What makes an intelligent story/sci-fi?

Get ready for another Gradius rant that I'm sure will offend somebody somewhere, but...well, I don't care. I saw a post on battle.net that I really identified with:

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People say the story is ruined because it was written for a lower common denominator of player. Everybody can understand that story, but people who are better read or more creative wind up with a lot of questions about the plot.

"Why a prophesy?"
"Why is Tychus a mole if he doesn't do spy things?"
"If the Dominion loses, the Zerg will kill everyone and there will be nobody left to save, so why does Jim still try to undermine the Dominion during the Zerg attack?"
"How did Swann build a miniature more cost-effective Odin by himself? Wouldn't that take tons of resources and a pretty competent R&D team to do?"

WoL is written at the level of a pretty young audience. Kids in their early teens, or guys there around. Unfortunately, a lot of the players from the old Starcraft days are adults, so we wouldn't behave like Jim. Some of us have loved before - we don't see anything special or good about loving Kerrigan. Some of us understand politics better, so the politics in this game seem really childish. Some of us like war history, and we can think of a lot of ways Jim could have been stopped with very few resources.

Think of it like watching Dora the Explora with your niece. You're not really captivated by the adventure, and when Swiper steals the map, you don't understand why Dora doesn't just ignore Swiper and continue on the linear pathway. The only way she'd get lost is if she left the road. Your niece, on the other hand, who's a little kid, just loved Dora to death. She shouts along and tries to stop Swiper from stealing things.

What WoL would be fine, except that men in their twenties is an expected part of the Starcraft demographic, and we're looking at a game script that can be picked up an easily understood by as early as eleven years old. WoL just doesn't have a challenging story! The twists are blatant, the characters lack depth, the conflicts are one-sided with good and evil being clearly divisible!

And again, it's a marketing thing. The more accessible your story is, the more people you can sell it to. Guys like Johnny make a lot of posts complaining that they didn't really understand character motivations from the original Starcraft games. However, for him, WoL is really awesome. Unlike the last games, characters are now doing things for really simple reasons, their plans are all very straightforward, and there's no ambiguity. Johnny gets WoL - from what he's written, apparently not so much for SC/BW.

Anyway, I hope that clears it up. The game is epic, but only at a certain level of critical thought. Once you start applying enough real world experience to it, the story is like wet tissue.

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And this is basically what I've been saying since forever. Not that everyone who likes WoL is stupid, but that the writers have made the story "accessible" with:

1) Stereotype characters. They are easier to understand than multifaceted characters. Fun, but not very challenging or representative of real life.
2) A clear black vs. white morality. It is extremely easy to tell who is the bad guy. Again, it can be fun, but not very challenging or representative of real life.
3) The joke news casts, which while entertaining at first with its same recycled joke & caricatural news casters, is actually pretty insulting to people who live in actual dictatorial regimes, or regular news casts themselves for that matter.
4) Bogus science. The lava surge gimmick, slowest supernova-explosion-ever gimmick, impossible planets, etc. Warfield mentions "the artifact pulses on a subsonic frequency, so we'll be immune to its effects", which is the equivalent of saying that "we're safe because we can't hear it". Again, while this is passable fluff for children or the less-informed, it's mainly a hamper on the story for those of us who care about the sci in sci-fi.

But does everything have to be intelligent? Can it not just be entertaining instead? Sure. But my personal opinion is that Blizzard's approach is wrong. A story should indeed aim to reach an intelligent audience, because that is the best way to make it truly accessible to everyone, instead of with dumbed-down characters & plots. Take an actual children's story for instance, Alice in Wonderland. Sure, it is accessible to a child. However, there is much more to it:

Hidden Content:

From Wikipedia:

Symbolism

Most of the book's adventures may have been based on and influenced by people, situations and buildings in Oxford and at Christ Church, e.g., the "Rabbit Hole," which symbolized the actual stairs in the back of the main hall in Christ Church. A carving of a griffon and rabbit, as seen in Ripon Cathedral, where Carroll's father was a canon, may have provided inspiration for the tale.[18]

Since Carroll was a mathematician at Christ Church, it has been suggested[19][20] that there are many references and mathematical concepts in both this story and Through the Looking-Glass; examples include:

In chapter 1, "Down the Rabbit-Hole", in the midst of shrinking, Alice waxes philosophic concerning what final size she will end up as, perhaps "going out altogether, like a candle"; this pondering reflects the concept of a limit.
In chapter 2, "The Pool of Tears", Alice tries to perform multiplication but produces some odd results: "Let me see: four times five is twelve, and four times six is thirteen, and four times seven is—oh dear! I shall never get to twenty at that rate!" This explores the representation of numbers using different bases and positional numeral systems: 4 × 5 = 12 in base 18 notation, 4 × 6 = 13 in base 21 notation, and 4 × 7 could be 14 in base 24 notation. Continuing this sequence, going up three bases each time, the result will continue to be less than 20 in the corresponding base notation. (After 19 the product would be 1A, then 1B, 1C, 1D, and so on.)
In chapter 7, "A Mad Tea-Party", the March Hare, the Hatter, and the Dormouse give several examples in which the semantic value of a sentence A is not the same value of the converse of A (for example, "Why, you might just as well say that 'I see what I eat' is the same thing as 'I eat what I see'!"); in logic and mathematics, this is discussing an inverse relationship.
Also in chapter 7, Alice ponders what it means when the changing of seats around the circular table places them back at the beginning. This is an observation of addition on the ring of integers modulo N.
The Cheshire cat fades until it disappears entirely, leaving only its wide grin, suspended in the air, leading Alice to marvel and note that she has seen a cat without a grin, but never a grin without a cat. Deep abstraction of concepts, such as non-Euclidean geometry, abstract algebra, and the beginnings of mathematical logic, was taking over mathematics at the time Dodgson was writing. Dodgson's delineation of the relationship between cat and grin can be taken to represent the very concept of mathematics and number itself. For example, instead of considering two or three apples, one may easily consider the concept of 'apple', upon which the concepts of 'two' and 'three' may seem to depend. A far more sophisticated jump is to consider the concepts of 'two' and 'three' by themselves, just like a grin, originally seemingly dependent on the cat, separated conceptually from its physical object.

