Death and Game-Overs

Game Development Writing and Content
23

In official Choice of Games games, there are clear stylistic guidelines on how to do death. Death should not be possible until the end, and it should be an interesting death eg deeply tragic (make that reader cry and they’ll love you forever) or ironic or sacrificial or funny. In my pirate game Scarlet Sails, there are loads of ways to die (all in the final chapter-plus-epilogue). Scurvy, swordfight, killed by a sea serpent, stabbed in the back, etc. All those deaths are appropriate in a pirate game and readers enjoyed dying (and also wanted to play again to see if they could survive next time). In fact, “Epic Death” was one of the achievements.

Another CoG style thing is that a good ending should be about 85% positive. That way things aren’t too easy, and the player will not win all the things all at once. It adds value to replayability, as the player thinks, “But can I romance so-and-so AND get that awesome promotion? What if I did such-and-such?”

Checkpoints are against normal CoG style, but can be enjoyable in HG, where there’s more stylistic freedom (although readers love HG partly because they love CoG as a company, so you’re likely to sell more if you stick closer to stylistic norms).

Readers complain if a story is too short, but rarely complain if a story is too long. I believe I see a trend of both official and Hosted games getting longer and longer over time. HGs only need to be 30,000 words (assuming there aren’t big cut and pasted bits; they don’t count towards the total) but I’d recommend at least twice that if you can stand it. (Having said that, the price varies with length so MUCH better to do a 30K finished game than an unfinished 200K game.)

Another stylistic thing is that the first few chapters are usually mostly building up stats, and then the stat tests start becoming more frequent, and eventually more difficult. So it would be very unusual to die early on, and I think it’s worth having a warning up front since it’s so different to what regular readers would be used to.

In general IF (not specifically ChoiceScript), I often see a 3-choice system where the player is loudly and repeatedly warned against a choice that ends in their death (eg by another character). So if they keep insisting that they really really do want to jump into the mouth of the monster armed only with an umbrella, then, well, okay. gory death ensues

Hope that helps.

10 Likes
24

Lol. Nope, it’s not really like I’m saying that at all since I don’t find premature deaths/game overs bad to begin with in IFs.

If anything I feel there’s not enough of them. Obviously others feel differently.

It’s the same reason why someone designed Dark Souls to have death around every corner while someone else designed Fable 2 where you couldn’t die at all. The different designs are going to appeal to different people.

6 Likes
25

I agree with you about that, but the IF category we are discussing. It is not about the difficulty. At least not in most part of the gamebooks. It is player expectations based on genre and in advertising basically.

If you make a Dark souls game or one defined loosely as one. The player will not only demanding those deaths, will be extremely angry if there aren’t there.

Most of the casuals in Cog that come from other media. Doesn’t expect to die in most part, and they even feeling annoyed if there are hardships before the end. Games are not advertised as a game of difficulty, and that’s not the target.
There is also not a back button due you don’t have to track down deaths not until reaching the ending.

However, in Genres as terror, thriller and Zombies or even some sort of Oregon Trail people would demand and expect death as a feature.

6 Likes
27

Speaking as someone who writes a rather lethal series, I think these same principles can be applied to interactive fiction, if not CoG itself.

Death is a core part of the experience in the Dragoon Saga, not necessarily as a pure mechanic, but also as a narrative threat. Sabres of Infinity and Guns of Infinity put your MC in the boots of a relatively junior cavalry officer at war, a type of person generally not well-known for their long lifespan. The fact that death is an omnipresent threat, and that any wrong decision might get you killed is a very real part of the tension which permeates the whole story, and makes the individual experience of battle (as opposed to the more general experience of “war”) something which the player should feel considerable anxiety over, possibly to the point where they would take the options to avoid optional combat to save their own skin.

The problem is, as you’ve already mentioned, that death can be extremely frustrating for the player. If they’ve sunk hours into a character only to have them get wiped out by a single bad decision, there’s a non-trivial chance they’ll just set the whole thing down and never play it again. That’s why I’ve tried to make death mechanics impactful without being frustrating, sometimes by using the same mechanics that Souls-likes do.

