Have you seen the recent Star Wars? *Spoilers abound* (Destiny)

by Korny , Dalton, Ga. US. Earth, Sol System, Thursday, July 12, 2018, 10:23 (2105 days ago) @ Cody Miller
edited by Korny, Thursday, July 12, 2018, 10:59

Explain to me how you can have a revenge story work when your guardian has no personality, no voice, no real sense of personhood, and no sense of agency and desire? And Bungie talks about Moral Compasses? Whose?!

What's worse than your protagonist is your villain. If your villain is not compelling, or their presence is not felt strongly throughout, the "revenge" aspect of your story will fail. I saw this recent video that makes a lot of solid points about how a villain "feels" like a real threat versus what we've been seeing in film recently, with Star Wars being the example:

While not of the yelling variety, our experience with Uldren is also not one of intimidation or power. We've seen him be subverted, we've seen his arrogance make him look like a fool, his slaves turned on him, and the one time we've seen him in action, he failed at his task. Sure doesn't make him a villain that we can take seriously.

We can say much the same about Skolas, and Xol. The only villain that was halfway compelling was Ghaul, and they turned him into a screaming punching bag at the end.
We were supposed to have a connection to him, but the whole final encounter felt so impersonal, and ended outside of our control, so Ghaul is just another blip.

What we have left as far as interesting villains is Calus, and we only hear snippets from him.

That dude replying to Jessica in that thread that got her fired was absolutely correct in my opinion, and it is directly applicable to Destiny.

Her thread basically said that because of the fact that players create their own characters in RPGs and MMOs, you have to make them with only enough personality to simply function, because it will clash with how the players might see their characters otherwise. Thus, limited narrative in MMOs.

Yeah, that excuse is pretty dumb, and it's exactly what I was talking about when I was criticizing the "silent protagonist" that Bungie gave us. If our characters are not participating in the game world, what is the investment? How can villains, especially in a revenge plot, be something that we want to go after if there's such an impersonal barrier between our character and the world?

But the reply was on the money: you can give the player dialogue options. You can have your character act in whatever way your player desires. There's no clash if the other characters react to this and it changes relationships or branches the story in some way. The alternative is a tightly focused narrative with a character who is well defined.

Or you can have both!
Obligatory Warframe post, but I'm going full spoilers.

There is a larger story arc for your character, where they grow over the course of the game's main narrative, and become a strong-willed character, but there are quests between these main plot developments where you have the freedom to make choices that define the kind of character that they are. And these aren't necessarily "Good, Neutral, Evil" choices, as the game's writers wanted more nuance in order to make the choices more personal, so you have choices that implement aspects of a "Sun" or "Moon" disposition based off of the concept of Yin and Yang.

As an example, at the end of the "Glast Gambit" quest, you have to decide the fate of a little girl, Neewa, who has been infected with an eventually-fatal brain disease by her people, the Myconians. The infection is key to her people's survival, and there is a strong back and forth between your leader, The Lotus, and Ergo Glast, the ally who sent you to rescue and return the girl to her people.
Lotus believes the infection is cruel and inhumane, and wants to take the girl away from her family to cure her of the disease, though it will destroy her people's way of life.
If you side with her:

[Sun] Cure Her
Neewa is taken to a relay to be cured, unsure of her future, but as a result she is exiled from the Myconian colony.

Ergo makes an argument about how the people's culture is different, but not evil, because Neewa was never misled about the infection, and what receiving it means to her and her people. Side with him:

[Moon] Send Her Home
Neewa returns to the Myconian colony, continuing to serve as the Triuna for as long as she lives, preserving her people's way of life.

You can also opt for a third, balanced choice, where you let Neewa decide what she wants. Her choice?

[Neutral] Let Her Decide
Neewa chooses to return to the Myconian colony, where she will become the last Triuna and usher a new tradition for her people, one without sacrifices.

The "nice" choice has the worst consequences for the most people, but the game gives you freedom to make it, and it affects your character's disposition and relationship with three separate allies/factions. What will this mean down the road? It's an unknown, but the consequences are a result of your choices.

Perhaps the smartest approach for Bungie given the conventions they've already set might be a Big Trouble Little China scenario, where your Guardian isn't actually the main character of the narrative, but just along for the ride in someone else's story.

Also something that DE did fantastically in their latest quest, "The Sacrifice". In it, you are not the protagonist. You are initially along for the ride. The protagonist is a man named Umbra. Someone who, unlike you, has a very direct relationship with the game's oldest villain, Ballas. The entire quest has your character's story interweaving with Umbra's, but it's ultimately his tale, and the tale of the Warframes' history and how Ballas has directly influenced it.
Because the relationship with the villain is personal, it also helps you get insight into the antagonist's motivations, and DE used this opportunity to avoid the Star Wars issue.
At no point does Ballas ever raise his voice or kill anyone (except for ordering Umbra killed at the beginning, but its complicated), but you grow to understand the reasons for his actions, the things he has had a hand in, and you want him dead. The moment that the game's writers used to establish and fuel your hatred of him? A recurring sequence where you play a few rounds of Reversi with him as he grants praise for Umbra, but uses the friendly board game as a source of his threats and plans. And there's nothing that you can do about it except play your part in the game.
It's not until you approach the end of the quest that your story and Umbra's become one (in an amazing scene where the only dialogue is a narration from a message that Ballas was sending to another of the game's antagonists, marveling at you, the player, and how you are able to get the Warframes to fight for you, even a guilt-ridden and tortured soul like Umbra, and even the song that's playing is relevant to the plot, since it's the song that Umbra would play to his son, the source of his guilt), and everything that has come before has served to push that story forward. And even though Umbra was only introduced in this quest, the quests that DE put out years ago have mattered in servicing this story, and they will continue to matter moving forward.

And the thing is, I'm amazed at how bad Bungie is at doing any one of these things for either protagonist, side characters, or villains, especially since it takes them ages to make anything for the game, so you'd think they'd make use of that time to flesh out the narrative, the characters, or the player's investment in the world. Instead, it's "How can we get players to accept flavor text as story instead of having to make an actual effort, while also getting them to pay for it?" And so now we have the annual pass.

I don't care about Uldren as a villain. I don't care about Cayde. They can't force me to invest in the story if I have never had a reason to invest in either those characters or my own, especially since there has always been zero relationship development between any of us. And now they're introducing a swarm of barons that they want me to care about hunting down as well?
They couldn't even get us invested in Osiris. They flanderized Vance, Ana Bray is dull as dirt, and even the Exo Stranger has been turned into a generic "genius scientist with attitude".

But hey, we have to stay positive, because maybe this time it will be completely different, and we'll be blown away for sure!