Mathematician Melanie Bayley asserted in the magazine of The New Scientist that Dodgson wrote Alice in Wonderland in its final form as a scathing satire on new modern mathematics that were emerging in the mid-19th century.[21]

It has been suggested by several people, including Martin Gardner and Selwyn Goodacre,[19] that Dodgson had an interest in the French language, choosing to make references and puns about it in the story. It is most likely that these are references to French lessons—a common feature of a Victorian middle-class girl's upbringing. For example, in the second chapter Alice posits that the mouse may be French. She therefore chooses to speak the first sentence of her French lesson-book to it: "Où est ma chatte?" ("Where is my cat?"). In Henri Bué's French translation, Alice posits that the mouse may be Italian and speaks Italian to it.

Pat's "Digging for apples" could be a cross-language pun, as pomme de terre (literally; "apple of the earth") means potato and pomme means apple, which little English girls studying French would easily guess.[22]

In the second chapter, Alice initially addresses the mouse as "O Mouse", based on her memory of the noun declensions "in her brother's Latin Grammar, 'A mouse — of a mouse — to a mouse — a mouse — O mouse!'" These words correspond to the first five of Latin's six cases, in a traditional order established by medieval grammarians: mus (nominative), muris (genitive), muri (dative), murem (accusative), (O) mus (vocative). The sixth case, mure (ablative) is absent from Alice's recitation.

In the eighth chapter, three cards are painting the roses on a rose tree red, because they had accidentally planted a white-rose tree that the Queen of Hearts hates. Red roses symbolized the English House of Lancaster, while white roses were the symbol for their rival House of York. This scene is an allusion to the Wars of the Roses.[23]

So what makes a story or sci-fi intelligent? One site gives an example for movies:

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What is an intelligent movie? It is the one that marks new parameters in the history of movie making. The idea is new and sends a message so intense that certainly moves you or the idea is such that it opens new gateways to scientists that they have not thought of before. When you step out of cinema you feel different now, that is intelligent.

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I think there are multiple ways to reach an intelligent audience. Using "references" and "allusions" that go beyond the story itself and parallel real life is how Alice in Wonderland can reach adults. But I believe that in sci-fi, the main idea is to challenge, captivate, inform, and generally force the reader to do what any well-informed person does: consider the opposite side of the argument. For example, Dr. Breen's dialog in Half Life 2 when you're going through the citadel. Sure, Breen is evil, but it seems that he honestly believes (or is deluded into thinking) that he is creating a better world.

Blowing the readers' mind with epic plot twists & foreshadowing is another way i.e. in Portal 2 when you created a portal on the moon, it would have been totally contrived under normal circumstances. However, you spent part of the game using paint made out of moon-rocks whose function is to allow you to create portals on unconventional surfaces. As a result, when you shot that portal at the moon, your mind is blown from such epic foreshadowing. Not the most high-brow example I could give, but you feel rewarded for paying attention. On the other hand, a nine year old playing this game probably just thinks, "hey, we created a portal on the moon. awesome!" This is how you reach everybody.

What about Brood War? After all, most of us were 10 or 12 when we first played it. Yet to this day, along with Warcraft 3, its ending is one of the few examples I know where "evil wins". Not because it deserves to, but because it was the most ruthless. A valuable lesson that I'm sure many of us have learned ourselves one way or another. In Rebel Yell, Raynor, the one good guy in the universe, ironically exemplifies a famous quote by Stalin: "A single death is a tragedy; a million deaths is a statistic." It's the deaths of Fenix and Kerrigan that actually spur him to real action, not that of entire worlds. There's more in just Rebel Yell alone: a government promising freedom & morality comes to power, yet ends up being just as corrupt as its predecessor. You lose the campaign and all your efforts have amounted to naught. This reaches an intelligent audience because it makes you feel like you learned another real life lesson along with Raynor.

On the other hand, there is very little in Wings of Liberty that made me think of an astute observation, parallel to real-life or make me feel like I learned something. Raynor's "slump" into alcoholism is a mockery of what it can actually do to relationships. Mengsk runs his dictatorial regime like a joke. In this game, you literally just come in as the underdog, walk on top of your enemies, and come out victorious. I've heard people say that Wings of Liberty has intelligent themes like "redemption" and "confronting the ghosts of your past". But this has little value when it is achieved through the triumph of unstoppable protagonists over clearly-divisible "evil" antagonists through the use of contrived & lazy plot devices such as artifacts & prophecies, as opposed to natural & logical storytelling.

I can't do more than post in agreement.

This is one of THE TWO ISSUES in Blizzard's storytelling.

The other one would be having an independent book/comic lore division and an independent game lore division. Each works on its own and creates lore that overlaps with the other's work. The result is chaos, which only breaks the lore more.

I disagreed with you on some points, Grad, in one of your threads sometime last year. And I still disagree with a few things... but since I started playing Mass Effect this past week (no, I've never touched it before) my expectations for games have changed. A lot. I'm fine with some gimmicks, like the Lavs Flows -- Blizzard and StarCraft are just like that. But after being exposed to a game that makes me feel like some of my choices matter... Yeah, I'm spoiled. And I'm seeing things more your way, I think. But it's not even that the changes Blizz has to make in HotS even have to be that big in order to be fulfilling. It can be a simple matter of changed dialogue, subtlety in character and motive, and at least some firm basis in science and consistency. But you know we aren't going to get that last one, no way.

Agreed, I too thought this post was phrasing things accurately. I never had problems with Kerrigan winning in the end - that was surprisingly refreshing from all those story when a plot twist happen and the good guys win, plus she did say there would be a reprieve so it wasn't "everyone is bound to die". On the other hand, I remember strongly disliking Fenix's death when I was 12 because that was totally unfair, but as I grew up, that scene became my favorite moment of the game.

