this appeared as a moral dilemma

Right, so I know it's been a long while since my last post. I have no excuse for myself and I'm tired of talking about my ineptitude when it comes to updating regularly. Needless to say, I'm here now.

So the subject of this particular post is one that I know has been discussed before, but I feel needs a little fresh blood. Games in recent years have taken to giving players a "moral choice," but the problem is that there are really only ever two ways to go. Either you're the pinnacle of right and justice or you're the darkest being ever to draw breath in this world. Nice in theory, and works for Star Wars and it's ilk, but for games with any degree of character depth, this is just rather pathetic. How can all of our actions be boiled down into two extremes? I don't like the saint or Satan approach to morals in life, so why would I enjoy it in games. Now, I did just admit that I'm okay with the simplistic moral axis in games like Star Wars, most specifically the Knights of the Old Republic games. Still, I think that having a little gray area would benefit this game just as much as it would benefit any other.

Now, why would I bother bringing this up. It's a fact of gaming, just like random, pointless quick time events. I cannot change it any more than I could reach up and take my place among the Olympians. Well, that's just it, I think we need to figure out a few ways to make the morals of a game as gray as it's modern graphics; predictable joke. Let us say for the moment that we have a game which we'll call The Adventures of Timmy. Timmy, obviously our protagonist, will have a moral choice system in the game. The norm of the day is that Timmy will be given a series of dialogue interactions in which he will respond with obvious good or evil consequences. For example, Bertha: Oh, my Timmy, you have grown so quickly. Timmy: A) Oh, thank you. Yes, I certainly am getting tall now. B ) Fuck off, wide load, I need to get outta this place. This is an extreme example, but then, a lot of games are quite extreme in this regard. Now, let's play this same scene out again, this time with a legit dialogue. Bertha: Oh, hello Timmy. You're getting so big these days. Timmy: A) Yeah, I'm already 6'2". B ) I guess. What've you been up to? Now where in this was the moral line? Some might say, oh, it's obvious, in one he agreed in the other he didn't, but didn't he act relatively nicely in both. I don't think not having an opinion is an evil act. Perhaps not polite, but are all impolite people evil? I doubt it greatly.

There are some solutions to this sort of thing. We could try to pull a Fable 2 and have more than one moral axis. In Fable 2 there is a purity/corruption axis and a good/evil one. This works to a degree, but I think it's still a little too obvious and extreme. All of my roommates and friends played Fable 2 and they all decided on their alignment on both axises before they'd even begun playing, generally because of the physical manifestation of the alignments.

How do we get past this. Well, one thing that I've thought about is not letting players know their alignment. Certain actions will be obvious, of course, like killing innocents, but some could be much more subtle and still affect the alignment. What's more, players can't just pull up a menu and see how good or evil or whatever they are. I think if you combine multiple axises with the hidden alignment there could be a lot more variation. Still, I think there should be no more than three axises. I really just think any more than that will become both redundant and confusing for players and programmers alike. Will this be effective, I really don't know, but I'm hoping so. I'm still working on my portfolio game, but under Zac's suggestion I'm looking into a simpler game to start off our little partnership with.

So that's all I've got in me this day. Let me know what you think about my thoughts on this one.

You gotta fight for your right to tell stories...

There is a new group out right now which I have to support. As I've mentioned before I am a writer who loves games and video game writing is the field of choice for me. One of the things I've been watching very closely recently is the argument over video game content. Now there is a movement for federal regulation of video games. Twelve courts in the past six years have already named this unconstitutional at the state level and yet they persist. We are protected by the same rights as any other media and it's time that people take a stand for this new media for art and expression. I for one love watching games mature and grow into a wonderful storytelling medium. A few years ago games like Final Fantasy XII simply could not exist. It is only really since the advent of home gaming has this media grown, but it has grown quickly. Now sweeping, adult storylines are vital to a game's success. More and more developers are recognizing the need to hire people, such as myself, for writing exclusive positions. So check them out, here's the link. VGVN

A Simple Post

Alright, so I've been rather busy recently and yet I still find time to not get my work done, impressive, ne? I have, however, finished typing a short WIP introduction to one of my longer stories. This is actually a rewrite of an earlier story titled Magic For Dinner Guests and I've decided, for the moment, to keep that as my working title. It deals primarily with a young woman who is dragged into a fantasy world and must decide what person she wants to be. A very strong theme that I've been working with recently, namely independence and personal choice, that I feel is important, especially with young women today. It is a rough opening and it's not even a full chapter, but I've posted it for all to critique and enjoy here.
In other news, not much to report. I would like to suggest the novel Guilty Pleasures by Laurell K. Hamilton to anyone who likes a very modern detective story with a vampire/supernatural twist. I may be the last man on this particular boat, but with the sheer popularity of Twilight I felt that some other works deserved at least marginal attention.

