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Category: Narrative Design

  • What Do You Even Mean By Branching Narrative?

    There’s a conversation I’ve had more times than I can count, and it usually starts the same way. Someone — a writer, a designer, sometimes an executive — says they want a “branching narrative” for their game. Everyone in the room nods. Everyone thinks they understand what that means. And then, about three meetings later,…

  • You Feel Nothing: The Problem with Second Person Storytelling in Games

    There’s a book I used to keep on my desk in the office. Bright Lights, Big City by Jay McInerney. Every time someone came to me with a design concept that had a particular problem baked into it, I’d hand them the book, tell them to read the first chapter, and let them figure out…

  • Less Is More: A Framework for Game VO That Players Actually Listen To

    There’s a version of this post that starts with a rant about Claptrap. We’ll get there. But first, a principle. Good game VO — the kind that actually lands, the kind players remember years later — isn’t really a writing problem. It’s an attention problem. And attention, it turns out, is one of the most…

  • The 7 Principles of Illusion (And How They Apply to Narrative Design)

    A magician’s job and a narrative designer’s job are more similar than you might think. Both are in the business of making people invest in something that isn’t entirely real. Both rely on attention, assumption, and a carefully constructed experience to pull it off. And both, when they’re working at their best, leave the audience…

  • There’s A Knock At The Door

    Imagine you’re sitting in your home, doing something casual, not using much effort or thought. Then there’s a knock at the door. Who’s knocking?What do you do?How does it make you feel? Your immediate answer might be something like — I don’t know, who is it? — and that’s a completely reasonable response to such…

  • Applying Vonnegut To Gaming Pt. 2

    (Blogtober Day 10) So picking up from yesterday’s Blogtober entry applying some creative writing tips from the late author Kurt Vonnegut and seeing if I can apply them to game development… “Start as close to the end as possible.” This is an interesting one to try to apply to game development as there can be…

  • Applying Vonnegut To Gaming Pt. 1

    (Blogtober Day 9) Something I maybe have a bad habit of doing is finding a concept, opinion, or soft guideline talked about in one creative industry and considering how it might be applicable to game design and development. I’ve done this almost subconsciously for a while and I tend to keep it to myself these…

  • Generic Can Be Another Word For Useful

    (Blogtober Day 7) Generally speaking voice over is recorded in sessions ranging from 2 to 4 hours in length. Typically the aim is to record somewhere in the ballpark of 200+ lines in 4 hours, although depending on the complexity of the lines that number could go down, or even up as high as 400+…

  • A Straight Line (The Most Direct Narrative Design Structure)

    (Blogtober Day 3) I’ve been a several narrative design and writing for games talks, and I have read over a dozen books covering the same topics, and I’m always amazed how, in my opinion, how little narrative design is actually ever discussed in any of them. There is often focus on writing, and branching dialogues…

  • What Is Voice Design

    (Blogtober Day 1) First things first. What is Blogtober? Blogtober is a challenge to write a blog or article each day, every day in the month of October. 31 posts in 31 days. Please wish me luck! What Is Voice Over Design? Voice Over Design is a practice and/or discipline within interactive game development in…