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Easy To Play Narrative Games
Jan. 28th, 2022 07:58 pmOver on tumblr, bamboocounting asked for recs for good narrative games without any difficult gameplay, and I thought it would make a good topic for a post.
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Some fantasy media and games reviews
Mar. 9th, 2021 12:04 pmRaya and the Last Dragon, Wandavision, Disco Elysium, My Brother Rabbit, Stay
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My gift, which was everything I asked for PLUS DRAGONS:
Hail the Hunter (3510 words) by Anonymous
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Original Work, Girl With One Eye - Florence + The Machine (Song)
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Characters: Girl With One Eye (Character), Narrator
Additional Tags: Fictional Religion & Theology, Servants, Dysfunctional Relationships, Power Dynamics, Non-Graphic Violence, Recovery, Dark Fantasy, Jukebox Fanworks Exchange
Summary:
And my favourite of the works I've seen, a short but interesting little interactive poem:
You are Building an Abbey for Lovers (54 words) by Anonymous
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Bele Doette (Traditional Chanson)
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Characters: Bele Doette
Additional Tags: Interactive Fiction, Jukebox Treat
Summary:
My assignment has gone down pretty well which I am happy about!
Hail the Hunter (3510 words) by Anonymous
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Original Work, Girl With One Eye - Florence + The Machine (Song)
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Characters: Girl With One Eye (Character), Narrator
Additional Tags: Fictional Religion & Theology, Servants, Dysfunctional Relationships, Power Dynamics, Non-Graphic Violence, Recovery, Dark Fantasy, Jukebox Fanworks Exchange
Summary:
A story of fate, devotion, cruelty and betrayal.
And my favourite of the works I've seen, a short but interesting little interactive poem:
You are Building an Abbey for Lovers (54 words) by Anonymous
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Bele Doette (Traditional Chanson)
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Characters: Bele Doette
Additional Tags: Interactive Fiction, Jukebox Treat
Summary:
You are building an abbey for lovers
For lovers who've always stayed true
You are carving your heart
So it says press to start.
My assignment has gone down pretty well which I am happy about!
First: my "Online Games: Literature, New Media, and Narrative" Coursera course is really very simplistic, I should be finding it challenging, not feeling annoyed at everyone for missing obvious points. And when the one POC in the videoed tutorial ever so gently suggested that maybe The Lord of the Rings has some troubling racial subtext the lecturer changed the subject :/ :/ Then while they happily chatted about the repeated theme of evil cripples in "To The Dark Tower Childe Roland Came" there was no suggestion that any of them saw this as anything but extra flavour to the general unpleasantness of the situation :/ :/ So...yes, let's just wallow in ancient tropes without thinking about their limitations or damaging effects. Sure.
Second: two games I was reccomended as examples of transcending the usual limitations of their genres.
In Dear Esther you wander a small island, hearing fragments of a man's story, and feel melancholy. It's like an interactive sad little art house film. The surroundings are beautifully rendered and they combine with the music and sparse narration to create a very effective sense of melancholy but there is NO PLOT. I enjoyed it to start with (it really does feel like exploring a beautiful desolate beach at dusk) but got bored by the end and didn't think the narrator's story was interesting enough to warrant a whole game. Gone Home did the "Experience a story as you wander around a setting" thing better imo, though it wasn't as pretty. But I don't tend to enjoy arty films with no plot either (or men poetically describing their pain), and a lot of other people found Dear Esther very effective. Warning: some of the content of this game could be very triggering, I don't want to spoil it so will put the specific warnings under a cut.
Ristorante Amore, on the other hand, made me angry. It would be a cute, slick, moderately well written m/f and m/m dating sim...if it weren't for the pretentious gimmick the writers chose to put over the top. It suffers pretty badly from "Not like other girls" syndrome, blatantly mocking other dating sims despite really not being all that different, and clearly thinking female characters only have value if they fit into the "~feminist~ strong female character" box (male characters of course can be much more varied. Also they get to be queer). If you can grit your teeth through all that the characters themselves are likeable enough and I did enjoy the romances, but overall the game left a bad taste in my mouth.
( Dear Esther content warning )
Second: two games I was reccomended as examples of transcending the usual limitations of their genres.
