the best way to write game story is to force the player to write it, every textwall is empty but to proceed the player must write a 500 page story. this has no effect on gameplay
@Artindi9 ай бұрын
Even better! not going to lie though, if someone was actually able to make a game with writing a story as the actual mechanic with like prompts and stuff, I would probably want to give it a try. :)
@notsodogninja359 ай бұрын
@@Artindi Have you, perchance, tried the game Storyteller? It's similar to what you said; the game gives you a title to fill out, and you have to put characters in a comic book frame to tell the story. Each character/actor has different reactions to the world around them, and motivations usually have to be established to do stuff (except for Baron and Butler), and each scene has different mechanics revolving around it. Modding community ain't half bad either.
@trouslinabone9 ай бұрын
@@notsodogninja35 That sounds honestly pretty sick. Do you know if it's on Steam?
@notsodogninja359 ай бұрын
It is. 15$ for a smallish puzzle game with pretty good modding capabilities, if you know where to look@@trouslinabone
@notsodogninja359 ай бұрын
Also free on mobile if you have a Netflix account but it's not the latest update so some puzzles won't make as much sense@@trouslinabone
@jackunvailable9 ай бұрын
Man, I thought "Burn down the orphanage" was the good ending 🗣
@Artindi9 ай бұрын
I never said which one was the good ending. 0.0
@mrlaz90119 ай бұрын
just use the military's playbook and say there were terrorists inside.
@EdKolis9 ай бұрын
Saving those innocent orphans from having to live in this hellish world 😉
@smort1234 ай бұрын
@@EdKolis Average Villain Speech
@eloniusz9 ай бұрын
It would be even better if "burn down an orphanage" was the good ending because of some crazy series of coincidences that are explained in the final cut scene and were not foreshadowed at all. So this options really saves the universe and the other option somehow leads to its destruction and the only small clue that this will happen is hidden somewhere in an optional quest. People love plot twists!
@Artindi9 ай бұрын
That sounds about right. :)
@EdKolis9 ай бұрын
The nerdy elf orphan who wanted to be an artist was actually the reincarnation of Reltih Floda, the elven warlord who plunged the world into chaos 100 years ago!
@aziamuth68569 ай бұрын
It's not that but Everhood's ending has you doing something terrible but ends up well for the universe, honestly quite incredible
@thekingscrown89316 ай бұрын
@@EdKolis This story sounds a little familiar, but I can't put my finger on it. I think it had something to do with some failed austrian painter?
@SoulHero79 ай бұрын
Its even better to have a linear story where the entire plot can be easily derailed by the player having more common sense than the protagonist! For example, we all know that video game players are stupid and wont think to grab a clearly marked plot important bag of money that's right in front of them that's in the exact same path they need to take to save the protagonist's cat. After all, the story says that money needs to burn so that the protagonist is forced to continue with your perfect story!
@Artindi9 ай бұрын
yeah, it's pretty hard to keep a player on track. And even when the succeed it can just be a bunch of bs that keeps the player on track, like knee high fence. "hm... I can't go this way." :)
@thegoldenaegis9 ай бұрын
Wow if only there was a game like that!
@generalrubbish95139 ай бұрын
@@Artindi I feel like keeping players on track is much more of an issue in pen-and-paper roleplaying games than in videogames. Videogames are bound by rigid programming, so it's much easier to tell the player "[you can't/you have to] do this". There's no game-master to negotiate with. Or throw physical objects at.
@CringeAnimePFP1609 ай бұрын
Gotta love Forespoken, truly the game of all time.
@mushroomjuise23499 ай бұрын
@@generalrubbish9513 ah yes harassing your friend into giving you a gun in a medieval world.... classic
@FoxNamedLuke9 ай бұрын
The best way to write a video game story is to make it really meta but for absolutely no reason. Start off by scolding the player for killing enemies, but have no alternative option. And in case they really go out of their way to not kill enemies (which the game is totally not designed for - remember, we only want to bitch at the player, not give them an actual choice) don't give them any reward for it. As a matter of fact don't even change the dialogues. Oh and don't give standard enemies any character, you don't need that to feel sympathy for them.
@ValeraDX9 ай бұрын
You described the opposite of Undertale lol
@Pablituss9 ай бұрын
Undertale is shit, good comment
@funguy3989 ай бұрын
Last of us 2?
@KasumiRINA7 ай бұрын
Spec Ops: the Line is pretty good BUT it does that thing that it scolds player for... playing it. The "choices" don't matter and it hints the REAL choice is... not playing violent video games and put down the game you bought. Bonus points how it tries to gut punch saying you're killing aMeRiCaNs (somehow I was supposed to feel more sorry defending from white people that shoot me, rather than brown-skinned ones). It DOES give character to enemies and your character becomes more violent as you go on but in the end the self-absorbed idea that "you always have a choice of not playing" tries to blame players do what devs chose to do in their story. ...but it ends up glamorizing war and violence while ALSO providing interesting commentary on trauma and war crimes and the gameplay is good if you like Mass Effect so it rocks.
@spawel16 ай бұрын
my favourite is how superhot mind ctrl delete has an unskippable (the only way is to edit files) 8 hour wait-time when you finish the game to teach you about "consuming"
@Artindi9 ай бұрын
To be clear, both hand crafted stories and dynamic, emergent stories can both be enjoyed, but if we are going to give the player the option to impact the story with their choices, forget the hand crafted stories.
