Variety have published a piece about the Writers Guild videogame award nominees, which awarded its first round of awards to videogame writers last year. This year there’s only one game that isn’t on PC, and another game that springs straight from the heart of the indie community.
Command and Conquer: Red Alert 3 (EA). Writer: Haris Orkin. Story Producer: Mical Pedriana.
Dangerous High School Girls in Trouble! (Mousechief). Writing: Keith Nemitz. Additional Writing: Adrianne Ambrose.
Fallout 3 (Bethesda). Lead Writer: Emil Pagliarulo. Quest Writing: Erik J. Caponi, Brian Chapin, Jon Paul Duvall, Kurt Kuhlmann, Alan Nanes, Bruce Nesmith, and Fred Zeleny. Additional Quest Writing: Nate Ellis, William Killeen, Mark Nelson, and Justin McSweeney.
Star Wars: The Force Unleashed (LucasArts). Writers: Haden Blackman, Shawn Pitman, John Stafford and Cameron Suey.
Tomb Raider: Underworld (Eidos). Story: Eric Lindstrom and Toby Guard. Screenplay: Eric Lindstrom.
Red Alert 3. Are you sure?
Congratulations to the Dangerous High School Girls in Trouble! team, obviously. And I have to say that I’m surprised that Tomb Raider Underworld has done so badly – it’s one of the best Tomb Raider games in years.
So anyway, does everyone agree with that list? If not, who would you nominate?
I agree with Schmung. You use the example of someone saying a film had great plot and characters but the writing was awful. I think these are mutually exclusive, particularly if you look at something critically rather than dismissing offhand. From the gaming world I would say Far Cry 2 was a good example. It had the ingredients to have a compelling, although seen before, plot. But the dull way the plot was delivered made it excruciatingly uninteresting.
I’m surprised that more games aren’t getting professionals in to help develop the writing. In this day and age, where games are becoming more and more mainstream, I would expect them to try to make every aspect of the game as tight as possible, so that it could compete with other mediums. The only writer I can think of that has had much involvement is Marc Laidlaw (Half Life series and apparently Mass Effect according to Wikipedia) but he is far better known for his game writing than his novels.
The WGA award rules imply they’re focusing on story, although the emphasis on scripts suggests dialogue plays a part as well (just like films, I suppose):
Submitted games MUST have separate credit for writing (i.e. Written By, Story By, Writer, Story Designer, etc.).
…
Scripts must be submitted in a reasonable approximation of a standard film or TV script format, and must clearly demonstrate a progression of the story. In addition to the script, a story synopsis (1-2 pages) is required. The synopsis should describe the flow of the storyline and serve to clarify the game experience. Note: the synopsis should not detail the process of creating the game, or list awards and accomplishments associated with the title.
…
Any script consisting solely of random in-game dialog will not be considered
I’ll take Red Alert 3 over BioShock any day of the week.
Anyway, all this proves is that games still present slim pickings for stories (Arguably because telling a story in a linear fashion isn’t their purpose) and that these awards don’t look far in the first place.
Did they have these awards back in the day of Planescape and Baldur’s Gate?
“Did they have these awards back in the day of Planescape and Baldur’s Gate?”
Wouldn’t have mattered; as far as I’m aware, nobody at BioWare/Black Isle was a member of the WGA. Folks upthread have mentioned it, but to emphasize, the nominees come from a pretty small subset of titles. They’re have to be primarily written by WGA members, along with another criteria.
Granted, I didn’t think the WGA members in games writing were so few that RA3 and TR: Underworld would get nominations. Guess they need work on encouraging membership.
I can’t really remember a game I thought had incredible writing since Planescape : Torment. Deus Ex, I suppose, but that was a long time ago, too.
Game sites should just stop reporting on these awards, they’re about as credible as the Spike TV video game awards :P. Even worse, they can only select from an apparently tiny list of writers that have their dues paid up.
The picture was well chosen for this laughable award.
Although someone on the Fallout 3 writing team did write a good supermutant knock knock joke.
What I liked about Dangerous High School Girls in Trouble! is that I worried that they couldn’t sustain the snarky borderline pg-13 humor throughout the whole game but they pulled it off. They deserve a reward just for sustaining their premise.
Fallout 3 deserves it simply because I saw Mr Burke shoot Lucas Simms in the back and I robbed his sweet jacket and hat.
