Eyes Align – Narrative Structure, How it Changed
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In my opinion, the most difficult part to get right in any story is the middle: The story needs an introduction which grabs the reader’s, or player’s, attention and a fitting conclusion that either wraps up lose ends or creates new ones to keep the reader wanting more. The middle, however, serves as the majority of the script and fills out the world, the characters and the conflict. At the start, the middle was loosely defined as a chain of events; the player meeting two – three characters and then depending on how the player interacts with them, the ending can be different. Due to time constraints, the narrative became more linear, with only a single ending being available and this has in turn led to some dialogue and items in the game seeming like they lead nowhere. The player’s agency in changing the story is completely mitigated.  It is, however, not all bad, as the game is supposed to be presented at the GGC as a vertical slice and the linearity of the game gives each player the same experience to judge, allowing for said experience to be polished as much as possible.  |