[MUD-Dev] Ray Feist interview

[Lee Sheldon]

> -----Original Message-----
> From: mud-dev-admin at kanga.nu
> [mailto:mud-dev-admin at kanga.nu]On Behalf Of
> Koster, Raph
> Sent: Thursday, December 28, 2000 11:42 PM
> To: 'mud-dev at kanga.nu'
> Subject: [MUD-Dev] Ray Feist interview

> Stratics just did an interview with Raymond Feist on massively
> multiplayer games. Thought there'd be some interesting debates based
> on it, if we got Lee to pipe up. :)

Heh, yes I read this via Lum's coverage before I left on a brief
vacation.  I've been away from the computer for a few days, but if the
trail isn't completely cold, let's see if we can catch up.

It's awfully easy to dismiss what Feist says, considering the brief
experiences he had with the games.  EQ is overly complex and difficult
to navigate?  He's lucky he didn't sample AC.  And his connection,
even dial-up, sounds less than optimum.  But dismissal for that reason
would be avoiding the issues he raises.  Let's take a look...

>> 2. Do you feel that an MMOG is capable of telling an in-depth,
>> quality story on the level of one of your novels?

> No, nor would you want to. RPG's and novels serve two different
> functions.  You write the "story" in your head in an RPG, while a
> novel is a far more passive undertaking, one which someone else did
> the majority of the work for you. You can have a grand adventure in
> a MMOG, but the story is in your head and that's what makes it
> grand.

I wish I knew what form of RPG he was specifically talking about.
Paper & pencil?  Board games?  In either you do not write the story in
your head.  You flesh out the story, and bring life to your character,
but you are reacting, not creating from scratch.  A GM, either subtly
or overtly, is pulling story strings.  All solo computer RPG's have a
story, usually mostly static, with an onion or jigsaw puzzle
structure.  You peel it/piece it together over time.  Then when you
reach points created by the author, the NPC antagonist moves into
present-time action.  It is the -quality of the experience- that makes
the adventure grand, and part of that experience has always been story
developed outside the player, either generated solely by an author, or
in collaboration with the player.

> There's almost no sitting around and talking in a MMOG, which is a
> shame, really, as when we did paper and pencil games in college,
> some of the most fun we had was the nonsense characters did to one
> another in a tavern before we even got out the door on whatever
> quest we were supposed to be undertaking.

As we who make and play them more than an hour or two know a vast
portion of game time is actually spent doing exactly that: sitting
around and talking.  The experience is structured much like war: a lot
of hanging in the foxhole, with only brief bursts of manic action.
MMORPGs even give us activities to keep our hands busy while we chat,
the equivalent of the old ladies crocheting as they gossip: fletching,
baking, and so on.

>> 3. What drawbacks do you feel there is in telling a story in an
>> MMOG?

> First of all, there's no coherent single source for the story.

I need to keep reminding myself he participated in the creation of a
very good RPG based on his material.  Was any of what the experience
gave us only plot?  Did we supply all the story there was?  It's been
years since I played Krondor, but that is not my memory.

> And usually, if you break the narrative down it reads like, "We
> kicked down a door, killed something, got the treasure. We rested,
> healed our wounds, and went to the next door, which we kicked down,
> then we killed something, then got the treasure." In a story, a
> little of that goes a long way.

Agreed.  In an MMORPG it can wear thin after time too, if that's all
there is.  Even the most hardened Loot Hound can be heard to complain
about the repetitive nature of the experience.

> Often people confuse the concept of plot and story. "King dies,
> queen dies," is a plot. "King dies, queen dies of a broken heart,"
> is a story.

Excellent point, and often overlooked by people trying to tell story
without really studying what a story is.  EQ for example doesn't have
a story per se, but what we call backstory, an exposition of "the plot
thus far."  AC throws plot at players, not story, so some can make of
it what they will.  Most watch from a distance, or ignore it: "Oh, the
rivers turned to blood.  Huh.  Good thing those banderlings are still
camped there, waiting to die..."

> In an on-line game, the players have to "fill in the colors" in
> their head that turns the plot of "kick door, kill monster, get
> treasure, repeat as needed," into a story, "the quest for the Silver
> Dagger," or whatever it is. That's the essence of heroic fantasy in
> the game reality.

