Character Development and Storytelling for Games PDF Download

Author: Lee Sheldon
Publisher: CRC Press
ISBN: 1000782867
Category : Computers
Languages : en
Pages : 519

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Book Description
This is the third edition of Character Development and Storytelling for Games, a standard work in the field that brings all of the teaching from the first two books up to date and tackles the new challenges of today. Professional game writer and designer Lee Sheldon combines his experience and expertise in this updated edition. New examples, new game types, and new challenges throughout the text highlight the fundamentals of character writing and storytelling. But this book is not just a box of techniques for writers of video games. It is an exploration of the roots of character development and storytelling that readers can trace from Homer to Chaucer to Cervantes to Dickens and even Mozart. Many contemporary writers also contribute insights from books, plays, television, films, and, yes, games. Sheldon and his contributors emphasize the importance of creative instinct and listening to the inner voice that guides successful game writers and designers. Join him on his quest to instruct, inform, and maybe even inspire your next great game.

Author: Evan Skolnick
Publisher: Watson-Guptill
ISBN: 0385345836
Category : Games & Activities
Languages : en
Pages : 210

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Book Description
UNLOCK YOUR GAME'S NARRATIVE POTENTIAL! With increasingly sophisticated video games being consumed by an enthusiastic and expanding audience, the pressure is on game developers like never before to deliver exciting stories and engaging characters. With Video Game Storytelling, game writer and producer Evan Skolnick provides a comprehensive yet easy-to-follow guide to storytelling basics and how they can be applied at every stage of the development process—by all members of the team. This clear, concise reference pairs relevant examples from top games and other media with a breakdown of the key roles in game development, showing how a team’s shared understanding and application of core storytelling principles can deepen the player experience. Understanding story and why it matters is no longer just for writers or narrative designers. From team leadership to game design and beyond, Skolnick reveals how each member of the development team can do his or her part to help produce gripping, truly memorable narratives that will enhance gameplay and bring today’s savvy gamers back time and time again.

Author: Josiah Lebowitz
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
ISBN: 113612733X
Category : Computers
Languages : en
Pages : 333

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Book Description
What really makes a video game story interactive? What's the best way to create an interactive story? How much control should players be given? Do they really want that control in the first place? Do they even know what they want-or are their stated desires at odds with the unconscious preferences? All of these questions and more are examined in this definitive book on interactive storytelling for video games. You'll get detailed descriptions of all major types of interactive stories, case studies of popular games (including Bioshock, Fallout 3, Final Fantasy XIII, Heavy Rain, and Metal Gear Solid), and how players interact with them, and an in-depth analysis of the results of a national survey on player storytelling preferences in games. You'll get the expert advice you need to generate compelling and original game concepts and narratives.With Interactive Storytelling for Video Games, you'll:

Author: Raph Koster
Publisher: "O'Reilly Media, Inc."
ISBN: 1932111972
Category : Computers
Languages : en
Pages : 259

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Book Description
Discusses the essential elements in creating a successful game, how playing games and learning are connected, and what makes a game boring or fun.

Author: Nicholas B. Zeman
Publisher: CRC Press
ISBN: 1315354470
Category : Computers
Languages : en
Pages : 280

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Book Description
The evolution of story-telling is as old as the human race; from the beginning, when our ancestors first gathered around a campfire to share wondrous tales through oral traditions, to today, with information and stories being shared through waves and filling screens with words and images. Stories have always surrounded us, and united us in ways other disciplines can't. Storytelling for Interactive Digital Media and Video Games lays out the construct of the story, and how it can be manipulated by the storyteller through sound, video, lighting, graphics, and color. This book is the perfect guide to aspiring storytellers as it illustrates the different manner of how and why stories are told, and how to make them "interactive." Storytelling features heavy game development as a method of storytelling and delivery, and how to develop compelling plots, characters, settings, and actions inside a game. The concept of digital storytelling will be explored, and how this differs from previous incarnations of mediums for stories Key Features: Explores the necessary elements of a story (setting, character, events, sequence, and perspective) and how they affect the viewer of the story Discusses media and its role in storytelling, including images, art, sound, video, and animation Explores the effect of interactivity on the story, such as contest TV, web-based storytelling, kiosks, and games Shows the different types of story themes in gaming and how they are interwoven Describes how to make games engaging and rewarding intrinsically and extrinsically

Author: Chris Bateman
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA
ISBN: 1501348973
Category : Games & Activities
Languages : en
Pages : 457

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Book Description
As the videogame industry has grown up, the need for better stories and characters has dramatically increased, yet traditional screenwriting techniques alone cannot equip writers for the unique challenges of writing stories where the actions and decisions of a diverse range of players are at the centre of every narrative experience. Game Writing: Narrative Skills for Videogames was the first book to demystify the emerging field of game writing by identifying and explaining the skills required for creating videogame narrative. Through the insights and experiences of professional game writers, this revised edition captures a snapshot of the narrative skills employed in today's game industry and presents them as practical articles accompanied by exercises for developing the skills discussed. The book carefully explains the foundations of the craft of game writing, detailing all aspects of the process from the basics of narrative to guiding the player and the challenges of nonlinear storytelling. Throughout the book there is a strong emphasis on the skills developers and publishers expect game writers to know. This second edition brings the material up to date and adds four new chapters covering MMOs, script formats, narrative design for urban games, and new ways to think about videogame narrative as an art form. Suitable for both beginners and experienced writers, Game Writing is the essential guide to all the techniques of game writing. There's no better starting point for someone wishing to get into this exciting field, whether they are new game writers wishing to hone their skills, or screenwriters hoping to transfer their skills to the games industry.

