225 - Gaming Narratives: Power and Pitfalls in Interactive Storytelling - Feat. Chris - Part 2

In the second half of our conversation with Chris on writing in games, we dive even deeper into how writing has evolved across the gaming industry. From the early days of text-based adventures to cinematic storytelling powerhouses like God of War and Baldur's Gate 3, we explore what makes game writing work.

We touch on the layered history of iconic characters like Lara Croft and James Bond, and how their portrayals reflect broader societal shifts. Is Lara’s journey just about tomb raiding, or does it say something deeper about class, identity, and representation? Why does 007's timeless charm continue to appeal?

Don't miss:

• How good writing transformed a rage machine into a compelling father figure in God of War.
• Marvel-style quippiness is invading game scripts - good or bad? 
• Can dialogue be Shakespearean in a game about space marines?

 If you care about how stories are told in games—whether through dialogue, narrative structure, or absence thereof—this one’s for you.

Links and Mentions:

• Baldur’s Gate 3
• The Witcher
• Disco Elysium
• Tomb Raider (Classic to Modern Trilogy)
• God of War (2005 & 2018)
• Uncharted
• The Last of Us
• Forspoken
• Warhammer 40K and the Horus Heresy books
• Lutin (YouTube channel)

Join the conversation:
Do you think quippy dialogue ruins a game? Can a storyless game still be good? Let us know your thoughts and stay tuned for more deep dives.

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Transcript

Alex: 0:15

Hello everyone. Welcome back to another episode of Gaming the System, the podcast where three intersectional feminists examine gaming and games through a feminist lens. Today, I'm your host, Alex, and I'm joined by my friends, gem and Matt, before we get started, if you want to support us, you can subscribe to our Patreon at patreon.com/gaming the system for some exclusive content. Or you can send us a one-off donation via PayPal to our email address. We are gaming the system@gmail.com. I am going to change things up. Now. I've got a big question to ask you all. How has writing changed over gaming's history? Games have gone from being, side scrolling 2D to big 3D cinematic story driven masterpieces so how is that reflected in the history of games and, what does it mean? Is it more important in certain genres than other genres?

Jem: 1:21

If you go right back to the early, early games, like on the spectrum, omega and things like that, they were only text-based. So there was actually quite a lot of, writing going on there because That's very true. It was, they were basically choose your own adventures, weren't they? And then we had the rise of the arcade games and I think story-based games almost died Death. Died death, yeah. And it feels that in the last decade we've seen a, a gradual increase of the story based games. And I think probably along with the increase of actors willing to voice. Characters. Mm-hmm. We've seen these big production concepts where every character is voiced and we're going into games disappointed when that isn't what's happening. And Boulder Gate three was a, a, a very good example of that. It is extremely complex and you've got all these different options going on, and so huge amounts of time writing and, and Narrat. And of course Boulders Gate three does have a narrator all the way through. So they definitely don't show. They do tell. I think we've seen this sort of ebb and flow of, writing in games and, and obviously then we've got these sort of. More immersive games. We've already mentioned the Witcher and, and things like Disco e lithium as well, which is depressing as, but it's extremely well written and very quirky and distinct in its, approach. So yeah, I think we have definitely seen changes, but, and I think you're right. Perhaps, it reflects what the audience, well, obviously it reflects what the audience wants, but perhaps it does reflect something about what society wants. Mm-hmm. Not to get too deep and meaningful.

Alex: 3:28

I had an example, I think of a, well, one of the best ways to look at it really, I guess I'm gonna start talking about again, you can probably guess, is team reader obviously, because you've got the classic era, you've got the middle in the middle era, and then the more modern trilogy now. And the differences with the writing in those is quite interesting to think about because obviously the protagonist Lara is the same character, but she's very different for each of those iterations. I always like to think about that as a, as an example because classic Laura is totally different to modern la in terms of the characters themselves, like obviously they were trying to portray Lara as someone who was very capable and competent and intelligent and strong. And those things will come across in each of the. Iterations, but I think from the middle or maybe from Angel of Darkness onwards, I think they wanted to give Laura more depth, and more background and explored her family. And there were these wider questions asked about how did she get to be like this, what happened, what was her past like? And, and exploring that kind of thing through the games has been interesting'cause there's several interpretations of Laura's parents. Laura's parents have always been a, a plot point, even if it was very small in the classic games. But yeah, I always find that quite an interesting one to think about.