Some News Concerning Writing

Alright, so first thing's first. I've completed a story which will be submitted for publication in mid-Feb. with the Baylor University writer's annual, The Phoenix. It is up currently on my DA for all to enjoy, but I will provide a direct link for those of you who do not wish to go the long way. LINK This story has been in the works for only about four or five months, but it is in it's more-or-less completed form. I would love any advice or critiques I can get as I can always grow as a writer.

In somewhat related, or maybe I just wish it was, news the man who I believe is the single greatest contributor to the art of writing since the invention of the craft, Neil Gaiman, has officially received the Newberry Medal for his newest children's story, The Graveyard Book. You can hear everything he had to say on the matter as well as learn all about his work here.

My own writing aspirations are advancing steadily and if anyone has any suggestions for publication avenues I would greatly appreciate them. I currently have the submission guidelines on my desk for Realms of Fantasy, Weird Tales, and Science Fiction & Fantasy. All three are SFF magazines and all three I am familiar with, though Realms of Fantasy most of all.

Well, that should just about wrap up what I'll be posting for now, but I'll attempt to have more up as it is completed and as always, keep writing.

To write is to live

I think that this blog has suffered greatly from outside duties and that makes me think very hard on a subject that has become particularly important in my final semester of college. Any writer who has ever actually tackled the unanswerable question of "how to write" has said the same thing. Write, write a lot, write every day, write until your hands fall off. This is certainly a valid point, but lets talk straight for a bit. We all have an obscene number of demands on our time, for those of you who do not I offer my endless spite, and so it is quite difficult to pull out the time to write something, and if we do write something, we often don't want to write for EVERYTHING that we are obligated to write for. I know when I write my assignments and work on a story I really don't feel like blogging anymore. It often becomes just easier to be enraptured by other people's stories so I spend the time I probably should be writing for this blog that I did intend to commit myself to playing video games or reading. Now, there's nothing wrong with reading and any writer should spend a good amount of time reading. Reading teaches just as much about writing as writing does, honestly. The point here is writing, however.
The truth is that anyone who really wants to write should write a great deal in whatever form possible. Get with a system, like writing a certain amount of pages a day or for a certain time. I'll admit I have a bad tendency to not follow through on this myself, but I honestly tell you it's true.
For those of you who, like me, have difficulties with this I suggest things like writing groups or Nanowrimo. (National Novel Writer's Month) Even if you just meet your buddies in the pub for a few hours one night a week, you're writing.

28 days later, really

Right, so we've gone over this already. I'm a bad, bad man who likes to ignore his readers, or reader, I'm not sure. Is there even one of you?
Well, in either case I passed another semester and retain only one more before escape. I've already begun my plans for world dom... I mean, game design. Yes, game design...
Zac and I have begun work on an as-yet untitled game which thrives in the psychological horror genre that is collecting so much dust behind the hack-n-slash horror genre.
I've been wondering, honestly what everyone plays games for, as I work on scripting this game. The gameplay itself is not terribly complicated, puzzle solving mostly, but the story is intensely complex with layers upon layers of subplots within characters. Plots that are somewhat extraneous to the game itself and could be ignored by any number of players, but I think they give that little bit of realism that makes this goal of this game possible; that goal being to make players wear diapers they're so terrified. A noble goal, I know.
What I'd like to ask the world then is this, what do you play for? I play games for escapism and imagination expansion, same a reading, but I'm curious what it all means to you. In either case, that's all I have for the moment. I've been shamelessly spending time with my fiancee and I intend to continue this trend. Merry Christmas (late) and Happy 2009 (early).

Thanksgiving

I have just returned from Thanksgiving break. I got to visit my fiancee and eat a great deal of now-dead animals.

That being said, I've done absolutely nothing in the way of professional work. It may be horrible of me, but this is my whole entry. Anyone who is planning on becoming a professional writer in any way should do so after they graduate.