Originality and story plagiarism in games

[GarageGothic]

This is related to the discussion on innovation in the "how much time do YOU spend?"-thread (http://www.agsforums.com/yabb/index.php?board=3;action=display;threadid=6513). But I decided to start a separate topic to avoid straying too much from the original heading.

It's no secret that the genres and plots of many (most?) adventure games are derivative of other media. At first it was just a genre thing (the first Space Quest games are sci-fi parodies, but don't refer as directly to Star Wars and whatnot as the later games refer to Star Trek, Terminator, Blade Runner etc. - but let's keep the parodies out of this, for now, since they HAVE to make intertextual references to BE parodies) but as games got more sophisticated and started to focus on storytelling, especially Sierra began harvesting ideas from popular movies (or the novel they were adapted from):

Phantasmagoria is more or less The Shining set in a creepy old mansion instead of a hotel. The sequel is in parts very similar to Jacob's Ladder. Gabriel Knight - Sins of the Fathers seems to be inspired by Alan Parker's Angel Heart and The Beast Within is Interview with the Vampire with werewolves.

I'm sure there's a reason for this. First and foremost, that sometimes you watch a movie and think: "that would make a great game - imagine actually being the main character in a story like that, experiencing it from within!". Another approach would be to watch a movie which you might or might not like, but certain parts would stick with you, sparking other ideas.

I'm sure that some of these games, if made as movies, would be accused of plagiarism. But in games this is apparently accepted. Making it interactive seems to make enough difference to turn it into something new.

My game-in-progress, Shadowplay, was heavily inspired by Theodor Roszak's novel Flicker as well as Arturo Perez-Reverte's The Club Dumas. They share certain basic elements: The rediscovery of long forgotten director, the hypnotic power of films, strange religious doctrines, and the search for hidden meaning in a number of old films (books in Perez-Reverte's story). The characters, the mystery and the themes are entirely different in the game, but the basic concept and story structure is very similar. It related to Flicker as Phantasmagoria relates to the Shining, you could say.

Do you consider this a problem? After learning that Darren Aronofsky (Pi, Requiem for a Dream) is working on an adaptation of Flicker, I'm even more set on distancing the game from the novel. Not for fear of lawsuits, but to avoid players regarding the game as derivative.

Tell me if you've had similar considerations, and what you think of these "more than coincidental" similirities between games and other mass media products, be it film, tv, books or comics (not too many games inspired by songs, paintings, and sculptures yet )

[M]

Well, nothing's original these days (very little anyway). The same formulas are always used. Maybe its because the audience are familar with the originals and lending traits from movies/tv/books/whatever to a game enables the audience to relate to it more instantly. Thats why spoofs and parodies are popular.

I think one level of the unoriginality comes from unconscious boundaries we have in our minds. For example, when ppl thought the world was flat - they couldnt comprehend that the world was round. You don't notice the shape of the world slope into a circle when you walk along - you look on and everything seems the same level - you can see the horizon. You are brought up to the believe that and its hard to shake it. Maybe coz people are brought up with stories and ideas from media like films and tv, its a little bit more difficult to think outside of these boundaries as well. So we just repeat them.

But what do I know. That could just be a load of sh!t what I just said.

[DGMacphee]

I think Narangas summed it up best:

"There's nothing new under the sun!"

One of my fav games, Grim Fandango, owe heavily to films like Touch of Evil and Casablanca.

One of my other fav games, Seasons of Sakura, borrows characters from well known anime, like Neon Genesis Evangelion.

I think stuff like this allows for a degree of reinterpretation of stories and genres.

As we move forward in time, or social view remodifies such stories in different contexts.

Look at Western films, which all contain similar elements but differ slightly through history.

