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Topic: TW-ligt plot (Read 44153 times)
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Bekanor
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I, personally, like UAF's plot a great deal. But that's just my opinion, and you're entitled to think otherwise. However, 'seems to me that the best way to make it better is to actually help writing FOR it. Take the Niko. Maybe you think they seem boring - Fair enough. But then, their brief is exactly three sentences long. Make them interesting! Why are they the religous fanatics they are? Alien intervention? Coincidence and Credulence? Maybe their really is inexplicable evidence for their goddess - a nice little mystery. What exactly turned the Alkory into the incontinent wrecks they are? Why do the Mrri want Ger Pudding? What IS Ger pudding? Why do the Umgah work with you - albeit secretly? And so on! Stripped of all the actual writing and interest, I could easily sum up the plot of SC2 on a page, in terms of go here, do this, kill this, watch this. Fleshing it out would be where we come in.
Take the Zoq Fot Pik. Their design brief, compressed to the same level, could be "Commune of three races - one green and smart, one blue and annoying, one brown and mute". Then someone with imagination and intelligence came along and crafted an interesting and much liked race from it. Similar tricks were performed for the Supox, who existed solely to give you the Ultron, and the VUX whose one actually significant important individual was, by neccesity, the opposite of his race.
The point is, we could kick around the plot for a few months and wind up with something maybe a touch better, maybe a touch worse, and then end up at precisely the same point - actually needing people to start working at the writing and coding to put all the grand ideas together. This is as good a(and in my opinion, a damn sight better) plot as any, so lets work with it.
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GeomanNL
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Well, I wanted to write a sarcastic reply to some of the generalized remarks out there. Deus_siddis made the last one, and looked persistently negative, so I replied it to him.
Weird, I guess starflight, starcontrol and starcraft were written by ghosts or something.
Sure there are writers *out there*. And that's the problem. If a professional writer would've been interested in writing a sc2 adventure sequel, there would've been a sequel by now. However, I've never seen them "here". So, from our perspecitve, we've never seen them, and if you've never seen something, you wonder if they exist, you know. It was intended to be a bit funny.
Uhm, and I also included a personal attack on DS there. I thought he deserved it, but as usual, such a thing goes on. My apologies, also to DS, for it.
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« Last Edit: May 08, 2005, 08:26:54 pm by GeomanNL »
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Frank
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Few quick points, then I vanish back into the ether for good! (I hope -- can't let forum-writing take time away from other pursuits.)
The dating sim in particular -- it's not that it's all *that* silly, but the way it's talked about it sounds like it would feel even more silly because it would intrude on normal gameplay.
I'm not sure that the dating sim is inherently flawed. Your suggestion is a somewhat nicer integration into the story, probably, but I think you can do it as a minigame without being too upsetting. If you've had a chance to play Pirates! (particularly the latest remake), you'll see how fun a game-like dating sim can be. Pirates!, by the way, is very close to the kind of tight design that you (and I) like: it has four or five gameplay elements that are used with slight variations to cover lots and lots of scenarios. I highly recommend it, especially the remake, which is a rare example of a remake that is actually much much better than the original.
Japanese RPGs like Final Fantasy et al are famous for tossing in lots of random minigames . . . even then the . . . games had a lot of meat
Well, I guess. If by "meat" you mean rancid fat. A bit like how cheap fried chicken is dipped in deoderizing batter before frying.  The "meat" of FF was terrible, which is why they used minigames and flashy graphics to distract from it. SC2 actually has a very fun core, which is why a sequel needn't be deep fried in minigames.
Now I have to guess as to what RTS game that was!
Well, no, it was a recent game. Less well-received than Warcraft II to be sure, but with good enough writing. After it was butchered by my employers, anyway. It certainly was not in beta more than 10 months before shipping, and I'm just treating "alpha" as pre-beta. I'm sure that's not the right jargon, but I'm just on the writing side, not the production side.
If a professional writer would've been interested in writing a sc2 adventure sequel, there would've been a sequel by now.
Err . . . if that professional writer had a team of professional coders and artists, maybe. As it happens, a SC clone was my second-to-last aspirational project before becoming a "real" professional writer. I had been paid to write for a GBC RPG, then had a three year hiatus, then was paid to write for two RTS games, a racing game, then an MMO, and now a very high profile PC RPG and this project; this was writen near the end of the hiatus. It wasn't in the SC universe, but it was (especially in hindsight) very heavily "inspired." Close enough for fans very easily to recognize, far enough to have surprises and to avoid any IP issues.