@healthy_stool9 ай бұрын
Of course by their design-which is a lack of design-even the ideal “the player truly controls the plot and world!” game shouldn’t hold a candle to a linear story of similar competence. This is probably why Homer didn’t make multiple versions of each book of the Odyssey
@TheRoseFrontier9 ай бұрын
@@healthy_stool Yeah, true though. I think here it's just good to remember that every medium has its strengths and weaknesses-you can't expect to do it all and give the experiences of a game, book, and movie all in one, for instance. Games can't really tell as much story in volume as a book, but it can be immersive in a unique way. Or, uh, the illusion of immersion. It's kind of impossible to give players unlimited choices to control the plot and the world, but you can make choices feel like they matter, at least, so, yeah?
@rushalias85119 ай бұрын
Out of curiosity is the next video gonna be level design because I really need advice on how not to fail at that.
@Artindi9 ай бұрын
@@rushalias8511 proly.
@RandomizedYoutuber0129 ай бұрын
If you’ve ever heard of Brandon Sanderson-while he was making the book Stormlight, he tried to fill all the pages with as much info story and magic system explanations as he could. While writing it he just knew something was off, so he rewrote the rough draft and was much more satisfied by putting the story into more sections. He says the lesson there is, “Bigger is not always better.”
@Artindi9 ай бұрын
Brandon Mull can do the same thing sometimes, his books are great, but often I get the sense he is just trying to show off his world building skills, (I mean, I'm always impressed, but sometime the story lags a bit because of it.)
@RandomizedYoutuber0129 ай бұрын
@@Artindi Brandon Sanderson accualy did a good job with his world building. He has a whole cosmere that all his main books take place in and many characters from other books show up on other planets in other books. It’s so cool, he’s my favorite author and only two of his books have disappointed me. (And he has like dozens of good books and they are all worth the read)
@Artindi9 ай бұрын
@@RandomizedKZbinr012 Yes, don't get me wrong, I absolutely love his books. (slowly trying to build a collection of all of them.)
@Flyingturt1e9 ай бұрын
Sanderson is an amazing writer, love his books
@BGDMusic9 ай бұрын
@@Artindiit's always people named Brandon...
@empireempire35459 ай бұрын
Imagine this guy making a collab with Terrible Writing Advice on artist collaboration
@Artindi9 ай бұрын
That would be pretty cool, and an appropriate subject too. :)
@TheMamaluigi3009 ай бұрын
@@a__ghost_ Fill the collab with skits even though that’s basically a dead trend “So let’s-“ [STATIC] “Main Guy!” “Other Guy?? What are you doing here? And why do I suddenly have an inexplicable and unquenchable thirst to b̴e̵r̵a̵t̶e̷ ̵a̸n̵d̷ ̶m̸u̵r̶d̸e̸r̶ ̸y̸o̷u̴ ̶g̴r̴u̸e̶s̴o̶m̸e̸l̸y̴?̵” “This topic is waaayy too big for one guy, and I need the advertisement for my show, so let’s do it together!” “UGHHH, fine, Dad, let’s do it tOgeTHeR”
@cosmicspacething34749 ай бұрын
You should do an episode on difficulty. It’s really fun when the game neuters the normal mode so the “hard” mode has all the fun stuff. It’s also especially great when a game makes itself hard in a completely tedious way, and calls itself inspired by dark souls or something to cover it up.
@generalrubbish95139 ай бұрын
I would especially like to see a deeper look at the difference between "real" difficulty which actually challenges the player's skills, and "fake" or "artificial" difficulty which depends on factors the player has no control of, such as RNG, trial-and-error puzzles, or insane moon logic that requires the player to do something completely counter-intuitive to progress.
@Artindi9 ай бұрын
That would be a good subject to touch on. I'll have to see if it will fit into its own episode or if it will be part of a larger subject like balancing in general or something. Thanks for the recommendation! :)
@artman409 ай бұрын
Uncharted. And first Halo.
@TheMamaluigi3009 ай бұрын
Subsequently, neutering the hard mode by removing mechanics to make it harder is also great! (Megaman Zero 2 and… Power Rangers: Lightspeed Rescue (GBC)?)
@funguy3989 ай бұрын
Just multiply enemy's health pool
@buzzlightyearpfp76419 ай бұрын
2:20 this shit killed me cause a stupid amount of games do this
@bruhperson4599 ай бұрын
this video could be considered a puzzle game
@Artindi9 ай бұрын
0.0 Your right! :)
@adiveler9 ай бұрын
Ah yes, when the story and the gameplay are contradicting each other, for example: The Witcher 3 (Don't get me wrong, great game, but still) - Story: "HURRY UP AND COMPLETE ALL THE MAIN QUESTS BEFORE IT'S TOO LATE AND THE WILD HUNT FINDS AND CAPTURES CIRI!" Gameplay: "Chill, you have all the time in the world. You can do side quests, explore the map, or just goof around to your heart's' content."
@Artindi9 ай бұрын
Yeah. Playing skyrim feels that way too sometimes. Alduin is supposedly burning down the world and her I am sorting my cabbage collection. :)
@Plide9 ай бұрын
No way, ludonarrative dissonance?