Jem: 5:00

Laura Croft is a great example actually, and something I would really like to see, a study done, I'm sure somebody's done on, of how her writing has changed over time because of course she has been around for such a long time that she's been present, when we've gone through quite a lot of social changes in attitudes to women. And also to class as well, because of course she is, from this very wealthy family and background. And as well to the idea of plundering. Ancient Yes, that's very true. Ancient sites, it's would be really fascinating to actually analyze how has La Croft change from a writing perspective, rather than we always just talk about what's happened to her boobs. Yeah. Really nice to think about what's happened to, how she speaks, the words she uses, the way that her story is told be fascinating.

Chris: 5:59

Yeah, I kind of equate it, a little bit to the same thing happened to James Bond, right? In that, you've got those different era of James Bond and you have sixties James Bond who, behaves and, is a certain way. You then have eighties bond, you have nineties bond, and then you have obviously two thousands bond. Right? And the thing that is interesting about the James Bond, I know Alex being, you've spoken about this a little bit, is that James Bond is always the constant in that story. He doesn't change, he doesn't do anything differently. He's always the same. And it's the world around him that kind of changes and develops and it's kind of interesting that they, in the later James Bond films almost try and do something similar to what we saw with Lara Croft. Right. Do people who are watching the James Bond film want to know more about him? Want to know about the man, want, about the, the kind of what makes him tick? Or are they just interested in watching him run really fast and shoot people? You're kind of playing into what, what do your audience want when you are, faced with that, I suppose.

Jem: 6:55

People are very attached, aren't they, to those characters. I mean, when, if anyone suggests making changes to James Bond, it's like, you can't do that. He's a national treasure and yet, yeah, there have been changes over the years.

Matt: 7:13

This leads perfectly into a, an anniversary celebration topic, because this month is the 20th anniversary of the First God of war game.

Chris: 7:25

I was gonna mention God of war as well.

Matt: 7:27

For the first all of the games, the four PlayStation games, and then two Epic PSP games, retos was just this rage in vengeance machine with very, very, very, very little apparent depth to him. Cut to 2018, Corey Barlow, who worked on the first game and directed the second original game in 2007 or eight, he comes and retroactively adds all of this depth to Retos. Um, and then that is built on and concluded with the Ragnarok DLC and Retos going back through his past. And, and that's the, the apex in how you take something from the past that probably was very shallow at the time. And then you can work or actively add depth to that in the right way. The problem comes in that. One way in which writing has never changed is that there is no standardized writing. Uh, like what? The best writing is school. So like with, with gaming technology, with programming, with art, with sound design, technological advancements lead the way. You can't be making stuff for a PlayStation game now. You have to go oh shit Programmers who are working in games now, who worked in them started 30 years ago, their skill set has had to. Update. Whereas with writers, you can have the same person writing 20 years ago and writing today, they've been working the entire time, but there has been no, qualification. Absolute. If you've got a PhD in writing, you can be not as successful as someone who's just writes something on their phone That's a problem with things changing. That experience doesn't guarantee improving in quality with writing

Alex: 9:56

How do we avoid things like when we think about bad writing? Oftentimes there are things that come up in, maybe in video games a bit more. I dunno whether it's like the last five, 10 years, but I feel like creepiness is a really common occurrence, within characters in films, games, tv. It's reached a point where it's become really annoying now? I dunno if it's just me. Where characters are just really quirky and quippy. I think there's a fine line where it's fine and then it becomes really annoying. A really good example of where it's bad is, we talked about it on the pod. I think the game for Spoken, that was really hyped up, before it came out. I can't remember how many years ago it was now, but it really didn't do very well, and the character was overly quippy and just really angsty and annoyed about everything that she had to do in the game. So every quest, she was like, well, why do I have to do it? And just moaning all the time. I dunno what, what was going on there. Maybe it was too heavily leaning into marvel esque dialogue. We've talked a lot about tropes in writing and stereotypical characters and complexes within characters. I've definitely talked a lot about, the more modern Lara having a hero complex and how does that change the way we feel about her as a character? So are those things good to have? How far do we need to have them? Like, how much do we need to have them? And is there a point at which games are overly saturated with bad examples of writing,