Worst. Sherrif. Ever.
Please stop reporting on these zero credibility “join our membership for free awards” events. Except when as today an indie darling wins\is nominated. I could care less about the shills opinions.
“robbed his sweet jacket and hat. “
Didn’t we all?
Maybe it all has to be commercial games, but a lot of the Interactive Fiction I’ve played through last year has been very charming. Nothing outside the notables Kieron mentioned weeks ago.
Fallout 3’s writing was dismal in every sense of the word; the plot was rife with holes and inconsistancies, the dialogue itself was stilted and poorly delivered, the whole presentation of that game was just bad.
I agree with Dangerous and Force Unleased, both had some really good writing, never played Tomb Raider but one never knows, and I guess C&C got on the list for camp.
I loved playing through Fallout 3, but I will admit that the stories weren’t … award-worthy. I enjoyed it more for the stories I was able to create around my character. The strange things that happened, like The Republic of Dave going completely aggro on me and mobbing me out of the place; just imagine walking up to the gate, seeing the little girl cower in fear and knowing that some crap was about to go down (still don’t know what happened), accidentally starting a war with and having to kill all the slavers, and having to indirectly murder Paladin Hoss(blew up a car next to him) because he stole some guns out of my home, after following me around for nearly 75% of the game. Honestly, I can’t really remember a game in recent memory that truly had good writing, the last ones I can think of are the Baldur Gate games, I would say Warcraft 3 as well. Say what you will about Blizzard (but we all know you’re just trying to be a unique and beautiful snowflake), they can at least write very well.
GTAIV, by a mile. I really liked Florian, and especially Niko’s acceptance of him. And the only thing to top Bas Rutten turned up to eleven in games this year was Little jacob talking to (Real) Badman…
(An aside on the 360: GoW2’s scripting and performances were very good, again)
Whether you judge it on plot or dialogue or both, Fallout 3’s writing was terribad. But since people have mentioned only a small subset of games even qualify for the awards, it makes sense that some garbage is going to have to be propped up.
WHY ISN’T LEFT 4 DEAD NOT ON THE LIST??? oh, you must need tons of annoying cut scenes that no one wants to watch in your game to get nominated. Making believable characters you can identify with is for chumps, suckers, and fat people!
Funky Badger: I had forgotten about Bas! That was one of the few bellylaughs I got out of a game the whole year. I’m entirely unsure that his part was “written”, though. It sounded like it could have been extemporaneous.
I like the fact that plotting is apparently important for these considerations. Good dialogue is important, but I’ve never enjoyed it as part of a story that I didn’t care about (hence why I’ve never understood the appeal of Jane Austen).
YOU SEE ME NOW!?!
*ahem*
So, I’m guessing the nominee list sucks because it can only include writers that are members of The Writers Guild?
There’s a lot more independent games with better writing than these…
I was going to say The Longest Journey, but then I looked up its release date and it actually came out a month earlier. :P
Fallout 3 did not have exemplary writing. Competent for the amount there was, but not award-worthy. Left 4 Dead has a lot of good one-liners, but I don’t think that really merits an award for best writing of the whole year. Penny Arcade deserves a writing award. The words that showed up at the start of a battle (”Peril!”) were pretty funny, but when I was greeted by “OH FUCK!” in a whooshing, red font, I ended up losing the battle because I was laughing too hard. That, and the scene with the model ferris wheel deserve an award. I also thought I Fell In Love With the Majesty of Colors had really interesting writing.
The only writing award Fallout 3 can win in good conscience is “Most Writing.” The sheer amount of dialogue in the game would be impressive if 90% of it wasn’t ridiculous garbage that no person in their right mind would ever say.
I think Red Alert 3’s writing is underappreciated, though. It perfectly fits the goofy camp quality the whole game is so obviously going for. For the first time in a C&C game, the cutscenes have been fun to watch rather than painful. They’re a guilty pleasure (like the rest of the game), but a pleasure nonetheless.
Also, I’m surprised that Keith Nemitz of DHSGiT is a member of the WGA. Or did they open the awards to nonmembers this year?
Who’s “Toby Guard”?
i am grateful few of the best-written games are on this list. if they won, they’d have wga writer credits. though i don’t know the mechanics of their contracts, but i know the wga make hollywood a closed shop and their strike left us with a weak television season and an even weaker year for movies.