#actively makes every decision in the storyline even though every game only has one preset ending. that's SO COOL. | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

blueskittlesart · 2 years ago

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me, thinking that i have at least a base level understanding of botw: :)

blue, about to write a 1,000+ word essay that is going to completely revamp my understanding of the game and interpretation of its events: bada bing bada boom

i dont know how you do it. i am incredibly impressed and using all of this for fic inspiration. keep writing

every time someone asks me how i do this shit i have to regrettably inform them that the real genuine answer is that i am fucking insane. my 2 passions in life are writing and video games and the place where the 2 converge fascinates me to no end and i am that special kind of crazy that is capable of latching onto something and not thinking about anything else for 10 years. so. the only thing i have cared about deeply for the last several years of my life has been the way video games are written and constructed. and zelda is one of the most interestingly constructed franchises i have found to date. these games are just like. the absolute perfect story for my brain to work with and i truly do not know who i would be without them. and i am genuinely incredibly grateful that ive been able to build a platform where people like. CARE about what i have to say and take the time to ask me to think about the games because like. i would be doing it ANYWAY but knowing that there are people who actually read my analysis and appreciate the amount of thought i put into this stuff makes me really happy lol

#i sincerely think video games are an art form and that so many stories benefit from being told interactively via video games #and i'm especially fascinated with the way loz chooses to tell its stories because the games are almost always designed so that the player #actively makes every decision in the storyline even though every game only has one preset ending. that's SO COOL.#ive found myself frustrated recently by rpgs that are super cutscene heavy and i was struggling to articulate why until i went back and #looked critically at the way zelda games are designed and i realized that there isn't a single cutscene in loz that openly takes away the #player's autonomy. cutscenes are almost always reserved for dialog or the beginnings of fight scenes but link almost never makes choices #without the player's input and that's a huge part of what keeps the games engaging! YOU are link. he's not a vessel you occasionally #control. he is you. his decisions are always yours.#and that's generally easier to do with a less complex storyline but the way botw kept that autonomy despite its complex story is SO clever #by making the cinematic cutscenes MEMORIES there's never any percieved loss of autonomy because the player understands that this is #something that has already happened so obviously there's no way they can alter link's choices. that's SO SMART #ANYWAY. i didn't mean for this to be a tag essay about video game mechanics sorry but tldr i am so so so passionate about this LOL #if you cant tell. very few people irl will listen to me talk for this long. this is why i love tumblr #asks

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