Originally posted by TracerBullet
I think I'm torn between what NeoZ said and what sqoon is getting at.

Games are about gameplay - The Sim's did a great job of expanding the market for a variety of reasons, but it is a game with no story - it is, in its rawest form, a world with a set of rules and it is up the gamer to decide what they do within it (which isn't a bold concept, it's actually very typical of western games, some have story some don't).

I would love to see the worlds greatest story tellers tell thier tale through games, but I often find that once it starts telling a story it stops telling a game. I think a game like Morrowind has perhaps the best potential (along side shooters, which have controled pace allowing for a great story to be told with out much interuping the flow of the game) to weave complex characters. However - if your interaction with them and the world around them doesn't change what they do or what they 'think' or how they act then they are simply props (ala Final Fanatsy or other games of its ilk). A great game story IMO, has yet to be seen. Besides the obvious appeal of sports games, one thing that is seldom mentioned is that you ultimately decide the outcome by your performance. The football season is crafted in ways that you intended and did not intend because of your actions. In Final Fantasy however (I love picking on it it would seem) your interaction and your choices have little bearing on what happens in the end. A great game story is not the same kind of story that is told in movies or even books.

Say there is a character in a town who works as a shipwright, and I come along and become fast friends with him. I decide that I want to leave and do something exciting, that NPC (depending on his inclinations and affinitys and so on) will also make a decision. Wether to follow me or whatever. If I killed his parents, he could try to kill me - and not in the traditional way of simply outright attacking me - but meticulously following (stalking) me and training to one day kill me (or die trying). Better yet, there could be a quest that one could take to attain great power and that NPC would take it to avenge his parents murder. This NPCs interatcion with other NPCs could change the way those NPCs think or work and so on.

I think that would be great and a good story could come of something like that. Imagine something like Morrowind with more quests and NPCs who are dynamic in thier actions (all simply based on certian rules that character is ste to obey by the developers). I don't know if any thing has the processing power to crunch numbers like that right now though.... it's the equivlent of a HUGE and very robust dynamic database where one changed value changes the valuse in many many colomns.

Just an idea.

ºTracer
I was about to ask about that last part when reading your post before coming across it - is their really anything powerful enough to handle such a game? Everything we pretty much dreamt of right there in a game - for now I'll be content to read books - oh and bitch about Morrowind's static characters!