236: Gordon Freeman, Private Eye

[Craig Owens]

Gordon Freeman, Private Eye

Valve has earned a reputation as one of the most cutting-edge game developers when it comes to storytelling. But it takes more than just ditching cut scenes - you have to build the world as much as you write it. Craig Owens looks at what makes Valve's stories so engaging.

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[DeviousJ]

Half life 2 must be one of the first games that really blew my mind. The atmosphere was so deep and compelling. But I had to play it twice to actually capture the whole world and its story. I think it had serious impact on my "gaming-life". I sometimes think about how it would be, if the half life fiction was our reality.
And I don't think there would be a Gordon Freeman for us.

 

[boholikeu]

This is exactly the reason why I value Valve's storytelling methods over those of the latest epic JRPG or Metal Gear game. Essentially, it comes down to the old "show, don't tell" adage from Creative Writing 101. Don't tell me the story through yet another un-interactive cinematic; let me experience it for myself through the environment and game play.

 

[johnman]

I think this is one reason why some people knock Half life for crappy storytelling, if people are use to games like Halo and gears, the enviroment only serves as cover, the story is told directly to you, and they dont notice these subtle devices that speak much louder than words.

 

[Earthmonger]

Excellent article. Reading it really makes me want to install and play through it all again, just to see if the article changed my perspective on it.

 

[M4rsch]

Wow.
This article was pretty darn accurate for the most part.

 

[DJPirtu]

For some reason, I have this feeling that this is the exact reason why we have had to wait for the Episode 3 for this long. While it is much easier to get away with such enigmatic writing in the earlier episodes, the grand finale does demand some sort of closure. And this is rather difficult to achieve without too much exposition, which the people in Valve are well aware to kill off all the excitement towards the story.

I think this is one reason why some people knock Half life for crappy storytelling, if people are use to games like Halo and gears, the enviroment only serves as cover, the story is told directly to you, and they dont notice these subtle devices that speak much louder than words.

This does remind me when I had a friend of mine sit down to play some Portal. He wasn't exactly impressed by the game thus far and I hoped that actually playing the game would make him change his mind.
After listening his ongoing rant about "What is this place? What's going on? This game sucks. What's that voice? Who's my character? This game sucks." I came to a realization on just how different our tastes were when it came to storytelling.
I don't think he played the game for more than 5 minutes.

 

[Insomniactk]

I think tha...
Whatever, everything I wanted to say when reading the article has already been said by DeviousJ and DJPirtu.

All that is left for me to say is: Great article, one of the best (the best?) I've read on the escapist.

Now if Black Mesa just could come out...

 

[Raithnor]

While we're casting Gordon Freeman as a private eye maybe we can have him investigate where Half-Life 2: Episode 3 went.

 

[Dannie]

Awesome article! I really feel that I want to play through HL2 again to explore all these details.

 

[Onyx Oblivion]

Wow. Just wow.

That said, when it comes to telling a story, nothing can beat Lost Odyssey's dream sequences.

To me, even Half-Life pales in comparison.


The music, the way words appear, it all blends to make me cry every fucking time I watch that.

 

[Bob_F_It]

Valve did take a different direction with storytelling by making you the play button, and I agree that it's a great way of getting the player immersed in the world.
However, a little care should be taken to making sure that the player can take in the story being suggested by the surroundings. With the house on Highway 17 I could deduce what the building was and what had happened, but that was only after I'd killed the headcrabs and raided all of the supplies. The part about the sea levels dropping a few metres I missed entirely. Sorry, but I was too busy not crashing the car and blasting antlions to pieces; there just wasn't the time to take in the scarred view. I didn't get the hint, and nobody directed my attention to it.
But at least there was somebody in episodes 1&2. Alex nicely points at a few things and starts the ball rolling for you to piece the rest together. And there aren't any distractions like endless headcrabs when you're meant to learn something new about the world you're in.

The hideaway in testchamber 16 is impossible to miss. You need to take one of the cubes, and when you do, you see the bright orange of the centre's innards in contrast to the sterile white of the chambers. And the sinister undertone when GLaDOS compares the value of the portal gun to somebody's organs hits you hard because she's the only voice you hear (bar the companion cube).

It's important to get the delivery right if you're wanting the player to stumble upon your non-narrative under-story. If there's something hidden in the corner, I'll need a reason to look at it first, otherwise I'll walk right by.

 

[NLS]

I loved how in Portal, you stumble across that room, and you see that computer that's been used as a stove. At first I thought it was just coincidental, but then I thought "hey just wait a second... did someone use the CPU as a heating source for cooking?"
That's what I love about Valve's games, you don't get everything pushed on you, you have to take a bit of a moment to watch and think about what has happened.

 

[johnman]

Valve did take a different direction with storytelling by making you the play button, and I agree that it's a great way of getting the player immersed in the world.
However, a little care should be taken to making sure that the player can take in the story being suggested by the surroundings. With the house on Highway 17 I could deduce what the building was and what had happened, but that was only after I'd killed the headcrabs and raided all of the supplies.

On my first playthough I did much the same, but I completed Hl2 about 5 times and every time I would notice somthing new that would help explain the story a little bit more.

 

[Trichy]

I think that this is one of the many examples that show that storytelling in video games has the ability to do things that film and literature never could. Outstanding article.

 

[The Youth Counselor]

Excellent article. This is a worthy addition to other Escapist articles dissecting and praising the VALVe style of strong but minimalist storytelling:

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/editorials/op-ed/2554-Portal-Less-is-More
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/issues/issue_122/2597-Slouching-Toward-Black-Mesa
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/issues/issue_51/309-Return-To-Ravenholm

As I wrote before in this thread [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/6.167502]:

The medium of gaming is one of experience... The story is formed as you play it. There are people who foolhardily dismiss straightforward games like Super-Mario: Bros, Doom, or Half-Life as having no plot or no depth. They have been accustomed to prose and film, and expect the story to be told to them.

We are all protagonists. We all have adversaries, loves, goals, conflicts, and struggles. There aren't scrolling text, a voice over (hopefully), a soundtrack, pop up verse, plot twists and conclusions in life. Yet everyday we experience a story in life.

 

[Stormpigeon]

Anyone else notice a resemblence between Gordon and Yahtzee?

 

[The Youth Counselor]

Anyone else notice a resemblence between Gordon and Yahtzee?

I noticed that only post scriptum.

 

[psychic psycho]

All Valve games seem to tell the story in this way. People who criticize L4D(2) for not having a story just don't take time to examine the environment.

I've always appreciated they way the story was presented in Valve games. I hate it when people say that Valve games don't have any cutscenes and come to the conclusion that the story sucks and Valve was too lazy to put them in.

 

[G-Mang]

Half-Life is not Copyright EA. It's owned solely by Valve. EA just had the console publishing rights to the Orange Box.

I dunno why people keep mixing that up.