Storytelling in Dark Souls and Skyrim

Forbes is offering an editorial that compares the methods of storytelling in Dark Souls and The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, with the author favoring the first over the latter due to its unobtrusiveness and for being deeply tied to the video game medium. Obligatory sampling ahead:

Games are a unique medium, and a game like Dark Souls takes full advantage of this medium to not just tell the story, but to let the story unfold around you during the game itself. (Show, don’t tell,) is a fundamental lesson in crafting good fiction; in games we go one step further. Story ought to be embedded within the gameplay itself, with only the briefest interludes.

A game like Skyrim may at first glance appear to do just this after all, there are no cut-scenes to speak of; but in fact, the narrative portions of the game are still very much parceled off from the actual game. Every moment you spend working your way through dialogue options is a moment you could be off exploring.

Then again, the more I sit with Skyrim and think about what all that exploring and questing amounts to, the less impressed I become. I’ll admit that playing Dark Souls has had a huge impact on how I’ve been thinking about games recently, and what heights games can reach if they truly stick to what makes them unique; to what makes them games in the first place.

Perhaps embarrassingly, I find myself simply thinking about Dark Souls a great deal these days. Its mystery has taken root and even though there has been virtually no dialogue and even though I am still only beginning to piece together the story itself, I find myself turning it all over in my head time and again even when I’m not playing. Maybe this is precisely because there is so little story to go off of, that I as a gamer am forced to drag my imagination out from where it’s been hiding lately.