@KasumiRINA7 ай бұрын
I'll accept that over forced time limits. Fallout 1 runs on timers to endgame, Fallout 2 had limitless time despite stories having similar stakes (Vault runs out of water then super mutants attack vs village is dying then Enclave assaults it and captures hostages).
@jeremiahrodriguez98666 ай бұрын
Breath of the Wild Story: "HURRY, LINK! I CANT HOLD HIM BACK ANY LONGER! YOU HAVE TO SAVE ALL OF HYRULE NOW!" Gameplay: "Relax bro, Go to a nice spa, buy a house, build an entire town from scratch, fill out your picture book, you got time! 😁👍"
@fearlesswee50365 ай бұрын
It would appear CDPR learned nothing and made it even worse in their next game; Cyberpunk 2077. Story: "YOU HAVE TERMINAL BRAIN CANCER AND WILL DIE IN 2 WEEKS IF YOU DON'T FIND A CURE!!!! OMG CHASE EVERY LEAD YOU HAVE!!" Gameplay: "Ayyy, you really wanna go to all those bajillion little markers on your minimap and find all the side content. No? Maybe you wanna hang out in your apartment with one of the romance options? How about sit at a bar and drink some booze in a lengthy animation? Oh, wait, I know! You really, really wanna do a sidequest about a guy with a malfunctioning junk, that's WAY more important than your brain cancer!"
@KRBrickBot9 ай бұрын
Telltale Games do feel like this sometimes. Like choices affect side characters that don’t change the outcome of destiny.
@rockduded89259 ай бұрын
Step one: Force your main character to enter a radioactive chamber and sacrifice themselves as the ending. Step two: Give your main character multiple companions that are immune to radiation. Step three: Eh fuck it, we already got their $60.
@toasterhavingabath69806 ай бұрын
Later add dlc
@borbduck4 ай бұрын
Step 4: add 10 different battle passes that each cost $15 and they're the only way to continue Step 5: Make one of the companions sacrifice themselves for the main cha- Step 6: fuck it we got another $150
@Qwerka3 ай бұрын
Fallout 3 would be more than awsome if SPOILERS AHEAD 1-> Joinable Enclave 2-> Better Ending 3-> Better Gunplay and Power Armor models
@MinorLife109 ай бұрын
Not gonna lie, I also noticed the similarity with TWA. This is how I got to your channel in the first place, and I totally support developing this series. The biggest difference between HTF and TWA I see is that while TWA is usually about either lazy writing or graphomany, this series covers deliberate self-sabotage.
@Artindi9 ай бұрын
Thanks! And I also support developing this series. :)
@greenstarlover19 ай бұрын
All that is left is an overarching narrative in the sponsor segments (if you have any)
@kronksstronkstonks63609 ай бұрын
Please note: Walls of text are acceptable in every kind of game EXCEPT text adventures. They're too wordy and you need to stand out so let's do away with all those descriptions and immersive scene-setting. Tell don't show. Your players want to play the game not imagine it.
@artman409 ай бұрын
Or if you want to show, then show, rather than let the player play.
@Lonkshi217 ай бұрын
Trials in tainted space is text based but it's 18+
@artman409 ай бұрын
Found 4 more tips to fail: First: Make your character incompetent during cutscenes, getting captured, knocked out etc. despite you managing to beat enemies left and right during gameplay. Or make the character have superpowers during cutscenes and you being forced to watch the character doing cool things you couldn't do during normal gameplay, maybe throwing in a quicktime event thrown in where you least expect it. Second: Make sure that there is a huge disconnect between what the player and what the character would do. For an example, make a character go on a revenge spree, then, before the revenge, switch to another person's perspective to give more insight. Then switch back to the original character and make the player decide whether the character would do what the player wants but what makes no sense for the character. Or a choice that would make sense for the character but what the player wouldn't do, given new insight. Or scratch that and take all the choice away anyway. Third: Make EVERY choice morally ambiguous or bad. Because everyone knows that in real life, there are no situations where one choice of action is clearly better than the other. Fourth: Railroad the player into doing a despicable action and then shame them for it!
@KasumiRINA7 ай бұрын
Second: Assassin's Creed 2, you get to final boss and Ezio, who spent entire game killing people, decides to be a pacifist or the game won't sell well in Catholic countries. (You fight the Pope, who is clearly a villain and WALK AWAY for no reason despite how many lives of actually innocent guards it took to get there). Third: Many "edgy" games think this is deep. Reason I like Mass Effect is that often there IS a best outcome and the default state for 2 or 3 doesn't include it so you feel like you earned i.e. Wrex surviving or more NPCs with flavor text. Fourth: Spec Ops: the Line LOVES blaming player for the story they wrote. The game is good and writing is decent, it is a good commentary of war and trauma screwing people up... It should really stop pretending the player not dropping the joystick is to blame for what happens.
@mcbadrobotvoice81559 ай бұрын
"It's only a game. Why put effort into the story?.....So anyway, I'm thinking of adding loads of cutscenes and audio logs"
@aliyahwilliams81689 ай бұрын
YOU'RE STILL DOING THESE? this makes me happy. this series is funny AND useful.. When Im ready to make the worst game ever, I'll rewatch this series.
@Artindi9 ай бұрын
Sounds good! Can't wait to play your horrible game. ;)
@iamthestoat9 ай бұрын
thank you, i was just about to succeed at this one
@Artindi9 ай бұрын
Glad I could help.... I think....
