Comments on: Funny Games Portal 2's vocal comedy works because it is mostly just single lines delivered very well, triggered at very precise moments. The gags in the animations and billboards seemed to work better for me though. I miss the LucasArts games of old, Day of the Tentacle still stands out and did have punchlines to gags that were set up many scenes previously. As developers, is it possible that we don't trust the audience will have the attention to get a joke that's carefully crafted? With a film you know that, by and large, people that start watching it will finish. So you can make a joke about swallows and coconuts that doesn't pay off until 60 minutes later. With a game we can't know for sure how long a pause a player might have between sessions, so it makes it much harder to confidently script longer lasting narratives. Portal 2′s vocal comedy works because it is mostly just single lines delivered very well, triggered at very precise moments. The gags in the animations and billboards seemed to work better for me though.

I miss the LucasArts games of old, Day of the Tentacle still stands out and did have punchlines to gags that were set up many scenes previously.

As developers, is it possible that we don’t trust the audience will have the attention to get a joke that’s carefully crafted? With a film you know that, by and large, people that start watching it will finish. So you can make a joke about swallows and coconuts that doesn’t pay off until 60 minutes later. With a game we can’t know for sure how long a pause a player might have between sessions, so it makes it much harder to confidently script longer lasting narratives.

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By: Kevin Daley/2011/06/01/funny-games/#comment-5074 Kevin Daley Wed, 01 Jun 2011 19:25:20 +0000