Games Imitating Films are "Bastard Half-Children"

And we thought the whole industry wanted games to be more like films. At the Develop conference this week, a chief narrative officer for a digital fiction company has said that studios should give up, because it's just not working out.

Alexis Kennedy spoke out against titles such as L.A. Noire and Heavy Rain, opining that games imitating Hollywood narratives "end up looking like the inverted baboon that came out of the teleporter in The Fly." Ouch.

"Try to make a film into a game you end up with this bastard half-child thing," Kennedy said. "Story in games so far has been whether your character dies or not. Heavy Rain is still about whether your character dies or not. I cannot think of a less interesting thing to do with a story than cut off parts of it as you go on."

He goes on. "Most games are fantasies for success. Why can’t they be fantasies for failure? What if you go mad in a game? What if you’re so mired in scandal that you have to leave a city and live with the consequences?"

It's probably worth pointing out that Kennedy's studio, Failbetter Games, has only released one browser-based game - but one that received enough critical acclaim to win Best Browser Game of 2009 from the Escapist. It's called Echo Bazaar, if you want to check it out.

Source: Develop