@mateuszszulecki52069 ай бұрын
I wonder how you're gonna deal with failing at a horror game, considering the state the genre is in currently
@Artindi9 ай бұрын
What is the state? Can't say I'm always in the loop with horror games.
@Mayorfoxia829 ай бұрын
@@Artindi they probably mean the “oh look at this retro/kids game!! oh wait the characters are evil!!! AHHH!! JUMPSCARE!!!! MOMMMYYYYUYYY!!!!!” horror games that all the washed up roblox youtubers play
@Artindi9 ай бұрын
@@Mayorfoxia82 Ah, that makes sense.
@SoulHero79 ай бұрын
Sad thing is that FNAF 1 was actually a good shakeup for the genre, but series fatigue crept up on it, on top of everyone copying FNAF's formula at the time.
@mrlaz90119 ай бұрын
nowadays most "horror" games are just kids crap seeking to appeal the algorithm.
@solarknight39429 ай бұрын
That part about linear and non-linear storytelling. There’s something about that that really invoked critical thinking in me. My game is inspired heavily on Final Fantasy 3 from my childhood, but that doesn’t mean I have to design the story to be so straightforward point to point with only side quests. My story would actually be made worse by that due to what I am trying to convey. I could have a part of the story where they are fighting the bad guys in a dense forest. Using fire magic would basically instantly win the encounter but the whole forest burns down, upsetting the druid party member. That could create a whole new line just to gain back that respect within the party itself else she’d just straight up leave and never come back. One party member can regenerate from death but it causes them to transport into a random crystal to regrow on the planet, meaning the player can choose to sacrifice her for something important or not take that risk and lose out. Story critical NPCs could be killed. Story critical villains could be saved. I already have it so that a very common feature is the party splits up in order to take advantage of not drawing too much attention in public areas, I can explore that with tough choices changing based on if the party is full or split, allowing multiple ways players can engage one scenario from how they managed to get there. Could’ve been using rumors in town and immediately heading there or regrouping and taking a longer, harder path with all 4 party members. All of these I came up with thanks to this video. Wow. I’m very glad I found this channel.
@Artindi9 ай бұрын
Sounds interesting, watch out for scope creep though, ether way. Glad I could help. :)
@solarknight39429 ай бұрын
@@Artindi Oh definitely. With how the plot works, it makes a lot of sense for me to heavily limit the content of each act so that there are an amount of branches I can actually handle instead of so many the game had 20 different endings. I got friends who can help tell me “bro too much” and bring me out of my game development trance of just adding more and more and more. Most likely for my game, I’m gonna not have any examples of killing or saving story critical npcs. For the sake of it not taking so long.
@zaidlacksalastname49059 ай бұрын
Your game is never gonna be released (jk best of luck
@hudadog9 ай бұрын
These videos are sometimes confusing because of how they’re worded, but at the same time, extremely helpful!
@Artindi9 ай бұрын
Thanks! Also you should see the first draft scripts. 0.o
@ballom299 ай бұрын
You forgot to give to the player some choices at one moment in the story, but only one option is clearly the correct one, and if the player select any other option he either get a gameover or after few lines of dialogues he has to choose again until he take the obvious pure hearted choice.
@TheMamaluigi3008 ай бұрын
Bonus tip for extra credit: No one likes to sit through long, unskippable cutscenes. They want to interact with the game, right? So, they’ll probably just walk away if they’re bored of the cutscene, and that’s not good. You want them to stay in their seat to pay attention, but you can’t just tell the story through gameplay, because you’re bad at game storytelling, and you desperately need the player to take in whatever drivel you want to force feed them. Thankfully, a recent invention called “forced walking sections” had been created to have your cake and eat it too! During a bit of gameplay, simply and jarringly throttle their character’s speed to a walk, making them walk to a designated point. Because they’re forced to go so slow, you can make story graphics and dialogue pop up as the player goes past them, ensuring they can’t miss or skip any exposition, no matter how innane it is. The best part is, pushing the left stick foward is the closest thing to sitting there that you can get, but the interaction required is still not zero. This means forced walking sections are everything you- I mean the player loves about unskippable cutscenes, but now with that secret ingredient of having juuuuust enough interactivity to stop them from just walking away to get something real quick, because their finite time is not important.
@enderfire33799 ай бұрын
YEAHHH. i already binged the entire series. Edit: i love that you finnaly mentioned TWA, i love that guy
@Artindi9 ай бұрын
There were enough people pointing out the similarities, so yeah, it was about time. But mostly it fit for the subject matter. :)
@GameJam2305 ай бұрын
Actually, I will say, 2:40 gives me a hilarious idea for a game about solving moral dilemmas but with the satirical twist that all your choices are extreme in one direction or the other. Seems like the kind of game I'd expect to have some kind of shock factor with a social statement about extremism like many of Nicky Case's games, and the length is fitting too, it very much shouts "goofy game jam idea".
@TheRoseFrontier9 ай бұрын
As someone currently attempting to make a non-linear story for a game, I can absolutely understand why so many games give only the illusion of choice... it's hard to craft this stuff! But, of course, that's why it's good to keep things simple when you're first starting out and just in general to focus on making the choices matter that players would feel like should matter, rather than fussing over every little thing...in my opinion, anyways. I'm still learning of course. But seriously, I have so much respect for people who do non-linear games well!
