An investigation into the importance of narrative in video games, how they operate and their relationship to film.
Introduction to my dissertation:
After the credits rolled on The Walking Dead: A Telltale Series (Telltale Games, 2012) I was not only amazed at my emotional response, but that it was a video game that had caused it. The importance of stories is difficult to measure, they are ethereal bodies that move us, they are imbued in everything we do and in what we say. Some have the ability to make us laugh, or cry or sweep us away to other worlds. I believe that it was as I was watching the credits of The Walking Dead: A Telltale Game Series that I knew the creators of that game had created an exceptional story and it needed to be recognised as an extraordinary story in a video game. Video games, as a medium, can appear as the infant of the media world. The worth of video games as a medium has been, and continues to be debated, yet its growth as a cultural industry is exponential. Every year, games are released that set a precedent for those that come after in terms of fidelity, gameplay and story. Despite their ever growing presence in cultural consciousness, video games are as yet unable to separate themselves from a comparison with the cinematic form.