Matt: 11:37

I can probably boil it down to. A fantastic quote from God, war Ragner rock, where, which is one of SKAs, his perfection element. Oh, yeah. Which is his perfection, or one of the other ones. And he just says, fewer words, greater impact. Yeah. And that's something that should be, uh, branded onto every writer, especially writers who end up doing this kind of thing. And then describe, I've just put it under the banner of millennial bullshit language. So my biggest thing is, yeah, no and no. Yeah. That kind of, that kind of thing. And saying like, too much. And so then I was like this, and then they were like this, I'm not the arbiter of what good writing is, so this is just all opinion and stuff,

Chris: 12:29

One of the things that I, I don't particularly like to see, I. Is if something is, is particularly popular. And Alex, you brought up the Marvel films as an example, so I'll use those. There's a style of writing that, they fell into a little bit of a rhythm with in those films where everything, that tonally, and there's a kind of a wit and a kind of a clap back in a slightly comedic tone, that they found. I find that kind of. So rifted into, into a couple of games I played over the last sort of decade or so. Just because something worked in, one big franchise in that way that, does that mean that it, it can now be used in every single sort of science fiction slash fantasy slash slash video game. Um, so I think that's something that. I see that kind of winds me up a little bit is that kind of overuse or reuse, I guess of a particular thing that has been successful, in another medium? Usually Hollywood films, sometimes not, sometimes other, even sometimes, sometimes either even other video games, right? If some kind of trope or some sort of, witticism was successful in some way, um, not necessarily in dialogue, but sometimes that's tends to be how it manifests.

Matt: 13:43

Yeah, that, that witty cadence thing is so grating. And that is an area where, where I think the executives are to blame.'cause they're going, we want this to be, we want this to work on TikTok. Yeah. We want a three, a three sentence thing between two characters going ha ha, ha ha. And do that over and over again. And then writers will just go, okay, we'll just do, we'll just do the cadence and then, and then that'll be it.

Chris: 14:20

And that is one thing that I do think Boulder's Gate is guilty of. And do you think I I, I, I do think so, and I love it, don't get me wrong, but it's, it, it is guilty of that. And Netflix does it now. Writing so that your shows can be clipped and used, on social media. Right. So all of ASR's lines are basically like, you can clip them up and use them in various contexts. Um, you know, it's almost like they wrote him with this idea that he was gonna be a meme even before, but I, maybe I'm taking that a little bit too far, but I'm, I'm probably not wrong.

Alex: 14:54

No, I can see it. I can see it in certain parts, like when you're walking around and maybe Shadow Heart and Australia and have a little bit of back and forth. That's where I can see it. Definitely. I wanna ask a question. I was thinking about while we were talking, does Uncharted fall into that category or is it, before this all started?

Matt: 15:16

Nathan Drake's like one of the biggest, most popular gaming character together. Mm. But he is the blandest, blandest saying absolutely nothing. Bland, bland, bland thing ever. And I can't remember anything he said

Alex: 15:36

except for crying. I just

Matt: 15:37

remember. Yeah. I just, and, and I just, just, just words, just words that don't matter and, but the gameplay is good enough and it looks good enough

Alex: 15:53

Do people go into Uncharted for the writing or do they go into it for the set piece action?

Speaker 10: 15:59

Yeah,

Alex: 16:00

I'd argue it was probably the latter, but I did enjoy the story though, don't get me wrong.

Matt: 16:06

It's so strange that this is the same studio that made the last of a stent.'cause it goes right. You know what they're capable of in terms of writing, but then that's a place where writing can go. We don't need this to be massively deep. It just be a swashbuckling adventure.

