The story is about halfway over, so I think now is a good time for an intermission post.

Let’s talk about characters.

It’s said that the eight worst words a reader can say is “I don’t care what happens to these people.” That highlights the writer’s goal: above all else, you must make the audience care. Your characters should be relateable and well-rounded enough for people to form an emotional attachment with them. If you can’t do that, then it doesn’t matter how meaningful or well-written their struggles and stories are; there will always be something missing.

People always say the key to this is to make your characters feel “human”, a vague, all-encompassing term that I believe means different things to different people. There are many components to consider: personality, history, relationships, character arc, and probably many more. I think the one that’s most relevant here is traits. Characters should have multiple traits; they should react to different events in different ways and display different facets of their personality from time to time. That’s what real people are like – complex, a gestalt of innumerable qualities. Reducing characters to single personality traits can be convenient shorthand, but it makes them flat. Real people don’t have only one or two traits, so those characters don’t feel like real people. They feel like props and puppets acting out a scene, because they are; in other words, it breaks suspension of disbelief.

That’s the problem we have here. We have precisely one character with a multi-faceted personality, subtly different reactions to events, and realistic and relateable motivations. He feels real, and so we can get emotionally invested in him more easily. The problem is that the game refuses to acknowledge this. It insists that no really it’s an ensemble piece, all the characters are just as good as Dehl here look at them aren’t they wonderful??? They’re not, though. Act talked about something similar in FiOS, coming up with a test to demonstrate the problem: try to describe a character without mentioning anything purely factual like physical attributes; describe them wholly in terms of their personality traits, basically. Let’s try this with, oh, let’s say Santes:

She talks a lot. She tends to talk about inane things and go off on weird tangents. She honestly sounds like she might be mentally impaired, like she’s stuck in the mindset of a child. She seems to have a good heart, though, and often shows compassion, but she’s just as likely to get distracted by something shiny. And, uh…

…Not very substantial, is it? Yet she hogs most of the screen time, while Dehl’s character arc is being kept in the background. She and the many characters like her don’t use their screen time effectively at all, however – almost every cutscene is just “Look at my single character quirk, I’m so witty!” ad nauseum. It’s always just the same set of quirks: Santes is crazy, Zargos is soft-spoken and down-to-earth, Fero is a kooky hunter. It’s that repetition that really exposes the problem; they occur over and over again but they never show us anything different, therefore that single trait must be all that exists of their perso. (And that’s not even counting the characters who are closer to a full personality but who change as the plot demands. Is Qualstio a nice guy with a prickly exterior, or his he a jerk the whole way down? The answer seems to be whichever is most convenient for the current scene, never stabilizing on a clear personality.) The whole thing feels a bit like a cartoon, honestly: grossly exaggerated caricatures, and an eternal status quo. But this isn’t an episodic cartoon where the status quo must remain fixed and there’s not enough time to explore the setting. This is, supposedly, a full, complete narrative where the world and people are supposed to change.

That’s another thing: there’s been no character development. None. I mean I guess Ques has some, a bit, but that’s really it. Three of five chapters in, and the characters are still the same as they were at the start. It’s good writing to have your characters evolve and change over the course of a long story so we aren’t stuck with the same routine for forty hours straight (Santes and Zargos I’m looking at you), but I think that’s also a component of the “human” element. Real people are fluid; they react, change, and grow in response to events. These characters react and reference past events on a cerebral level, but I mean, Fell manipulating everyone into killing Desmon doesn’t seem to have had much of an emotional impact on anyone other than Dehl. No one else really had an investment in her trust to begin with, but that’s a weakness too – if you’re going to have all these characters, why are you purposefully writing them out of the plot? There are plenty of opportunities for character development, but they’re never taken. When the heavy stuff is going down, the bit characters are mysteriously silent. I mean for chrissakes Santes was in a war, surely she can have an opinion on these tragic deaths that seem to be happening around her a lot?

This may just be a textbook case of Too Many Characters. It does often feel like the game has more characters than it knows what to do with. I Miss the Sunrise has even more and I thought it handled them well, but this is earlier in the developer’s career so maybe he hasn’t mastered the juggling act yet. Certainly there are lot of characters that could be cut.

