Developing a Story for Your Game: A Practical Process

While there are many ways to go about developing stories for games, in this blog post on narrative design we will focus on a process that has been passed down through multiple generations of game developers over the industry’s relatively short lifespan. This process is simple, extensible, and gives us every opportunity to stay on track and not get “lost in the weeds” during pre-production. Not every step is needed on every project, but the process is presented here in its entirety for those who wish to apply it to their current projects or practice it on their own.

This simplified approach boils down to five steps:

1. Developing a Concise Story Seed
2. Building out the Story Treatment
3. Laying out a Narrative Flowchart
4. Documenting the Walkthrough
5. Writing Dialog

Step #1 – Developing a Concise Story Seed

The Story Seed, known elsewhere as the “logline” or “pitch” (what’s the use of being in games if we can’t have our own jargon?), is the step in which you do your best impression of a salesperson or a Hollywood producer, and for good reason. If your Story Seed intrigues project stakeholders, there’s a good chance you’re working with an idea that can be developed into something truly memorable.

Another advantage of Story Seeds is that they are short. If you need the perfect concept for a sixty-hour epic, ideas can be dreamt up and discarded quickly. If you need lots of brief stories for an ongoing episodic concern with an insatiable need for new content, many ideas can be quickly sanity-checked before they are allowed to move on to the next stage.

For our example, we’ll pitch a sequel to one of the oldest and most enduring Greek myths, that of good ol’ King Midas: King Midas 2: Gold Harder. Midas, if you remember, asked Dionysus (the god of wine and ritual madness, among other things) for the power to turn whatever he touched into gold. It did not end well, especially for his daughter (we’ll forget for a moment that this last part was apparently a wrinkle added by Nathaniel Hawthorne in the mid-nineteenth century. Another lesson for you: never let facts get in the way of a good story).

A quick note on gameplay: for simplicity’s sake, let’s assume that King Midas 2: Gold Harder is a game in the style of Half-Life 2, a shooter at its heart, but one with “real-world” or “in-game” puzzles that sometimes involve physics (for example, pushing a crate up against the outer wall of a building to gain access to the roof). In our game, Midas will have the power to turn people and objects (including liquids) into solid gold, but also to return them to their original states. He will shoot golden orbs from his hand that, while they look exquisite, are very painful for enemies to be struck by.

It is only with the game’s mechanics in mind that we can create a story that we are confident will dovetail nicely with gameplay, to the point where gameplay can become a storytelling device all on its own.

With all this in mind, let’s take a crack at our Story Seed:

When King Midas leaves his castle to beseech Dionysus to rid him of the “Midas Touch” and give him the power to restore his daughter Zoe to her original state, Zoe’s gilded statue is stolen, and he has just forty-eight hours to find her before she is lost, this time forever.

A good Story Seed clearly defines three things:

1. A strong protagonist, in this case King Midas.
2. An emotional hook: the theft (kidnapping?) of his daughter in gold statue form.
3. A clear conflict: Midas has just forty-eight hours to retrieve her from those who stole her.

Having these qualities doesn’t guarantee that anyone will be entranced by a given Story Seed, but without them the writer will undoubtedly have to revise it or let it fall to the cutting room floor in favor of another idea.

If, however, the project’s stakeholders feel you have a real winner on your hands, you may be ready to move on to the next step.

Step #2 – Building out the Story Treatment

In my experience, the Story Treatment phase is the most overlooked step in the game writing process. I have personally seen many game developers leave pre-production with little more than a Story Seed, a few plot twists, a possible ending or two, and a hazy idea of what happens in between. Beginning development of a game in which the story matters with only a vague idea of how the story unfolds always courts disaster later, the kind that invites wasted art assets, wasted time, and grumbling from the dev team.

The most important thing to establish in the treatment phase is a solid beginning, middle, and end(s) to your story. If that sounds obvious, consider again that many game developers start development of story-centric games without these guideposts to navigate by. Even a brief Story Treatment will need more high-level detail than this, however, if we’re going to move things along while keeping project stakeholders on board.

