Jan Kavan, СBE software

Designing Meaningful Narrativity: Let Your Game Stand Out from the Crowd

(White Nights Conference St.Petersburg 2018)
The official conference website — http://wnconf.com

Transcript

1. Designing Meaningful Narrativity: Let Your Game Stand Out from the Crowd Jan Kavan @CBEsoftware
2. About me: • Cellist, composer, writer and software developer • In game industry since 2002 • In 2006 started CBE software with Lukáš Medek • Worked on over 15+ published games outside CBE • Main roles: • Game design • Writing • Programming • Audio design and composition • Running a company
3. Our games so far: • Ghost in the Sheet (PC) (2007 / 2008) • J.U.L.I.A. (PC) (2012) • J.U.L.I.A. Untold (2012, 2015) (iOS, PC) • Vampires! / Crazy Vampires (PC, Mac, iOS, Android) (2012 / 2013) • Boredom of Agustín Cordes (PC, Freeware 2013) • Serena (indie collaboration) 2014 (PC, Mac, Linux) • J.U.L.I.A.: Among the Stars (PC, Mac, Linux) (2014) • … AND
4. SOMEDAY YOU’LL RETURN www.youwillreturn.com With the support of the Creative Europe Programme - MEDIA of the European Union
5. With the support of the Creative Europe Programme - MEDIA of the European Union
6. Starting with a couple of • Can narrativity be designed? • … and if so, can I structure the design? • How can I avoid “a walking simulator” stigma? • How to present meanings and symbolism? • What are the types of narration I can use? • … and can I measure their impact? • Can I incorporate context into a nonlinear narration flow? • Can narration help me to stand out of the crowd?
7. Interactive narration – let’s start with a story Parrhasios vs Zeuxis
8. Understanding meanings • Three types of meanings • Meaning for me as a creator • Meaning for target audience • Meaning for PC/NPC • Our paradigm is given (nothing to be done for it) • I have to create paradigmatic layer for PC/NPC’s
9. How the meaning is conveyed? - author’s paradigmatic layer - limitations of skills and technology (developer) - game qualities / issues - player’s paradigmatic layer - Internal motivations - reviews - direct feedback - social media
10. Personal context more than just a game!
11. World Transposition
12. Meaning-driven game • Each game element should be pairable with a meaning • … actually – with all three types of meanings • Designing meanings using the principles of: • Selection • Hierarchization • Restriction • Assigning desired “impact values” to individual meanings • Centrifugal vs centripetal elements
13. Two possible approaches • 1) Randomly “interesting” “Let’s use a lot of weird random stuff to confuse players. Hopefully they don’t find out it’s random.” • 2) Meaning-driven “Let’s use a lot of weird stuff but pair it with actual meanings so it’s possible to decipher why it’s there.” Common denominator of both approaches? A lot of weird stuff …
14. Desire recapitulation • Story-driven game • Meaning-driven game • Interaction-driven game • Personalized • geographically • through paradigms
15. Issues with a traditional script • Good for a story outline • Not so good for an actual game medium • Doesn’t give the needed overview • I needed some kind of a data-driven method
16. Used type of narration Direct • Monologues (context sensitive) • Dialogues • Cell phone (call / SMS / MMS) • Found documents • Radio • Cutscenes Indirect • Environmental narration • Narration through animations • Acoustic narration • VFX narration
17. Measuring interaction density • Starting with intuition • Basic unit: walking distance time • Interactions classified as a „time diluters“ • Feedback from focus testing to adjust the dilution values • Good way to maintain interaction variability, too
18. Making it interactive • Types of interaction in SYR • Walking • Examining / discoveries • World object manipulation • Sneaking • Workbench • Herbalism • Climbing • Escape sequences • Traps avoidance • Cell phone • Contextual actions
19. Making it interactive • Types of noninteraction in SYR • Dialogues • Cutscenes • Transitions
20. Measuring interaction density
21. Designing emotions • Each in-game set of actions should factor in an emotional response • In case of PC <-> NPC the response should be bi- directional • Once again I have to count with multiple types of meanings of the emotions (Author, PC, NPC, Player) • Rationally designing desired emotions helps me to finetune when it doesn’t work as expected
22. Designing emotions
23. Questions? Jan Kavan @CBEsoftware
24. Jan Kavan @CBEsoftware Thank you for your attention! www.cbe-software.com (see you at the booth 136)