Bogus science didn't bother me as much as the rest of the points, though "that platform stays in orbit because it has power" made my teeth cringe - if you are in geostationnary orbit, you stay there for centuries by definition.
Worded that way, I'm not sure I learned a "real life lesson" from Starcraft, because well, it's a game. But I definitely felt Raynor learned one, and I also agree that a good story should have parallels with real life. To elaborate a bit, I liked a lot in Rebel Yell and Queen of Blades (the campaign) in that if you change the characters and the factions, something like that could totally happen in real life. You ally with some infamous or downright dangerous people to fight an enemy that is actually a bad guy, only it turns out that this person is as bad (Arcturus) or worse (Kerrigan's Zerg) as the people you helped defeated. And yet, choosing your stand in the first place had probably been the right thing to do.

That moved a bit, not because of the characters or the dialogs themselves, but because it felt like what happens in real life: you try to do what is right and manage to change a few things, but it doesn't always end the way you wanted.
It sometimes does, of course. The Protoss campaigns end on a bittersweet but overall positive note, and things don't always go south in real life. I know I certainly become much more invested in a story when some things go right and others wrong, because I can't know how the current arc is going to end. This, again, is what happens in real life.

As far as I'm concerned, I'd say I consider a story intelligent when the events could also have happened if the fictional universe was reality, filled with real people. There are no Zerg in real life and the Confederacy is not supposed to be any real governement. But there are real people with actual principles that ally themselves with terrorists, today, because they are the only ones helping. On the other hand, no one cuts a reporter live twice. If you are the sort of media that censors his journalists, you should replace him by someone who knows what it has to say. In fact, doing it even once is counter-productive because it's really obvious.

I wouldn't say good stories could be apply to real life, but I believe they should remind of it - obviously without being written to mimic a real event, because the situations are necessarily different, and that contrives the story more than anything else.

This is probably going to go south really quick, but:

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Originally Posted by Gradius

And this is basically what I've been saying since forever. Not that everyone who likes WoL is stupid, but that the writers have made the story "accessible" with:

1) Stereotype characters. They are easier to understand than multifaceted characters. Fun, but not very challenging or representative of real life.
2) A clear black vs. white morality. It is extremely easy to tell who is the bad guy. Again, it can be fun, but not very challenging or representative of real life.
3) The joke news casts, which while entertaining at first with its same recycled joke & caricatural news casters, is actually pretty insulting to people who live in actual dictatorial regimes, or regular news casts themselves for that matter.
4) Bogus science. The lava surge gimmick, slowest supernova-explosion-ever gimmick, impossible planets, etc. Warfield mentions "the artifact pulses on a subsonic frequency, so we'll be immune to its effects", which is the equivalent of saying that "we're safe because we can't hear it". Again, while this is passable fluff for children or the less-informed, it's mainly a hamper on the story for those of us who care about the sci in sci-fi.

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There's not much in the above post that hasn't been discussed to death already. Point 4 is always something iffy for me though, how we declare some soft sci-fi in the settling acceptable (psionic powers, khaydarin crystals, the Shakuras temple) but not others (prophecy and the artifact).

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Originally Posted by Gradius

But does everything have to be intelligent? Can it not just be entertaining instead? Sure. But my personal opinion is that Blizzard's approach is wrong. A story should indeed aim to reach an intelligent audience, because that is the best way to make it truly accessible to everyone, instead of with dumbed-down characters & plots.

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This is another fallacy I've encountered. It's less a claim of what WoL was, as opposed to what it wasn't. What it supposedly should have done. It's a fallacy I try to avoid, because while it's tempting to entertain the notion of "what if?", it's something that should be minimalized IMO unless it's being used as the basis for creative work. Maybe it's because I try to avoid AR and AU like the plague, but meh.

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Originally Posted by Gradius

But I believe that in sci-fi, the main idea is to challenge, captivate, inform, and generally force the reader to do what any well-informed person does: consider the opposite side of the argument.

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Not sure how consideration of an opposite argument is a requirement, because that's assuming there's an existing argument in the first place. But looking at the phrase..."I believe" what x should do/be. There's nothing wrong with this, but it's a poor crutch for the basis of an argument. Can form part of one of course, but...well, I won't say what I believe what sci-fi should be. Mainly because it's based on opinion. I can't use that opinion as a basis to dictate what something should be simply because of my tastes.

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Originally Posted by Gradius

For example, Dr. Breen's dialog in Half Life 2 when you're going through the citadel. Sure, Breen is evil, but it seems that he honestly believes (or is deluded into thinking) that he is creating a better world.

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Half-Life 2 is an...interesting example to use. The Breencasts and the player's perception of them are both the game's greatest strengths and weaknesses IMO. On one hand, his argument is presented, and we can consider it due to Freeman being a player surrogate. On the other, we have very limited facts at our disposal, so it's not an argument that we can make an informed judgement on (then again, we're deprived the option to make any choice at the end, but whatever).

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Originally Posted by Gradius

What about Brood War? After all, most of us were 10 or 12 when we first played it.

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9 in my case.

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Originally Posted by Gradius

Yet to this day, along with Warcraft 3, its ending is one of the few examples I know where "evil wins". Not because it deserves to, but because it was the most ruthless. A valuable lesson that I'm sure many of us have learned ourselves one way or another.

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Couple of pointers:

-Warcraft III isn't an example where "evil wins" IMO. For Reign of Chaos, it certainly doesn't win. It has victories, and the effects of them are still around, but it certainly doesn't score a victory. The Frozen Throne isn't really an "evil wins" scenario either IMO, partly because TFT is more a case of telling numerous stories rather than a continuous one, partly because we effectively control seven factions over the course of the game. We have two cases of "evil wins" (Forsaken and Scourge), two cases of "good wins" (Horde and Sentinels), one case of "good loses" (Alliance), and two cases of "neutral loses" (Watchers and Illidari, though the latter is stretched in hindsight). "Evil wins" is more because of the fact that the two cases are in the final part of the sequential campaign and the last thing we see rather than a giant statement for the future of Azeroth. The Lich King doesn't deliver a Kerrigan speech after all.