Chris: 16:24

I think that's the nail on the head right there is I think that you definitely have writers who work for these studios who are more than capable of writing. To genre, to type to what they are given in terms of a brief. And if you are sat on the writing table and someone says, here's what we're doing, we're writing uncharted, these are the parameters to which your main character must adhere off you go. And you can, as a writer, I guess internally be like, I do not wanna do this. This is beneath me. Or I guess you can take your paycheck and, and suck it up. And, I think that there's almost a kind of, uh, duality, I guess if you're a staff writer of the BBC and you are writing episodes of EastEnders, you are churning those things out.'cause you've, got deadlines to hit and. Every single conceivable story has already been told at the east end of London. I'm sure. So, you have to almost rehash things, move things around, kind of, and I, I'm kind of sprawling a little bit with this, I think. That's the, the point I'm making is that if you're a writer and you're being paid to write, sometimes you're just gonna have to soak up and write to a type.

Matt: 17:29

Mm-hmm. That thing of, it's, it's the, the safest paycheck. I think it's possible to earn to, because you literally just have to do for most, like jobing writers in, in these kinds of jobs. You just need to hit the word count because the hardest kind of writing is comedy because you need to, you need to force the audience to laugh with every other kind of writing. You don't need to force the audience to do anything. You just need to have words. And as long as you're putting words there. Then you're gonna keep on getting paid. And then if you're getting paid, then why Rock the boat?

Alex: 18:14

Has everyone seen the trailer or heard about Naughty Dogs Next Project after the last of us?

Matt: 18:21

Oh yeah. The, is it intergalactic? I can tell you it's

Alex: 18:25

too many. It, it's wordy. Um, it's, there's, there's a heretic prophet in there somewhere. Yeah. Heretic, prophet. Intergalactic

Matt: 18:31

heretic, prophet.

Alex: 18:33

Yeah. It's, it's four words mushed together. But yeah, I'll be really interested to see what direction that goes in, in terms of writing for sure.'cause obviously you've got uncharted and that's very uncharted. And then the last of us completely different obviously. Um, and some of the best writing, uh, in, in gaming, I think in terms of, just the emotion of the whole thing. I wasn't sure what to make of it when I saw the trailer. It's very product placement heavy.

Chris: 19:09

I dunno if they're doing a thing. I dunno if they're doing like a kind of satirical kind of comment on maybe, late stage capitalism or it's just dumb and they've been paid lots of money to have product placement. Yeah. I dunno which one it is and I kind of really hope it's, it's the former, but yeah.

Alex: 19:29

You'd hope so from a studio like Naughty Dog, but then equally the latter is also very possible that they've like fully sold out. I don't know. We shall see, but it was also very eighties as well. It's getting lots of eighties vibes.

Matt: 19:45

I wonder if Neil Druckman Iss gonna be directing it since that he's doing the, the last of his TV show now stuff.

Alex: 19:51

We shall have to wait. It'll probably be at least a couple of years away, I should think. But we'll pen that down as a feature episode for sure.

Chris: 20:00

Considering my brand just now about Marvel films, um, if there is any hint that it's got the same kind of, dialogue structure as GLIs a Galaxy and it's all kind of tongue in cheek and witty and all that kind of stuff, I will be crossed.

Alex: 20:14

Yes, yes. There is definitely a danger of that, I think. But you can't really tell anything from a first trailer. Things can change it, can't they? Let's hope it's not So I'm gonna wrap up the episode. I think. Um, so we'll have to come back'cause there's definitely more questions to ask though I haven't, uh, asked yet. But I want to know, I'll leave you with, with this question, I think, can you have a good game or any game really, without any writing in it at all?

Chris: 20:46

I will go first. Yes. With a simple point, but I think, a fun one, which is, it of course depends on what you wanna play. Tetris is a great game, but I'm not particularly interested in the deep Tetris law.

Alex: 21:03

Mm-hmm. Is there a deep Tetris law?

Jem: 21:06

There is apparently. I think, apparently

Alex: 21:09

I,

Jem: 21:10

but I, I have heard Yeah, obviously you can have good games with no writing, but we focus very much on the dialogue mm-hmm. Um, in our discussion today. Um, and obviously writing is also about the whole story of the

Speaker 10: 21:28

game.

