The Future of Storytelling & Narrative Design with Ken Levine (The House of The Dev podcast S1E4)
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- čas přidán 6. 08. 2021
- Raphael Colantonio and Peter Salnikov talk to Ken Levine (BioShock, Thief: The Dark Project, System Shock 2) about the way video games tell stories, and instruments which let the devs go deeper and bigger than in any other medium.
- Timing, dynamics, and keeping it simple;
- Smaller stories inside bigger ones;
- How to lead player’s attention and highlight what really matters;
- Cut-scenes, dialogue trees, audio logs, prescripted events and their impact on user experiencs;
- Procedural storytelling: what the future holds.
This and many more - in the fourth episode of The House of The Dev podcast.
Unreal Engine Dev Contest: unrealcontest.ru
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Apple Podcasts - podcasts.apple.com/ru/podcast... - Hry
It's time to rename the channel into «The House of The Immersive Sims»
Wow, guys. I guess you decided to invite all my gamedev heroes for these podcasts. Just AWESOME!
This podcast needs more views!
Terrific talk - very much agree about audiologs over cutscenes; I'm an old radio-show fan, and as a tool for scaring the hell out of me, this method has never been beat.
Somehow the Thief cutscenes were damn near perfect, though.
Probably because they are a totally different style than the game.
I was replaying Thief 2 recently, which I realised I haven't re-played all that much, so I was kinda playing with fresh eyes!
The levels I was playing were cool, but in some ways nothing super mind blowing.
But the big chunky reward was finishing a level and seeing that next CUTSCENE!
You feel like you are actually in a "proper" authored story, with real places to go, interesting themes, etc.
Thief's sense of purpose, and dramatic momentum, just wouldn't be the same at all if you took the cutscenes away.
I was thinking recently about how there were multiple members of Tribe involved on the Thief games, although I guess they were coming and going (Greg LoPicollo, Eric Brosius, Terri Brosius), and it always feels to me like somehow that was another vital ingredient of why the game felt so rich and wonderful. The whole audio side of things was certainly a hugely powerful part of the game.
[EDIT] It's not self imposed challange! We do care! If I wanted to watch a movie I'd watch a movie. I want games to give me control as much as possible. So yeah... Prey/Dishonored/Bioshock/System Shock etc. There are milions of people loving what you do and one of the reason IS the fact that you allow us to have control of what we're doing!! Love you guys!!
Ken Levine - Freakin legend!!
Raphael Colantonio should partner up with Ken Levine and help him finish this Ghost Story project. --- They both are heirs to the Shock legacy, and yet have very different strengths that would complement each other perfectly. Hope they are both humble enough to share a project at some point down the line - they could break the mainstream.
I know Ken has a fairly "Active" twitter but damn is it good to see him in another focused interview. Feel like it has been awhile and always find his insights and thoughts great in a discussion with other people.
This interview was really awesome. It got the floodgates open here in my notebooks and Google Docs for game dev. Things started to flood out and ideas began to grow and flourish. A bunch of my old notes and thoughts re-sprouted and started to entangle, with new insights and metaphors based on the great thoughts and discussion here. Thanks! Love these chats. :)
One day we will get a sequel to Prey. And if it ever happens, call it "Neuroshock". Prey is worthy enough to carry the shock name. Could have been something even more special just by changing the name
1:00:46 nice one xD
17:20 I'd love to read some of these old interviews, like the Looking Glass guys in CGM magazine.
And even to see the old adverts for a Game Designer role at Looking Glass in Next Gen. That'd be historically exciting! :D
Good chat! Take away quote: "A great idea that cant be made in time is not a great idea" - ken
Спасибо за такую возможность послушать симбиоз умных людей, прям услада для мозга!)
Loved every second of it. I've always had a dream of working in game development which fortunately or not never came true, but learning about the genius of game designers and how they use instruments that are so seemingly simple yet so hard to master is truly fascinating to me. Thank you so much!
I love that you guys spoke about this topic because I struggle with inner conflict with the ethics of letting other people know that a video game is or was based on a movie or something from pop culture. Is it understood industry wide that it's okay to let people know? I just thought it might create copyright issues.
Immersive sims for the win. I hope that S.T.A.L.K.E.R 2 and Deathloop will be successful.
Nice to see Ken, thx/
Just watched this one again. Excellent discussions here.
Lots of great practical ideas in here as well as interesting theoretical ones.
Great job Peter
Спасибо за потрясный подкаст!
Thank you for amazing podcast!
👏🔥
indescribably congratulatory! thanks!!
Both legendary and my fav devs. Match made in heaven
Great discussion, let’s see what stories can be told
I've lived every episode keep it up
Thank you! Very informative.
good to see ken doing well, one of the best franchise's ive played was Bioshock. Its a shame he wont be involved in Bioshock 4.
I just want to say thx for so cool content
Magnificent
This is so insightful
Really wanted to dig more into the generated/experimental interactive storytelling Ken's been pursuing, next time :)
Some feedback :
I wish there was timestamps on the different topics, sure it's more work, but there's stuff I'm not interested in.
