games to play for inspiration if I want to make a "story generator" game

• This is a Reddit post from 5 years ago discussing games with procedural storytelling.
• The author is looking for games that let them make their own unique campaign, squad, story, etc. without necessarily being a sandbox.
• XCOM 2 is given as a big example of a game that makes each campaign feel unique because of the order in which you do things, the recruits you pick, the lieutenants you end up nurturing, even down to the random backstories and names.
• The post mentions a lot of RPGs seem to be moving less from ‘here is a world, go play in it’ to ‘here is a path, follow it, although feel free to photograph the sights.’
• The author highlights Renowned Explorers: International Society as a game with interesting systems, including a load of choice and randomness, where every decision is a dice roll.
• Shadow of Mordor is mentioned for its fantastic nemesis system that hasn’t been copied much.
• Other games suggested in the comments include:
  • Crusader Kings 2: managing your dynasty in medieval Europe/Asia/Africa
  • Mount & Blade: Warband: game where you make your own story by building your own kingdom, recruiting companions and building armies
  • Hand of Fate: card game where cards represent equipment and encounters on tiles of the current map
  • Divinity: Original Sin: turn-based combat RPG where you have a lot of freedom as to how you approach different situations
  • Wasteland 2: a lot like Divinity: Original Sin in the world of Fallout
  • Total War: Warhammer II: deep gameplay with lots of options to reach an end goal
  • Invisible Inc.: turn-based tactical game of infiltration and sneaking focused on action rather than combat
  • Dungeon of the Endless: roguelite with different playthroughs depending on the party you select, the characters you find along the way, and ship you choose
  • Sunless Sea: roguelite with a creepy, lovecraftian horror open-world exploration game that has very replayable crew quests

[Comments]

• The person mentioning Crusader Kings 2 highlights that it takes a while to learn, but building and managing your dynasty is brilliant. They mention the community can tell you which DLC is essential.
• Another person seconds the recommendation for Crusader Kings 2 and mentions that the mod/DLC possibilities are amazing
• Someone suggests that there are tile

• Procedural stories in video games generate coherent narratives in response to the player’s actions.
• Procedural narratives are different from pre-written branching stories and create slippery configurations of plot, setting, conflict, resolution, and people.
• There is an emphasis on procedural narrative design that produces stories that seem to be spontaneously generated while being driven by rule sets and simulation algorithms.
• Procedural narrative creators utilize a “bottom-up” approach to identify and “bubble up” emergent narrative elements.
• Acclaimed games such as Dwarf Fortress, RimWorld, and The Sims showcase the effectiveness and potential of procedural narratives to create compelling video game stories.
• Wildermyth is an example of a game that successfully utilizes procedural narrative to generate stories that follow a broad structure but are never quite the same.
• Emergent narrative involves the sifting of interesting micro-stories that surface and are woven back into the game.
• Procedural storytelling requires the suggestion of a machine beneath it that adds to the player’s sense of collaboration with the game to create unique stories.
• Cats Manning, the narrative and design consultant for Blaseball, explains that players bet on matches involving bizarre fictional teams and weigh in on players’ individual skills. Blaseball utilizes story sifting to identify sequences of events that become interesting micro-stories.
• The Society for Internet Blaseball Research stepped in to develop a tool that lets players watch replays of past games using data available on the site, which is a form of “backward story sifting” utilized by the game to surface significant storylines to players.
• Emily Short, creative director at Failbetter Games, brings her wealth of interactive fiction experience to the studio developing the romance-murder game Mask of the Rose.
• Kitfox Games is a developer and publisher of games, including The Shrouded Isle, and is the set to release an updated version of Dwarf Fortress on Steam.
• The academic study of procedural narrative is focused on finding and creating emergent narrative structures and fluid simulations.
• The major hub of this academic study is the University of California, Santa Cruz, home to students and professors at its Expressive Intelligence Studio.
• The work that emerges from the lab continually pushes the limits of AI and storytelling with a focus on AI methods and interactive storytelling.
• The lab’s academics are focusing on an AI-powered narrative system that blends synchronous and asynchronous narrative structures.
• Max Kreminski, a Santa Cruz professor and game designer, is working on a procedural story sifting tool designed to scan