@Artindi9 ай бұрын
o7 I solute you. And a good point. We only need to worry about the most important choices. :)
@shroomer38679 ай бұрын
Hey, here's a trick you might find useful to fail at making your game, you create the illusion of choice as mentioned in the video, BUT also make a super duper secret ending which in the end only depends on one dialogue choice in the mid point of the game, where you aren't even notified that something interesting happened or just make it impossible to access without external help from wiki or game code observation because if not the players might discover it by accident!
@SuperDK099 ай бұрын
Thank you for making one on making a story. This will help me become a failure in game development
@Artindi9 ай бұрын
Happy I could help..... probably? I'm confused now. ;)
@SuperDK099 ай бұрын
Thank you maybe, probably. I’m a game developer in unreal engine and the 2 things I can’t do are stories and 3d modeling/animation. Thank you for teaching me how to fail!@@Artindi
@ugib83779 ай бұрын
I love these videos. Upping my potential for failure with each new release! I'll have to give that channel you mentioned a look, and take their advice as gospel instead of sarcasm. That way I can fail well at the story too!
@Artindi9 ай бұрын
He has some very helpful stuff. I've learned a lot by watchin his channel. :)
@legiongames24009 ай бұрын
It's freaking sick seeing you pop off like this! Congrats man, keep 'em coming!
@Artindi9 ай бұрын
Thanks! :D
@mertensiam33849 ай бұрын
I don't think having "the illusion" of your desicions mattering is always 100% a bad thing. You can have it be a thematic thing in the story and narrative, so sadly, telling people to do that isn't ALWAYS gonna make them write a bad videogame story.
@Artindi9 ай бұрын
You are correct. Anything that can be done in a video game can be done really well if done right. Even if it's a cliché or something that most would consider a bad choice. :)
@KasumiRINA7 ай бұрын
It can also spice up linear gameplay: some real old games got extra replayability by letting you choose path, something as simple as going into forest or through the bridge in that Capcom m D&D beatemup. With games that have more involved story, you can have option to, say, follow a caravan or climb the ramparts to infiltrate the same castle AND write it as a story choice, both paths to same end but adds to the replay value.
@yipyipyipi21 күн бұрын
2:07 side eyes telltale games...
@Urza267 ай бұрын
The best game story is to lock it behind a paywall where players must pay per paragraph, but it's random loot, so you won't know which paragraph fits in the story where.
@azylan9 ай бұрын
this was a very helpful episode to me, the game i'm brainstorming rn has a story that i really love, and gameplay that i really love... but i wasn't exactly sure how to put them together in a way that feels fluid and pleasant. i would like to be less reliant on dialogue and cutscenes and lean more toward interactivity. in turn, though, i might need to slim down the story when it comes to details.
@Artindi9 ай бұрын
Glad I could help! :)
@Peppy100039 ай бұрын
one of the best games that incorparates the story and gameplay together is Lobotomy corparation, with the story explaining the difficulty, the visual artstyle, the enviroment and even players restarting. it's one of the best games to play interms of writing
@redactedoktor9 ай бұрын
Disco Elysium on its way to just straight up be a book where you also read books (it is one of the most engaging and incredible experiences in video games ever made and is great because of its format and it couldn't actually just be a book, because it was a book, and it was good, and no one cared, until it was a game)
@zaidlacksalastname49059 ай бұрын
Disco Elysium has over a million words. That's harry-potter-sized, all 7 books
@SyndicateOperative5 ай бұрын
@@zaidlacksalastname4905 It, in no way, shape, or form, has over a million words. It wouldn't even scratch a tenth of that.
@ozan____9 ай бұрын
you are not only helpful, you even give us links to other channels, thank you so much Artindi
@Artindi9 ай бұрын
Yeah. I forgot it for the first hour or so. Glad I remembered before too long. :)
@ozan____9 ай бұрын
i plan to show your channel to teachers, i study digital game design
@Artindi9 ай бұрын
@@ozan____ that sounds awesome! I study game design too... just not formally. :)
@Thegamerking3126 ай бұрын
Worst way to make a story is to watch game theory
@KozelPraiseGOELRO6 ай бұрын
2:52 the "else" statement may lead to partial success 'cause two's better than one, therefore, use the "if" alone.
@VoltitanDev19 күн бұрын
Since my current game (FFF Voltitan Vol.3 )is a visual novel/ 3d mecha game hybrid I integrate the gameplay to the story by having the player's performance in the game have narrative consequences for example the enemy of the next level adapts to how the player defeats the previous enemy and how they defeat the enemy can fulfil a flag for a ending's condition. The narrative and gameplay also have a feel of a retro super robot anime.
@itainteasywhenitshard70879 ай бұрын
Love these, please do more if you have any ideas
@Artindi9 ай бұрын
Oh. I got more. :)
@itainteasywhenitshard70879 ай бұрын
You love to hear it
@jpgartist1106 ай бұрын
Honestly this is way more helpful than serious tutorials, thanks
@doob.5 ай бұрын
- 20 mins for each cutscenes - 15 pages novel in between each missions - Gameplay have nothing to do with story - Fake choices Got it!
@qoombert8 ай бұрын
i wanted to compare this to terrible writing advice, but i now see that it has already been done.
@lyngoodpresents52609 ай бұрын
Great episode as usual. Really excited to find out how to fail at level design!