An artist friend (now doing music videos and commercials) and a programmer friend (now doing natural language processing at ISI) and I tried to make the game, got as far as a space-duel quality melee engine (with 3D graphics!), and then threw in the towel.
I guess if someone wants, I can send all the old design docs. I don't think I have any of the art or code anymore. The design docs are lengthy, but I think actually do not have much of plot summary (to quote Connery, "The plans were in my head!"), but perhaps they do.
Anyway, the point is not that the docs are particularly great (I doubt there's much worth cannibalizing in them, except maybe for a couple of the gameplay mechanics -- the gameplay stole a lot from XCom too). Indeed, I suspect they're probably pretty bad, given my lack of experience and given how derivative the game design was. The point is rather that at least one "serious" writer did try to undertake such a project and couldn't do it, because writing is only one small part of it. If I wanted to restart the project now, what would I do? Maybe if I trotted out my credentials I could attract good amateur coders, but I'm skeptical that they'd ever finish their end of the project (having seen so few amateur projects come to fruition).
If you actually have a team of coders in whom you have confidence, then for goodness sake, don't drop the ball on the writing side. You have more resources at your disposal than this "professional" writer does.
This coop structure really sucks in this sort of application. It can quickly turn into a jumble of poorly thought out, and poorly connected plot elements.
So, the project I'm working on now is a big, single-player RPG, and from working with the company, I now have a sense of how all of the great story-driven single-player RPGs of the past (Fallout, PS:T, BG, KOTOR, etc.) were done. A team of writers gets together. There is a head writer. The team sits around and discusses things until the head writer has a clear idea for a plot skeleton. He drafts the skeleton. They then discuss fleshing it out. The head writer okays suggestions until they have characters, side-quests, etc. (Presumably, he does a fair bit of the idea-work himself.) After that, senior writers take over areas, and then delegate to junior writers flavor-text and unconnected small dialogues (the "Welcome to our town" sort of nonsense).
The senior writer's work in a given area is sent to the head writer for comments and approval, and to the other senior writer's for comments. By reviewing each other's work, they keep abreast of the flavor and style and things remain (relatively) coherent.
Now, I think SC2-style games actually have sufficiently finite dialogue that one writer could do the whole thing. But if you're going to run a team, it's worth using a hierarchical structure where you have a Lead who quality controls and gives the project its animating themes, Seniors who manage areas (in this case, probably races rather than areas), and Juniors who do flavor text (probably not necessary at all in this case).
The problem with the PPI, from what I've gathered, is that it's too egalitarian. Anyone can propose an idea or shoot down an idea, and there's no one person ultimately responsible for giving it the up or down. Moreover, everyone has an incentive to cherry-pick (coming up with the coolest twist, the most bad-ass enemy, the funniest dialogue, etc.), but no one has an incentive to do the real legwork of making an area (or race in this case) work. The result is that what you end up with are races who are hodgepodged from "cool" stuff. It's well and good to have one chimera ("Let's give it the head of a lion! And a snake head! Let's make it breathe fire! But what about my goat idea . . ."), but you need some relatively coherent stuff too.
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Deus Siddis
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You don't need to apologize, GeomanNL. I just didn't see the point in this becoming about me, instead of the TWL plot.
UAF, if you're still here, I was not trying to offend you, and my first post came across a lot more serious it seems, than I wanted it to. To be serious, my point is that your project does seem to have a long way to go from a programming stand point. Thus, it's really important to your project, that you attract more talented people in this area. If you put out a plot they don't agree with, and refuse to change it, they probably will not help you. So my opinion is that, you either need to let the people who are doing the work make the decisions of where the game goes, or you should really use a structure like the one Frank outlined, to create a coherant plot that will excite potiental volunteers.
Each part of a project builds off of the others. If you are an amazing programmer, and you see a project that is old, has little art, little code and has a confusing plot, you might not be very motivated to join. But, if you see a project where your skills will go into a professional-esk project, where there is a solid code base, or great art/music, or a really unique and interesting plot, you might take a different attitude. Similarly, a project that would give extra creative consideration to the people who really make it happen (programmers especially), will look a lot brighter.
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UAF
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It's impossible to keep changing the plot, at some point you must declare that it's done.
Frank said that anything that still don't have graphics made for it can be discarded, but then graphics can only be made for things that have been decided upon.
It's a magic circle, one which I saw at work.
I don't know how real game companies make games, but for one they have MONEY.