To that end, you might consider building out your treatment using this practical outline offered by Brian McDonald in his excellent book on writing, Invisible Ink: A Practical Guide to Building Stories That Resonate:

• Once upon a time…
• And every day…
• Until one day…
• And because of this…
• And because of this…
• Until finally…
• And ever since that day…

Let’s give this a try with King Midas 2:

Once upon a time… there lived a king named Midas who was given the ability to turn whatever he touched into gold. After his “gift” turned his only daughter (Zoe) into a gilded statue, he lapsed into despair. Now at the end of his life, Midas is miserable, alone, and has had most of his legendary wealth stolen out from under him, save for this statue, which serves as a haunting reminder of his greatest shame and deepest regret.

And, as the decades passed, every day… he cursed himself for being so shortsighted, while his few remaining subjects scoured the country for the one thing that might cure his daughter.

Until one day… one of these scouts “struck gold” by spotting the god Dionysus, who had made another rare appearance on earth.

And because of this… Midas set forth from his castle to confront Dionysus and strike another bargain with him, leaving the statue of his daughter unprotected.

And because of this… Midas confronted Dionysus, who let him keep the power of the “Golden Touch” but gave him the ability to transform anything he’d turned into gold back to its original form, with this caveat: both gifts would disappear forever after forty-eight hours.

And because of this… Midas was forced to do Dionysus a favor in return, which kept him away from his castle longer than he expected.

And because of this… the statue of his daughter was stolen.

And because of this… Midas was forced to pursue a Persian Pirate Prince through hostile territory, using his gifts to defeat enemies, escape traps, and manipulate his environment (puzzles) en route to retrieving his daughter’s statue before his gifts vanished. Etc., etc.…

Here you can keep going, touching on each major plot point, character, and conflict, including any major allies, antagonists, unique scenarios, major changes in setting, and more, while saving any “B stories” or side quests for their own Story Treatments (perhaps hinting at them here if they overlap significantly with the main storyline).

Until finally… King Midas lies dying, but is able to transform his daughter back to flesh just before his gifts disappear, with just enough time to bid her goodbye and to see that she is now safe from harm.

And ever since that day… Midas’ soul was at rest, and his daughter lived happily ever after, the Pirate Prince (now reformed) at her side, helping her restore her father’s kingdom to its former glory.

There is no set length for Story Treatments, though you should keep them focused on the big picture. For brief episodic stories, a few paragraphs might be enough. Even for an epic tale that supports sixty hours of gameplay, a truly high-level treatment might not exceed a single page. However, for more robust stories, several Story Treatments of varying length may be necessary. For example, stakeholders may want you to go from a Story Seed to a one-page treatment to make sure high-level executives are still on board before a writer spends the time on a separate, two-to-three-page treatment that will also make the rounds (albeit with probably fewer busy executives scrutinizing it).

As for style, I like to write these almost as prose, as I feel it keeps readers entertained. As with nearly every phase of this process, you’re continually trying to reassure those around you that this is a story worth investing considerable time, money, and energy into. That said, there’s nothing wrong with breaking the fourth wall here and there to illustrate your point.

Examples:

“…I imagine the ‘bargain’ Midas strikes with Dionysus to be the start of our tutorial…”

“…Here’s our classic ‘lose-the-world-yet-gain-your-soul’ ending…”

Step #3 – Laying out a Narrative Flowchart

With a solid treatment (or treatments) under your belt, it’s time to zoom in on your vision for the game’s narrative by mapping out the story within the larger context of the game itself. Using our Narrative Flowchart, we will decide exactly when, where, and how our story is told to the player. It is usually the longest and most labor-intensive part of the process, but well worth the time to get right. The steps after this become relatively simple with a well-thought-out Narrative Flowchart in place.