As for the world… there’s just so little substance. The story scratches the surface of a variety of different things, but it never plunges very deep. We see a few facets of Wadassia, Nal, and Fortifel in their quests, but the characters never inquire or investigate into deeper matters, even when it’s staring them in the face (like Metsueno’s politics in Fortifel). There’s breadth, but never depth. Just how much of a monopoly does Wadassia have, and how much control does this let them exert over the world? Why is Nal a blighted wasteland? How does magic work?

This is important because the plot is, supposedly, about the characters trying to fix their broken world, but how can they do that when they never seem to have any interest in these places’ circumstances? How can they find solutions if they don’t analyze potential problems? Ironically, it was the very beginning, in chapter 1, that actually did this well – the guild directly focused on and investigated the ecology problem, and that led them to the source of the issue. But they didn’t do that for Nal or Fortifel. The plot’s just… happened to them. They haven’t done anything proactive.

On a fundamental level, what I think the story needs most is direction. It can’t seem to decide on what it wants to do. Is it a travelogue? Is it a witty, lighthearted ensemble piece? Is it a deconstruction of the heroic fantasy? We have a morass of interesting ideas but not enough time devoted to any of them, and it results in the thin, shallow narrative we’ve seen so far.

I wrote a big rewrite for this, but then I looked at it and realized I was writing a completely new story. There is no easy fix here; the story is missing half its plot. The most I can say for sure is that the interludes should be nuked from orbit. Other than that, it’s just a lot of building blocks without any blueprint.

I can give some direction in broad strokes, depending on what story we’re telling. I think the episodic, character-driven ensemble piece could easily work – honestly, it’s probably what the story is closest to right now. Most importantly, we need to care about the characters. Their personalities and relationships need to be grounded and well-established. They can’t change on a dime to suit the plot or a joke. Cutscenes should also mean something, either by showing additional depth or by making the characters change and develop, instead of just filling space.

I think something that would really help here would be a party chat system. That did wonders for developing even the most minor characters in I Miss the Sunrise. When everyone has to meet a certain threshold of subplot and enough personality to carry on a number of conversations, they come out better for it. This would also help space peoples’ character arcs out instead of having them take place over like two scenes total. Alternatively, every chapter could focus on a character instead of a location, sort of like what the game tried and failed to do with Qualstio in chapter 3. The chapters would probably have to be much shorter, though, and optional characters would probably get shortchanged even more than they already do.

Much of the overarching plot would have to be cut unless it could fit with the characters’ own arcs, and I don’t think the Watchers plotline really does. Havan and Skint might still work as foils if they were given more prominence and development. It’d probably help if their parties had more (and better) characters, instead of just being one guy each. The relationships between the three groups, as well as their differing philosophies, could be what drives the plot.

Some unnecessary characters should probably be cut – Santes (at least in her current incarnation), Sirush, maybe Kidra – to give the others more screentime and attention.

I feel this version would be the easiest to implement, as the game’s honestly pretty close to it as-is. Hardcore plot doesn’t happen until very late and the worldbuilding is so shoddy that it’s probably best if the characters distract from it. Most of the opportunities for character development are already there, they just need to be better written. Changing the tone to be more lighthearted and carefree could also help accommodate the madcap and snarky personalities the developer seems to love so much. The plot would probably be a much more standard one, but memorable and likable characters can go a long way on their own.

If it’s a travelogue, the worldbuilding needs to be better, plain and simple. Like with the characters, there are already a lot of scenes that discuss the world, they’re just terrible at it. There should be more discussion of resources, culture, religion, and especially international politics (which as I’ve already pointed out, there is a distinct lack of). This is a fantasy story, so focus should be given on how this world is different from ours. How does magic affect things beyond giving one group a sort-of-but-maybe-not-really monopoly on advanced technology? How is magic incorporated into peoples’ religious beliefs? The glossary mentions that the closest thing Fortifel has to a religion is a worship of magic itself – that’s a really cool concept, expand on it. Contrast their scientific methodology with blind faith and irrational beliefs – perhaps that’s why their technological progress is stalled, and why Metsueno is so revolutionary. (Metsueno’s specialty could even be changed from mundane technology to a different, more “secular” approach to magic research.) Above all, Fortifel should make sense instead of being a mess of contradictions.