The most obvious parallel would be making death not actually hurt all that much. A lot gets made of Dark Souls’ “hardcore” death penalty, but ultimately, it’s pretty soft. Dying and losing all your accumulated souls and your humanity is bad, but it’s short term. You can get all that back, and even if you don’t, there are ways to keep going. The mechanics allow you ways to avoid or lessen risk (grind weaker enemies, spend your souls whenever possible, visit bonfires often etc). The harshest penalties are the ones which the player themselves choose.

I’ve tried to do the same by putting a checkpoint between every chapter, and (as mentioned before) allowing the player choices to avoid taking certain risks - not necessarily as cop-outs, but as entire separate plot threads with consequences that reverberate further down the rest of the series. By putting as much attention into those normally-neglected options as the more foolhardy ones, I try to tell the player that avoiding risk is a valid strategy, which doesn’t lessen your experience. There are, in fact exceptionally lethal points which I don’t expect most people to run specifically because they’ve been constantly warned against it.

There’s other things I’ve tried to do to make death less of a chore as well: there’s some achievements linked to particularly common ones. Each death has its own unique ending text, and so on.

While most “conventional” CoGs lack these features (mostly because the guidelines dissuade authors from putting in too many deaths, especially before the climax), there is room to implement characteristics which make death part of the story in a way which enhances narrative tone and atmosphere, especially in Hosted Games.

18 Likes
28

I really don’t mind it. Sure some time’s it can be annoying, but it’s a game book you can die in a game I would expect the same in most choice of games or hosted. It you be nice to have a check point system if a game has many ways to die. It would also probably have to do with what kind of game book it is too.

1 Like
29

Lol, sure it’s comparable, but if you want another example, you can take any rogue like where you build up a character and as soon as that character dies, you lose everything. Ironman mode for survival games, etc. Same concept.

Take any number of the old infocom IFs or even the Sierra adventure games as an example. Do something wrong and you died. Hell, you didn’t even necessarily die immediately, sometimes you got the “walking death” syndrome, which was probably more insidious.

Cataphrak probably summed everything up already, but my main point was some people hate those death everywhere designs, others like it, so it’s not really a question of “bad design” since it’s just a different one.

4 Likes
30

Alot of games use checkpoints at least. So you generally aren’t starting all over.

And there are some really great IFs that still make permadeath fun.

And if the game is made right you shouldn’t have to go back and adjust your stats, there should be ways to utilize any skill to get to the end.

And in the case of written works that are more story than game, even if one path or the other ultimately leads to a characters demise it’s fun seeing how it got there, and where things change by picking another option next time around.

2 Likes
31

I would say that there’s a significant difference between Roguelikes and CoGs/HGs, still. Sure, if you die you lose everything and have to start over, but that’s the entire point of Roguelikes and the game mechanics are built around that. You don’t have to wade through the exact same levels, because everything is randomised, and the “plot” is formed by the unique experiences that the randomisation puts you into. They’re also generally short compared to other games. If you die, even near the end, you’re not going to have to go back through stuff you’ve already played through, ever, because it’s always different. The frustration is limited solely to the death itself, not to the replay.

By contrast, CS games are very plot-heavy, and the only differences will come from the players’ own actions (I know there can be randomisation, but it’s uncommon, and probably shouldn’t be used much, either). A death near the end can mean several hours of reading through the exact same plot, before reaching a single point and trying to work out what you did wrong the last time. Now, the frustration will carry through pretty much the entire replay, and frustration is not good for player enjoyment. This would be closer to playing through a long RPG with permadeath than a game specifically designed around the concept of permadeath.

I’m not saying that they can’t, but a game with permadeath needs to be written around the concept in a similar way to the way that Roguelikes are, and this is not something that comes standard to CS games.