• Procedural generation allows certain games to create randomized environments with unique elements that are different for each playthrough.
• There are 10 games listed:
  • Valheim: an open-world survival game steeped in Norse mythology with procedurally generated levels and challenging gameplay.
  • Don’t Starve: a Tim Burton-esque survival game with procedurally generated levels where the player must balance their character’s health, hunger, and sanity.
  • Crypt of the NecroDancer: a rhythm roguelike with procedurally generated dungeons that encourages players to move to the beat of the music.
  • Enter the Gungeon: a bullet-hell roguelike with procedurally generated dungeon levels where players search for a gun that can kill their past.
  • The Binding of Isaac: a game with randomized loot, bosses, and floors, creating a different experience with each playthrough.
  • Spore: a game where players can create and maintain their species, with procedural generation taking them on a unique evolutionary journey.
  • Hades: a critically acclaimed dungeon crawler based on Greek mythology with procedurally generated rooms that reward players with plot information after each playthrough.
  • Terraria: an action-adventure sandbox with a 2D environment where all assets are randomized, keeping players on their toes.
  • No Man’s Sky: a game with procedural generation that has improved massively since its release, boasting a procedurally generated galaxy with randomized planets and flora and fauna.
  • Minecraft: an iconic game where the world is procedurally generated via seed and all resources and structures are randomized.
• The games are not ranked in any particular order.
• Each game has a brief description of its gameplay mechanics, including how procedural generation is incorporated.
• Procedural generation allows for a unique and ever-changing experience for players, encouraging replayability.
• The website may be useful in identifying different gameplay mechanics that can be incorporated into a “story generator” game.

• The Reddit thread is titled “Procedural generated story” and was posted in r/proceduralgeneration 1 year and 8 months ago.
• The original poster asks how difficult it would be to generate stories in a procedural way, mostly in the context of video games such as Minecraft, Dwarf Fortress, and Don’t Starve.
• One user recommends starting the process of creating a procedural story generator by writing a novel first as a way to understand the creation process and problems that may arise. They suggest studying writing and recommend a lecture series on YouTube by a fantasy author named Brandon Sanderson as a valuable resource.
• Another user recommends using “storylets,” which are self-contained modules of narrative content that can be combined to create branching stories. They also suggest “fill in the blank” generators as a starting point.
• Several users agree that generating stories procedurally is extremely difficult, as it is a nuanced and involved problem that often requires human understanding and interpretation. One person recommends that proceduralism should be subservient to the story, not the other way around. They argue that while proceduralism may work for filling in gaps in games, such as with procedurally generated landscapes, it is not effective for storytelling.
• Another user mentions that caves of Qud has event generation and branching and chaining events but not a story in the sense of beginning, middle, and end. They also discuss the limitations of procedural storytelling.
• Several users share links to tools and resources for generating stories procedurally, including a Swedish-language story generator, a character history generator, and tracery.io.
• One user mentions that they are doing AI research related to this topic and are open to communication with others interested in the subject.
• The general consensus is that generating stories procedurally is incredibly difficult, and most agree that it may not add much to a game.

