AdviceToolbox
It’s not quite as simple as writing a script:
Tony explores the realm of game design documentsHyper-screenplays:
why don’t we read
video game scripts?
AUTHOR
TONY JEFFREE
Tony is Wireframe’s game writing and narrative design columnist.
He’s also creative director of Far Few Giants, and you can find his
work via tonyjeffree.co.uk or @tonyjeffree on Twitter.nyone who wants to write a
game has at some point asked
the following question of a game
writer, narrative designer, or
teacher: It’d be useful to see what
video game scripts should look like, do you have
any examples of them?
This is an innocent question, and a very sensible
one. It is also cursed. The resounding answer
from almost anyone in the know, regardless of
how helpful they want to be, is a pained face and
an uncomfortable “Well, it’s not quite that simple...”
To understand the answer, we must first
consider what TV, film, and play scripts really are.
Forget for a moment that we sometimes read
or study them separately from the end product.
They’re a prototyping tool. Let me explain:
Let’s say I want to make a movie. The most
immediate way of doing that is to pick my location,
imagine some characters, hire actors and film
crew, then go and start filming. All lines would be
written as we go, acting would be intuited by the
actors and guided by the director. Shots would beimprovised on set. We’d then wander to the next
location and repeat. Eventually, a story would start
to take place, but we’d likely have to reshoot earlier
scenes, much like an author revising their book.IT’S ABOUT TIME,
AND TIME IS MONEY
This would be a prohibitively expensive way to
make a film. Imagine the sheer amount of money
that’d be wasted on totally avoidable things like
plot errors and character inconsistency. So instead
we start with a screenplay, which describes the
film in words only from start to finish, such that
a human reader can imagine the film without
the expense of shooting it. They can then assess,
edit, and rearrange elements quickly and cheaply
until they’re absolutely happy with it. Once this
written prototype is done, it’s much safer to start
spending money on equipment and talent.
So why don’t we see these ‘written prototypes’
for games? The answer is, actually, you do. They’re
called game design documents (GDDs), and they’re
a human-readable document which describes
every aspect of a game in such a way that a reader
can imagine the game without the expense of
making it. They are, in fact, more potent than
screenplays, since they not only describe the
story and game mechanics of a project, but also
key elements that traditional screenplays don’t
paper-prototype, such as descriptions of music,
art direction, and plans for required technology.
Just like a screenplay, everyone on a game
team is referring to the GDD for guidance onA
38 / wfmag.cc
Film scripts are everywhere,
easily accessible, and endlessly
studied. Why isn’t the same
true for games?
This is what a real, machine-
readable game script can look
like. A lovely easy read – I
wonder why these don’t often
get published separately...