The Three-Act Structure - Video Game: Storytelling - page 20

expect to be actively playing within seconds—or at the most, a minute or
two—of launching into the experience. And in games, playing generally
means overcoming obstacles related to a conflict.
Moreover, those first few minutes of gameplay need to be very compel-
ling indeed, to convince players that they're going to want to stay awhile.
Consequently, game designers and writers often jump straight to the in-
troduction of the main conflict, since they don't see a straightforward path
to creating compelling gameplay without the main conflict to provide in-
terest, motivation, and context for players.
The Act I of many games, even those that boast eight or more hours of
epic storytelling, often lasts only a few seconds, or is essentially absent.
Here are a few examples:
▪ BioShock : The main conflict is introduced within the first minute of
the game, as the player character survives a plane crash and fights
to stay alive and return to the normalcy initially glimpsed. The entire
rest of the story revolves around the protagonist's struggle to sur-
vive and return to the ordinary world.
▪ Far Cry 3 : Within the first ninety seconds, the player transitions from
video footage showing player character Jason Brody and his friends
and family members vacationing in Bangkok (Act I) to the revelation
that after skydiving onto a nearby island, they were kidnaped by
brutal slave-traders. The main conflict for most of the rest of the
game story is finding a way to rescue Jason's friends, defeat the
slavers, and escape the island.
▪ Grand Theft Auto III : The opening cutscene shows the unnamed
player character, a small-time thief, as he's violently betrayed by his
partners during a heist. He's arrested, but he and another prisoner
escape from the van taking them to jail. The rest of the game story
is centered around the protagonist working his way up the criminal
underworld on his path to taking revenge for the betrayal seen in
those first few seconds.
There is a natural inclination to introduce conflict into a game experien-
ce from the very beginning. And it's the right instinct, because conflict is at
the heart of both story and gaming experiences. However, is there always
an immediate need for conflict or even true gameplay? And does the initial
conflict you encounter need to be the story's main conflict?