Jem: 21:29

Mm-hmm. So even in a game where there's no dialogue, there will still be writing, even if it's not, you know, you're not reading it, you're not having it spoken to you. Mm-hmm. But obviously there is a story there and that ha that is also part of the writing, um, experience. So I think that, we're talking about very simple games if you're taking out the writing and, but I think games without dialogue. Yeah. That's. That you can have some very good games. That dialogue,

Matt: 22:04

Plenty of games where if you removed all of the dialogue, the game would improve massively. Like Space Marine two.

Speaker 10: 22:12

Hmm.

Matt: 22:13

If there's a game that I wanna play that the writing isn't particularly good, I'll change the voice language. So I played Horizon Forbidden West in Italian and it's like playing a completely different game because it just makes it feel fresh. But if you like removed all the dialogue from God of war. You'd be able to work out what was going on from the gameplay and the acting. And that's, that's the, the biggest like thing I think is, is the gameplay good enough to, to stand on its own without any, without any writing, any dialogue. And if that's true, then you've made a great game. And then writing can only enhance that. And the last, the thing that I remember that I, I, I wanted to say earlier I'll sound like a 15th century gentleman going, Shakespeare is the best at writing dialogue in history. To me. There's Shakespeare and then there's George, RR Martin. Those are my two biggest inspirations in terms of dialogue. And I just wish more people would write like Shakespeare. I think that that's the perfect place to start.'cause it's, it's prose and it's poetry and it, no one understands the human condition better than him. And I just, yeah. If you, if you made the space of Marines talk like Shakespeare, that'd be something.

Alex: 24:02

I'm sure there's a game that's got Shakespearean type dialogue. I can't remember if I'm imagining it,, I'm sure there's like a murder mystery. Of some kind that you have to solve that's got either that or it's medieval, I can't remember, but there must be a game out there with some Shakespearean inspiration. Well, perhaps we'll find it for the next episode, mark.

Chris: 24:24

I will be very interested, Matt, if you have read any of the 40 K novels, because they Warhammer watch, they obviously, yes. Yeah. Not for now, but, one, one day I must speak to your brains about those because, I could talk for ages about the quality of the writing and how you write characters to, to wuh hammer 40 K individuals.

Matt: 24:44

Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. Have you heard of, Lutin the YouTube channel? Yes. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So I, I, I have listened to so much of that was my gateway into the 40 K universe. I've never played it, I'd hope to at some point. Then recently I've listened to the first four audio books of the, the hos heresy, uh, books, and they make the Space Marines so interesting. Through the way they talk. It's this very Spartan dialogue, very like Retos and how you can have these, what are shown in the space spring games, these sort of, these meathead, oh cool. Kill the alien Xenos over there. And then that's as deep as they are. Whereas in the books and in the law, they are fascinating, unique individuals. And it can, it can be as stupid as arcs fighting against bugs and go, yeah, that's cool. But then the, I think the Warhammer 40 K universe is quite a transcendent example of writing when you think it's all based around like little figurines on a board.

Speaker 10: 26:06

Mm-hmm.

Matt: 26:07

They really went hard for it.

Alex: 26:09

Mm-hmm. There we go. Well, thank you everyone for your thoughts on this episode. It's been a fascinating look into writing for gaming. And writing for games. And thank you very much for your thoughts and I expect we'll probably come back to the topic again.'cause like I said, there's plenty more we could talk about what we haven't done today, like Jen mentioned, the, um, the world building and the story behind the game as well. Um, so there's definitely more to explore and, and we'd be happy to have you back on any time. Chris. So thank you very much for joining us. Oh,

Chris: 26:47

that, that's very flattering. Thank you very much. And, thank you guys for, for accommodating me and, uh, putting up with my nonsense.

Alex: 26:56

You are very welcome. So, um, thank you very much for listening and watching. We hope you enjoyed as well. Do you have any thoughts you'd like to share? Just, um, let your friends know. Let anyone you think might be interested know. Let us know what you thought and we'll be back every Thursday with more episodes for you. So until then, uh, we'll see you later. Bye

Matt: 27:19

bye.