Author: Robin James Stuart Sloan
Publisher: CRC Press
ISBN: 1466598204
Category : Computers
Languages : en
Pages : 256

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Book Description
While the earliest character representations in video games were rudimentary in terms of their presentation and performance, the virtual characters that appear in games today can be extremely complex and lifelike. These are characters that have the potential to make a powerful and emotional connection with gamers. As virtual characters become more intricate and varied, there is a growing need to examine the theory and practice of virtual character design. This book seeks to develop a series of critical frameworks to support the analysis and design of virtual characters. Virtual Character Design for Games and Interactive Media covers a breadth of topics to establish a relationship between pertinent artistic and scientific theories and good character design practice. Targeted at students, researchers, and professionals, the book aims to show how both character presentation and character performance can be enhanced through careful consideration of underlying theory. The book begins with a focus on virtual character presentation, underpinned by a discussion of biological, artistic, and sociological principles. Next it looks at the performance of virtual characters, encompassing the psychology of emotion and personality, narrative and game design theories, animation, and acting. The book concludes with a series of applied virtual character design examples. These examples examine the aesthetics of player characters, the design and performance of the wider cast of game characters, and the performance of characters within complex, hyperreal worlds.

Author: Tanya X. Short
Publisher: CRC Press
ISBN: 0429948581
Category : Computers
Languages : en
Pages : 360

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Book Description
This edited collection of chapters concerns the evolving discipline of procedural storytelling in video games. Games are an interactive medium, and this interplay between author, player and machine provides new and exciting ways to create and tell stories. In each essay, practitioners of this artform demonstrate how traditional storytelling tools such as characterization, world-building, theme, momentum and atmosphere can be adapted to full effect, using specific examples from their games. The reader will learn to construct narrative systems, write procedural dialog, and generate compelling characters with unique personalities and backstories. Key Features Introduces the differences between static/traditional game design and procedural game design Demonstrates how to solve or avoid common problems with procedural game design in a variety of concrete ways World’s finest guide for how to begin thinking about procedural design

Author: Pat Harrigan
Publisher: MIT Press
ISBN: 0262514184
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 428

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Book Description
Game designers, authors, artists, and scholars discuss how roles are played and how stories are created in role-playing games, board games, computer games, interactive fictions, massively multiplayer games, improvisational theater, and other "playable media." Games and other playable forms, from interactive fictions to improvisational theater, involve role playing and story—something played and something told. In Second Person, game designers, authors, artists, and scholars examine the different ways in which these two elements work together in tabletop role-playing games (RPGs), computer games, board games, card games, electronic literature, political simulations, locative media, massively multiplayer games, and other forms that invite and structure play. Second Person—so called because in these games and playable media it is "you" who plays the roles, "you" for whom the story is being told—first considers tabletop games ranging from Dungeons & Dragons and other RPGs with an explicit social component to Kim Newman's Choose Your Own Adventure-style novel Life's Lottery and its more traditional author-reader interaction. Contributors then examine computer-based playable structures that are designed for solo interaction—for the singular "you"—including the mainstream hit Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time and the genre-defining independent production Façade. Finally, contributors look at the intersection of the social spaces of play and the real world, considering, among other topics, the virtual communities of such Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Games (MMORPGs) as World of Warcraft and the political uses of digital gaming and role-playing techniques (as in The Howard Dean for Iowa Game, the first U.S. presidential campaign game). In engaging essays that range in tone from the informal to the technical, these writers offer a variety of approaches for the examination of an emerging field that includes works as diverse as George R.R. Martin's Wild Cards series and the classic Infocom game Planetfall. Appendixes contain three fully-playable tabletop RPGs that demonstrate some of the variations possible in the form.

Author: Chris Mark Bateman
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Video games
Languages : en
Pages : 350

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Book Description
As computer games become more and more like Hollywood productions, the need for good story lines increases. Research shows that stories are highly valued by game players, so today's studios and developers need good writers. Creating narrative - a traditionally static form - for games is a major challenge. Games are at their heart dynamic, interactive systems, so they don't follow the guidelines and rules of film or T.V. writing. Game Writing: Narrative Skills for Videogames addresses these issues and is the first book written to demystify this emerging field. Through the insights and experiences of practicing game writers, the book captures a snapshot of the narrative skills employed in today's game industry. This unique collection of practical articles provides the foundations to the craft of game writing. The articles, written by member of the International Game Developer's (IDGA) Game Writer's SIG, detail aspects of the process from the basics of narrative and non-linear narrative to writing comedy for games and creating compelling characters. Throughout the articles there is a strong emphasis on the skills developers and publishers will expect a game writer to have. The book is suitable for both beginners and experienced writers, and is a detailed guide to all the techniques of game writing. This book is an essential read for anyone wishing to get into this exciting field, particularly for new game writers wanting to hone their skills, and film and T.V. scriptwriters who want to learn how to transfer their skills to the games industry.