The Role of Religious Faith in Narrative Games

so when are all of us going to get together & launch an exalted game company?

• When you secure funding
• When you find a group of developers whose skills complement one another rather than overlapping (a company of narrative designers?)
• When you either find a group of developer who share your vision or adapt your vision to match the consensus view of your desired development team
• When you work out your team structure to allow creative freedom to the creative people and agree to either devolve at least some measure of control to the designers / writers or appoint a manager / CEO to run the company while you head one of the teams

Also, you might want to tone down the use of the word 'exalted' because I am sure CCP / White Wolf hold the copyright on that term...

so when are all of us going to get together & launch an exalted game company?

• When you secure funding
• When you find a group of developers whose skills complement one another rather than overlapping (a company of narrative designers?)
• When you either find a group of developer who share your vision or adapt your vision to match the consensus view of your desired development team
• When you work out your team structure to allow creative freedom to the creative people and agree to either devolve at least some measure of control to the designers / writers or appoint a manager / CEO to run the company while you head one of the teams

Also, you might want to tone down the use of the word 'exalted' because I am sure CCP / White Wolf hold the copyright on that term...

Thanks Anthony!!

Yes I claim no trademark on the use of word exalted, but was simply using it as a descriptive term in: "Patent application title: System and method for creating exalted video games and virtual realities wherein ideas have consequences"
--http://www.faqs.org/patents/app/20090017886#ixzz0gYyoDSky

I'm not sure I could find any other word for that...

In a funny way, I think a company of narrative designers just might work... outsourcing and advising and sharing their "expertise" in narrative design.

Some of the most recent games are disappointing not in the realm of technology, so much as in the realm of narrative design, whence a few principles, brought in early, could have "Exalted" said games.

I have faith that time will teach of the epic opportunities of story and narrative in the realm of games.

And also, in a funny way, the resistance is not so much a monetary issue, as philosophical. Perhaps that is what is so frustrating? For EA could have easily respected and exalted Dante's story and his principles and precepts, and Heavy Rain could have designed a game wherein the player's actions had more resounding consequences, thusly exalting interactive narrative with its inherent strengths of the ability of the player to effect the story of a game. With relative small changes in their philosophy, EA & Sony could take games to a higher level...

I sincerely believe that investing the $3,000,000 spent on the superbowl ad in narrative designers (in Dante's Inferno and other EA games) would have been a far, far greater investment.

I do laugh at myself often enough--layering the universe with reams and reams of text, and I get a vision in my mind of me pitching my vision of Dante's Inferno in the EA board room, going a mile a minute and then some, talking about the importance of story and how Dante's Christian/Classical principles (for he was mentored not by Jesus, but by Virgil) could enhance and exalt the game. And I get the picture of Jonathan Knight and CEO John Riteccelio nodding off, or maybe nodding and agreeing just to shut me up, and then the next person gets up and starts showing slides of b0000bies and everyone wakes up (lolzing like beavis & butthead--check out mike judge's UCSD keynote--he was a physics major! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ylnMb6niDJ0 ) . . . and then they wake up even harder as their market cap declines by ten billion. Is there no correlation? Am I imagining the demand for story and soul and the epic, exalted classics I see in all my students? Is my mission hopeless? Is this an impossible task? Must I "abandon all hope?" before I enter? Would that not make it hell? For hell is where all hope is gone--literally--are we to consign ourselves to this forever?

At any rate, the founder of a multi-billion dollar company just wrote me:

Thanks for the compendia (right word?) on business and the Classics. It's
all wonderful stuff, but I'm not sure that I don't have (much) too much
information to capture the attention of XXXX and XXXXX at
XXXXX.

3. A few excerpts from your proposed new book--large title to begin, then 5
pages max. "Simplify; simplify; simplify." (Thoreau was right!)

Well, he's telling me the same thing you guys are, so don't be surprised if you find yourself founding billion-dollar companies!

Seriously though--a company with expertise in narrative design could work wonders if brought in early and often throughout the design process. EA hired that academy-award nominated writer of Monster's Ball for pure publicity reasons, again malinvesting tons of cash for mere, fleeting publicity. You guys are right that interactive narrative is different from Hollywood/linear writing and requires a feel and knowledge of interactive branching. My one trick pony is to point you guys towards the moral premise as a device to simplifiy design, while yet keeping it subtle, as is Homer's Odyssey--simple, subtle, and infused with a sense of morality that is never perfect, but always there, like a form that is never reached.



Best,

Dr. E

Hi, great topic Steve!

Apologies to all, I've just returned from holidays, and I must admit that I've skimmed through the bulk of this thread and am an Ignorati, but at its core this looks like a bit of a conundrum.

I don't think it's really possible to merge a good religious message with gameplay.

There are games that seem to merge morality messages and gameplay (although somewhat clunkily) like KOTOR and every other game that has some kind of alignment meter. But it's hard to consider those as religious.

Likewise there are games that draw upon religious themes, but don't have that integral religious message per se - easy to incorporate fighting demons and theology, but without a clear morality or faith-based message.

Perhaps the fundamental floor, particularly in Christianity taking on games, is that games use a reward mechanism - more points, bigger weapons, more money, more gold etc, and these are partially contradictory to Christianity and some Eastern religions - Greed, Pride, Wrath etc being Deadly Sins.

Hard to make a compelling, dramatic story while frowning upon these themes, unless engorging on these sins ultimately leads to the player's downfall (to keep a morality message meaningful)... And who wants to play a game where you'll ultimately lose?

Other religions may offer more fertile ground (for instance, I've always wanted to see a game based on the Buddhist realms, ie Ghostly realm, Titan realm, Godly realm, human realm, animal realm, 'hell' etc, where your actions during one realm influence which realm you 'reincarnate' to when your character dies). But most religions advocate a message of peace, which runs counter to conflict found in most games.

Perhaps a Christian 'Sims' would work, where you could earn God points by being kind to your neighbours etc to unlock a better lot in Heaven? Then again, it doesn't feel very Christian to be doing something solely for a reward.

It's a tough ask to try merging games as they are now with religion in a meaningful way, that's for sure. Worth pondering a bit further, though.