In the previous posting, I mentioned briefly how intriguing, how
different, how liberating it is to work with the evolving story of an online game. Aside from the fact that the feedback is instant and constant, and the process organic, part of the reason why I like it is also that it's brand new territory; it's not something any of us have done before. In fact, it's something very few have even
attempted to do. There aren't a heck of a lot of ground rules, aside from the rules that apply to all fictional forms.
One rule unique to online games that I've learned first-hand in the few months that we've been doing this is that an evolving real-time online world story -- basically a sort of "history in the making", something that can be looked back on six months down the line and appear logical and coherent -- can often be experienced as too slow-moving, at least when compared with the sort of stories that people are used to experiencing. It's natural that some players would want everything to move quicker, to be more exciting and action-packed, something more akin to watching a movie, or playing a single-player console title. But the story in an online game (not counting past history; more on that another day) can't move at an unrealistic pace. You can't dissolve from one scene to the next, indicating the passage of days, weeks, or months. You can't put up a title-card reading "Five years later", or "Meanwhile, in Devon". You can't have characters age, you can't expect the players to be online twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, right when you want them to, and you can't change things around so much that you risk alienating all those people who prefer the world the way it is right now.
In other words, it's a right bugger keeping people interested and engaged, in addition to keeping a realistic and practical pace.
I think it's important to realise what exactly the story's supposed to be doing. Think of an online game as being more like a TV-show than a novel or a movie; a TV-show with clear story-arcs that run through a season, or several seasons. Let's compare it to
Buffy the Vampire Slayer, for example; as chance would have it, my favourite show. In
Buffy, there are several types of arcs. Some run through one season -- like the whole arc with the Master, in season one; the Big Bad who had to be defeated, and who affected the characters and the plot on a regular basis. Each and every episode of the show didn't feature the Master. In fact, each episode was able to stand on its own legs, and thus make sense to the casual viewer who'd just happen upon the show while flicking through the channels. Each episode had to be entertaining and self-explanatory, whilst in some ways moving the season one step forward. At the same time, things couldn't move too fast. Success often hinges on familiarity, especially with a show that's still finding its legs. Viewers should be able to miss two, three, four shows, and still understand what's going on.
Same thing with an online game. Every game-session a player has -- and unlike a TV-show, we don't know what the session contains; that's up to the player -- must be valuable and entertaining in some way or another. But every session can't be about the big story-arcs. The story is flavour and setting, it's something that shapes the player's environment, something that hints at things to come, something that, when it happens, is doubly exciting because it doesn't happen every time. Players who expect big leaps in the story every time they log on to an online game will have to adjust.
But just as a TV-show like
Buffy dares to change over time, so should an online game. Now in its sixth season, it's hard for a casual viewer to watch a single episode of
Buffy and understand what the heck's going on. The arcs have become much more defined and all-encompassing; we now have arcs that run through several seasons, something that pleases the fans -- like myself -- but probably alienates the casual viewers. Where in past seasons, there would be standalone episodes, now each and every episode addresses the larger arcs in some way or another. Thing is,
Buffy's no longer a show for the casual viewers. It's a show for fans who watch
every single episode, and who are able to follow the convoluted (but brilliant) storylines and arcs.
Eventually, the same thing will happen with the story in an online game: Confident of its audience, of the players' knowledge of past history, present situation, and the prophesised (or hinted at) future, the story can really take off. Each game-session can now contain elements of the greater story -- the major arcs -- without confusing or alienating the players. The fans will expect it and understand it, and while the casual players may be confused and bewildered, that's no longer an issue. Like with a successful TV-show, there's Insiders and Outsiders. And the Insiders have all the fun.
Of course, this all depends on what the players themselves want and wish for. It's not a given that this is the future of story-based online games. It could be that players prefer the standalone "episodes", and don't really see the need for the long story-arcs. Or it could be -- like the case was with
The X-Files -- that the fans get fed up with slow-moving arcs that never lead anywhere, and that they just want everyone to shut up about it and stick with the entertaining, action-packed stuff.
With an online game -- like with a TV-show -- we at least have the ability to change when change is required. Which is, I guess, a Good Thing.
