Video games have evolved since the days of Pong. Advances in technology and computers have allowed for more sophisticated storytelling in video games. In reality, though, writing has been a part of gaming’s DNA for a long time. Games such as Zork allowed player participation entirely through text prompts, and some well-known authors have contributed to fan-favorite games.
With the deep connection writing and video games hold, a number of games will appeal to writers. They can be powerful tools to create scenarios for characters. Adventures in games with extensive quest options can be the basis for other written adventures. Just playing a game may also be a good catharsis for the struggles writers face in the creative process. Here are some great games that will resonate with many creatives.
7 Watch New Stories Unfold In The Sims
Will Wright’s The Sims is a simple premise: create custom characters, build their homes, and guide them in their daily lives. Titles in the franchise have allowed Sims to work, relax, get married, and even have children.
This game offers an intimate look at The Sims’ lives, which makes it an interesting creative tool for coming up with stories. The characters pantomime and speak in Simlish, so a creative imagination can fill in the blanks. Designing the Sims mean that they can be anyone the creator wants, and the modding community has added even more options for creativity.
6 Skyrim Is The Ultimate Choose-Your-Own-Adventure Experience
Who doesn’t know what The Elder Scrolls 5: Skyrim is? It seems like every time a new console is released, it automatically shows up on the system. At the time, the game was incredible, allowing anyone to take on the role of the Dragonborn, and go on a quest in a massive world to save Skyrim. Or not.
The thing about Skyrim is that the environment is so massive and there is so much to do, that the game has plenty of flexibility to create one’s own story. This makes it a wellspring of inspiration for writers. The Dragonborn can get involved in the Civil War between the Imperials and the Stormcloaks, or declare neutrality and become a bounty hunter.
5 Alan Wake Battles Otherworldly Demons, And His Own
In some ways, being a writer is like wrestling with one’s demons. The writer has to look deep within, conjuring images and scenarios for one’s characters, challenging them, and sometimes torturing them. This may bring forth something from the subconscious that the writer may rather have left contained.
Thriller writer Alan Wake becomes the protagonist in his own story on the Xbox 360 when a dark force abducts his wife, and he must battle through these forces in Bright Falls. Any writer who is a fan of Stephen King will enjoy this game’s horror vibes, and his struggles with writing his own story will be all too easily relatable.
4 Steve Jackson’s Sorcery Is A Living Storybook
Inkle developed a series of games based on Steve Jackson’s choose-your-own-adventure games. These take the hero through a vast fantasy setting fraught with monsters, enemies, and traps.
All the action in the game is told through beautiful prose writing, which unfolds page by page. The game map is gorgeously illustrated, looking like something out of J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings. The branching paths mean any writer can explore the story options, and even rewind a step to explore another path.
3 City Of Heroes Is A Game Of Grand Adventures
Massively multiplayer online role-playing games (MMOs) are an excellent source of inspiration for writers. They can take place in a variety of science-fiction and fantasy settings. City of Heroes is an MMO where aspiring superheroes or supervillains can don their brightly-colored tights and embark on comic book-inspired adventures.
If one needs proof that City of Heroes is a great game for writers, look no further than Mercedes Lackey. She wrote The Secret World Chronicles with contributions from Steve Libbey, Cobey Martin, and Dennis Lee, based on her adventures with her friends in the game.
2 Write The Novelist’s Story
The Novelist from Orthogonal Games is a curious title, in which control is not taken of the titular author, but rather, a ghost in a summer home observing him and his family. This game takes a look at the struggles a writer has with completing a manuscript, while at the same time trying to balance the needs of his family.
Gameplay consists of exploring the notes and items scattered around the house to gain clues to the characters’ needs. Depending upon whose desires are discovered, the ghost can influence the novelist to pick an option, as well as to find compromises between the family members.
1 Toss A Coin To The Witcher
The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt popularized Polish author Andrzej Sapkowski’s fantasy novel universe in the gaming community. It follows outcast Witcher Geralt of Rivia, as he searches for his former student, Ciri, across a vast fantasy land, as well as taking on paid work for villagers along the way.
This game has everything a fantasy writer could hope for in a video game. The Witcher 3 exists in a beautifully detailed world, with diverse characters, and multiple side quests for writers to forge their own story.