RWI and AKI presented the 'Green Pages' for narrative designers
On February 28, the presentation of the online guide for narrative designers 'Green Pages' took place at 'AKI.Lab' (located in Moscow on Bolshaya Nikitskaya). It is available on the website at https://greenbook.forgamedev.ru/.
Essentially, the project is a collection of articles about storytelling in games, game development from a narrative perspective, and other aspects of working with narrative. The articles are grouped into several sections, starting with 'Basics', which contains several definitions of the discipline 'narrative design' and discusses many important concepts, and ending with specific guides on creating characters and lore, as well as a set of links to programs and online services that can be used for script development and other documentation.
The project is an initiative of RWI (the Association of Developers for the Development of the Gaming Industry), carried out with the support of the Agency of Creative Industries (AKI, which supports not only game development but also animation, design, and much more). Its goal is to inform anyone interested in trying their hand at narrative design about the basics of the profession and recommended directions for skill development.
Here I personally want to add that I view this initiative very positively. When I was just looking into the gaming industry (that was about ten years ago), I was somewhat troubled by the lack of a clear 'entry point' that would explain the basics of creating story-driven games. I gleaned all my initial knowledge from several forums, where I had to navigate through many different theses and opinions, many of which contradicted each other, and most of which were not adequately explained.
On the other hand, it is also important to understand that, as with any creative profession, all guides are only recommendations. Rules and principles in narrative design can always be broken — the main thing is to know why it is worth (or not worth) doing. It is good that the creators of the 'Green Pages' understand this — in some sections and articles, they describe several alternative views and approaches, allowing for immediate comparison.
By the way, the diversity and contradiction of approaches to narrative design were demonstrated during the presentation of the 'Green Pages' at a round table, which was dedicated to the connections and differences between narrative and game design. Among the participants were Slava Makarov, one of the creators of 'World of Tanks', Maria Kochatkova, a lecturer on 'Narratorics', and director Asya Chashinskaya (who has worked in games by Ice-Pick Lodge and Game Art Pioneers, as well as events like 'Igroprom'). They all couldn't even agree on the definition of narrative design and the tasks of narrative designers.
In addition to the discussion panel, the presentation featured Alexander Romashkov, the narrative director of Atomic Heart, who spoke about his work with cutscenes. Also present was Anatoly Dobrozhans, the creator of the first seasons of the web show Mr. Freeman (not related to Half-life), with an authorial lecture on the ideological content of narrative-driven projects.
Then, as is customary at such events, the time for casual communication began, when all presentation participants could ask questions about the theses they had expressed or discuss other topics. It is a pity that the 'Green Pages' do not have a forum for similar discussions or advice. Although there seems to be some form of feedback.
As for the content, the guide currently includes 46 articles from 23 authors, but in the future, it is planned to add new materials and improve search functionality. It is important that all articles go through 'premoderation' for quality compliance. So newcomers will not be overwhelmed by too many contradictions. Those who 'desire the strange' and want to do something that has not passed the selection will be able to choose another resource, but will already know how to navigate the topic.
We can only wish the organizers (both RWI and AKI) success in developing this project, as well as other initiatives to facilitate newcomers' first steps in game development.