The less direct gameplay agency you give the player the more freedom you have in not having to accommodate what is essentially a main character who can and will do anything.
It's possible to make a game with lots of action and shit that has a well written story, but fundamentally it's gonna have to be shaped around the actually existing great man that is the player character.
If Disco Elysium had the combat originally suggested in the early documents, people would simply end up winning the tribunal with epic cowboy moves, and the story would either have to accept that or be a poorly written story.
Yeah, a lot of games struggle with having the player character forced into circumstances that make no sense given the wild abilities of the player. I recall being put off by the rapid alternation in FFXIV between killing actual gods and getting owned by random dudes.
I'm no game designer, but I think the best way to do it is to focus more on the quality of the writing. It's what gives a story those moments that really stick with you. When I think back on Disco Elysium, it's not about being disappointed that such and such options weren't available for me to say or do, it's on "That the bourgeoisie are not human."
It’s possible to make a game with lots of action and shit that has a well written story, but fundamentally it’s gonna have to be shaped around the actually existing great man that is the player character.
I'm going to mention Pathologic 2 here as well, as an example of a game that very much doesn't do this. There's lots of action (depending on how you play, I guess) and the story is fantastic, but despite the fact that your character is a bit more important than most other characters, it's not like you're super human or anything. You're very much just trying to survive an impossible situation, exactly like everyone else.
That being said, I think your general point stands, because I can't think of a single other game that does what Pathologic 2 does. That game is truly special.
From what I know Pathologic 2 has a good setup for it, being limited in scope(easy to be the Great Man of one village) and each character being uniquely capable by virtue of having a comparatively rare medical skill or ability that would be scarce in a rural area.
Well yeah theres no rule to say you need to do it, but if you let players have enough freedom within the gameplay to become godlike compared to every other character, then it preserves the coherency between story and gameplay to make the character a Great Man in some way. Compared to just not doing that and making players frustrated and unimmersed, or having to scale back what the player can realistically do so the character can also be credibly limited in ability within the story(which can be better but is harder and requires good balance and time to fine tune.)
I never said it was trivial to write stories that aren't just arcade games for the MC to win, but it's by no means difficult if you have aims more interesting than shoveling power fantasy slop into the player's gullet.
The less direct gameplay agency you give the player the more freedom you have in not having to accommodate what is essentially a main character who can and will do anything.
It's possible to make a game with lots of action and shit that has a well written story, but fundamentally it's gonna have to be shaped around the actually existing great man that is the player character.
If Disco Elysium had the combat originally suggested in the early documents, people would simply end up winning the tribunal with epic cowboy moves, and the story would either have to accept that or be a poorly written story.
Yeah, a lot of games struggle with having the player character forced into circumstances that make no sense given the wild abilities of the player. I recall being put off by the rapid alternation in FFXIV between killing actual gods and getting owned by random dudes.
I'm no game designer, but I think the best way to do it is to focus more on the quality of the writing. It's what gives a story those moments that really stick with you. When I think back on Disco Elysium, it's not about being disappointed that such and such options weren't available for me to say or do, it's on "That the bourgeoisie are not human."
I'm going to mention Pathologic 2 here as well, as an example of a game that very much doesn't do this. There's lots of action (depending on how you play, I guess) and the story is fantastic, but despite the fact that your character is a bit more important than most other characters, it's not like you're super human or anything. You're very much just trying to survive an impossible situation, exactly like everyone else.
That being said, I think your general point stands, because I can't think of a single other game that does what Pathologic 2 does. That game is truly special.
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From what I know Pathologic 2 has a good setup for it, being limited in scope(easy to be the Great Man of one village) and each character being uniquely capable by virtue of having a comparatively rare medical skill or ability that would be scarce in a rural area.
You don't need to have the protagonist be a Great Man, even though most games do that.
Well yeah theres no rule to say you need to do it, but if you let players have enough freedom within the gameplay to become godlike compared to every other character, then it preserves the coherency between story and gameplay to make the character a Great Man in some way. Compared to just not doing that and making players frustrated and unimmersed, or having to scale back what the player can realistically do so the character can also be credibly limited in ability within the story(which can be better but is harder and requires good balance and time to fine tune.)
I never said it was trivial to write stories that aren't just arcade games for the MC to win, but it's by no means difficult if you have aims more interesting than shoveling power fantasy slop into the player's gullet.