All work on TWL is voluntarily, and the people doing it still have their real life to consider, and would like to spend their free time doing other things besides working on TWL. This means that the number of work hours invested on the project in a week is much smaller then what a professional game made by a company get.
Now the situation is simple - I like the plot, there are other people who like the plot. This DOES include programmers and people who make graphics.
Starting over does not only means throwing away things that I actually like, it's also A LOT of work to do.
And while it's easy for you to say 'then do it' it's not you (and I'm not talking only to Deus_Siddis here) who are going to work.
So, I'm just settling for getting help from the people who do like the plot, which there are.
If you dislike it so much that you don't want to do anything with it - fine, stay away and have a nice life.
If you like it and want to help - welcome aboard!
If you'd like to suggest changes - well it'll require you to work and actually make real suggestions that can fit into the game and not some 'scrap this' or 'hey lets make a big Mycon Druuge war' idea or the like of these.
At any case, small suggestions and changes are what is likely to be accepted and not big changes.
I tell the same things to those who join the project and want to help, and they seem fine with it.
If they don't, then unfortunately they'll have to either concede or leave.
Also, as Bekanor pointed out the Niko for example have a very short description. Most races aren't detailed in depth.
This is where dialog writers and anyone else on the team DOES have creative license and are even EXPECTED to use it.
Similar to the structure Frank has mentioned writers each have their race to make where besides the lead writer (which will be me I guess) they "rule supreme".
And I try to let them be as creative and free as they want to.
The Niko (whom are a good example since they are one of the game villains) are NOT finished yet. Their dialog writer will have a lot of work with them, flushing out their history, society and reasons for acting as they do. And Suggestions you'll make for them now will both help and will have a nice chance of being used.
I find that I'm repeating things I have said already so I'll stop here.
Points are:
1) This is the plot. Only little changes are possible, LIVE WITH IT. Suggest such changes if you want to. Shut up if you don't.
2) Help wanted.
If you liked it and want to help - please do.
3) We don't need advices on how to do things. We need people to actually do things. If you're not going to be the one doing whatever your advice is going to be, then I insist that you'll spare us that advice.
4) None of this is open for discussion.
Have a nice day, and I hope that even the most skeptic of you will like the game once it'll be ready.
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Deus Siddis
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Alright, fair enough. Freeware game projects are still a relatively new concept and we're all trying to figure out the best way to go about creating them, especially for remakes/sequels. I've spent many hours of my life explaining to people how difficult it is to produce freeware games, and how slack must be given.
So good luck, I'm sure that those of us who've stirred up a storm here, will continue to keep tabs on your project (I know I will).
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Pik
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I don't know how real game companies make games
This to me is the root of the problem. This will determine whether you want the project to truly be special or to appeal as the standard 'fan fic' type stuff does within the small enclosed circles.
, but for one they have MONEY.
Shame on you! Fred and Paul (two people) completely made Star Control 2 with a few help from friends, and outsourcing for a few elements like the music (mod contest) and the art (gorgeous paintings). Both Fred and Paul went 6 months with no pay to finish SC 2 the way they wanted.
When Star Control 2 was released, probably the most influential video game of all time was also released at that same time: Wing Commander. Before, a couple of designers in a garage could make a game. But Wing Commander changed all that as so much money was thrown in production (775,000 $?) . Ever since then, video games have had hefty production. Now games are so expensive to make that companies will not risk innovative designs, so we are trapped in FPS/RPG/Strategy/Racing genres forever.
Star Control 2 was probably one of the last 'old school' designer oriented games before the industry went full production oriented (elaborate cutscenes, silly explosions, etc.)
You have more people on your team than Reiche or Ford did. You also have an infinite time limit, Reiche and Ford had Accolade breathing down their necks. And you are piggybacking off of the universe they created. You have it much easier than they did.
And Hollywood proves that lots of money cannot make good scripts.
1) This is the plot. Only little changes are possible, LIVE WITH IT. Suggest such changes if you want to. Shut up if you don't.
I've worked with Independent Game Makers, the ones who even go to the Indie Festivals (some win, some don't win). One of the classic beginner mistakes is for the people to come up with a 'design' and their 'game design' is nothing more than a story plot. One big trend seems to be many people trying to make final fantasy style cutscenes and all (*puke*).
What annoys me is not so much the plot. What infuriates me is that you are actively and knowingly betraying Star Control's core elementals of design.
The game is supposed to be open ended. Forced modes of playing for 'story purposes' doesn't make sense. SC 2 told a damn good story and it never took control away from you.
