Linear Narrative Or Freedom Of Choice

Everyone has their preferences when it comes to gaming. Some prefer strategic battle games while others prefer first-person shooters. However, beyond these standard genres lies something else: player freedom. This can come in forms such as what places players can go to and even how restrictive character customization is. But what’s easily the best way to show player freedom is how choices in the game affect the game as a whole.

Linear stories allow writers to show their vision from start to finish. They don’t have to worry about what-if scenarios and can instead focus on making the best story possible. This also helps with gameplay as it makes it clear needs to happen in order to go from A to B. This however can at times seem stifling to the player. By restricting what the player can or can’t do there lies the risk of players feeling less invested as they don’t have a lot of agency in the game they're playing.

With choice based games players are able to be more involved with the game. They feel that their actions actually carry weight as the game around them changes based on their actions. This makes it feel like they’re no longer an outsider looking in, but instead an active participant in the game. This usually culminates in players getting different endings based off of these choices. Some feel though that this can detract from the story of these games. An argument can be made that by having multiple endings in the game, this makes it so there’s no real way to get invested in the story. While multiple endings does allow writers to explore more possibilities, it also means that they lose out on overall quality.

With all of this being said, what ultimately matters is giving the player the best experience possible. For some this means telling a compelling story that players can get invested in. With others it means it allowing players the freedom of changing the story how they see fit. In either case as long as players are able to have fun playing the game, then the creators have succeeded.

 

 

 

Logan Floyd-Mcgee | Writer
POP-COOLEDTURED SPECIALIST
cooledtured.com |  GROW YOUR COLLECTION