LW: Could this be a videogame?

[[deleted user]]

This novel could easily be made into a tightly narrated videogame. It's written like a movie but there is enough action where you could have "hallway combat" or even epic space battles where you play as Holden commanding the ships various crewmen. When playing as Miller the gameplay would switch to almost a L.A. Noir type of gameplay, where you look for tells in people and much of the game is conversation. This book would do very well as a game.

But who would develop it? My first thought is the guys who make EVE online, but then Bioware comes to mind and blows them out of the water. Nobody does science fiction like them, and though the game would have Mass Effect similarities there are plenty of ways to differentiate, such as switching POV between characters or even just changing perspective from which you play. First person perhaps?

I think a member of the Sword and Laser Community should write James SA Corey and see if he'd be willing to do this, and suggest BioWare as a developer.

[P. Aaron]

I am a wee touch resistant to the book-based-video-game. I suppose that you could get some fun out of handwalking each character through the plot, but since you know where it's going to lead, and can't really change that story, I can't see where the narrative attraction would lie.

[[deleted user]]

Well, it's the same concept with the book-based-movie. Everyone who read the book knew the plot. But people who didnt only knew it from the movie. this is the same thing just making it interactive, giving it a different life just as cinema did literature. Two things sell godd games. Gameplay, and Plot. also, these two traits can lean on each other, so a game with great gameplay can have a sub-stellar plot and do perfectly fine and perhaps get a sequel. And vice versa.

[Walter]

I posted this on another thread, but it fits here better. Holden is paragon, Miller is renegade.

[Mark]

I don't see how detective noir would work well as a video game...

Anybody have some good examples? I mean it sounds like it would work more in a novel but be very boring as an interactive game

[[deleted user]]

In fact, there was a game by Rockstar Games named L.A. Noir, which was detective noir. It worked well and was generally well received when released. The gameplay was relatively stale after long periods but if broken up with Holden's action sections it could work.