5 Likes
32

lol we have clearly been playing different dating sims. i think all of the visual novels i read in my early twenties had one or more ways for the MC to die. oh yaoi…

well, i am referring to dating sim vns. but yeah, i’m no crusader for the problematic dynamics and the more heteronormative ones anyway lol. and now i’ve talked so much about this tangent, i feel i must contribute to the actual topic at hand :sweat_smile:

am i wrong to feel like this format needs more game overs and deaths? i understand and agree with a lot of the points made against them in this format, but one of my favorite things about ChoiceScript is the amount of depth that can be given to… anything! Maybe I’m playing the wrong stories? ah, or it could be that most of the Choicescript titles I’m reading are mid-series, which makes sense, too.

i also do exactly this and agree about length. however, while i do enjoy game overs (@Felicity_Banks and @Cataphrak perfectly describe why), i do think the option of enabling and disabling checkpoints is important. As much as i love reading, I loathe having to start a long game over again, trying to remember my options from last time, to get back to a major decision that could potentially send me back to the start again. and i personally struggle with compulsion and a bad memory -_- like if I played 80,000 words, died before the climax, then accidentally made a different choice at 75,000 words… the likelihood of me pressing restart to perfectly replicate my original playthrough is very high. :mask:

4 Likes
33

Those are virtual novels I am talking about Dating sim as The sims or other mainstream games. I don’t play virtual novels as I prefer to die millions of times to touch one of that anime machismo filled stuff.

Except Winterwolves and few occidental ones

1 Like
34

I do the exact same thing. It takes me a few playthroughs to find my perfect playthrough, and once I do I run through it one more time to take screenshots so I can read through it like a novel (probably where our similarities end to be honest). So restarting when I accidentally make the wrong choice before or during a fight and needing to replay the entire story is highly frustrating. Though I completely understand the purpose of game overs (as listed above).

2 Likes
35

A thing to note is that CoG tries to dissuade authors from putting in a checkpoint system because it adds massively to their QA overhead, with more checkpoints meaning more resources they have to expend to get titles through the editorial process.

So generally speaking, it might be better to err on the side of caution when it comes to signposting deaths and potential “bad ends” regardless, if only because the kind of safety net you might need to keep your players engaged doesn’t offer a particularly suitable cost/benefit ratio on the editorial side.

11 Likes
36

I’ve never really minded the game over aspect in some choice of games titles.

Admittedly in larger titles it can be frustrating to start from scratch, as figuring out what I should do differently is far more difficult with more than a few hundred choices to scrutinize.

The lost heir however turns it into an asset that fuels replayability. Same with the hero of kendrickstone

In the end it’s really a matter of suitability for your story, and the customer’s personal preference.

1 Like
38

Lol, it really isn’t different at all, but you’re obviously entrenched in your mindset.

Once again with feeling though, my main point was some people are fine with permadeath/death around every corner, others aren’t. You obviously aren’t and have decided its some abhorrent game design.

Your prerogative of course, but you’re just jumping to the conclusion that it universally isn’t fun/interesting/frustrating because YOU don’t find it fun/interesting/frustrating. Sorry mate, people like different things.

As far as all outcomes being rewarding that’s going to be subjective to the reader anyway. It’s impossible to determine what’s going to be rewarding to the reader so the writer should just do what they want anyway.

2 Likes
39

I play many games as permadeath, by my own volition. It is something core to hardcore RPGs. And that old school IF games had had before. It is not ordinary on Cogs as by designing choice they focused more on the story that in gameplay challenge difficulty. But is a company’s choice, not an impossibility of system.

For example, Imagine a hypothetical terror game type Amnesia, and many parser escape room very common on the IF genre . Where you can explore levels in a dungeon but only really way to advance on the plot is dying. After that, our body wakes up in another level or time.

Dying is another mechanism in hands of development.