But if it wants to do the deconstruction thing, well.

According to the developer, the central theme is scope: how your beliefs and actions can change depending on perspective and knowledge. This isn’t terribly noticeable as-is, however. It needs to be apparent from the beginning and a consistent thread that ties everything together, not just something that vaguely shows up at the end of each chapter.

Obviously, the Watchers are very important to this. They need to be given more prominence and screentime, and their connection to the theme needs to be more apparent. Play up the gamer analogy, maybe. Like a player, the Watchers experience a dissociation from their actions and a general apathy toward certain things due to their greater understanding of the world. We can see them cerebrally discussing horrific, costly plans involving the guild (perhaps at the start of each chapter), as a strategy player might, then the guild’s perspective shows the consequences play out on a human level.

The chapter plots themselves would need to be heavily reworked, though. This is an aspect where the episodic nature of the chapters really works against the game as a whole. There needs to be a full, unbroken plot arc from beginning to end instead of these mini-arcs that don’t really go anywhere. The mini-arc format could theoretically work, but it’d be tricky. They would all need to clearly and directly tie into the main plot, which in turn needs to be a constant, looming presence. The mini-arcs would have to be in service to the main arc, not the other way around. I think this may have been what the game tried to do, but, again, didn’t work, as the chapter-ending quests don’t have much to do with scope at all.

In this case, the game needs to buckle down on plot writing and sideline everything else. It would have to stop pretending to be an ensemble piece and focus its attention on the core cast. Dehl’s backstory, motivations, and actions need to be at the forefront instead of a background element, and his character arc should start where the game starts, not halfway through. Skint and/or Havan should be given more screentime to better interact and contrast with Dehl.

The travelogue format might need to be nixed, too. What we have currently is kind of the worst of both worlds – sticking to one location unnecessarily limits the plot, but there’s not enough time or detail spent on any one location to make them come alive. The locations are barely any more fleshed out than standard RPG towns, yet we spend almost the entire game in them. Taking the focus off the locations and letting the guild travel around a bit more freely would open up more room for the main plot to develop.

Something that could work, I think, would be to amp up the desperation of the Wadassian drought and make it clear that the fate of the world really hangs in the balance. (A more satisfying and dramatic resolution would be good, too – maybe there really is someone draining the canals for their own purposes, which could be good environmentalist commentary too.) In the process of fighting the drought, the guild discusses the state of the rest of the world as well (or they stumble across some shady Wadassian politicking), and Dehl could realize that all they’re doing is preserving a pretty crappy status quo. In this case, the game starts where most RPGs end, with the save-the-world plot happening all in the first arc, leaving the rest of the game to be about changing the world instead. The travelogue format could still be preserved, even, with the characters visiting locations with the express purpose of analyzing their problems and coming up with solutions instead of just general do-gooding.

…What I just outlined is a political plot centered around the world itself, though, and the Watchers don’t fit into that at all. I don’t feel like it’s possible to focus on both at the same time; they’re kind of diametrically opposed, since the Watchers exist outside of the world and don’t care about it at all. (The game’s already trying to do just that, and, come to think of it, that could be another reason why it’s fumbling things so badly.)

This one is, I think, what the game was most earnestly trying for, but it’s just not there. You need to have a plot before you can deconstruct it, and “look at my world and characters (but not too hard)” isn’t a plot.

Next time we’ll start chapter 4, the longest chapter thanks to having all the sidequests, all of them. I’m sorry I’ve been subjecting you to a line-by-line analysis; I didn’t realize just how empty this game was. It’s a fun ride but there’s not much literary analysis to be had. The plot should start getting denser soonish, but I’ll try to cover more ground each update. I can probably afford to speed things up a little.

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