David Cage - the notgamer?

[Thomas]

Did not see actual presentation he had at GDC, but stumbled upon this write-up:
http://www.brainygamer.com/the_brainy_gamer/2011/03/rollercoaster-bias.html

Some quotes:

Most games are about challege. Heavy Rain is about the journey. We tried to move the challenge from the controller to the mind of the player.

"Forget video game rules. Mechanics, levels, bosses, ramping, points, inventory, ammo, platforms, missions, game over, cutscenes ARE THINGS FROM THE PAST.

He is pretty much summing up the not games movement, so this is quite interesting.

And oh, did any one here see the actual talk? Or know of some better write-up than the link I posted.

[Malcolm]

I saw this talk (my writeup of it is in this post, though I wrote mostly about my reaction to the game and hardly any about the talk itself).  I haven't played Heavy Rain (no PS3), but it didn't surprise me that his talk was essentially a notgames manifesto.  Heavy Rain was a notgame from the beginning.

The write-up I linked above is admittedly anemic (it was really late when I wrote it ^^;), but I still have all my notes, so if you have any questions about the talk I can probably answer them.

[Jeroen D. Stout]

Fahrenheit certainly inspired me when it first came out - I had the 'it can be different' feeling.

In a sense Cage's position in the industry is a little strange; he is very American action drama, or at least, whenever someone at the GDC said Dinner Date made them think of Heavy Rain that is what I would answer, that I am different in narrative style and content. His speeches are very similar to the ideology of notgames. I do not recall him ever mentioning notgames, however.

I am not sold on Cage's writing from what I experienced and read, but his ideas are good and he evidently is a big driving force. In a sense it is ironic that he frees himself from the 'shackles' of traditional games only to remain trapped in the shackles of American action drama.

[Thomas]

Another thing to consider is if he might actually have damaging effect on the notgames movement. Perhaps people will directly think of any talk about "less gameplay" as Heavy Rain-inspired and then instantly think of "interactive movies"?

While it is of course always possible to explain how your game is not an "interactive movie", this kind of bias might lead to people switching off before you have time to convince them otherwise.

It might also have the exact opposite reaction, with people having such positive feelings toward Heavy Rain that they listen extra carefully!

[Jeroen D. Stout]

People asked me about 'interactive movie' and it is very enjoyable to see their faces as one replies: "Well, actually, I think Dinner Date is both a game and an interactive film."

Because the areas overlap, given certain definitions. It is very helpful to just defuse this choice, I think

[Michaël Samyn]

In terms of interaction, Heavy Rain really is not an interactive movie! On the contrary: it's filled to the brim with all sorts of game mechanics. In fact, David Cage designs game mechanics to give you a physical sensation that corresponds with the sensation the character on the screen might be feeling. If anything, it goes a lot further in terms of interaction. Most games seems stale and rigid compared to the richness of Heavy Rain's interaction design.

Personally, I'm not a fan of this approach -I prefer the interface to become invisible- but for many people this concept does seem to work.

In terms of story, Heavy Rain is similar to a movie. A rather conventional movie, even. I think this was a conscious choice given the size of the audience the game needed to reach to justify its undoubtedly enormous production budget. Hopefully in the future the market of games will be bigger (than gamers) and such compromises will not be necessary anymore.

[Michaël Samyn]

I do think David Cage has a vision that has overlap with notgames. In a way, his vision is a subset of the notgames idea. Notgames is very broadly about designing interactions for the purpose of expression. For some of us this expression is highly artistic, subjective, complicated. David Cage chooses popular entertainment and b-movie stories. It's the same method used for a different purpose.

I'm completely happy to embrace him in the notgames circle, to represent us towards the games audience, even. Anyone who judges the work of Any of us based on his is an idiot. It's not because you like Cage's notgames that you will like Stout's. Or vice versa. We should hope for and encourage that kind of diversity.

I'm personally more interested in more intimate, subjective expressions. But I'm very happy there's someone out there who applies the same methods to popular entertainment. Sort of proving our point that video games need to stop being (rigid, conventional) games if they want to reach a wider audience.

[Michaël Samyn]

People asked me about 'interactive movie' and it is very enjoyable to see their faces as one replies: "Well, actually, I think Dinner Date is both a game and an interactive film."

I actually disagree. Dinner Date is, above all else, a software application. Which is very different from film. In a film, you sit back and watch while you empathize with what happens. A software application, on the other hand, is something you use. You're continuously manipulating things, "playing" with the possibilities.

I guess the linearity of Dinner Date makes it similar to film in some way. But I really think this linearity is a detail and does not warrant calling the entire application "film". There's too many other things going on.

Heavy Rain is similar but it invites comparison with film much more because of its story and the way it portrays scenes and characters.

[ghostwheel]

@Michaël

I agree. Using the word "film" gives people the wrong idea. It's like comparing films to books. Plus it raises the evil spectre of all those terrible FMV games from the '90s.