-I don't think ruthlessness has that much to do with it either. Certainly not in TFT. Arthas wins against Illidan because of defeating him on the field of battle. Sylvanas defeats Garithos by being ruthless, but no more ruthless than he already was. In the two cases, we have a case of "evil defeats neutral" (Scourge vs. Illidari) and "evil defeats good" (I call the Alliance "good" in the game even if Garithos certainly wasn't). And going by Brood War, it's simplifying things to say that Kerrigan wins because she's more ruthless than her opponents. Certainly not Mengsk, who consigned an entire world to die so he could seize power. And not necessarily the UED either. Kerrigan wins because of her tactics and plans. Ruthlessness is just part of the package.

-If we need videogames to teach us the fact that good doesn't always win, or fiction in general, then...well, to each their own. Life teaches us these lessons long before fiction does.

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Originally Posted by Gradius

In Rebel Yell, Raynor, the one good guy in the universe, ironically exemplifies a famous quote by Stalin: "A single death is a tragedy; a million deaths is a statistic." It's the deaths of Fenix and Kerrigan that actually spur him to real action, not that of entire worlds. There's more in just Rebel Yell alone: a government promising freedom & morality comes to power, yet ends up being just as corrupt as its predecessor. You lose the campaign and all your efforts have amounted to naught. This reaches an intelligent audience because it makes you feel like you learned another real life lesson along with Raynor.

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The lesson thing is brought up again. I'll ignore that, because if I need fiction to teach me that kind of stuff, then I need to get out more. But that aside, RY ending the way it does is not something I'd call inherantly "intelligent." RY is a cynical story set in a cynical setting (at least cynical during the time period of the campaign). Cynicism and "grimdark" does not necessarily equal some grand statement about the wider world. It can. It can be the writer's intent for that to happen. Assuming it was, then yes, it works. But interpretation of fiction is just that. Interpretation. To counter the argument, my interpretation of the last scenes/missions of WoL is (or at least the feeling I got) was that of the 'light side' of humanity. Throughout the game, we've seen the 'dark side.' The Dominion's tyranny. The cynicism of many other factions, that even in the midst of a zerg invasion, they're willing to fight for the right price. Not even Raynor is completely clean, considering the stuff he's done (anti-Dominion in midst of said invasion, the Tal'darim, the New Folsom realization). Yet at the end of the game, humanity comes through. United, humanity stands, those same factions working in common cause, or at least the Raiders and Dominion. Unlike the Great War, where the terrans were victims caught between the protoss and zerg, here, the terrans have come into their own, showing what they're capable of doing.

Of course, that's my interpretation. No doubt there are people going "WTF" as they're reading this. But the point is, ideas/themes can't be held objectively superior/inferior to other ideas/themes. One can say it's immature to assume good always wins and all that, but staying in grimdark territory is just as guilty if it's done poorly. RY stayed in cynic/grimdark territory, WoL broke out of it. I like that personally, how it showed how the setting was changing over time. Can't call it objectively good. But I can't call it objectively bad either.

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Originally Posted by Gradius

In this game, you literally just come in as the underdog, walk on top of your enemies, and come out victorious.

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Yeah, this is another argument that also gave me a feeling of iffiness. It depends on how we look at it. If we're looking at it in the context of games/fiction in general, it comes across as iffy because fiction is filled with the underdog triumphing over something stronger. Especially games. Of the games mentioned above, Half-Life 2 is the most ergrerious, to the point where it feels like the game is satirizing itself given how much belief you have to suspend in regards to everything Gordon does, and why the Resistance treats him as some kind of messiah.

If we restrict ourselves to the RTS/RTT/TBS genres, then the underdog prevailing is quite common as well. There's nothing in the genre that prevents this scenario from occuring. And if we restrict ourselves to the previous games, then admittedly, it's where the contention arises...sort of. The SoK and UED both succeed in overtaking governments while the Raiders certainly don't, their actions feel on the scale appropriate to their level, and...well, this is where the argument will arise that it isn't, that Korhal shouldn't have been invaded, New Folsom should be impregnable, yadda yadda yadda. On the other hand, we'd never played a faction like the Raiders before in SC1 or BW (unless you include the final mission of Rebel Yell). Maybe some people prefer familiarity, but it's diversity I welcomed. I've played as a paramilitary, and a 'proper military.' A small rogue group, while not something I'm alien to in the RTS genre, is still something that was an interesting and, IMO, enjoyable change from what had come before.

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Originally Posted by Gradius

I've heard people say that Wings of Liberty has intelligent themes like "redemption" and "confronting the ghosts of your past". But this has little value when it is achieved through the triumph of unstoppable protagonists over clearly-divisible "evil" antagonists

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Let's cut out "unstoppable" protagonists because I've already discussed that, even before this thread. The line of argument is that "x" has little value due to the triumph of clearly defined protagonists over clearly defined antagonists.

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Okay, maybe "unstoppable" was the keyword here. Maybe supposed "unstobability" (probably not a word, but whatever) is the key defining point, in which case, then a lot of protagonists across fiction would have their deeds rendered null by the same logic. But supposing it isn't the key word, supposing the "weakness" is that WoL is a story with protagonists vs. antagonists, as opposed to the previous games, then this isn't something I can objectively fall right or wrong.

There's two ways this can be approached - the wider sense, and the series sense. In the wider sense, then no, the idea that distinct protagonists vs. distinct antagonists is inherantly weaker than a setting that's lacking both is, IMO, just plain wrong. You can argue that a lack of distinction is more realistic, but realism does not necessarily equate with a good story. A realistic story told well is good. A realistic story told poorly is bad. To cite a common example, I can cite the prequel Star Wars trilogy as more realistic than the original because the prequel trilogy operates in shades of grey as opposed to the good (rebels) vs. evil (Empire) scenario of the original. Truth be told, it's a decision I give the prequels cudos for for at least attempting it. Still, I think most will agree that in spite of its lack of 'grey', the original trilogy is superior, because of better storytelling.