A Narrative Flowchart can take several forms. For a game with a single gameplay mechanic and a strictly linear story, such as a match-three game, you may need only an outline, similar to the treatment but more specific. Let’s look at a match-three game that uses our hypothetical story, King Midas 2: Gold Harder, from the first post in this series:

For games that contain a variety of gameplay features and storytelling methods, as well as branching (nonlinear) narratives, traditional flowcharts are more useful.

Whenever possible, I like to create Narrative Flowcharts on-site with a dev team, using a whiteboard, some different colored markers, and the collective energy of a group of creatives jazzed about the game they’re making. That said, any commonly available flowchart app will do for a writer working alone, and in a pinch, Excel is just fine too.

Before we start, let’s again consider all the features we have to work with in our example, King Midas 2: Gold Harder:

• Cinemas: the player is passive.
• Interactive (branching) dialogs: the player guides a conversation with one or more non-player characters (NPCs).
• Combat: in our case, turning people into gold statues and possibly back to flesh afterward.
• Environmental puzzles: turning liquids into solid gold and back again; turning a light object (a feather) into solid gold so its increased weight affects the environment (for example, the nest containing the feather falls out of a tree).
• Exploration: in our hypothetical game, a catch-all that includes finding collectibles, discovering items that add to the world’s lore (scrolls, books, tapestries, paintings, chatty NPCs, scripted events, etc.), important items the player needs to progress through the game, and more.

The best way to get your flowchart started is to use the major story moments in your treatment as guideposts, then work backward, continually asking yourself: “What has to happen for the player to get here?” Let’s start with a dramatic moment from our Story Treatment:

And because of this… the statue of his [Midas’] daughter was stolen.

I’m going to drive that stake in the ground, then work backward toward the beginning of our game. This is a big moment, so I’m going to make it a cinema. To keep track of how many cinemas are in the game and where they occur, I’m going to color all cells in my flowchart that contain cinemas red.

But what needs to happen before this?

Thanks to the treatment, I know that King Midas and his dimwitted man-at-arms, Cadmus, make a rare foray from their castle because Dionysus, the Greek god who gave Midas the “gift” of the Golden Touch, has been spotted not far away in an ancient temple. I know that Midas will confront Dionysus, and what will happen as a result. I also know that afterward Midas will rush back to his castle to try to cure his daughter, Zoe, only to find Zoe’s gold statue missing.

So before discovering that Zoe’s statue has been stolen, Midas needs to return to his castle. Perhaps on the way he is set upon by brigands watching the roads for an easy mark (a nice excuse to use some of the new gifts Dionysus will give Midas after their confrontation). In our flowchart, all combat sequences will be green.

But what needs to happen before this?

Perhaps before Midas can leave the Ancient Temple where Dionysus gives him the ability to reverse the Golden Touch, Dionysus asks Midas for a favor (Greek gods, amirite?). This could be a good opportunity to teach the player how to use this new gift to solve environmental puzzles. I see our Dionysus as a party animal who provides some comic relief, so perhaps his pants are stuck somewhere he can’t reach them (or won’t, because he’s lazy and has a bad hangover).

Obviously, I’m not getting into any detail regarding the puzzle (or anything else). The pants-finding I can leave to the game designer in charge of puzzles, the combat to the game designers in charge of combat, and the cinema I can describe further in the next phase, the Walkthrough.

But what needs to happen before this?

We’ll need Dionysus to reveal to Midas that he’s not going ANYWHERE until he finds the god’s pants. We can do that with a brief cinema.

But what needs to happen before this?

Midas finds Dionysus in an ancient temple built to honor the god. Perhaps BEFORE Dionysus ropes King Midas into retrieving his pants, but AFTER the god gives Midas the cure for the Midas Touch, Dionysus lets King Midas explore the ancient temple, knowing full well that the only way in or out is now sealed (again, devious buggers, these gods). This gives the player the opportunity to find a collectible we’ve hidden for them and to interact with items in the environment that fill them in on some backstory (a mural depicting the first meeting of Midas and Dionysus would be a nice touch). They could also briefly interact with Cadmus or Dionysus’ Hairdresser (another NPC), if they wish.

