Hey, real talk fellow game writers:
If you're working in text, recognizing screenshotable moments as being as much of a priority as character growth or plot revelation is so important, particularly in the landscape we currently occupy.
Let me explain what I mean by that:
1/
If you're working in text, recognizing screenshotable moments as being as much of a priority as character growth or plot revelation is so important, particularly in the landscape we currently occupy.
Let me explain what I mean by that:
1/
A screenshotable moment is a standalone piece of text that's particularly evocative, funny, or horrifying - the key factors being that the line and/or choice has easily parsed context, and is compelling to share.
Just to use a recent example, Yakuza 0 is full of these.
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Just to use a recent example, Yakuza 0 is full of these.
2/
I am all for simply telling a story as well as you can, but what a screenshotable moment does is inherently *present* that story in a compelling, visual way that text-based games don't usually accommodate.
It's like a billboard ad for your game, within your own game!
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It's like a billboard ad for your game, within your own game!
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When you create contexts to accommodate these marquee moments, you aren't JUST writing Good Stuff for your players. You're condensing a fundamental aspect of your narrative in a way that naturally causes the same people who love your game most to spread it!
Like a virus!!
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Like a virus!!
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This is something I've always lucked into on my previous projects. Now that I'm doing it mindfully, I can see a massive difference.
It's changed how I approach my own writing--as well as how my clients react to it, before a single member of the public reads a line.
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It's changed how I approach my own writing--as well as how my clients react to it, before a single member of the public reads a line.
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Here's the big ol' secret of writing: *people aren't good at remembering things* - you included!
Creating concrete, 'anchor' moments for people who consume your work seeds positive impressions, rather than leaving space for them to say, find negative anchors of their own.
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Creating concrete, 'anchor' moments for people who consume your work seeds positive impressions, rather than leaving space for them to say, find negative anchors of their own.
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With screenshotable moments embedded into your story, you'll also see more insightful, specific feedback when you present your work to others, since they'll have a benchmark (your Really Good Stuff) to measure against.
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So:
Compelling text within an easily digested visual context will help market your game, get you better feedback, and simply improve the time your attention-limited audience spends with your work in the endless hellscape we call life.
As my good friend Kiryu Kazuma says:
8/8
Compelling text within an easily digested visual context will help market your game, get you better feedback, and simply improve the time your attention-limited audience spends with your work in the endless hellscape we call life.
As my good friend Kiryu Kazuma says:
8/8
P.S.: We are taking full advantage of this principle on Hypnospace Outlaw, and it shows.
(You can wishlist it now!)
store.steampowered.com/app/844590/Hyp…
(You can wishlist it now!)
store.steampowered.com/app/844590/Hyp…
*vomits in #HypnospaceOutlaw*