In the 30s and 40s, Westerns were a good guy vs bad guy type story to aid in depression-era optimism. E.g. High Noon, The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance

In the 50s, films were more about more alien elements and began to humanise Native Indians (they weren't just bad guys and they did just talk in their pow-wow dialogue), which showed similairity to the McCarthy-era blacklisting of screenwriters. E.g. The Searchers

In the 60s and 70s, the outlaws became the heroes, similar to the anti-authoritarianism of the period. E.g. Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, Easy Rider (just substitute horses for motorcycles)

In the 80s, westerns became more big-budget blockbusters, most of which failed. Similar to the 80s, the focus was money. E.g. Heaven's Gate

And in the 90s, some Westerns became alienated and morally ambiguous (which sums up the 90s too). E.g. Unforgiven

Although they borrow elements from the same genre, the interpretation is different, based on society.

And I think something similar (although not exactly the same) applies to other media, such as books, music, and computer games.

[MillsJROSS]

I don't know if I agree that there is nothing "new under the sun." Yes some games stick to a genre, and in that sense, there is nothing new. We are influenced by the work of others in making our games. If we totally alienated our work from previous works we might alienate the player from the game. But just because a games genre and general mood might be influenced by a book, movie, etc... doesn't mean that storyline isn't unique and original. It just happens to use elements that exist to tell it's story succesfully.

Let's take my game for example (as I'm not going to interpret others work, when I could be completly off) Ace Quest. Basically you have your good guy bad guy thing going on here. A very common element in the making of stories. You need conflict and resolution. Your bad guy has a sidekick with more intelligence, also done before. The main character is made to feel inferior through the narrator, Space Quest was a game that did this well. Its humor ranges from punny to  shocking. All these humors have been explored. But whens the last time you heard a story of a man so fat he's causing a flux in gravity, pulling the earth towards the sun? I'd like to think that this makes the game original. Yes it takes elements that already exist, but it is original.

And yes, it is hard to think outside of the box. If everyone could do it all the time, though, there would me no metaphorical box, anyway. The box is what stands for what we have already set in stone, but once you go outside the box and convince others that this can also be done, then that idea is now in the box too.

As for you Garage Gothic. If you feel that your homage of these books you enjoyed is taking you away from originality, and being original is what you want, then yes, try to be original. You can still employ the elements that these books use, and you already have strayed from them. Try to find a balance, though. Use what the books gave you, but don't have your main focus on something original.

And if you really want to think about it, the Adventure Game market is relatively new, and really untapped, as far as originalty is concerned. And the masses don't even crave for originality, as can be seen by Hollywoods popularity.

-MillsJROSS

[DGMacphee]

Mills, that's similar to my point.

Even though there is nothing new in a general sense, out interpretations create something new for us (hence the difference in westerns over the period).

Which brings me to my Eugene Delacroix quote from Capt Mostly's post: "Newness is in the mind of the artist who creates, and not in the object he portrays".

[Barcik]

I think what you described above is not 'stealing', not even 'borrowing', but inspiration. And there is absolutely nothing wrong with that.

Each great work, even the most original is inspired by something. Let's take Sir Tolkien's work for example. The man pretty much created the classical fantasy genre. But did he create it from scratch? No. His works were inspired largely by many myths, such as the Nordic ones. Many of the elements in The Lord of the Rings and the Hobbit are very similar to elements in ancient myths. But does this make his work unoriginal? I very much doubt so.

To sum it all up, there is nothing wrong with inspiration.

[Archangel (aka SoupDragon)]

I was astounded on reading Terry Brook's first Shannara trilogy that he had somehow essentially copied Tolkein (right down to the winged riders), and not only got away with it, but was praised highly for it! So I wouldn't worry too much about plagiarism, especially not in an amateur adventure game.

[Trapezoid]

Wanna hear a new song I made? It's called Wild Frontier.

[Matt Brown]

Wanna hear a new song I made? It's called Wild Frontier.

ROTFL

Thanks Trap, that made my day

I liked it...but it needs more cowbell

[rodekill]

Everything starts out as an idea inspired from something else.
The trick is to develop your ideas into something original.

Rode Kill started out very similar to Roger Wilco (maybe less of a moron but still), but I like to think that he's starting to take on a life of his own.

[Barcik]

I was astounded on reading Terry Brook's first Shannara trilogy that he had somehow essentially copied Tolkein (right down to the winged riders), and not only got away with it, but was praised highly for it! So I wouldn't worry too much about plagiarism, especially not in an amateur adventure game.