In my flowchart, interactive dialog sequences will be blue and notable exploration opportunities will be orange. Note that these three new gameplay sequences are stacked vertically: they can be done in any order (or skipped entirely, which will be made clear in the upcoming Walkthrough).

And so on and so forth.

Using this process, I can keep working backward until I reach the very beginning of the game. With all of this added to the flowchart, I can then look ahead to other key moments in the game’s story and work backward from those until I reach this sequence. In this way, the entire game can be plotted out (bonus points to the narrative designers with the fewest red cells, i.e. costly cinemas, in their flowchart).

Branching Narrative

Allow me to skip ahead and give an example of how we’d handle branching narrative. At this point in our story, King Midas needs to reach a harbor on the coast and find a boat quickly, so he can stay in hot pursuit of the pirate prince who stole the gold statue of his daughter, Zoe. We’ll give the player two paths to the harbor: one features more environmental puzzles than combat, and the other offers the opposite. Players who prefer one or the other can choose the gameplay experience that suits them best.

The interactive dialog at far left (blue) sits between two alternate paths. Once the player chooses a path, they’re stuck with that choice (at least in that particular saved game) until they emerge from either Fist City or Puzzle City, after which Midas reaches the harbor and the paths converge, so we’re back to one main story path for a while.

Narrative flowcharts (also known as “dependency charts”) aren’t sexy, but if you put in the time to get them right, you’ll be in great shape throughout development, and so will the rest of the team as they create the assets and functionality needed to tell the story.

There is more to Narrative Flowcharts, but this should be enough to get you on your way. Remember, this is the meat and potatoes of narrative design.

Step #4 – Documenting the Walkthrough

Congratulations!

If you’ve made it this far, the rest is downhill. The Walkthrough is simply your Narrative Flowchart with important details added to fully illustrate the entire experience from the player’s perspective.

The final result won’t look too different from a well-written walkthrough a fan might create after thoroughly playing your game from beginning to end. You can use your Walkthrough to illustrate:

1. The emotions behind each character interaction.
2. Any changes (or potential changes) to the player’s inventory (assuming they have one) from sequence to sequence.
3. Links to reference images that help game designers, artists, and others understand the settings, characters, and other things described.
4. Anything else you need to express to get your vision across.

While Story Seeds and Story Treatments, having served their purpose, are usually left by the wayside, the Walkthrough is a living document. And while keeping the same information in two places at once can be tricky, it’s a good idea to update your Narrative Flowchart with any changes as well, since it still gives you a good bird’s-eye view of the game at a glance.

In the following example, we’ll take this segment of our Narrative Flowchart and translate it into Walkthrough form. NOTE: This part of our game’s story occurs immediately after King Midas receives the “gift” (or cure) for his “Golden Touch” from Dionysus, henceforth known as the “reverse Golden Touch”: the power to turn things back from gold to their natural state.

 

Let’s start with the three sequences at far left: two interactive dialogs and some exploration.

12. INTERACTIVE DIALOG: DIONYSUS’ HAIRDRESSER

[Image: Dionysus’ Hairdresser]

Setting: ANCIENT TEMPLE
Condition: Sequence 11 (cinema: Dionysus and his hairdresser reconcile)

A brief interaction with Dionysus’ hairdresser sheds some light on their tumultuous relationship and Dionysus’ unpredictable nature, hinting at what a help and a hindrance he will be to Midas in the future.

Inventory: dagger, Flip-Flops of Swiftness

12. INTERACTIVE DIALOG: CADMUS’ THOUGHTS

Setting: ANCIENT TEMPLE
Condition: Sequence 11 (cinema: Dionysus and his hairdresser reconcile)

A brief interaction with Cadmus reveals how excited he is to have found the means to return Zoe to human form. He’ll also encourage Midas to explore the temple a bit in case there’s anything that might be useful on the journey home, and warn his king of the dangers of the road back to their castle. He is wary of Dionysus, but likes his hair.

