Dark Souls - Best Story Telling in Gaming

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James Wynne of The Game Fanatics has penned an opinion article were he talks about how Dark Souls has the best story telling in gaming. Now do you all agree with him?

From Software has created more story by giving less of it and fewer answers. Dark Souls is relevant to this day and fans still hotly debate how the story actually goes. People have even made a living off of telling their versions of the lore on youtube. It’s the current pinnacle of how to use the interactivity inherent to video games in order to build an immersive story that players themselves are a part of instead of just their avatars.
More information.
 
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Good, but compared to the brilliance of Dragon Age Origins Ultimate with 200+ best awesome mods installed, Dark Souls is tiny, really far far in the past.
 
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Good, but compared to the brilliance of Dragon Age Origins Ultimate with 200+ best awesome mods installed, Dark Souls is tiny, really far far in the past.
Not a question of quantity, but quality.
Dark souls "Story telling" is brillant, as much as Planescape Torment ( in a very different and opposite way ).
 
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I disagree.
Dark Souls has impressive atmosphere and the lore of the world that you discover along the way contributes greatly to that, but it doesn't really have a "story".
I don't feel comfortable comparing it to something like Torment, a game with pages upon pages of well-crafted dialogue, even if I appreciate what Dark Souls does too.
 
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Dark Souls thread - I'd usually skip.
The best storytelling? LOL
It can be the best storytelling… in a grinder. Maybe all other grinders don't have the storytelling that good. Hell, grinders usually don't have any storytelling at all. So when it comes to grinders, DS perhaps has the best storytelling.
But cmon. Generally in gaming? LOL

Danielle Steel made bestselling books, and I adore books, yet never bought a single one by her. It's just… Regardless of her storytelling skills, I'm just not into grinding.
Perhaps the next article on Game Fanatics will be "Danielle Steel made the best storytelling in novels".
 
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Dark Souls storytelling: if at first you don't succeed, try and try again.
 
If we're talking about abstract storytelling, perhaps. :)

True about the abstract part. I think some people prefer to "find their own meaning" or some other nonsense. Hence people think Souls is the best ever when it really has a shallow story based on unclear mythology. I will leave now before the Souls defenders have a chance to roast me.

PS: But what do I know about Souls? I only completed Demon Souls 4 times, Dark Souls 3 times, and Dark Souls 2 twice. So I'm a noob. ;)
 
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Dark Souls barely has a story to begin with.
There is also rarely any "telling" of that.

Think System Shock 2, but without the main story. Just the fragments you find on your way.

Yeah, I don't think the author has any idea what he is talking about. Confusing setting and atmosphere with story.
 
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I think setting and atmosphere can tell a story, though.

Take Oblivion for example. Many people said the caves, ruins, forts, etc., were "copy-pasted", unoriginal, bland, etc. Yet if you really observed these areas, you could see they all had a story to tell, a story unique to their location, told with their setting and atmosphere. I never once felt they were uninspired, however, I pick up on subtlety a lot in things like games, where other people just completely miss or ignore.

I'm sure Dark Souls tells a story with its setting, atmosphere and mood. A picture can say a thousand words, well, a game's atmosphere can also say a thousand words, too, as could be the case with the Souls games.

Disclaimer - I never played a Souls game, so take that for what you will. :)
 
I've put in 240 hours on DS1 and 100 hours on DS2. Had they said best, atmosphere, exploration and rewards for exploration, combat, world design, I could get behind any of that but best story telling? Sorry, after 2 games and 340 hours I still couldn't tell someone the story.
 
I've read the arguments for why Dark Souls has a such a great story and I have to disagree. The argument seems to be that it has some kind of incredibly elaborate story that it's not telling you about and that you have to piece together yourself. But I'm not entirely convinced that's true. I think it's just as likely that the designers added a whole bunch of random things in with cryptic bits of flavor text and dialog, and that people are just reading what they want to read into it.

It's still a great game and the atmosphere is great. But I'm not convinced that it actually has a story, let alone that it's the best story telling in gaming.
 
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I think the game definitely does not have the "best story", but I think it delivers a very good example of storytelling that doesn´t rely on exposition and is woven into exploration instead.