Audio could be little better.
I wonder if speech simulation is the key to that kind of RPG.. it's gotten surprisingly good and surprisingly accessible at this point, add that to the list of things that AI can automatically generate.. with the tech in cyberpunk that I think is third party if I recall that does the facial mapping or animation, that allows you to translate into multiple languages with tone and things like that.. you could solve that conundrum of being able to write a Tom Clancy level multi-branched story, without having to go through the the traditional process of spending a fortune every single time you have a scene, or have to get the actor back or etc.. like I think I think alpha protocol is a really good example of how daunting the expensive that kind of stuff used to be especially if you're not as disciplined to studio.. but then also, if they were as disciplined as studio LOL they probably wouldn't have tried to make alpha protocol and I'm really glad somebody tried it even if it's just about as flawed in every single way.. it's it's definitely something I've thought about would be really cool and never really had that particular reaction in the narrative.. the best I've been able to get is the gameplay version of that in games like crisis or your dark Messiah.. Deus ex, and to a certain degree cyberpunk, although I needed a little bit of modding to add things back in that they had cut to to fully bring out that simulation factor like manual control over what your character is doing rather than contextual automation.
and just goes to remind me that I really wish they would just come up with different control schemes for PC and console LOL I'm so tired of being limited to that dual analog stick in game design on every level.. but the fact that they had it and then they cut it.. good God, I can only imagine how many times I've almost had my cake and never got to eat it it's just usually better if you never knew but is it? With story and narrative branching it's.. I mean it's been done, you have that whole project that was disco Elysium, but it seems like when you try to mix the immersive reality experience and the immersive narrative experience you don't really those two are such oil and water when it comes to development it seems.. I've never really had a good experience in both.. although vampire of the masquerade bloodlines seems like it could have been had they had a slightly more reasonable publisher or had started on source engine 2 years later after it had basic documentation.. I would like to have both I feel like I really need to have both at some point but at this point, I'm just tired of being gas lit by the gameplay.. just something like having your enemy be able to lean around the corner but you can't.. just something so basic that used to be a standard.. and honestly I kind of blame games like Bioshock for that, there's such a stripped immersive sin that I don't understand why people still call it an immersive Sim.. it didn't really have any of those things it was no case shooter but it wasn't even up to the quality of system shock 2 in that regard.. it's certainly wasn't SWAT 4... Somehow, that ended up getting doubled down on and now that everything has been split into its own specific genre play style, the moment you try to introduce mechanics from one to the other which is the whole point LOL people just start crying about things being too complicated to control..
I love you guys!!! 🔥🔥🔥💪💪💪👍👍👍
As Ken Levine said, architectures of neural networks like GPT3 have great potential in generating stories, but they are not very controllable today. I think they will develop someday in a such way that human can make some bio for game charecters and AI will use them as a reference points.
Woahhh Ken Levine!!?? We miss this guy, is he ever gonna make a game again, gaming has gone to shit and predatory practice after predatory practice since his last one! Save us Ken
he is making a new game but he still won't say what it is
Ken - one love!
I am enjoying your channel
two genious in one place
Thank you! I enjoyed this conversation. One thing I cannot fathom, though, is the fascination with generative storytelling. Stories are interesting because they are generated by minds like ours. The fact that they are "handmade" by another person is an intrinsic part of their interest. An AI might generate a good story but the moment you tell me it was AI-generated my interest shifts away from the story and toward the AI itself.
It's not so much the desire to solve interesting arcs, which I believe should stay authored but it's about expanding the potential outcomes and consequences and flavors thanks to AI
@@WeirdWolves Thanks for your reply. Do you mean in the sense of helping the author see possibilities that they might otherwise have overlooked?
@@simonabbott to some degree, but also to dynamically resolve some situations
Part of it I think is also the desire for unique stories. A story will often have much more (or perhaps mosty just a different) impact if the player feels like they had agency in it. While a pre-authored story might still be engaging, you will always know that it was going to turn out that way regardless, and everyone else is experiencing the exact same.
@@Jelkeludo very much
54:50
🔥
I keep checking back for a new episode. Huuuungry. ;) Gotta feed the beast.
Someone has to find that wild Doug Church one day, and drag him out of his burrow.
Perhaps you are the guys to do it??? :D
Кен такой милаха)
Dude sounds like Master Chief.
23:00 How long now before someone makes a competitive first person shooter in the style of minecraft for challenge accepted reasons? :-D
you know
Why is Levine entertaining God Of War as if it's good? Peak of sad & angry war tard.
Because the story was good?
He's a hack job. The only thing interesting about Bioshock was the aesthetics (that he had nothing to do with since it's not an artist).
He had nothing to do with what made any of the popular Looking Glass games.
Honestly, game directors/designers are generally pretty horrifically overrated. Implementation is what's always made games.
Just shut up dude and listen to what talented people have to say, and you'll learn something from them.
Nice joke 👍
@@fatalmokrane I knew more about games 20 years ago than Levine will know on his deathbed.
Actually make that 30 years ago.
@@youtubesuresuckscock yeah yeah sure