Silent Hill is Zero Wing. (This is for SH fans among you)

Turrican · Post by **Turrican** » Fri Sep 30, 2005 12:32 am

Sometimes you rest for a while, take a look back and you say to yourself, "whoa, gaming sure has come a long way, in a lot of ways, storytelling for example". Well, apparently, it's not. Just a perception distorted by being a gamer yourself:

http://www.edge-online.co.uk/archives/2 ... ry_tal.php

sethsez · Post by **sethsez** » Fri Sep 30, 2005 1:06 am

Saw that interview yesterday, and it gives me more hope than ever that they actually know what they're doing.

That said, game writing still sucks. We've progressed from "holy christ that's awful" to "decent for a Saturday morning cartoon." The advancements have mostly come in the presentation of the plots (as Avary said, the integration of plot and interaction).

Of course, with Silent Hill the issue isn't the writing, but the translation. Since I doubt Avary speaks Japanese, he probably hasn't seen the original dialog.

Turrican · Post by **Turrican** » Fri Sep 30, 2005 2:42 am

Yeah, I agree with what you're saying of course. I just wanted to ignite discussion and gather SH fans around here. I somewhat expected you to reply. ^_^

Anyway, yes, although I haven't seen yet Gans' brotherhood of the wolves, I've heard good things about the movie. It would be great if these people could throw out for once a film that can live up to the franchise... Despite some stumbles, SH deserve this.

It will also be interesting to see if this upcoming movie will be able to stea the heart of SH fans who think that the series already has a movie, Jacob's Ladder, and don't want another.

JBC · Post by **JBC** » Fri Sep 30, 2005 3:29 am

Aha! You know it's Castlevania that he's talking about at the end, right?

Lets hope to god he's not full of shit and empty promises like most people who work on movie adaptations.

Post by **Shatterhand** » Fri Sep 30, 2005 3:41 am

I thought it was Metal Gear

Turrican · Post by **Turrican** » Fri Sep 30, 2005 1:12 pm

circuitface wrote:Aha! You know it's Castlevania that he's talking about at the end, right?

Lets hope to god he's not full of shit and empty promises like most people who work on movie adaptations.

If he's really talking about Castlevania, then all my hopes of Silent Hill being a good movie are vanished. Because come on, only an idiot would want to embarass himself with a castlevania movie.

On the other hand, Metal Gear... But I'd really like Kojima to direct that personally.

Dandy J · Post by **Dandy J** » Fri Sep 30, 2005 3:33 pm

sethsez wrote:That said, game writing still sucks.

Most does. But then there are exceptions like Planescape: Torment.

Post by **Shatterhand** » Fri Sep 30, 2005 6:09 pm

I personally doubt Metal Gear would make a good movie.

Metal Gear plot works because its a videogame. In a movie you arent interacting with it, so all the "magic" is gone. We will end up with a stupid action movie (Like xXx or something stupid like that) , or a boring action movie (Stealth in an action movie ?!?!).

And Castlevania would be ridiculous indeed.

Why cant we keep games as games? The only game that would make a good movie is Out of This World, but that would NEVER be made.

Post by **Ghegs** » Fri Sep 30, 2005 6:38 pm

Shatterhand wrote: And Castlevania would be ridiculous indeed.

There's actually a fan-made Castlevania movie called Prelude to War. Unfortunately it's currently in the hands of Konami whether it will ever get released. If you check the trailer and movie clip on the site you'll see that it's indeed really, really campy stuff.

Turrican · Post by **Turrican** » Fri Sep 30, 2005 7:11 pm

Shatterhand wrote:I personally doubt Metal Gear would make a good movie.

Metal Gear plot works because its a videogame. In a movie you arent interacting with it, so all the "magic" is gone. We will end up with a stupid action movie (Like xXx or something stupid like that) , or a boring action movie (Stealth in an action movie ?!?!).

Kojima expressed your same concerns more than once. Of course, thinking to a Metal Gear movie would mean rethinking the whole concept from scratch. I was certainly not thinking to a stuipid action movie. That's why I'd welcome such a movie only if Kojima decides to do it personally.

JBC · Post by **JBC** » Mon Oct 03, 2005 5:58 pm

Over at the Contra DB there is a report from April that Konami and Columbia/Tristar are making a Contra movie.

http://innit.ukgamer.net/contradb/

sethsez · Post by **sethsez** » Mon Oct 03, 2005 6:58 pm

But... I thought Predator already existed. Who needs more than that?

howmuchkeefe · Post by **howmuchkeefe** » Mon Oct 03, 2005 7:14 pm

I don't know about Hideo Kojima. MGS2 got kinda goofy halfway through:

*SPOILERS*

Character one- MUHUHAHAHA! I'm screwing you all!

Character two- No, I'M screwing YOU.

Character three- That's what you guys think. In reality, it is I who am screwing... hold on, phone call. Hello? Hi! ...yeah? ...hm. Ok, will do. ...naw, it's fine.... gotta go! Bye.

Characters one and two- ...?

Character three- That was character four. He just called to say that HE'S SCREWING US ALL!

I really didn't want to hear about Otacon's pathetic sex life. I had no idea how much I didn't want to hear about it until it became the focus of a half hour stretch of the game.

At no point during the utterly inane last few hours of the game did I think 'OMG I've just been told by the game to put down my controller and turn off my PS2 NEVAR B4 HAS THE LINE BETWEEN FANTASY AND REALITY EVAR BEEN SO BLURRED!' It was more like, "I get to actually play the game again? Yay! -Shut up, Colonel- Ah! Here we go-I TOLD you to SHUT UP, Colonel TARD- ...damn! Another cut scene!"

The actual game play in MGS2 was great. I bought MGS3 despite my mixed feelings about MGS2 because I really like the core game concept. So far, MGS3 hasn't offended me; lots of sneaking action, not so many cut scenes.

DeBurgo · Post by **DeBurgo** » Mon Oct 03, 2005 8:08 pm

I think storytelling and writing in games is different from storytelling and writing in movies, though. I mean, the only real role stories have in a videogame is to heighten the whole experience. The thing is, it's really difficult to have an extremely articulate and traditionally well-written story in a game, because most of the time the good parts will just go over the head of the gamer, because the gamer is usually engaged in the game in a way that is radically different from a completely story-based medium.

My point is, it's not just like a movie or book where you're sitting back and watching/reading the thing, and you have time to ruminate over scenes and stuff. In a videogame, you've got work to do. You have things to interact with. If things go over your head, then they need to be that way discreetly and intentionally. Oftentimes the more delicate storytelling devices like subtle symbolism in a game won't work well, because the player usually doesn't have any reason to think that way.

Also I just wrote all that only to realize that Roger Avery is saying almost the exact same thing in the interview!:

You're playing an interactive game and then suddenly you stop and you’re sitting there watching a cinematic. It's like 'well hold on a minute, this is a game and I'm not an active participant'. So I actually think that eventually game designers will realise that trying to make movies out of their games is not the key, and that it's instead creating an interactive experience full of consequence that drives the story along without stopping. Movies, by design, are passive entertainment, which is not to say that that's any worse or lesser than gaming.

sethsez · Post by **sethsez** » Mon Oct 03, 2005 8:52 pm

That's another thing that makes me very, very hopeful for this movie. It's clear that Avary and Gans not only know Silent Hill, they know gaming in general. It's nice to see talented people who actually know something about both mediums doing an adaptation for a change. Usually we either get a gamer who barely knows how to light a scene, or a writer or director who hasn't played a game since Asteroids.