Some games facilitate interactive storytelling primarily via dialogue choices, this one does it via exploration and encouraging use of imagination.
It gives players an opportunity to become virtual archeologists who collect fragments of evidence provided via level and art design, small bits of NPC talks or item descriptions and through these possibly gain more insight into the setting and their purpose in the gameworld.
There is a story of what transpired before players enter the scene and there is a story surrounding players themselves, but there isn´t quite enough of the above mentioned fragments for these to be conclusive, they´re ambiguous (back)stories, as far as the complete picture goes.
There´s enough evidence for smaller parts to be reasonably conclusive though. For the other parts, those who feel like employing their imagination can try to fill in the blanks themselves and there´s usually at least some evidence to anchor these blanks somewhere.
Story-wise it´s a stranger in a strange land game where the land doesn´t really care player is a stranger, except for taking advantage of it when it comes to the core plot.

Even if I´d concede there´s isn´t "a story", at least not in a traditional sense, the game still presents players with events constituting its lore as well as happenings "in the now" and I´d say it does a good job utilizing storytelling techniques unique to the medium to convey these. The nebulous story aspects also go well hand-in-hand with the game´s intended oppressive general atmosphere.

The game is also not a primarily story driven one and most of the above is pretty much an optional bonus. It´s certainly not a game for those who need a strong story drive to engage in (continuing) playing, but for the others there´s still a fantastic combat, well crafted atmosphere elements, level design and exploration with rewards besides lore/story bits. And, as usual, there´s always a place for an emergent story stemming from just progressing through the game and I´d say Dark Souls provides a good ground for this to be possibly a memorable one, particularly on a first playthrough, thanks to its non-linearity, varied encounter design, difficulty balance or online aspects.

If the game was supposed to be a primarily story driven experience I´d say its storytelling is definitely inadequate, but as an additional means to immerse players in the setting and possibly inspire some detective work I think it´s pretty damn alright.
Personally I don´t even really care whether the complete "story" in creators´ heads is good or not, or whether this approach stemmed more from budgetary rather than artistic reasons, I only know I enjoyed the digging and engaging with the game´s story elements on the side was fun and refreshing.

I disagree with the title of the article (haven´t read the article itself), partially because, as implied above, I don´t think this type of storytelling with Dark Souls´ level of obtuseness would work well in games where story is a primary focus, and partially because I don´t believe there´s any approach to storytelling inherently best for computer games in the first place.

I also don´t find Dark Souls´ execution to be flawless - I don´t like that some of the more important facets can only be discovered pretty much by accident and I think there´s a bit too much blanks for its own good (whereas Dark Souls 2 comes with somewhat fewer blanks, but some of those present are big enough to prevent any reasonable inference whatsoever).

Overall, in my book Dark Souls´ storytelling was adequate, well fitting with the whole and refreshingly creative (though not necessarily unique) and I´m glad this kind of approach has its place in the gaming landscape.

There are other ways to take advantage of unique possibilities of the medium when it comes to storytelling and I don´t think there´s much need to put some above the others. How well these work in concert with other design aspects is what I consider of importance and worthier material for comparisons.
 
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I've read the arguments for why Dark Souls has a such a great story and I have to disagree. The argument seems to be that it has some kind of incredibly elaborate story that it's not telling you about and that you have to piece together yourself. But I'm not entirely convinced that's true. I think it's just as likely that the designers added a whole bunch of random things in with cryptic bits of flavor text and dialog, and that people are just reading what they want to read into it.

It's still a great game and the atmosphere is great. But I'm not convinced that it actually has a story, let alone that it's the best story telling in gaming.

These "gaming" journalists are so cringe worthy.

"Look, I like Dark Souls! I totally get what it's about! That means I'm cool and I haven't lost my hardcore gamer street cred, right?"

I liked this series better when the mainstream knew nothing about this and when I had to import the Hong Kong version of Demon's Souls to be able to play it in English.

And no it doesn't really have a story. The designer of Demon's Souls said in an interview that he was inspired by English dark fantasy books he read at a child and that what impressed him the most was "the feeling of barely understanding what he read".
 
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