{"id":972,"date":"2012-03-12T10:00:53","date_gmt":"2012-03-12T17:00:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/islemaster.wordpress.com\/?p=972"},"modified":"2014-03-17T00:47:18","modified_gmt":"2014-03-17T07:47:18","slug":"raph-koster-narrative-is-not-a-game-mechanic","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bradleycbuchanan.com\/b\/raph-koster-narrative-is-not-a-game-mechanic\/","title":{"rendered":"Raph Koster: \u201cNarrative is not a game mechanic\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Black<\/a><\/p>\n

Reflection on an article by Raph Koster<\/a>: \u201cNarrative is not a game mechanic\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

To summarize first: Koster states that \u201cnarrative in a game is not a mechanic. It\u2019s a form of feedback.\u201d He then elaborates on this idea by describing and diagramming game interactions in the form input-black box-feedback. He points out that the popular quick-time event interactions rely heavily on narrative feedback, which limits their replayability. He suggests this is bad game design, even if it might be good experience design.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m not sure how to respond to this article. It\u2019s built on a simple, sound logic about the way games work and I have no doubt that for most games Koster\u2019s assertion holds true. I can\u2019t help but want to find exceptions to this, and there\u2019s two issues that I\u2019d like to tackle – the first is an issue of narrative, and the second is an issue of feedback.<\/p>\n

I think there are a few places where narrative might be considered a game mechanic. Right away I think of several examples where narrative is both input and output: Sleep is Death<\/a> for one, or Polaris by TAO Games<\/a>, among other storygames. In these cases much of the \u201cblack box\u201d of mechanics is in the mind of another player, but I don\u2019t think this is a sufficient counterexample to Koster\u2019s assertion. Experiments like Facade<\/a> or Prom Week<\/a> more obviously put narrative into the black box, where the narrative structure itself is part of the hidden processing. Once could argue that the computer is just crunching numbers – that it doesn\u2019t really process narrative per se, that\u2019s created by the feedback in the mind of the guest. But then we have to ask if narrative is a formula, which is a conversation I don\u2019t want to get into at the moment. This isn\u2019t common yet, but I have a feeling it\u2019s going to show up more.<\/p>\n

Second, Koster says \u201cIf the systems of your game are outweighed by the feedback, you should grow suspicious.\u201d I can see why he says this, but I feel like it depends on your objective – games like Peggle<\/a> are almost built around the idea of having feedback outweigh systems. Koster himself points out that slot machines are a prime example of this, and while such games may not be advancing the art form they are great at capturing and holding an audience.<\/p>\n

So I suppose I\u2019m saying that Koster\u2019s bias comes through loud and clear here – he seems to favor what Ian Bogost<\/a> calls the \u201cprocedural\u201d aesthetic. I agree with him that systemic problems lie at the center of the art form, but I\u2019m not sure you can make a blanket statement that feedback should always play second fiddle to systems.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Reflection on an article by Raph Koster: \u201cNarrative is not a game mechanic\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[146,180,191,225,237,287,335],"class_list":["post-972","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-game-designer","tag-feedback","tag-ian-bogost","tag-input","tag-mechanics","tag-narrative","tag-raph-koster","tag-story-games"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bradleycbuchanan.com\/b\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/972","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bradleycbuchanan.com\/b\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bradleycbuchanan.com\/b\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bradleycbuchanan.com\/b\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bradleycbuchanan.com\/b\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=972"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.bradleycbuchanan.com\/b\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/972\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1247,"href":"https:\/\/www.bradleycbuchanan.com\/b\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/972\/revisions\/1247"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bradleycbuchanan.com\/b\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=972"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bradleycbuchanan.com\/b\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=972"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bradleycbuchanan.com\/b\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=972"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}