In Dear Esther you wander a small island, hearing fragments of a man's story, and feel melancholy. It's like an interactive sad little art house film. The surroundings are beautifully rendered and they combine with the music and sparse narration to create a very effective sense of melancholy but there is NO PLOT. I enjoyed it to start with (it really does feel like exploring a beautiful desolate beach at dusk) but got bored by the end and didn't think the narrator's story was interesting enough to warrant a whole game. Gone Home did the "Experience a story as you wander around a setting" thing better imo, though it wasn't as pretty. But I don't tend to enjoy arty films with no plot either (or men poetically describing their pain), and a lot of other people found Dear Esther very effective. Warning: some of the content of this game could be very triggering, I don't want to spoil it so will put the specific warnings under a cut.
Ristorante Amore, on the other hand, made me angry. It would be a cute, slick, moderately well written m/f and m/m dating sim...if it weren't for the pretentious gimmick the writers chose to put over the top. It suffers pretty badly from "Not like other girls" syndrome, blatantly mocking other dating sims despite really not being all that different, and clearly thinking female characters only have value if they fit into the "~feminist~ strong female character" box (male characters of course can be much more varied. Also they get to be queer). If you can grit your teeth through all that the characters themselves are likeable enough and I did enjoy the romances, but overall the game left a bad taste in my mouth.
( Dear Esther content warning )
Stuff: Shrines and roses
Sep. 4th, 2013 10:47 amBooks:
A Shrine to Saint Ann: A very enjoyable little fantasy ebook, reminds me of the Curse of Chalion series by Lois McMaster Bujold but with less racism and more sarcastic reanimated corpses. Like Bujold (and Megan Whalen Smith, who I was also reminded of) a little too in love with gods and royalty and not enough with regular people for my tastes, but that's what I get for reading fantasy. It was still a quick enjoyable read with interesting and diverse characters and worldbuilding, focussed very much on complex female characters being fascinatingly terrible. And only $3!
The Circle of Magic 1: Sandry's Book/The Magic in the Weaving by Tamora Pierce: Light and mostly innoffensive children's fantasy about a mismatched group of children with different magical gifts gathered together to learn magic and the ~power of friendship~ etc. Obviously trying VERY HARD to be DIVERSE (about race/class/gender/body type) which gets wearying sometimes (and is undercut by some skeevy subtext) but is a nice change from books that don't try at all and creates lots of natural moments for character growth and contrast.
TV:
Watched the Cowboy Bebop movie and I did indeed enjoy it more now I know it affects NOTHING in the series chronology and is just a random side adventure. Still makes no freaking sense.
Games:
Flight Rising: Briefly opened for new members! Hello all! You will have to friend me if you want to be friends, the notifications were annoyingly lacking in lair links. Also, the comments to this post have some good advice.
Gone Home: a very good little interactive story (not a dating sim! Or fighting game!!) where you play a woman who arrives home from an overseas trip to find the house empty. You wander around trying to figure out what's been up with your family while you've been gone, and are railroaded enough by having to find keys for locked doors etc that the clues you piece together form a coherent and affecting story. Note: the vast majority of items you can interact with are there purely for atmosphere, don't waste time trying to figure out the Secret Meaning of the toilet paper or how to set it on fire, because there is none and you can't. *cough*
And now two very fluffy fantasy visual novels with f/m dating sim elements.
Blue Rose: I played the demo of this and enjoyed it but not enough to pay $20 for the full version, especially given all the typos and general amateurish feel. It's fairly generic fantasy with lots of anachronism and unconvincing worldbuilding, the characters were varied and kind of interesting but the dialogue was often stilted. The one f/f romance option seems nice but bland. Blindingly white, even the (blonde!) woman who seems to be from pseudo-China.
Everlove: Rose. This I enjoyed enough to pay $5 for the full version and I'd say I got my money's worth but I wouldn't rec it very strongly. The historical setting is SO SHALLOW and the vast majority of scenes are identical on every path even when you make drastically different choices. But the art is pretty, the characters are likeable enough and the plot was interesting the first time through. The puzzles are easy (on an iPad) and not super fun but do break up the plot. You have the option to declare yourself a lesbian in one scene but otherwise it's very heteronormative despite your female best friend having the cutest sprite :( I wasn't very satisfied with the special ending you get after doing all four paths.
A Shrine to Saint Ann: A very enjoyable little fantasy ebook, reminds me of the Curse of Chalion series by Lois McMaster Bujold but with less racism and more sarcastic reanimated corpses. Like Bujold (and Megan Whalen Smith, who I was also reminded of) a little too in love with gods and royalty and not enough with regular people for my tastes, but that's what I get for reading fantasy. It was still a quick enjoyable read with interesting and diverse characters and worldbuilding, focussed very much on complex female characters being fascinatingly terrible. And only $3!