@Artindi9 ай бұрын
I'm excited to find out too! ;)
@zaidlacksalastname49059 ай бұрын
It's out
@ruffeboi73049 ай бұрын
Just found this channel like 10 minutes ago and i already know i'll be binge watching all of these 🔥🔥🔥🔥
@joebalIs9 ай бұрын
you've done it again david cage!
@Artindi9 ай бұрын
Who dat?
@Artindi9 ай бұрын
Oh wait. I figured it out. Lol
@Sr.CorvusDev9 ай бұрын
Can you please make "How to fail making a fighting game"? I'm curious about what you come up with.
@Artindi9 ай бұрын
I guess that depends on what kind of fighting game? Your probably talking about a Mortal Combat style game?
@Sr.CorvusDev9 ай бұрын
@@Artindi Yeah!
@TheMamaluigi3009 ай бұрын
@@Artindi Yeah, or Street Fighter
@JohnSmith-uk6wh9 ай бұрын
I'm a simple man. I see a "how to fail at game dev" video, I upvote.
@smokeback9 ай бұрын
awesome always look out for these videos
@MacronLacrom9 ай бұрын
Heres an idea: - Don't explain the story or give any context to where you are and where your going. Leave it open ended so the playerbase can make up some fanfiction to feel smart. - Add an open world with no quest tracking or logs; only add NPCs that talk a little and leave it up to the player to figure it out. (NPCs should talk in some old medevil english) IMPORTANT NPCs should only say their dialogue *ONCE!* - Don't mark anything of the map. Leave it blank with some structures squiggled on and make it the same style as the terrain of the points if interest is even harder to see *Bonus points* DO NOT mark where you've been so the player will get stuck going in circles. - punish the player for minor and easily made mistakes *bonus* force the player to redo a chunk of the level when they die with all of the enemies respawned. - *DO NOT* give the player a way to beat the boss or allow the player to use strategy to exploit the weaknesses of the boss; that is what the open world is for: increaseing your power level
@stproducciones91404 ай бұрын
the YIIK dev took this to heart
@maverickREAL9 ай бұрын
These videos really have sapped my will to create video games. Thanks!
@RafaelFilho5 ай бұрын
Instead of walls of text there can be endless dialogues too!
@MrGreenshard8 ай бұрын
Just found your channel and I really like this series. I’m really wanting to work on a heavily story based game and I was wondering if an entirely linear game would be a bad design, but I guess you just have to pull it off properly.
@Artindi8 ай бұрын
Glad you like it, and yeah, I think most stories should ether be completely linear, or completely dynamic. So no, I think an entirely linear game is great design. assuming all other game design aspects are done right. :)
@TrulyAtrocious9 ай бұрын
This man makes me feel called out for things I never thought of
@SomeUsernameSomeoneElseTookIt9 ай бұрын
found these videos on accident and binged most of them to see this video came out 4 hours ago, real
@entothechesnautknight17629 ай бұрын
Remember, your story and gameplay should be entirely disconnected. Just because your game lacks any fall damage doesn't mean your protag cant break his leg in a fall. You've heard the term "ludonarritive dissonance" before, so gamers are probably used to a little bit of extra suspension of disbelief. But also doing things in gameplay rather then cutscenes is also really cool. You played a game that did that once and, like, it was badass! You gotta put as many story moments into your gameplay as possible, people love that stuff, and for some reason most games don't do it much. So when you need a character to die, don't do it in a cutscene and leave the player to escape whatever danger kills them after. Instead, you should have the player carry this character on their back, slowing them down to really emphasize how they're trying to save this person at their own expense, before they're forced to leave them behind in order to not die themselves. Yeah, that sounds super cool! Oh, how do we force them to leave the character behind? Yeah, we'll just take one of those door puzzles where you need to push a crate onto a button, and remove the crate. Now they *have* to leave them behind no matter what. Of course the door can be opened by another button on the other side, ya know, makes sense, but we removed all the crates, so there's mo way to keep it open while rescuing the character! ...wait, we added a gun that swaps the player and another character? And the character is a straight shot from the player, so they could just swap places with the character, both keeping the door open and allowing the player to rescue the character? And we've had them do this multiple times before in previous puzzles? Better disable the gun's function for literally just this and only this one segment with no explanation. We can't let player agency get in the way of the story, the character needs to die so the story can play out exactly as we originally wrote it, they need to be sad he died! And the player needs to do it in gameplay to make it extra sad! Even if we have to literally disable basic game functions and turn the "gameplay" into basically just a worse cutscene, the story will clearly be good enough that players won't mind. I mean, it worked for CoD, right? Everyone knows about "Press F to pay respects"! Man, we are smart. (Yes this is about one specific game how could you tell)
@madnessoverload78248 ай бұрын
2:13 *cough* Life is Strange *cough*
@wander78129 ай бұрын
Literally Starfield and Skyrim.
@nowonmetube8 ай бұрын
The true story at the end made me go "What!" I mean... for real bro?
@Color_Splsh9 ай бұрын
You should totally make one of these "fail" videos on metroidvanias
@ShadowOfOurHearts9 ай бұрын
"A really long movie occasionally interrupted by a walking simulator" Man really gotta call out YIIK like that huh?