And what shit that was! I couldn't take it past the 50th page.

[m0ds]

They say there's nothing new under the sun, but under the ground...

[Las Naranjas]

Alls fair in love was and post modernism.

If you're really unoriginal, but don't want to parody, just call it an "homage". It's the hip thing to do!


DG- On the NGE-Sakura things, according to HOTU, Sakura was made in '92 (The translation was '97) and NGE was '94-'95. Yet you knowing my opinion of Sakura in strict literary terms, I somehow doubt the latter copied the former, but the similarities are far far far too striking to be coincidence.

:/

[Snake]

Just think of all the games, different genres, puzzles and such. It's kind of hard to be totally original. I think almost every original idea out there has been done, now there's just many offspring of the same storylines, plots and especially puzzles.


--Snake

[MillsJROSS]

As to to Terry Brooks, I attempted reading the books, but I didn't even get past the first one. I thought, "Hey, haven't I read something extremely similar to this? Yet, this book leaves a bad taste in my mouth." I couldn't feel anything for the characters, to me they were as flat as the paper.

-MillsJROSS

[DGMacphee]

Las: Holy crap!

That's freaky!

It means JAST ARE IN LEAGUE WITH MR COLOSSAL!!!  :o :o :o


Either that, or there's a screw up in the dates some where -- My guess is the Underdogs screwed it up, because I can't find any other site that lists a Japanese release date as 1992.

And you're right -- far too many similarities for it to be a coincidence

[GarageGothic]

Thank you so much Barcik for mentioning Tolkien. It made me remember watching LOTR (without having read the books), feeling that it was a blatant ripoff of Star Wars . Of course it's actually the other way around. But it made me realize that being inspired by other works isn't necessarily a bad thing. I mean, a huge part of the original Star Wars audience MUST have read Tolkien, and yet George Lucas pulled it off.

However, I agree with MillsJROSS that

"...just because a games genre and general mood might be influenced by a book, movie, etc... doesn't mean that storyline isn't unique and original. It just happens to use elements that exist to tell it's story succesfully."

That a work of fiction can be defined within a certain genre doesn't mean that it isn't original. I mean, High Noon is an original story although it's a western. But Outland, which is more or less "High Noon on a spaceship", isn't (or at least not AS original).

And to DGMcPhee: I would classify Grim Fandango as a parody. The game wouldn't work without those specific noir references. It's the Big Lebowski of adventure gaming (while, one the other hand, a game like QFG2 could easily do without the Casablanca and Maltese Falcon references).

[Barcik]

Although I have not seen Casablance, I doubt Grim Fandango is a parody. The idea of a parody is to make fun and mock, and Grim Fandango is so much more than that.

[GarageGothic]

Ok, so it's a loving tribute then

Maybe pastiche would be a better word. I'll post again when I find my thesaurus

[Captain Mostly]

in case no one's spotted this, Naranjas (much as I respect him) wasn't exactly the first to say:

"There's nothing new under the sun!"

Indeed, it was a Biblical quote (I THINK old testament, but I may be wrong).

Anyway, in an interesting addition to this thread, Jesus once said
"And lo, adventure games will suffer from a steadily decreasing pool of ideas as the designers start thinking of plots exclusivly in terms of the situations, and not-at-all in terms of the characters within those situations. Thus, when all player characters can be divided into three groups: Larry clones, Guybrush clones and Simon the sorccerer clones. THEN the adventure game will be dead. LONG LIVE FEMALE ADVENTURE GAME LOAD CHARACTERS!!!"
at which point he drove the childs pedal-car into the side of the tample and I woke up...

[edmundito]

"Good artists copy; great artist steal." -- Pablo Picasso

[plasticman]

in my eyes, when you create something "new" all you've done is assembling bits of existing material together, only in a way that hasn't been done before. it's hard to come up with a new concept, but it's easy to apply an old one to any random subjet. chances are you're the first one to do that...
what i found interesting at first about independent games was the possibility of creating original, unusual works that no company would have dared to produce. taking inspiration in other medias is natural, and the adventure game approach can always give the subject a new dimension.

now back to working on my cmi fangame...