You are confusing plot and design, thinking the two are the same. These 'mini-games' are added fat. You could focus on...
-Expanding conversation trees...
-Expanding the resource element of the game, of what you can do on the planets...
-Expand the 'module' style design of the Mark 2 to be superior to the options we had in SC 2.
Instead, all the energy is going to be put on more minigames that don't help the gameplay at all. Any game must obey its core elements just like credible science fiction must obey to the consistent 'science' rules its universe creates (or else its laughed out).
Making a game product, whether freeware or commercial, is extremely time intensive, challenging, and ensemble requiring. I think its one of the hardest jobs and one that ought to get more pay and respect than it does.'
How many wanna-be game programmers are out there?
How many wanna-be game artists are out there?
How many wanna-be game writers are out there?
Tons. Massive amounts.
How many of these people have Grand Ideas for Game Design and Plot?
All of them.
So why aren't there more 'great games' ? Why the shortage of quality indie games? Because industry work is much more cuthroat than the 'everyone is happy' mode of fan production. Imagine spending a year of your life working on a game only to have the company cancel the project. That is severe. Being sensitive to comments about the plot or direction you want to take? That is nothing.
As Frank says, you must be prepared to toss it all out. Many many games a year or so in production will 'rework' themselves with art, story, and even programming from the ground up. Why? Because the game's core elements is the axis of the game, never the plot, art, or programming. All are frequently torched and redone, bits here, bits there.
The complaint is not about the content (content is easily altered). It is about the context. I've done work with Indie titles, but here you have Frank who has worked on big titles (and I'm still not sure what RTS game with which you were involved, Frank! ) And you're dismissing it because of... what? If you didn't intend to do any changes to the plot, then why reveal it to the public? Is the public allowed to have any reaction other than overjoyed worship and praise?
Anyone can do freeware. Anyone can write fan fiction or 'fan sequels'. But very few can do it well enough to rival the original's work. Those who manage to do it will get noticed.
I think you're blowing a huge opportunity here.
(Here, this [http://www.gamasutra.com/features/20041101/rouse_01.shtml] is sent to beginning Indie game makers to hopefully avoid the Usual Mistakes (tm). Imagine if the guy who wrote that on was on this forum. What would HE say to you? Compared to us, we'd be sweet little angels.)
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UAF
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Paul and Fred worked full time on SC2, and with the full intention of making money from it.
Perhaps I wasn't clear, it's not the money that allow great games to be made (shall we say more easily then fan projects like this) it's the people.
BUT those people work for MONEY. Now, as you probably know the company "buy" someone skill and time and make him work.
We don't have this money, nor do we have the promise that in the future people will make money from this game.
In fact, the best thing that someone will be able to make with TWL once it's completed is add it to his resume.
Paul and Fred, courageous as they were to work as renegades for 6 months still worked on SC2 as their REAL LIFE WORK.
TWL will never ever be someone's real work.
Also, it took Paul and Fred more then 6 months to make SC2, for the other months they got paid. Then Accolade wanted to publish the game when it was, in fact, CRAP.
Going into hiding and working these 6 months was for the intention of making it a good game, with the clear knowledge that good games sell better, thus increasing the profit that they'll make from the game.
The game is supposed to be open ended. Forced modes of playing for 'story purposes' doesn't make sense. SC 2 told a damn good story and it never took control away from you.
You are confusing plot and design, thinking the two are the same. These 'mini-games' are added fat. You could focus on...
-Expanding conversation trees...
-Expanding the resource element of the game, of what you can do on the planets...
-Expand the 'module' style design of the Mark 2 to be superior to the options we had in SC 2.
I'm getting the impression that you misunderstood something here.
We have design docs that explain the game mechanics and such, and you can look at them in our Wiki
http://openfacts.berlios.de/index-en.phtml?title=Engine
You'll find that the Melee aspect of the game will undergo a big change, there will be expansions to the resource collection aspects (building mines, bigger map).
Let me also assure you that we'll have many new modules for the MK2 and Salvation.
BTW, suggestions here are welcomed, more then to the plot 
You mentioned expanding conversation trees - I'm afraid I don't quite follow you here. There will be completely new dialogs in the game, and they will include some new options (like "popup" windows where the characters with you can add their opinion on matters).
Perhaps you meant something else?
Also, while the plot documents are written in a way of 'player does A then B then C' the actual game is not like that.
Limitations are rare (limited to one Arm or the other at some points and some cases of forced autopilot) and we're actually trying to see how we can remove these as well.
