Ken Levine’s current projectJudasmay have derivative elements, but it’s the execution of the narrative that truly matters, not the trope the story is built atop. Often, forcing elements that are wholly ‘original’ into a narrative can harm, rather than help, the story.
Ken Levine, head of Ghost Story Games, and creator/director ofBioShock,BioShock Infiniteand the upcoming Judas did anexcellent interview with IGNand Geoff Keighley recently. The trio discussed the “narrative lego” technology that underlies the gameplay of Judas, essentially procedural elements that adapt and change the story depending on the player’s actions. Levine also spoke at length about key aspects of Judas’s story.
Tropes Help Narratives, They Don’t Define Them
Parts of the world described by Levine certainly sound cliche. First, the setting is essentially post-apocalyptic with the titular character being the last remaining human. Next, through a glitch in a sort of cloning (reprinting) process, Judas’s memories are incomplete, meaning both the player and the character they’re playing are going to be learning about the character’s past simultaneously. Lastly, automation has taken over a large part of the ship, placing the robots firmly in charge of proceedings.
These are all tropified elements of science fiction and storytelling in general, but that’s not necessarily a mark against the story. The above are all popular because of the types of stories they allow the writer to tell. The post-apocalypse allows one to tell stories of societal collapse, how humans react in extreme circumstances. The inclusion of advanced artificial intelligence enables the exploration of the ever-interesting interaction between technology and human emotion.
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My point is, that the strength of Judas’s narrative will not be determined by the use of these tropes, but by how Levine and his team use these elements to tell the more interesting and nuanced parts of their story. A subtler argument would be that Levine is retreading old ground, and it can be hard to disagree with this sentiment as Judas currently feels like a marriage between BioShock and System Shock.
A Ken Levine Story Was Inevitable
This is a fair point, but I also don’t see it as a negative. Both of these series were critically acclaimed, with BioShock hailed as one of the greatest video game stories of all time. I think people are amused by Levine taking 11 years to create something that, at first glance, is reminiscent of his past work. This isn’t surprising, though. It’s a Ken Levine game, we were always going to get the kind of story that Levine enjoys telling.
BioShock had a couple of tropes, too. The protagonist is a sleeper agent, the ultra-rich become comically immoral in a libertarian society, and so on. Familiar elements didn’t detract from the story but added to it, Jack’s past was consistently foreshadowed throughout the game, meaning the payoff didn’t feel cheap. Judas may seem unoriginal, but we haven’t seen the creative flourishes and narrative elements that are going to elevate the story into something worth experiencing.
Judas will be good if Ken Levine’s creative team is as good as he says they are, and if the narrative building block system is more than just procedural narrative design. It’s not going to be a worse game because of a couple of world-building tropes and similarities to past (beloved) games. Levine has made fantastic narrative experiences in the past, and I’m reasonably confident he’s going to land this one too.
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