[Las Naranjas]

Grim Fandango was open about it's mixing of genres, so whilst the Casablanca, Maltese Falcon etc. etc. references were very explicit, it wasn't parody, since in a truly post modern way it was placing them in the Land Of The Dead context and exploring that.

And I think DG only quoted me because I used it in the context of adventure games.

It's context dudes!

[GarageGothic]

Ugh, postmodernism - been there, done that, wake up and smell the millennium, the 80's are over, and so is Quentin Tarantino's career judging from the Kill Bill-trailer! Sorry, you would react that way too if you'd spent ten years dissection postmodern theories and films. Seriously though, I think the postmodernism defense is getting old. Writers have always stolen from eachother, making tributes, tipping their hats, it's the way art works, we don't need Umberto Eco to explain that.

In regards to what Jesus said:

LONG LIVE FEMALE ADVENTURE GAME LOAD CHARACTERS!!!

(I presume he meant "lead characters", but I wouldn't want to correct the lord almighty). Maybe there weren't that many female adventure game characters in Gallileia around the early A.D.'s, (although I'm sure they had Rosella and Laura Bow). But these days it seems that female player characters are getting to be a cliché in adventure games.  April Ryan, Kate Walker, the girl in Legacy: Dark Shadows, the female journalist in Journey to the Center of the Earth plus the female characters in multi-character games such as Grace in GK2 and 3, and Nico in Broken Sword 2 and 3. It looks as if the female player character could be the new cliché in adventure gaming - not because of her gender, but because they all more or less look the same and are all either journalists or some other kind of investigator. The Uncertainty Machine didn't do much to change this.
Now, with the protagonist in Legacy: Dark Shadows, the title character of Goldmund's Donna, and Dinah Burroughs in my game, Shadowplay, maybe we're close to creating an even more specific cliché: The gay female player character.

[Captain Mostly]

I know las! I was messin'!




soz






As for female characters, I'm pretty sure they're still a minority (although a minority that's steadily filling out with identicle clone-people). But more importantly, there's SO MUCH space for expantion with the ladies-roles that people will surly end up creating fresh character almost by accident. I mean, it could be any group of people. In fact, it's not so much that I want to see minority lead-characters, rather that if people initially say: I'm gonna' make a game with a black-guy as the lead, they're then going to be thinking about how the characters blackness would effect the way he acts, or interacts, or is interacted with. And if people start thinking this, then they're ACTUALLY thinking about their character, rather than saying: "Hey! I'll put a crazy white trash type guy in a mad-cap situation!!!" then churning out yet-another two dimentional (in so many ways) mouth-piece for all their "wize cracks".

I don't know if I'm putting accross my point clearly. I don't want to offend people (because there's enough facets to making games that poor or even non-existant characterisation doesn't mean it'll be a rubbish game over-all) but if people are so intent on setting themselves challanges (like "I'm gonn'a make a game in ONE HOUR!!!" etc) why does no one set themself, or set other people, the challange of "I'm gonna make a game, WHERE I'VE REALLY THOUGHT ABOUT MY LEAD CHARACTER!!!" ?

All these sprite jams, and idea pooling, but I NEVER see anyone setting out to really think about how a character might react in verious situations. And isn't it almost always how the character would react that ought to steer the story? We are following that character aren't we?

I liked alien rape escape at first, becuase I thought "Hey! I've never plays a game about a bimbo porn-star before!"  and I expected the fact that you were a bimbo porn-star to have a tageble impact on how the game plays. I was a little dissapointed that imediatly she starts to act like every other game character ever (in that she climbs out of windows, crawls through air-vents, combines improbable object blah blah blah) without ever even mentioning how this is un-usual behavior for her!!

Why aren't we ever asked to think like a porn star instead of think like an adventure gamer?

[GarageGothic]

Sorry, I'm no good with irony. Especially coming from religious celebrities