1 Like
40

As long as CoG won’t implement a solid save/checkpoint system permadeaths will be a challenging feature to incorporate into your games. For me it doesn’t work because it eventually boils down to banging my head against a wall till it breaks. As much as I like roguelikes, it simply does not work for me in a CoG without some form of checkpoint system.

Let’s drop the “if it’s implemented well then it can work” because it’s a moot point. Everything can work if it’s implemented well.

Comparing CoG’s to other games (SoulsBorne) for example is a silly argument, since it’s just comparing apples and oranges. Yes they are both “games” but so is monopoly.

6 Likes
42

This is a gentle reminder to please keep conversations directed at the topic at hand and not at the individuals themselves. Focusing replies on the individuals themselves instead of the topic at hand can lead to friction between members and often causes the thread to derail.

Please also remember that it is often not so much what ones opinion is that causes friction, but how one chooses to express that opinion. Using negatively-charged value words are a good way to start friction, as is generalization and sniping. Personal comments lead to friction and flaming.

Sniping back and forth will often lead to the system closing the thread down, let’s avoid this if we can.

Please remember that we can always agree to disagree.

Finally, if you see disrespectful posts please do not reply to them. Rather, please use the report feature and let forum staff deescalate friction.

3 Likes
44

You’ve repeatedly written as if this should be an argument-ender, amigo, but it’s not. An arts education–and “design” of any kind is an art, not a science–yields a well thought-through framework for making aesthetic judgments; it can make the creative process more focused and intentional, establishing a tradition within which creators can describe their work and others critique it.

But those frameworks/traditions are subjective, at the end of the day, and as soon as their rules are well-established someone will make a good piece of art by breaking the rules.

People with an MFA in writing can come out pronouncing similar judgments on bad writing. If you read judgments from fifty years ago, though, you quickly see how much of this is based on taste trends rather than timeless standards.

“Optimization of an experience” isn’t an objective thing. Sure, there are games designed so thoughtlessly that pretty much everyone would agree that they don’t achieve much of what they’re aiming at. But once we get out of the really clumsy end of the pool, we’re into areas where reasonable people disagree and an education doesn’t give the last word (though it can give a lot of interesting and potentially persuasive insights–it’s invaluable for having a conversation about design, but it shouldn’t be treated as if it grants authority to end that conversation).

And an education in design always overlooks some qualities that are recognised only in hindsight. “Disastrously designed but I played it for 200 hours” is the kind of red flag statement (even more than e.g. “terribly designed but bought by 30 million people”) that suggests the current standards of good game design might be missing something important.

On the specific issue of game-overs, a “death” ending that massively inconveniences the player is the kind of thing that many people will relish, even as it causes many others to delete the app. One challenge designers face is how to give players “real” risk, a heightened sense of consequence to their experience. I wouldn’t rule out “replay from the beginning” as a way of imposing a cost and generating that feeling. That’s a design choice, and to some extent a choice of audience. It’s not helpful to write as if education and experience would rule it out.

If a CSG writer does go down that path, I’d suggest some complementary design choices. One, as mentioned by Cata, is periodic checkpoints to reduce the cost of reaching a failstate. But another is to make the game replays as diverse and fun as possible, since there will have to be a lot of them. Have genuine variation in each chapter, different paths to explore. The more your game is on rails, the fewer people will enjoy being forced to run down those tracks one more time…

16 Likes
46

I think you misunderstood what Havey meant by “tradition.” It’s less of an established code and norm to follow and more like a common language where people can analyze, evaluate, and improve in the same page. As such, most of us try to imply that deaths in CS games – specifically – is not a bad thing that should totally be avoided at all cost.

For context, I did get the sense that was what you’re implying in your previous comments. But now, I’m not sure?

2 Likes
47

I was saying that death is a mechanic that doesn’t translate well into CoG’s and that it’s hard to get right. That’s it. That’s literally it.

Edit: Game Design is neather an established code nor a language with which one can analyze. That’s just not what it is. Like, at all. It’s more closely related to psychology and architecture than anything else.