Immersion and Linear Progression

by Cody Miller , Music of the Spheres - Never Forgot, Sunday, July 28, 2013, 11:28 (3931 days ago) @ kapowaz

You talk about these things as if writing optional, non-linear narrative is just a simple problem to solve. I think the very fact it doesn't exist (a few experiments aside) in mainstream video games is a good demonstration that it's far from simple.

The original Deus Ex. Hardly an experiment, and definitely mainstream.

Deus Ex does present the player with much more choice in the narrative, but it's still pretty much just smoke and mirrors: there are a grand total of three possible endings, and so whilst the route you take there might be different the outcome is really just one of a set of narratives where you mix and match parts. The original Colony Wars did the same thing, but had five final outcomes at the end of an overlapping tree structure depending on mission outcome. These are actually the examples I was thinking of when I said experiments, because as much as they were interesting they haven't massively influenced mainstream games that followed, and linear narrative has remained the dominant form.

You're not getting what I'm saying.

In Deus Ex, you can:

1. Get important story details way before you are supposed to if you are inquisitive and have the right skills / augs
2. Get sidestory and flavor story in much the same way.

The story is still mostly linear and largely the same regardless of how you play (there are little changes of course). However, the game was designed in such a way that jumping the gun and finding alternate info actually enhanced the experience and was rewarding.

Did you ever hear anybody complain that they discovered the twist with Unatco way before the game is supposed to reveal it, because you hacked your way into secret computers in hard to reach places? No, most people though that was COOL.