But of course, there's also the 'series sense' to consider. WoL has some grey, IMO. The Dominion is sound in principle, but it's got a tyrannical ruler (Mengsk). The Raiders claim to be fighting for freedom, but they're not entirely clean. But there's far more grey in the original games, there's no denying that. Rebel Yell, we have a morally reprehensible oligarchy called the Confederacy that's overthrown through a rebel group that uses equally morally reprehensible means to overthrow its foe. In BW, we have the UED. One could claim some affinity for them in that they're from Earth, usually a sign of the 'good guys', but they're not angels either. They may have neutralized the zerg threat, but they certainly weren't doing it for the people of the K-sector, a people that they were quite happy to clamp down on, invading the Dominion without provocation. Even the nature of the foes are different. Rebel Yell, the Confederacy is faceless. The zerg and protoss are faceless (during the campaign itself). In WoL, we have 'faces' for our enemies-Mengsk for the Dominion, Kerrigan for the Swarm, and while not much of a character, at least we got Nyon representing the Tal'darim.

So yeah, the storytelling styles differ. Are they better? In terms of 'faces,' I think it works well for WoL in context. In a wider sense, the zerg and protoss being faceless in RY works well because they're new, unknown species to the terrans, and are so far above them that they wouldn't really come down to their level. Come WoL, the species are more familiar. Humanity's earnt the 'right' to be given the time of day by the protoss, and Kerrigan being the way she is represents an interesting midpoint between her Brood War persona and the Overmind. Distant from her former humanity, but not so far gone that she's like the Overmind, who'd have never even considered making direct contact. The 'faces' of WoL, IMO, provide a natural progression of the universe. 'Faces' don't necessarily make things better or worse, but they can definately do the former. Half-Life 2 is another example IMO. The Combine/Overwatch is a faceless foe, but Breen isn't, and it was a good choice IMO to give the player a distinct opponent to latch onto in the midst of an otherwise mysterious, faceless foe.

But in terms of protagonists/antagonists? That's down to personal choice. WoL's a departure from the previous games in that in the terran sense (and the protoss too I guess), the lines between friend and foe are more clear cut. It's not a departure I mind myself. Others might. But it can go either way. The "good vs. evil" scenario can be cited as immature. But it's equally vapid to keep something in grimdark territory for the sake of keeping it grimdark.

So yeah. Not much more to say, it's 2:30 in the morning, and I know that in all likelihood, the argument will begin again. But I guess the point I'm guessing is that the above post is the manifestation of argument based on preference/emotion. That WoL does what SC1/BW didn't, ergo, it's bad. And if you want to argue about storytelling techniques, that's getting into more objective territory, but I prefer WoL's to the previous games', how there's more cinematic intergration, there's more show than tell before, more of a feeling of depth in the universe, has a distinct 3 act structure, and has recognisable themes. Of course, those above points can probably be turned into negatives, but meh, you'll have a hard time seperating opinion from fact when it comes to fiction.

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This is another fallacy I've encountered. It's less a claim of what WoL was, as opposed to what it wasn't.

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But I guess the point I'm guessing is that the above post is the manifestation of argument based on preference/emotion. That WoL does what SC1/BW didn't, ergo, it's bad.

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"I believe" what x should do/be. There's nothing wrong with this, but it's a poor crutch for the basis of an argument.

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Yes, I used language such as "I believe" because I tried to make it clear that this is all just my opinion:

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But my personal opinion is that Blizzard's approach is wrong.

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This is not my thread for dissecting the story in the most objective way I can. I'm asking you guys what the ingredients of an intelligent sci-fi/story are, and if Wings of Liberty or your other favorite games fit the bill? Or do you believe there is no such thing and that all critically acclaimed & highly-rated stories are indistinguishable from random amateur fanfiction based on "personal preference"?

Do you think that the best way to reach the largest audience is by making characters & plot "easily accessible" or should stories aim to include content that isn't immediately obvious to everyone?

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Point 4 is always something iffy for me though, how we declare some soft sci-fi in the settling acceptable (psionic powers, khaydarin crystals, the Shakuras temple) but not others (prophecy and the artifact).

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People don't like prophecy & artifacts in that it promotes lazy writing, not that it's bogus science. I'm mainly referring to actual errors and the writers' inconsistency with sticking to either sci-fi or science fantasy. If they're going to insist on using science terms and promoting WoL to us as an epic sci-fi, then spend a little bit of time on research. I mean, I can understand that office politics are bogging down the consistency between books & games, and I get that everything will have some mistakes, but it just boggles me that there are people at Blizzard who get paid to think about the story for years & months, yet you get a bunch of obvious science mistakes within the main game narrative itself. It's a trivial nitpick, sure, but it's important to at least my enjoyment of the story.

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Originally Posted by Gradius

This is not my thread for dissecting the story in the most objective way I can. I'm asking you guys what the ingredients of an intelligent sci-fi/story are, and if Wings of Liberty or your other favorite games fit the bill? Or do you believe there is no such thing and that all critically acclaimed & highly-rated stories are indistinguishable from random amateur fanfiction based on "personal preference"?

Do you think that the best way to reach the largest audience is by making characters & plot "easily accessible" or should stories aim to include content that isn't immediately obvious to everyone?

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That's a lot of questions being asked. Trying to answer them:

-In terms of reaching a target audience, making something simple is probably going to reach a target audience faster in the long run. Many high grossing movies seem to correspond to this, though admittedly, that's iffy. Looking at the highest grossing movies of all time (source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of...grossing_films), it's filled with a lot of stuff that I think succeeds because of being enjoyable entertainment. But even then this is subjective. Looking at some of the films on that list, I don't deny that Avatar (#1) has a relatively simple plot, but I feel that among its many pros IMO, it's an interesting story of how an alien invasion would logically progress. I say that because it has the balls to not only make humanity itself an invader, but an invader who makes an honest effort over 25 years to find an ideal solution, but still fails. In contrast, I never found The Avengers had anything interesting to say, and don't see it as anything more than a popcorn flick. But I have a feeling that it'll last long after its release simply because of how many people see it as a triumph of the superhero medium. And going further down, there's probably people who can find grandiose themes in Bay's Transformers films. If there are such themes, I'd like to know what they are. Honestly. Because it's interesting to get another person's opinion.