• Story elements are a foundation of comprehension work with students.
• The 5 story elements are Plot, Characters, Setting, Conflict, and Theme.
• Teachers can introduce one story element at a time and students can practice during small group instruction, literacy centers, or independent reading.
• Story elements graphic organizers can be used to help students practice.
• A game is an engaging way to practice retelling a story with its elements.
• The game is played by dividing students into teams and providing each team with sticky notes of a different color.
• Teams must work together to correctly identify the story elements.
• Students pick a card from the container, and each card contains one of the elements of a story to write about.
• Students must show the teacher their answers, and if it is correct, they may place their sticky note under the correct column on the board.
• If a team picks an “Oh Snap ME” card, they must take down one of their own sticky notes. But if they pull an “Oh Snap YOU” card, they may take down another team’s sticky note.
• Teams must place the correct sticky notes back on the board to win the game.
• The game can be adapted to work with other skills and concepts.
• The text also includes links to helpful resources to practice story elements.
• The game is low-prep and can be played last minute with only a few materials necessary.
• The teacher must print the story elements chart, the story elements chosen, and the “Oh Snap” game cards.
• The teacher must display the story elements chart on the board.
• One of the best aspects of this game is that it can work for either remediation groups or the whole class.
• Descriptions of how to prepare for the game, how to play, and additional tips are included in the text.
• The game enables students to work quietly to not give answers away to other teams.
• The game could also be played to practice Main Idea.
• The game can be used for any fiction text.

• The webpage discusses the rise of “story generator” games that can create an entire universe at the press of a button.
• It mentions games like Dwarf Fortress, Rimworld, Oxygen Not Included, Gnomoria, Factorio, Middle-Earth: Shadow of Mordor, Minecraft and the Sims as examples of these types of games.
• Dwarf Fortress is praised for its ability to build a fantasy world with its own climates, biomes, creatures, towns, people, civilizations, and trade routes between them. It is noted that the game is free, but uses ASCII symbols as graphics, and has a difficult UI and controls.
• Rimworld is also mentioned as an example of a successful story generator that uses a mousable interface with a storyteller AI to guide players towards their goals and manage the tension curve. The game is praised for its psychological awareness of players’ blind spots for storytelling impact.
• One commenter notes that actual stories and complex narratives still require human intervention in these types of games.
• The article discusses the potential impact that story generators could have on the gaming industry, and the possibility of larger gaming companies investing in creating these types of games in the future.
• There is also discussion about the potential to physically put players into story generator worlds using VR.
• The comments section of the webpage includes various viewpoints on the limitations of story generators and their ability to create actual, structured narratives. One commenter mentions Open AI’s recent developments with GPT-2 and its potential to generate video game narratives.
• The article touches on the importance of the tension-release buildup in games and how it leads to powerful emotional moments for players, even if the story is not told directly.
• The article also discusses the potential for story generators to make players feel as though they are truly present in the story and creating their own narrative.
• The impact of randomness on the feel of generated worlds is discussed. Too many different elements in the same map can make it feel fake, and it is important for creators to focus on creating the most important elements of the world.

• Reddit post titled “Do you guys actually use this game as a “story generator?” - 2 years ago
• Poster wonders if players use RimWorld like DnD, imagining the interactions and events
• One commenter says storytelling is what sets RimWorld apart and recommends engaging with pawns to deepen investment in the game (43 karma)
• Another commenter shares a memorable playthrough where an entire family crashed together and died, highlighting the emotional impact of investing in characters (10 karma)
• A third commenter notes that character interactions and habits are what make the game enjoyable and a “beauty” to experience (42 karma)
• One user suggests using mods to customize and name characters to make them more memorable and care for them more (11 karma)
• Another user suggests using different difficulty settings to create different challenges and experiences, as well as different mods and mechanics (3 karma)
• One user prefers the mechanics and systems aspect of the game, with only occasional storylines emerging (11 karma)
• Another user emphasizes the importance of playing the game how you want and experimenting with different settings and mods (3 karma)
• One user shares an example of how they create their own narratives for the game, imagining interactions between pawns (3 karma)
• Recommended mods: Children mods, Character Editor
• The game’s randomness and difficulty level add to the storytelling potential
• RimWorld is a game with a lot of potential for generating unique and memorable stories based on player choices, character development, and random events.

Not used in article

💭  Looking into

Overview of 3 core elements of a successful 'story generator' game

💭  Looking into

List of 5 online games that can inspire a 'story generator' game