He is also nervous about leaving the castle unprotected, as it’s constantly being broken into, even though almost all the gold has already been stolen.

Inventory: dagger, Flip-Flops of Swiftness

12. EXPLORATION: ANCIENT TEMPLE

Setting: ANCIENT TEMPLE
Condition: Sequence 11 (cinema: Dionysus and his hairdresser reconcile)

• Exploring the ancient temple to Dionysus reveals a faded mural or frieze, a sequence of panels depicting the first meeting between Midas and Dionysus, in which the overweight party god is falsely shown with washboard abs and flawless cheekbones.
• Collectible bust 1 of 100 is found somewhere in the Ancient Temple: Bust of Apollo.
• There is one flask of healing wine somewhere here.
• There is a sack of gold coins somewhere here.

Added to Inventory: sack of gold coins, flask of healing wine
Inventory: dagger, Flip-Flops of Swiftness

Why are all three of these sequences numbered twelve?

First, we know several sequences have to happen before these three, the opening cinema for example. Let’s say that, as in most games, the opening cinema is the very first thing to happen in King Midas 2. In our Walkthrough we’d assign the opening cinema the number one, and for the sake of example, let’s arbitrarily say ten other sequences take place before we reach these three at sequence twelve.

We assign the number twelve to all three of these sequences for the same reason they are stacked vertically in our Narrative Flowchart: within the game’s timeline, they become accessible to the player simultaneously but can be done in any order (or skipped entirely).

Once the player tries to exit the Ancient Temple, however, the next sequence unlocks. Let’s go ahead and translate the rest of the Narrative Flowchart into Walkthrough form. NOTE: All dialog is placeholder, just enough to get the intention across.

13. CINEMA: DIONYSUS NEEDS A FAVOR

Setting: ANCIENT TEMPLE
Condition: Player tries to exit the temple.

Dionysus has sealed the only exit to the temple. “You didn’t think I’d give you the cure for the Golden Touch for nothing, did you? Here comes the rub, chump!”

Midas is furious. He wants to get back to his castle and cure his daughter, and he’s nervous about leaving her statue unprotected. Thankfully, despite the buildup, Dionysus doesn’t want much: just his pants, which got lost during last night’s bender.

Inventory: dagger, Flip-Flops of Swiftness, sack of gold coins, flask of healing wine

14. PUZZLE: RETRIEVE DIONYSUS’ PANTS

Setting: ANCIENT TEMPLE
Condition: Sequence 13 (cinema: Dionysus Needs a Favor)

Midas must use his new gift to retrieve Dionysus’ pants before the god will let him leave the temple. Tutorial: This is the first time the “reverse Golden Touch” is used in a puzzle sequence.

Inventory: dagger, Flip-Flops of Swiftness, sack of gold coins, flask of healing wine

15. COMBAT: BRIGANDS WANT MIDAS’ HANDS

Setting: ROAD BACK TO MIDAS’ CASTLE
Condition: Sequence 14 (puzzle: Dionysus’ pants retrieved, temple exited, Midas heads toward his castle)

King Midas and Cadmus rush toward the castle to cure Midas’ daughter, Zoe, but are set upon by brigands who are pumped to see that Midas has left his castle. Somehow they’ve got the idea that if they cut off Midas’ hands, they can use them to turn things into gold. Tutorial: Dionysus’ “reverse Midas Touch” is used in combat for the first time.