So yeah, three examples of films that reach a large audience, but not ones I'd call particuarly cerebral, even in the case of Avatar. But there's the other side of the argument.

-The other exposited way to reach a target audience is to 'go for intelligence,' or whatever other phrase one wants to use. An intelligent piece of fiction can speak to more people if it works on numerous layers and all that. But...well, I'll put it this way. Some books, and some films.

Brave New World - 1984 - Farenheit 451

Blade Runner - 2001: A Space Odyssey

The books and films are examples off the top of my head that I'd call intelligent speculative fiction, all of them I've seen/read. Of the books, Brave New World would be my favourite novel of all time, a story of humanity being destroyed by love (borrowing phrases and simplifying stuff here, but whatever). 1984 is a riveting piece, a story of humanity being destroyed by hate. Farenheit 451 is, IMO, a very intelligent piece of work, a story of humanity losing touch with itself because of a world that's speeding up, to the extent that anything that could slow it down (books, rational discussion) is destroyed. A book that I have high regard for. Yet personally, I don't hold it up on the same level as the other two books. Why? Well, more on that later.

Take the films. Blade Runner is an intelligent film. 2001: A Space Odyssey is a very intelligent film IMO, or at least, in as much as that it makes great effort to show space travel that exists within the laws of physics. Obviously it's outdated (nah, really?), but for the time it was made, I give it kudos. And yet, I'd call Blade Runner the superior film anyday.

So what's with this. Why do I consider Brave New World and 1984 superior to Farenheit 451? Why, when I consider 2001: A Space Odyssey to be inferior to Blade Runner despite it being the more realistic of the two? The answer is the same in both cases. IMO, the superior works of fiction in both cases are superior because IMO, they're better stories. Better characters. Better pieces of fiction rather than better pieces of fact.

-Which, at the end of the day, is how I see the divide between 'intelligence' and the lack of it. A divide that is indeed mainly down to personal preference. We can agree on what makes a piece of fiction good in theory. Plot, characters, structure, themes, motifs, etc. But people see different things. Some people look at Blade Runner and see a dreary, uninteresting film with nothing to say. I see it as primarily a story of a man rediscovering his humanity in a world that's lost it. Some people look at 2001: A Space Odyssey and see a grand story of human discovery. I look at it and see a film that's practically bereft of plot, and of what plot there is, is poorly executed. And the notion of aiming for an audience through intelligence is something else that's iffy, because perceptions change over time. Sometimes the perceptions change for the better. Sometimes things don't hold up as well as they once did with hindsight and/or changes in perception.

-The question was raised at the start as to whether (paraphrased) whether there's a universal standard for intelligence, or whether personal preference rules the day. IMHO, I drift more towards the realm of personal preference. There are many cases where people tend to agree on something's quality or the lack of it. There are many cases where people are divided. Not a sci-fi example, but I saw Skyfall last night for the first time for instance. My personal interpretation is that it's a very well told story with well told characters that's elevated by its themes of a changing world and how people can or can't adapt to it. In contrast, some of those I went with saw it as a parody of the James Bond formula, primarily designed to satterize the motifs of the previous films in an otherwise brainless action film. To that I say, "to each their own." I disagree with their line of thought, but if you can provide me with reasoning, I'll at least understand your 'right' to an argument.

At the end of the day, I don't think a universal standard truly exists because perceptions change over time, and because people can look at the same thing and take different things out of it. And to address something else, I generally put the "fi" before the "sci." Hence, to use a common example, while RY is undoubtedly more realistic than WoL, I still see WoL as an example of superior storytelling. Fi before sci.

Hmm... feels like I've not posted in an eternity and an age. Oh well, might as well start here. Just thought I'd toss my two cents...


On the subject of "dumbing down" to increase audience accessibility, this is true. However, there is a difference between audience accessibility and audience enjoyment. While a simple story is accessible to a large number of people, that does not mean that all of them will enjoy said story. Which is not to say people won't watch it (which is more dependent on accessibility) but they would give it a chance only to walk away disappointed. They'd watch it once only to move on after that instead of coming back to it again and again. Which for business purposes is fine because that's all they are trying to get out of people since for the most part, you can only buy a product once.

As a side note to Hawki, it's interesting but erroneous to make judgment based on the highest grossing films since there are multiple other factors at play. Reasons like pop culture relevance, stunning visual effects and serving as a social activity with friends contribute to the continued success of franchise giants like the Transformers film franchise; even though most comments made view the story/plot negatively. I can almost guarantee that if the movies weren't based on a nostalgic preexisting franchise and had crappy graphics, its box office earnings would be markedly lower and that once they stop making new movies for it, people will eventually move on and forget about them.


In my opinion, a "good" story should aim to be both, widely accessible and widely enjoyable. And achieving the latter doesn't mean the story must be complex or perceived as "original". What's important is that the story not assume the audience is stupid. Take a look at classic cartoons like the old Batman cartoon and Gargoyles, or the more recent Avatar cartoons - both, The Last Airbender and The Legend of Korra. All these shows were clearly marketed towards children yet were enjoyed by older viewers and still appreciated until even today. Yes, the stories are simple - as they were intended to be accessible to children - but they tackled their respective subject matters maturely, did not shy away from difficult topics and (this is key) told stories that were consistent. They did not treat the audience like children. Which is good since after all, even children don't like to be treated like children!

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Originally Posted by mr. peasent

On the subject of "dumbing down" to increase audience accessibility, this is true. However, there is a difference between audience accessibility and audience enjoyment. While a simple story is accessible to a large number of people, that does not mean that all of them will enjoy said story. Which is not to say people won't watch it (which is more dependent on accessibility) but they would give it a chance only to walk away disappointed. They'd watch it once only to move on after that instead of coming back to it again and again. Which for business purposes is fine because that's all they are trying to get out of people since for the most part, you can only buy a product once.

