of the tensions we create. We tease the audience by oscillating between near-wins and near-losses for the protagonist. We grip them by raising the stakes every time something goes right or wrong. Just when all seems lost, something happens to push the story into climax where the tension is resolved and the “normal” is reestablished.

Here’s a little graph I whipped up to illustrate: (more…)