Oh, videogames, how we love your stories that lift up our spirit and at the same time let us beam it down to the ground by means of an ion cannon. One could say the Writers Guild of America acknowledges this with its announcement for the 2011 WGA Awards nominees for videogame writing, a category that first appeared in 2008.
Then again, this year’s nominees are: Assassin’s Creed: Brotherhood, Fallout: New Vegas, God of War III, Prince of Persia: The Forgotten Sands, Singularity and Star Wars: The Force Unleashed II.
You have to keep in mind that this is based on submitted scripts for videogames — not on actual in-game writing analysis or whatnot — but even so, some of these titles seem like odd choices, to say the least.
Here’s the full list of credits for each nominee:
- Assassin’s Creed: Brotherhood, Story by Patrice Desilets, Jeffrey Yohalem, Corey May; Lead Script Writer: Jeffrey Yohalem; Script Writers: Ethan Petty, Nicholas Grimwood, Matt Turner; Ubisoft
- Fallout: New Vegas, Creative Design Lead/Lead Writer: John Gonzalez; Writers: Chris Avellone, Eric Fenstermaker, Travis Stout; Additional Writing: Tess Treadwell, George Ziets, Jason Bergman, Nick Breckon, Matt Grandstaff, Will Noble, Andrew Scharf; Bethesda Softworks
- God of War III, Written by Marianne Krawcyzk; Additional Writing by Stig Asmussen, Ariel Lawrence, William Weissbaum; Sony Computer Entertainment
- Prince of Persia: The Forgotten Sands, Writer: Benjamin McCaw; Story Dialogue Editor: Marianne Krawczyk; Ubisoft
- Singularity, Written by Marc Guggenheim, Lindsey Allen, Emily Silver; Additional Story and Writing: Jason Henderson, Adam Foshko, Michael Cassutt; Story and Script Consultant: Adam Foshko; Activision
- Star Wars: The Force Unleashed II, Executive Producer-Writer: Haden Blackman; In-Game Script: David Collins, John Stafford, Cameron Suey; Additional Writing: Tid Cooney, Ian Dominguez, Tony Rowe; LucasArts
Assassin’s Creed: Brotherhood had a decent story, which was more focused but also less expansive than, and not as engaging as, that of Assassin’s Creed II. The main setting in Rome and the singular purpose to take down the Borgias felt more like one of many quests in Assassin’s Creed II, although it didn’t make the game feel short or limited in the slightest. Then again, a lot of the story comes from snippets of Subject 16’s hidden messages and the story outside of the Animus.
Fallout: New Vegas makes me wonder what the script looks like on linear paper, but there is more to that game’s writing than meets the eye. Although I doubt the WGA cares about it, the main story and the writing were a big improvement over Fallout 3 and the world itself felt more alive because of it.
God of War III had to wrap up the entire Kratos storyline of the past games and it had plenty of classic themes to like. It may not be everyone’s favorite God of War game, but a nomination nod isn’t too farfetched.
As for Singularity and Prince of Persia: TFS, I only played the latter myself and it was not horrible. The story is pretty basic and there are only three actual characters in the game, but I thought it was done competently. The Prince and his brother felt like actual characters, even though their interaction was pretty limited, and the story was paced well throughout the (admittedly short) game.
But The Force Unleashed II‘s nomination is mind-boggling. Its story was a shadow of the first game’s narrative, with little to no characterization or payoff. Even though it’s mostly Star Wars fans who had issues with the story in this second game in the series, I had no idea there were people out there who thought this was a great example of videogame writing. The only reason I can think of for this title’s nomination is that the script was much better before the game was rushed out to stores, or because the original The Force Unleashed won the WGA award in 2009.
So: no Mass Effect 2, no Heavy Rain, no Alan Wake and no Red Dead Redemption. Personally, Assassin’s Creed: Brotherhood would be my pick out of these six because I just love the way Ubisoft dealt with Renaissance Rome, and the endless discussions centered around its ending and the series’ mythology as a whole. What about you?
2011 Writers Guild Awards Videogame Writing Nominees Announced [Writers Guild of America]