His observation is absolutely correct as far as it goes, but he's
highlighting only one facet of the potential for story in our games,
isn't he?  It occurs all the time, but is it all there is?  In an hour
or two in EQ or AC you won't be exposed to an attempt at any other
kind beyond a Fed-Ex quest or two.  But even in games where the story
delivery system is flawed, it isn't the innate structure that
prohibits story, simply the skill or even mindset of the storytellers.
Let's take the apparently hardest example of the big three.  I could
tell full-blown on-going stories in EQ with that engine, exactly as it
is built now.  But my mindset is obviously different.

> If you look at the earliest computer FRP's, for example the original
> Apple II version of Wizardry, it's line art, no plot, except what
> you read in the manual, which says you've got this wizard at the
> bottom of this maze, and you, the hero, must kill him. I've had
> people say, "It was a good story." It wasn't. It was a very basic
> computer game, primitive by today's standards, but because of that,
> the player had to build the fantasy in his or her head. That's why
> it worked.

Agreed.  Even with line art I felt I was in that dungeon.  Children
develop stories, worlds in their heads with the simplest of toys.
Piles of sand become castles, pebbles princes and princesses.  The
human imagination shouldn't come as a surprise to anyone.  It is the
gift that makes play possible.  It is also the curse that slams far
too many non-storytellers up against an unmoved public.  But you
shouldn't be distracted into building upon Wizardry a thesis that its
children are the only rightful heirs.

>> 4. What advantages do you see to telling a story in an MMOG?

> No story advantages, really. You can set a paradigm, setting up a
> group to "save the world from the evil Uga Booga," and give them a
> mission.  Everything after that is what the players do. So, it's not
> about story, but about game play and pleasure derived from game
> play.

If you have the notion that stories in passive novels, and active
games, should be handled exactly the same way, then it's easy to reach
this conclusion.  If you believe that stories and games by their
nature must be incompatible, then there is no other conclusion to
reach.

Remember Clarence Darrow (in "Inherit the Wind" not the actual Scopes
trial).  What does he do with the bible and "Origin of the Species" in
that last symbolic moment?  He places two seemingly
irrevokably-opposed volumes in his briefcase side by side.  We get the
point.  They can coexist in the same remarkable universe.  But -that-
is the paradigm you need to work from, not that the story is only in
the player's head.

<BIG SNIP>

>> 7. What if they shift the intended direction of the story?

> So what? It's not about a story. If it was about the designers
> concept of the story, it wouldn't be a MMOG, it would be a movie,
> and we'd all watch it while eating popcorn. I love a good
> movie. Just saw "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" yesterday and it
> was incredible. It's a terrible role playing game, but then it's a
> terrible sports car, too, if you see my point. You don't ask a
> computer to bake bread and you don't try to run spread sheets on
> your oven. A game is a game, and story is only a small element of
> it; game play is everything.

No, entertainment is everything.  It's not about a story, or a game.
They touch us in different ways.  They are often confused for one
another because they flow from the same fount of imagination within
us.  They are not mutually exclusive.

<ANOTHER BIG SNIP> of side issues.

>> 9. Should players determine the direction and resolution of a
>> story, or should GMs guide the players towards the intended result?

> Again, do you want to watch a movie or play a game. I think you set
> up the parts of the machine, then get out of the way and see how the
> players screw with it. That's a big part of the fun.

Why must it be either/or?  Players must be allowed to screw with it.
That's what play is.  If you want story, then storytelling must
provide roadmaps for the play.

>> 10. Do you prefer games played from a 3rd person perspective such
>> as Ultima Online, or a 1st person perspective such as EverQuest?

> For me, 3rd. I like seeing what's around the character, while others
> prefer 1st person so they can be "in character." I think it's just a
> matter of taste.

Most writers who come to games from novels or films feel this way.
With notable exceptions 3rd person is what we knew after all.  Only
the tense is different.  Novels are usually past tense.  Films and TV
are present tense, even the flashbacks.  It really boils down to a
common question every designer faces: Is the player the character?  Or
is the player guiding the character?  Which paradigm do I want?  Which
one really -is- more immersive?  The follow up question is also
important: who is my intended audience?

<SNIPPING THE REST>

Lee

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