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It's true to an extent. However, a simple story is not inherantly inferior to a complex story, nor is a superior story inherantly superior to a simple one. and to some, story, if there is any, can be a moot point. As a game example, the Super Mario series has rarely employed a storyline beyond Bowser saving Peach with Mario coming to the rescue, but it's still one of the most popular and accessible game series in history. With films, off the top of my head, there's the Star Wars divide again, where the simple story of the original trilogy is regarded as superior to the more complex one of the prequels in part because it's better told. Obviously there'll be some contention with this, but there's also the realm in both medias of story not mattering at all to the consumer. Some people just want something gratuitous. Some people will keep coming back for that gratuitous thing. And that's perfectly alright.

At the end of the day, if a story is being told, I'd rather it be told well and be simple rather than be complex and be told poorly.

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Originally Posted by mr. peasant

In my opinion, a "good" story should aim to be both, widely accessible and widely enjoyable. And achieving the latter doesn't mean the story must be complex or perceived as "original". What's important is that the story not assume the audience is stupid.

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Agree...sort of.

In terms of accessibility, and in light of later comments, writing can go both ways. It sounds good in theory, to have something that's widely accessible and it can be. But a good story can still be in a niche, whether it be subject matter or age group. This probably sounds cynical, but I've seen far too many examples of series/medias over the years that try to break out of their niche to the extent that it feels like they've forgotten what they once were. 'Essence' is a very subjective thing to define when it comes to fiction, but even if it's on a child's level, I'd rather that essence be kept rather than making a failed attempt at wider accessibility. There's plenty of children's stories that don't speak to me as an adult the way they did to me as a child, but I still regard them as good in the sense of writing, characters, etc. More than something that works on both levels but to a less satisfactory extent.

And no, a story shouldn't assume that an audience is stupid. There's no denying that statement. On the other hand, I find it just as irritating when it goes the other way. Sticking to subjects that have already been brought up, Half-Life 2 is a game that relies on audience intelligence to work out background and plot. Sometimes it works, and my intelligence has been 'respected.' Sometimes it doesn't, where while I can work something out, it irks me because it shouldn't have been something I had to find out.

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Originally Posted by mr. peasent

Take a look at classic cartoons like the old Batman cartoon and Gargoyles, or the more recent Avatar cartoons - both, The Last Airbender and The Legend of Korra. All these shows were clearly marketed towards children yet were enjoyed by older viewers and still appreciated until even today. Yes, the stories are simple - as they were intended to be accessible to children - but they tackled their respective subject matters maturely, did not shy away from difficult topics and (this is key) told stories that were consistent. They did not treat the audience like children. Which is good since after all, even children don't like to be treated like children!

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Lot to cover here. I'm afraid that I can't really comment on Gargoyles or Batman since I didn't see much of either as a kid (insert Greek choir sound here). As for The Last Airbender and The Legend of Korra...well, getting into semantics, but I'd classify both as "young adult" stories rather than ones for children (and yes, there is a difference). Not that that's a bad thing. The Last Airbender is, IMO, one of the best, if not the best cartoons I've ever watched. The Legend of Korra is quite good too IMO, my loathing of the ending aside. Certainly both are examples of cartoons that multiple age groups can enjoy.

On the other hand, the reason for that is, for me on a personal level, is how they're told, not what they tell. I have strong regard for both because of the quality of writing, character development, and plot. Concerning subject matters, I have respect for both...sort of. LoK wheaseled out of it at the end, but while TLA often had to wriggle its way around at times concerning subjects such as war and genocide, I think, for the most part, it still treated it with respect. Still, that's an added benefit to me personally. It's part of the reason why I like these cartoons so much, but not the main one.

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Originally Posted by Hawki

It's true to an extent. However, a simple story is not inherantly inferior to a complex story, nor is a superior story inherantly superior to a simple one. and to some, story, if there is any, can be a moot point. As a game example, the Super Mario series has rarely employed a storyline beyond Bowser saving Peach with Mario coming to the rescue, but it's still one of the most popular and accessible game series in history. With films, off the top of my head, there's the Star Wars divide again, where the simple story of the original trilogy is regarded as superior to the more complex one of the prequels in part because it's better told. Obviously there'll be some contention with this, but there's also the realm in both medias of story not mattering at all to the consumer. Some people just want something gratuitous. Some people will keep coming back for that gratuitous thing. And that's perfectly alright.

At the end of the day, if a story is being told, I'd rather it be told well and be simple rather than be complex and be told poorly.

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Same here; with my benchmark of being told "well" being there as being minimal Fridge Logic moments after completing it and no major, obvious Plot Holes during it. Which, WoL did not pass.

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Originally Posted by Hawki

Lot to cover here. I'm afraid that I can't really comment on Gargoyles or Batman since I didn't see much of either as a kid (insert Greek choir sound here). As for The Last Airbender and The Legend of Korra...well, getting into semantics, but I'd classify both as "young adult" stories rather than ones for children (and yes, there is a difference). Not that that's a bad thing. The Last Airbender is, IMO, one of the best, if not the best cartoons I've ever watched. The Legend of Korra is quite good too IMO, my loathing of the ending aside. Certainly both are examples of cartoons that multiple age groups can enjoy.

On the other hand, the reason for that is, for me on a personal level, is how they're told, not what they tell. I have strong regard for both because of the quality of writing, character development, and plot. Concerning subject matters, I have respect for both...sort of. LoK wheaseled out of it at the end, but while TLA often had to wriggle its way around at times concerning subjects such as war and genocide, I think, for the most part, it still treated it with respect. Still, that's an added benefit to me personally. It's part of the reason why I like these cartoons so much, but not the main one.

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Actually, The Last Airbender (TLA) was rated Y7, was marketed by Nickelodeon towards elementary school kids and performed strongly in the male, 9 to 14 demographic. As such, I wouldn't say that TLA would be classified as "young adult" as all. Rather, it's an example of what I said before about having wide accessibility and wide enjoyability/acceptability at the same time. The story is simple enough and sufficiently complete at the basic level for those not looking for something easy to consume while also providing sufficient, non-extraneous meat to satisfy those looking for it.

