My Narrative Design Process

More often than not, the approach to defining a narrative will differ from project to project, depending on the stage of game development, the IP, the nature of the game itself, the various areas of game design where narrative is applied (from in-game texts to wider game contextualisation) and the manner in which the narrative is delivered. To keep things simple, I will outline below the process I used for writing Scopely’s Star Trek Fleet Command missions.

STFC missions are essentially a scriptwriting job, with parameters based around how long a single block of character dialogue can be in a text bubble and how long any dialogue exchange can be for a single mission objective. Beyond that, writers are free to let their imagination fly.

Once I know which franchise the release is to focus on (Next Gen, DS9, Voyager, etc.), to kick things off, I start with my ideation board. I think about the kinds of concepts that resonate with a particular franchise and place them on a target board.

The next step is to focus on which of those ideas feel the strongest and develop them into slightly more detailed story outlines. To help with visualisation, it’s very useful to look for images. This is especially handy for art later on. With the TNG movie release, I created an alien similar to prawns. So, I included a picture of that creature with a biological rundown. Those terms would later be used to add believable flavour to the creatures.

Knowing the structure gives you a chance to play with it, and to create more complex stories. Here is the framework I was working on to develop an epic time-hopping mission that would see the player believe they had completed the adventure, only to find that they had not actually completed anything and had instead been sent hurtling back in time to take a different path.

The story you choose, the characters it involves, the franchise it features, and of course the tone and content, it will all go on to colour every other narrative aspect of the release, from the mission summary, to character biographies and ship descriptions. The important thing is to maintain a consistent voice across every aspect.

When we are happy with our choice of story, the next step is to map out the beat-by-beat steps of the narrative.

Given a story almost always consists of five missions, and that each mission is usually split into five objectives for the player to carry out, we already have a very clear structure for the adventure we want to tell.

To that we apply the basic technique of beginning, middle and end, call to action, hero’s journey, etc., to write our tale.

Even then, with a more complex story framework, the script can still be broken down into its constituent 5-segment parts. Essentially, it is all about knowing how to spread your story out, where best to include conflicts and resolutions, and making sure there is never a lull.

That’s just good storytelling.

As I already mentioned above, approaches to the narrative design process will vary from game to game, and from narrative designer to narrative designer. There is, however, one key approach I have yet to mention, and it was one that works across all disciplines. A good narrative designer has to enjoy storytelling. They have to love what they do. Without that, any story will always fall flat. I love telling stories. I love plots that take the player by surprise, that delight and enthral, and that love is what drives my process more than any other.