From JazGalaxy, one of the forum goers at Evil Avatar. This was his response in a thread where developers at GDC 2014 argued against narrative in games. Full thread here.
I was probably about 14 or so when I played Final Fantasy VII. There’s a TON of things to like about that game, but the thing that most people praise it for, the death of Aeris, left me completely cold. I grew up watching anime and playing video games, and Aeris was a complete stock anime character and Cloud was a boring blank slate. Her death pretty much meant nothing to me. Even less than Polom and Porom turning themselves to stone in FF2, and FAR less than Cyan’s family dying in Final Fantasy 3.
All the cinematic pomp and circumstance… all the trying to WRING emotion out of the event… didn’t add anything to that experience for me.
Now, contrast that with Final Fantasy Tactics. Final Fantasy Tactics has almost NO cinematic elements to it at all. It plays out far more like a play, really, than a film. BUT, what it does do is ENGAGE YOUR IMAGINATION. This is the key. You can name you characters, you can make them do what you want them to, you can equip and grow them as you like. And because of these attachments, you grow fond of them. They develop personalities of their own.
I was playing a mission in the game and I eked out a victory, but only after losing a few of my favorite characters. Let me tell you man, I WAS BUMMED OUT. That very unique feeling of winning, but at a great cost, was never so fully realized in any media as it was for me in that moment. THEN I had to think about rebuilding and replacing my fallen characters. I basically brought on some random new characters and didn’t even think enough of them to name them. I had my beloved guys who had been with me from the beginning and who I had faced many adventures with, and then I had these new guys. The outsiders. In battle I sent them to do dangerous things and really didn’t care whether they lived or died. They were new kids in school trying to break into an established clique. Then, one of the characters the game auto named Akintunde and I had specced out as a Chemist, was in the midst of a battle that was going horribly wrong. One of the characters I really liked was in a battle that was going poorly and nobody could get to him to back him up. He had almost no life left and if he couldn’t beat the enemy on the next turn, he was going to die. He strikes. He barely does any damage and the enemy is still alive. I’m thinking he’s done for. But then, out of the blue, of his own volition, Akintunde throws a potion from all the way across the board that saves my guy’s life and turns the tide of the entire battle. I almost jumped out of my chair cheering. After that battle, Akintunde was one of my main guys. He and the other guys who came onto the team with him earned a place in our squad and went on to do great things in the game.
That, for me personally, was a GREAT story. I loved every second of it as it was unfolding, and the emotions that I felt during it were nigh-incommunicable any other way. ONLY GAMES CAN DO THOSE THINGS. But every single one of those story beats came not from “narrative”, but from gameplay.
I feel like the problem with trying to TELL stories come from writers trying to FORCE players to experience things, and there is no other way to do it than to be manipulative. It’s absolutely counter to the entire concept of what video games are supposed to be. If I’m a “video game writer” and I’m trying to FORCE you to FEEL lonely… well, what part do you play in that? You’re being acted upon by the game and the writer. You aren’t interacting with the game at all.
LOVE that post. It’s so beautifully written that I had to share it. Fortunately, Jaz was kind enough to give me permission. Stay tuned for the next installment of The Water Cooler, folks! Interested in sharing a story? Drop me an email via our about page! The contact form is at the very bottom. 
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