@Artindi9 ай бұрын
I like how someone can always think of a game that represents something said in the video. Ha ha. I've never even heard of YIIK, but I'll claim the call out. :)
@jensinamart51535 ай бұрын
This reminds me so much of the Kings Question remake. At one point, you're given a choice to save either: a) A pregnant woman and one of your most loyal subjects or b) a blind old goat. And yes. This choice is 100% serious and the game will guilt you for not saving the goat.
@logan_wolf9 ай бұрын
Damn, it's like Emil Pagliarulo saw this video, and didn't realize it was sarcasm!
@DaikoruArtwin8 ай бұрын
I've played quite a few Pokemon ROM Hacks and fan games, but in the most part, when they made a new story or simply modified an exisiting story, I had found that story to actually be worse than the original games, which really isn't a high standard. I've seen stuff that contradicts confirmed canon facts, I've seen a lot of "important" events and characters that serve no purposes, and lot of other horrible stuff story-wise. Strangely enough, the best story I've seen from a Pokemon fan game actually comes from a game whose main selling point wasn't even the story. It's a simple idea: Pokemon Fire Red, but you play as a Rocket Grunt. What they've done with the story was actually very amazing, they made it happen parallel to the original Pokemon Fire Red story, but you get to see everything behind the scenes, everything is explained in a way that not only makes sense (such as why Team Rocket was at Mt. Moon), but also doesn't deny anything from the original game. And at the end, you also get some 4th wall-breaking storytelling, in the same way that Undertale does. This last point is actually what I absolutely love in video game story-telling. Explaining game mechanics in a way that makes sense within the story setting of the game is super cool, but making use of illogical yet extremely common game mechanics to make the story go meta about you as the player or other out-of-the-box concepts, I crave that kind of plot twists!
@lemonlordminecraft9 ай бұрын
2:12 shout out to onions worldwide!
@Artindi9 ай бұрын
They have layers.
@thetageist8 ай бұрын
I wonder if J.P. from Terrible Writing Advice has actually seen this series yet. Someone should send it to him now that this shoutout's been made.
@renzero43299 ай бұрын
No way, Terrible Writing Advice but games?!!!
@ChuckSploder5 ай бұрын
Even better when the player's dialogue explains everything that happened in the past at perfectly convenient intervals. Player (just woken from a 1000-year cryostasis): "Huh, that's a plant I've never seen before. It must be a highly evolved Zega-Flytrap clone that was created by High Magistrate Bruno when the War of the Corps raged on planet Oswan VI in the year 3329 A.D., 952 years ago. How interesting."
@robertlauncher5 ай бұрын
Remember, right out of the gate you have to overwhelm and bore the player with your plots at the expense of the exciting game they bought. Never let the opening be comprised of quick, effective teaching through level design, or poignant and lush storytelling through environmental details and visual cues. You HAVE to frontload the game with text so that, at best, your fans will say “It gets really good hours into the experience.”
@BaconNuke7 ай бұрын
Best way for the multiple endings to happen is make it so there is either a single choice made at the start of the game, ie you chose to steal some bread on your journey from the windowsill of a house vs asking nicely from the obviously mean neighbor who won't give it, that makes every single other options during gameplay flavor text, or you make *every* choice alter your "karma" that is unseen and unknown by the player, ie you have 51% bad and 49% good therefore you get bad ending, but 50/50 is a neutral ending, but every event has different weights that you can only figure out via data miners dumping all that online so people have to make guides based off it and now the player is doing a pre-determined set of choices that they don't always wanna do but have to for sake of a third ending that isn't satisfying in either direction, because it's neutral
@Steelpoly3dJ3165 ай бұрын
Sometimes I feel like the story in a linear game assumes that I'm competent and know what I'm doing when I don't. According to the story of half life 2, I'm a new member of the resistance going off to find the nearest base and escape from the combine forces. In reality, I'm going in whatever direction the game's level design points me in without a clear idea of what we're doing, where I am, or what's going on. And I would like to know what's going on. I want to know that I'm not working for the bad guys.
@OmgMcGamez9 ай бұрын
0:54 to 1:18 is just explaining the current state of Five Nights at Freddys.
@Lonkshi217 ай бұрын
Walking dead telltale is a good example of a movie with a walking sim, but it has more interactive mechanics, like choosing what to say based on the situation
@RoamingAdhocrat6 ай бұрын
shoutout to Hardspace Shipbreaker, which had a good story, delivered as unskippable cutscenes where your colleagues _phone you at home after work_ and monologue at you for minutes at a time. truly a horror game
@-189 ай бұрын
Some questions. - What about Telltale video games?... those are based only on cinematics that activate depending on the options you choose, so it's like a kind of interactive movie or cinematic? - And what about visual novels? - And does what was said in this video change anything if the player is previously announced that the video game will be more linear and therefore would not generate so many illusions/expectations that would be betrayed in the end? Of course, then I guess fewer people would probably be attracted.