Some quests are opened after certain actions are taken, but most of the time the player have several quests going on at the same time, allowing him many options.
This game is not going to be UQM with new dialogs, ships and graphics. There will be changes.
Two more things:
1) You must understand that the people working on TWL are doing it FOR FUN. We don't get paid, nor would we ever make money from this game.
I'll repeat it - FOR FUN. No fun - not working.
So Frank got paid while making a story, the story was dumped, and they he got paid making another. See the difference?
Even if he didn't get paid for the first story BTW, he HAD to make another in order to make a living.
I like this game as it is, I want to play it, I profit in any way if Mr. Pik from the UQM forums will play it or not...
2) Why did we make the plot public?
Mainly to get people to help TWL by writing dialogs, making graphics, composing music and programming it.
And maybe, MAYBE, some minor changes to the plot.
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Deus Siddis
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I think that what Pik was trying to say, was that every minute that's spent working on the dating game (or the like), could be spent on something he thinks is more important.
I'm not going to comment on this (as I never liked the Syreen in SC2, too lazy). But I can tell you that on projects with limited resources (like our freeware ones) you have to apply your resources to the things that are the most important, first.
On a side note, I've story wrote for a freeware project before, and I don't think it is that bad. You create the best stuff you can, present it, and most of it gets shot down. So you get back to work, create a modified version and present it again. Rinse and Repeat. Then, when you look back on the stuff that got shot down, you realize it was not that good after all and you feel releaved that it wasn't used. Perhaps this is depressing to some, but I don't think it is, it's actually kinda fun creating something that is really well refined.
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Death 999
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We did. You did. Yes we can. No.
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You know what really put me off when I was first reading this over?
The incessant misspelling and grammar errors. It just gave a juvenile sloppy impression. Maybe that is contributing to a great extent to the negative reaction.
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UAF
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I did apologize for that... 
You know, not everyone are native english speakers *points at himself*
This is why Halleck is going over all of the docs fixing all of these mistakes, and this is also why I won't be writing any dialogs
Did you know that Hebrew only have 3 tenses? Past, present and future.
Do you have any idea how much more simple matters are that way?
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Frank
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Despite my promise of non-intervention, I cannot help but meddle.
here you have Frank who has worked on big titles
I don't want to overstate my case. The titles I've worked on have almost certainly sold less than a million copies, combined. (The one I'm working on now will do much, much better I suspect.) They hardly got glowing reviews for the plots, though some got some praise. I've neglected to mention the titles because I do like having some pseudonymity, and a quick Google search would reveal who I was once I said the titles. Then my advice would likely be rejected with, "Game X had a shitty plot anyway!" (I promise it was better before the higher ups cut it!) and my ability to comment *ahem* frankly on the process I went through with my employers would be hampered.
I think I can avoid disclosing my identity by saying that right now I'm working for Bioware on Dragon Age in the freelance equivalent of a Senior Writer position. It has been a tremendous experience and has taught me oodles about how to make a game story work. For what it's worth, we're in the process of completely rewriting the section I had designed, which means ditching something like a hundred man hours, 30k words of dialogue, and lots of scripting. The next version will be much, much better.
Perhaps I wasn't clear, it's not the money that allow great games to be made (shall we say more easily then fan projects like this) it's the people.
BUT those people work for MONEY.
Check out www.wesnoth.org. Although I don't think they have any great writing in their campaigns or a great backstory, the project is in many ways the model of how a large, indie game should be made. (My own taste is for authoritarian central management, but Wesnoth's success cannot be denied.) If you prefer the small, hard-working core approach, check out www.agdinteractive.com (I believe that's the URL). Professionalism is a mind-set and is not dictated by economics.
I think that what Pik was trying to say, was that every minute that's spent working on the dating game (or the like), could be spent on something he thinks is more important.
That's not necessarily true for a zero-budget title. If you were paying designers / coders / artists, then you could say that $X spent here means -$X over there. But because the currency of indie titles is interest and excitement, it is possible that you'll have some weird coder who really likes doing a dating sim, some cheesy anime artist who only wants to draw for one, and a designer who's really into the idea. The dating sim might actually generate more work in other areas if the artist could be leveraged into creating general assets and the designer's morale was kept up by being able to divert himself on his pet dating sim.
That said, my experience with indie projects (many, many failures) is that the worse the project is doing, the more features it starts to promise . . . .
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Deus Siddis
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Hebrew is no better than english. Too many gross throaty noises. 
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« Last Edit: May 11, 2005, 12:06:34 am by Deus_Siddis »
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