Removed from Inventory: sack of gold coins, flask of healing wine
Inventory: dagger, Flip-Flops of Swiftness

16. CINEMA: STATUE OF MIDAS’ DAUGHTER IS STOLEN

Setting: MIDAS’ CASTLE (THRONE ROOM)
Condition: Sequence 15 (combat: brigands want Midas’ hands)

Midas returns to his throne room to discover that while he and Cadmus were gone, someone broke into the castle and stole the gold statue of his daughter, Zoe. Midas is crushed. He’s waited decades to find the means to cure her, letting his entire kingdom go to hell around him, and now she’s gone. Thankfully, the thief couldn’t resist leaving behind a calling card. From this clue, Midas deduces that the thief is a Persian pirate of some reputation. He must be headed back to sea with his stolen loot, and thankfully there’s only one route to the nearest harbor.

Added to Inventory: Pirate Thief’s Signature
Inventory: dagger, Flip-Flops of Swiftness, Pirate Thief’s Signature

It’s easy to see that each sequence stacked horizontally in the Narrative Flowchart gets a unique number in the Walkthrough (see 13–16). This reinforces the idea that before a given sequence is accessible to the player, the sequence before it must have occurred (or been made available). Further details about these conditions can go under the “Condition” header. You’ll also notice that any potential changes to the player’s inventory (whether they actually occur or not) are easy to track through the Walkthrough.

Most important, however, is that you take the opportunity to discuss the motivations, emotions, mood, and context of each cinema, NPC interaction, and gameplay sequence in relation to your story.

Step #5 – Writing Dialog

After giving the artists, game designers, audio designers, gameplay programmers, and others a clear roadmap for adding their contributions to the story, it’s time to flee to the quietest place you can find and hide, so you can write crisp, pointed, and at times hilarious dialog brimming with subtext that will change the lives of the players lucky enough to experience your cinemas (unless they skip them).

There are literally hundreds of good resources on the art of writing dialog, and precious little I can add to that conversation that hasn’t been said before. Instead, let’s consider the constraints we game writers must keep in mind before we start writing dialog.

Before you start, work out with your programmers, producers, audio designers, localization folks, and any other relevant parties the details of your localization pipeline, your voice-over pipeline (if applicable), and exactly how dialog will be displayed in your game (again, if applicable). For example, if your dialog will appear on-screen, will you use word balloons? Boxes at the bottom of the screen? Will they point at the person speaking? If not, how will you handle attribution? Will you need different types of balloons or boxes for different types of dialog (speech, thought, sound effects, voices coming from radios or TVs, etc.)? How will you EMPHASIZE words: all caps, italics, bold? What about dual dialog (more than one character speaking at the same time)? The more you’ve thought through the design and mechanics of how dialog is presented to the player, the more effective you’ll be at writing dialog that does your characters justice.

Here are some resources that may help:

• Blambot: Comic Book Grammar & Tradition
• Foreign Dialects: A Manual for Actors, Directors, and Writers
• American Dialects: A Manual for Actors, Directors, and Writers
• The Week: David Mamet’s 6 favorite books with amazing dialogue
• Robert McKee’s Dialogue: The Art of Verbal Action for Page, Stage, and Screen

A Final Thought: Is It, Uh… “Good”?

Unfortunately, even with other stakeholders scrutinizing a writer’s output at each phase of this process, we can’t necessarily vouch for the creativity of the story being developed (we’ll cover QA for writers in a future blog post). A story created using this process can check all the boxes and still ultimately fail to please. However, by following these steps carefully, you can be certain you won’t have to halt mid-development to solve nasty story problems while artists sit on their hands and wait impatiently. In other words, you won’t get “lost in the weeds,” which is all well and good for novelists, but not when you’ve got a development team, a limited budget, and looming milestones to worry about.

Thank you to Erin McGechaen at East Side Games for her excellent insight into story pitches. Thanks to author Brian McDonald for sharing his wisdom in his excellent book, Invisible Ink: A Practical Guide to Building Stories That Resonate, and special thanks to David Grossman and Noah Falstein for their wisdom and insight in sharing this process with me early in my career.

Two things to check before publishing: the Mamet link was labeled “Newsweek” but points to theweek.com, so I relabeled it “The Week”. I also trimmed the long Amazon search-tracking parameters from the book links.