@Artindi9 ай бұрын
Great questions. :) Interactive/visual novels can have many endings or possible outcomes, some can seem more desirable than others on a subjective level, but any ending should be just as valid as any other ending. If a certain ending became the official win condition or lose condition, the intended use of the medium would no longer be a free discovery of story, but rather an official challenge to achieve the target outcome set by the medium. A game must have a conclusive measurable outcome established by the medium, such as a win, a loss, a state a maintained condition, (such as in king of the hill) or a performance based outcome, without this there would be no defining factors setting "game" apart from any other recreative activity. Because this distinction between "interactive novel/visual novel" and "game" are definitionally opposed, they are mutually exclusive. So you could ether have a game, perhaps with a visual novel style story such as in Ace Attorney, or an interactive/visual novel, perhaps with game like elements such as in Detroit: Become Human, but it can only be one or the other with the main distinction based on the presence of an objective goal establish by the medium. However this doesn't mean that we can't still refer to certain forms of entertainment as a "game" colloquially to avoid confusion as I would do with Detroit: Become Human. Thanks for the thoughtful comment. :)
@TheMamaluigi3008 ай бұрын
@@Artindi “Turns out, it’s easy to fail at making a game when what you make is not a game.”
@thabluetails9 ай бұрын
2:19 Fire Emblem three houses in a nutshell
@RayOfTruth8 ай бұрын
How? Most of the post time skip sections are incredibly different from each other
@lordmarshmal_06439 ай бұрын
Wait you're telling me GameMill Entertainment invented time travel and took notes from this video while they were developing The Walking Dead Destinies??? HOLY SHIT
@JoelTheParrot9 ай бұрын
0:18 I love this like... I wouldn't call it a crossover, what would it be called though? 617 episodes?! so cool, and I think this was a good way to do it. thank you for the vids :D
@Artindi9 ай бұрын
To be clear I was joking about 617 episode. But I can't tell if you are playing along. :)
@JoelTheParrot9 ай бұрын
i wasn't entirely sure how serious you were since i don't personally know the limits of such a series but it definitely reads as hyperbole as well lol, so i'm not really surprised. d(^v^d)@@Artindi
@dmas77499 ай бұрын
well, i got called out in like 20 seconds, fair play thanks again for the vidya
@ChuzzleFilms8 ай бұрын
Holy cow a bejeweled reference
@Bigparr438 ай бұрын
I do take issue with the concept of nonlinearity still converging on the same ending vs a binary choice in non-linearity, because it has been done before well albeit in a somewhat niche setting. 999, Virtue's Last Reward, and Zero Time Dilemma (the Zero Escape trilogy) do a fantastic job of letting the player experience many different endings to inform the player (and NPCs kinda) about things that can progress other timelines to a final ultimate ending. I know it is niche, but the compromise can absolutely be done
@pointyorb3 ай бұрын
2:07 Minecraft Story Mode
@ScorbunGame8 ай бұрын
Don't forget to not have the story and gameplay converge to make the mechanics of your game feel like their part of your world, that might make the player feel like their actually experiencing the setting and take advantage of the interactive nature of the medium. In fact, just have characters act completely irrationally for the sake of gameplay even if a entre section or boss fight could be avoided if the cast would just talk to each other!
@AsePlayer9 ай бұрын
You are on fire lol. Can't wait for the roast of live service
@angel_of_rustАй бұрын
1. hire sweet baby inc
@ArtindiАй бұрын
That would do it. lol
@pickyphysicsstudent2019 ай бұрын
I'd say stay away from multiple choice branching narrative games. They take too much effort and very rarely work out. >Endingtron 3000 where you choose one of ~4 choices to decide the ending of a linear game, which results in reloading hte last save to see the alternate endings. >David Cage-esk CYOA games which has minute choices which but has to constrain to pragmatic case of no choice having any real meaning. >Good vs evil routes where 9/10 times the evil route is the just bad ending. Getting the middle route is also kind of bland as well.
@EmperorSigismund8 ай бұрын
I don't care what anyone says. The literal 'Wall of Text' was the funniest joke in the Neverhood and yes, I read all of it AND I enjoyed it.
@Artindi8 ай бұрын
Nice. I was pretty proud of that. :)
@Csbees9 ай бұрын
Great video, make how to fail at learning to code, idk how to code and I might actually learn
@johnterpack3940Ай бұрын
"Warhammer 40k: Rogue Trader" fails hard at story. Sets you in a world chock full of lore and potential. Gives you tons of dialog options. But all the endings listed in the code are based on two factors- what alignment you chose and how you responded to the big bad at the very end. Everything in between was irrelevant. It was actually jarring how poorly the story followed my actions. Rescue the navigator by killing the guy who tried to kill her and she tries getting into your pants five minutes later, fair enough. Rescue the navigator by killing the bad guy and slaughtering her entire clan in the process... and she tries getting in your pants five minutes later. Huh?
@hershmergersh67339 ай бұрын
Instruction unclear. Followed them exactly but made Metal Gear Solid 4
@fabiofanf3e8139 ай бұрын
2:22 when you accidentally give a fire game idea:
@pixelatedluisyt7 ай бұрын
2:26 literally every roblox camping game ever
@dogiy17759 ай бұрын
Instructions unclear, proceeds to create lore rich game
@SamuelBrokenaro8 ай бұрын
Outer Wilds : the time loop has meaning, you understand the "why" if you finish the game 12 minutes : There is a time loop. Yeah there is a time loop, this is the game that's it. If you finish the game you're in another timeloop. So spooky isn't it ?
@theReincarnate9 ай бұрын
scungle
@Artindi9 ай бұрын
dofrustie
@JacobKinsley9 ай бұрын
Lmao the nonlinear story thing just sums up Prey (2017) Still a stellar game with an incredible story regardless