​Ludonarrative: what now?

by Ben Haugmo

benhaugmo@yahoo.com

In 2011, Bethesda released “The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim,” an open-world action-adventure game putting players in control of the Dragonborn, a hero blessed with a dragon’s soul. I clocked a significant number of hours playing Skyrim and remember my experience with the game fondly.

The question remains though, why did the citizens of Skyrim still treat their hero as a common drifter? By the end of the game I had stopped a civil war and thwarted a draconic apocalypse. Where was the fanfare? Where were the banners raised in my honor? Why were the city guards still so condescending?

The answer requires that we understand the term “ludonarrative dissonance.” “Ludonarrative” is where ludic elements, that is, gameplay and mechanics, criss-cross with a video game's story. “Ludonarrative dissonance” occurs when some disparity arises between these two aspects.

Sometimes this leads to acceptable breaks in the narrative, such as an adventurer being able to chow down an inventory’s worth of food and not get sick. We’re not going to question such an illogical metabolism because, hey, better that our heroes quickly swallow a steak whole to heal their injuries than be stuck in a hospital bed for a couple weeks.

Other times, this results in the main character receiving zero recognition for stopping the world-eater.

It’s no surprise that ludonarrative dissonance occurs sometimes. Developers can’t foresee every instance of mechanics causing a disconnect from the story, and they can’t program a consequence or reaction to every single player choice. Skyrim blends story and mechanics well, even if in some places it falls flat.

At times, the story hardly matters. I’m a lore nut, I’ll admit that. If a game presents a robust world to explore, I’ll go out of my way to learn all I can about it. But extensive world-building isn’t a requirement.

If the gameplay is fun, I am willing to overlook a shallow story or even a total lack of story, such as with my personal favorite sandbox title, Re-Logic’s “Terraria.”

In Terraria, there’s no overarching plot spurring you forward along the line of progression. Improving items and weaponry is for no purpose other than making my character more powerful. Terraria’s bosses, rather than being colorful villains, primarily act as hurdles on the path to the best gear. I’ve built bases with both function or aesthetic in mind, from austere storehouses for all the items I’ve collected to sprawling castles in the clouds.

There’s an enjoyment to be found in the simplicity a game without extensive narrative can provide. Strong mechanics without story affords no chance for ludonarrative dissonance to arise, since there’s no narrative to cause us to notice those inconsistencies.

At the opposite end of the spectrum, narrative-driven games can be as engaging as those which focus solely on gameplay. There exists an emergent genre of “walking simulators,” games that streamline the storytelling experience by eschewing complicated gameplay. In many walking simulators, the only mechanical input required is pressing WASD or the arrow keys to move the character along the path.

I don’t have a ton of experience playing walking simulator games, but one that I’ve played and really enjoyed was “The Stanley Parable,” developed by Davey Wreden. The game’s premise is simple enough: One day, Stanley is sitting in his room at his work to find that he’s receiving no more orders from his superiors, which are usually delivered over his computer monitor. He leaves his cubicle to discover that everyone in the office has gone missing, and decides to try and determine what’s happened.

The Stanley Parable starts simple, but quickly reveals itself to be a complex meta-narrative raising questions of the player’s agency. Following Stanley on his adventure, we are forced to examine whether the choices we make really matter. Do we play the game, or is the game really playing us? The snarky narrator that comes along for the ride makes The Stanley Parable a lot of fun, even if its gameplay boils down to four or five button inputs.

At the end of the day, the importance of story or gameplay comes down to player preference. I’m not picky about the worlds games bring me to, even if I’d have liked it if Skyrim gave me a little more appreciation for my heroic deeds. Others might demand that a game’s setting be as fleshed out as Tolkien. Without any story elements, a game is just numbers on a screen, while at times even the most gripping narrative can’t salvage poor gameplay.

The two principles can be blended in many different ways, be it in equal amounts or in favor of one or the other. From there, a game’s success lies in what its player-base values most.