Aahh, how I've missed the wisdom of peasant!

Hawki does have a point that "what is intelligent" is somewhat muddied by personal preference. Even then, considering that WoL is supposed to be a sequel, a continuation of the first story, there is an inherent expectation of a degree of internal consistency and verisimilitude being maintained across the works. As has been pointed out before, there are many instances in WoL's storyline that make it feel the least realistic (relatively speaking, in a Starcraft-y way) of the three games so far.

It's ok to dumb down the science in sci-fi but you just have to be careful on what you dumb down, how you dumb it down and how seriously you are taking your universe in the first place.

For example, I think that the vast majority of players (young and old alike) don't question how actually feasible it is to have psychic powers like the ghosts do. We just kinda assume that it makes sense. But why? There is no real proof in the real world that psychic powers are possible. One of the reason is that no proper explanation was given (as far as I know). No one said something like ''well they have specials cells in their brains that send waves that modify special particles and blah blah blah''. As soon as you define something too much, we can start destroying the idea with real world logic. As long as you keep it general enough, any kind of concepts can be introduced in a sci-fi.

To be honest, it's kinda hard to say exactly what level of generality is acceptable/not acceptable. It's fair to say that this value is closely related to the level of seriousness of the universe though. For example, I really don't care about the science behind Warhammer 40k or the Power Rangers. It's so over the top that they can do anything they want. But, I do care about the science behind a serious movie like Prometheus. At one point in the movie, they say that the android aboard their ship has studied communication techniques and (few) alien symbols so much that he'll be able to speak to anything on demand. This is completely impossible and is one of the (many) things that threw me off in this movie.

One integral part, I feel everyone will agree, is that a work must be consistent within itself (and ideally, within the rest of its series as well). Meaning, if X is stated as true, then X should always be true unless something comes along to change it to Y at which point Y is now true and X no longer applies.

However, this was not achieved in WoL on multiple fronts and involving major story elements. The game, and Blizzard, makes a huge fuss about how Mengsk is a tyrannical dictator who is especially savvy at controllling the media yet throughout the game, the female UNN newscaster undermines this notioin in virtually every newscast throughout the campaign.

Another major inconsistency is the strength of Raynor's forces. The story tells us that they are at a low point and running on fumes. Yet, are able to convincingly beat back a large Protoss fleet (commanded by its top commander, no less) without crippling themselves in the process. Yet, are supposedly unable to score a decisive military victory against the Dominion. Yet, are able to invade and launch an attack on the Dominion capital world of Korhal where their top military leaders and forces had gathered to defend it from alien invasion and to launch its military's latest super weapon. So... which is it? Are Raynor's forces strong or are they weak?

Had these been minor back story elements for a minor background character, these inconsistencies would have been (more forgiveable). Unfortunately, the inconsistencies I just described cover central themes that are being used as the basis for the story and setting.

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Originally Posted by sandwich_bird

For example, I think that the vast majority of players (young and old alike) don't question how actually feasible it is to have psychic powers like the ghosts do. We just kinda assume that it makes sense. But why? There is no real proof in the real world that psychic powers are possible. One of the reason is that no proper explanation was given (as far as I know).

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I think it's reflected on in Twilight how terran science (in-universe) doesn't have a bona fide explanation for psionics (in-universe). Make of that what you will.

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Originally Posted by sandwich_bird

To be honest, it's kinda hard to say exactly what level of generality is acceptable/not acceptable. It's fair to say that this value is closely related to the level of seriousness of the universe though. For example, I really don't care about the science behind Warhammer 40k or the Power Rangers. It's so over the top that they can do anything they want.

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I dunno. W40K is over the top in a sense, but it's consistant over the top...ness. It's an iffy example to use as I'd cite it as an example of science-fantasy rather than science fiction though. Its lack of scientific explanations also works on a thematic sense, as while they're not entirely absent, they make sense thematically in that humanity doesn't even understand much of the technology it operates, even worshipping it in some cases. W40K is over the top, but I'd still call it a serious universe.

As for Power Rangers...yeah. You know, although I've appreciate PR series that have had a more serious tone (e.g. RPM and PRIS), no-one could accuse the setting of being a serious one. I'd still classify it as another science-fantasy example though, as it has elements of both, the amount of both varying per season, sometimes with one being completely absent. I'll accept that in the PR universe, the moon has a breathable atmosphere. What's harder to get my brain around is why the villains only send out one monster at a time...:confused:

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Originally Posted by sandwich_bird

But, I do care about the science behind a serious movie like Prometheus. At one point in the movie, they say that the android aboard their ship has studied communication techniques and (few) alien symbols so much that he'll be able to speak to anything on demand. This is completely impossible and is one of the (many) things that threw me off in this movie.

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That actually didn't bother me too much. It's a stretch, but it's a stretch that's required for the plot to work. Likewise, I'll accept that a black goo can do its stuff because it's plot-relevant as well, lack of explanation aside. The most I got miffed about the science in Prometheus was the notion that the mala'kak and humanity are 100% identical on the genetic level. From a scientific standpoint, it's bogus. From a plot standpoint, it's unnecessary. You could have a lower percentage and still get the point across. Works on the plot level, works (more) on the science level.

Again, Prometheus is a case where lack of consistancy bothers me more than realism, namely why mala'kak lore is retconned into the Engineers. But at the end of the day, it was the directing and characters/lack of development for them that shot down the film for me more than anything. Scientific accuracy can add to a story, but it's never been a make or break for me.

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Originally Posted by Hawki

What's harder to get my brain around is why the villains only send out one monster at a time...:confused:

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It wasn't only one monster all the time. Also, if this does your head in, how about the villain never trying to create a monster that is invulnerable to the super-duper mega-attack that invariably kills so many previous other monsters as well? Oh, Rita Repulsa, will you never learn?