This post has a mini-review of the new Deus Ex
Deus Ex keeps up with a grand tradition of giving you an established character in an established universe, giving you a beginning mission, and then showing your character die… right before the opening credits.
Right from the start, you are given a reason to care about the storyline. You need to find the sonuva who looked down his sights at you and pulled the trigger and then get revenge.
Right after a visit to the hospital.
Of course, the story is *NEVER* so simple as just finding the guy. The guy who pulled the trigger? He’s just a little fish. Doesn’t mean that he isn’t a problem calling for resolution, mind… but he’s just the guy doing someone else’s bidding. Who is the someone else? Why you? What was the “someone else” trying to prevent? Oooh, but first, there’s an old lady with rats in her basement. There’s a group of hooligans outside of town that are making trouble. There’s also a rumor about collecting 100 pelts/bottlecaps that will then result in Great Treasure if you only knew where to look.
Of course, you could lampshade this by pointing out that, hey, your first interaction wasn’t exactly a rousing success and that obliges you to put some effort into sharpening your skills and going up levels until you reach the level cap, and making a lot (a LOT a lot) of currency so you can buy upgrades, and, hey, if you happen to meet a special someone along the way? That’s pretty awesome too. So, pretty much, you’re *OBLIGED* to help every knucklehead who can’t tie their own shoes. That’s how you will gain the necessary tools to solve your own problem.
Especially the one that involves getting the best ending. (I mean, it’s possible to beat Mass Effect 2 in less than 10 hours. Just hit the essential missions and don’t do any of the side (or loyalty) missions. You beat the bad guys and everybody dies. Which is pretty cool.)
Deus Ex has you begin by going on a tour of the company for which you work and meeting your various friends and frenemies before an attack on the facility results in a little ballistic maintenance. After waking up, you’re sent on a mission to deal with another attack on another facility and, along the way, you learn a handful of interesting things that call some fundamental assumptions into question…
Which is, if you ask me, the best way to grab a player and drag them into the story. They’ll eventually drag themselves to the end. Just kick it off by making it nice and personal.
I’m trying and failing to find a more efficient way to grab people and engage them. What am I forgetting?
I think that’s the failure regarding my Changeling: The Lost campaign. Moreso than having three players who are casuals and think stopping by, breaking bread then declaring at random moments “I shoot the guy”. It’s a hobby and requires lots of involvement on the behalf of the players otherwise every game is played out like the first session trying to grab people’s attention so they don’t ask “Why is my character hanging out with these mooks?” This essay by Lilija may be of interest in this vein.
There needs to be something giving players, and characters, an important stake in the story. I’m half-heartedly working on a space campaign and your post gave me pause because what am I going to do to make this story shine for the players who have their own motives? Space pirates? Stolen ship? Port of call was destroyed and their particular lovers were so much collateral damage. At least with the lamented Asbury Park by Night I established a vendetta twixt the team and Vlad who did some sick things to teenaged nerds in a hotel.
Y’need a hook. Several. And it’s important to have a character’s background to know which buttons to push. My failing with Mr. Osprey was not knowing the right buttons which would make him put down that ledger and pull out his nine to mete out justice and maintain the status quo.
I can’t wait to acquire Deus Ex: The Human Revolution not to mention FO:NV’s GOTY edition for the DLC in one tidy package. For the sheer fun of it but also to see if videogames are becoming capable of telling compelling tales. I maintain that FO:NV is a strong science fiction story which would be worthy of a Hugo or Nebula unlike Star Ocean where you grind to a certain point, watch a cutscene and suddenly the map’s full of different monsters.
By the way, I’m already planning my Caesar’s Legion allied character. Melee, Barter and Survival skills. Later I’d tag Unarmed. Unsure if I’d take Confirmed Bachelor but goodness only knows.
That might actually be a good kickoff to the first session.
If everyone is fey, have them all be attacked with some cold iron at the beginning of the first session. Maybe have them all get some sort of package from Jokey Smurf and, kapow, spiked. After 4 months of recovery, they are finally tentatively going out… and, as luck would have it, to the same Malt Shoppe. To ensure conversation ensues, you can have the Malt Shoppe owner open a package of his own.
“Wow! A package for me!”
And… go.
Maybe because I haven’t played a Deus Ex title since Conspiracy on the PS2 or maybe because I just suck at FPS (I’m thinking the latter) but I found the intro (and the first real mission) at a rather high difficultly curve – I mean, how can you die in an ostensible tutorial session? And I like the ‘sneak’ aspect of this Deus Ex game (and I liked the last one) but the hidden ‘sneaky’ pathways seem considerably less obvious.
Yeah, I kinda died a dozen times myself.
I told myself that it was the game showing “tough love”.