The Circle of Magic 1: Sandry's Book/The Magic in the Weaving by Tamora Pierce: Light and mostly innoffensive children's fantasy about a mismatched group of children with different magical gifts gathered together to learn magic and the ~power of friendship~ etc. Obviously trying VERY HARD to be DIVERSE (about race/class/gender/body type) which gets wearying sometimes (and is undercut by some skeevy subtext) but is a nice change from books that don't try at all and creates lots of natural moments for character growth and contrast.
TV:
Watched the Cowboy Bebop movie and I did indeed enjoy it more now I know it affects NOTHING in the series chronology and is just a random side adventure. Still makes no freaking sense.
Games:
Flight Rising: Briefly opened for new members! Hello all! You will have to friend me if you want to be friends, the notifications were annoyingly lacking in lair links. Also, the comments to this post have some good advice.
Gone Home: a very good little interactive story (not a dating sim! Or fighting game!!) where you play a woman who arrives home from an overseas trip to find the house empty. You wander around trying to figure out what's been up with your family while you've been gone, and are railroaded enough by having to find keys for locked doors etc that the clues you piece together form a coherent and affecting story. Note: the vast majority of items you can interact with are there purely for atmosphere, don't waste time trying to figure out the Secret Meaning of the toilet paper or how to set it on fire, because there is none and you can't. *cough*
And now two very fluffy fantasy visual novels with f/m dating sim elements.
Blue Rose: I played the demo of this and enjoyed it but not enough to pay $20 for the full version, especially given all the typos and general amateurish feel. It's fairly generic fantasy with lots of anachronism and unconvincing worldbuilding, the characters were varied and kind of interesting but the dialogue was often stilted. The one f/f romance option seems nice but bland. Blindingly white, even the (blonde!) woman who seems to be from pseudo-China.
Everlove: Rose. This I enjoyed enough to pay $5 for the full version and I'd say I got my money's worth but I wouldn't rec it very strongly. The historical setting is SO SHALLOW and the vast majority of scenes are identical on every path even when you make drastically different choices. But the art is pretty, the characters are likeable enough and the plot was interesting the first time through. The puzzles are easy (on an iPad) and not super fun but do break up the plot. You have the option to declare yourself a lesbian in one scene but otherwise it's very heteronormative despite your female best friend having the cutest sprite :( I wasn't very satisfied with the special ending you get after doing all four paths.
Who knew this was going to be a series?
Some preliminary thoughts about interactive stories
Notes for Interactive Storytelling panel
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Some preliminary thoughts about interactive stories
Notes for Interactive Storytelling panel
( Read more... )
Tags:
Notes for Interactive Storytelling panel
Mar. 20th, 2013 02:45 pmMy initial post
So you want to create an interactive story
I'm focussing on single person games like Interactive Fiction/Text Adventures, puzzle/RPG games with lots of story, visual novels etc.
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So you want to create an interactive story
I'm focussing on single person games like Interactive Fiction/Text Adventures, puzzle/RPG games with lots of story, visual novels etc.
( Read more... )
Since I'm doing a panel on it for Swancon. Am still adding to this as I think of things!
EDIT Further posts:
Notes for Interactive Storytelling panel
So you want to create an interactive story
( Read more... )
EDIT Further posts:
Notes for Interactive Storytelling panel
So you want to create an interactive story
( Read more... )
Just got a letter from the credit card company asking if I want to opt in to future offers of a credit increase, now that a new law makes this mandatory. Ha! I bet they were all gnashing their teeth over that one.
FailFandomAnon is often a den of iniquity (do not read any threads about anything remotely political/social justice related unless you have a strong stomach) but the rec threads can be fantastic. Alas the Interactive Fiction thread was accidentally deleted, but someone *cough* has posted what recs they can remember with the hope of someone else filling the gaps. I've been having such fun. I recommend Gun Mute if you want something short and fun, you're a cowboy shooting his way through town to save his boyfriend.
I have Things to Do but keep getting sleepy when I try to do them. Stupid body. Still, you can at least see the loungeroom table now.
FailFandomAnon is often a den of iniquity (do not read any threads about anything remotely political/social justice related unless you have a strong stomach) but the rec threads can be fantastic. Alas the Interactive Fiction thread was accidentally deleted, but someone *cough* has posted what recs they can remember with the hope of someone else filling the gaps. I've been having such fun. I recommend Gun Mute if you want something short and fun, you're a cowboy shooting his way through town to save his boyfriend.
I have Things to Do but keep getting sleepy when I try to do them. Stupid body. Still, you can at least see the loungeroom table now.
