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Best Examples of Environmental Storytelling?
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There was a topic the other day asking why the Combine didn't attack Aperture Sciences (answer: they did) , which was a segue into a large portion of the topic realizing they had missed like 99% of both Half Life 2 and Portal's stories because they are told entirely though background items in the environment. Like, one dude had never even heard of the 7-hours war.
I really love learning about (possible) Chell through the various exhibits strewn about Portal 2. When I finished the game I was certain she was Caroline's daughter but I haven't replayed it since launch and the exact reasons elude me now.
There is lots of evidence of that, yeah. I believe it as well.
Regarding the overall story, Portal 2 is probably the most subtle happy ending ever.
When Chell looks at the earth from the moon after creating the portal, the planet is green and the earth's oceans are restored, indicating that, at some point, for some unknown reason, Earth repels the Combine and undoes their teraforming.
SMT Nocturne and Bloodborne springs to mind, Silent Hill 2 also relies a lot on it, while the story is more clear a lot of details are still relegated to the environment and the monsters.
Downward Spirals story is mostly told through environmental storytelling. The way you move through the station, the messages on the computer screens, what you see while you move through the station and then piecing together what actually might have happened and led to the downfall of it.
Firewatch did that too kinda, but then at the end they actually explain most of what you encountered.
In Deltarune
When you get out of the dark world you end up in a playroom full of objects that correspond to things you encountered in there. It recontextualizes that entire area, especially when the major characters that Kris and Susie meet in the seem almost tailor-made to let them both confront their inner demons.
Portal 1 takes place roughly at the very start of the combine invasion. It SHOULD be green, because they haven't begun teraforming. In Half Life 2, which takes place about 10-20 years after Portal 1, they have already drained 2 of the earth's oceans. Portal 2 is thousands of years after Half Life 2. The earth's state at the end of Portal 2 is extremely telling.
This was a land of beauty once. Prosperity. A kingdom of riches, monuments, culture, and beauty. Its people scattered shrines throughout the land, its endless bridges a tether to the rest of the world, its towering pillars looming large over mortal men below. Its Babel tower scrapes the heavens while vestiges of a long-forgotten empire are carved into the very mountains.
It's all gone. Abandoned and decayed. A whole kingdom reduced to the tomb of a fallen god while towering elemental beasts roam its vacant plains and soar across lonely skies. There is no laughter here. No markets or shops or palaces. Just a silent shell of a once-prosperous people, either abandoned... or sealed... lest the rest of the world fall prey to whatever malice reduced them to hollow echoes in the wind.
Shoulda been the first post.
Seriously the Resident Evil series perfected this imo. Many areas in the franchise tell you what happened / ad context to the greater situation just by how they are set up or the few snippets of info you get by examining random objects that are not actually useful. You can tell shit went down in some rooms simply how they are set up, even if nothing of interest is actually in it.
Dead Space and (especially) Dead Space 2. Oftentimes the environment heavily implies the response of the people who lived there to the growing infection (or lack thereof). In Dead Space 2 it's especially interesting because of the cult aspects and the fact that you're living out the early stages of infection with the people on the colony.
Huh, I don't remember anything about drained oceans. Fair enough. Can you actually drain individual oceans? I know we call them different names, but they're connected. You'd have to build dams the depth of an ocean to partition them.
You learn about them draining the oceans in the coastal section of half life 2 after highway 17. You also learn that fish in general have become extinct.
Halo 3. Tsavo Highway.
So, the first act of Halo 2 is set in and around New Mombasa in Kenya, which has become a massive port city owing mostly to it being the first city to have a space elevator. The close of the act involves an in-atmosphere slipspace jump:
Cut to black, and that's the last part of Earth you see in Halo 2.
Halo 3 opens up on Earth, with the Master Chief crash-landing back near south Kenya. Tsavo Highway is the third mission in the game, and involves MC having to follow the road to the town of Voi.
N.B.:
Along the way there's also piles of various wreckage from the space elevator everywhere:
...including, in the skybox, a trail of this wreckage:
...which points back in the direction of New Mombasa. Between "here" and "there" is also where the Covenant are excavating a Forerunner Artifact, to open a portal to the Ark:
I absolutely adore that they built this level around a very distant aftermath of what is, in-universe, a really major event, and never call any particular attention to it. It's just there on its own.
Relatedly, you also get to see the space elevator itself collapse in Halo 3: ODST, which is set in New Mombasa shortly following the slipspace jump in H2:
So, the first act of Halo 2 is set in and around New Mombasa in Kenya, which has become a massive port city owing mostly to it being the first city to have a space elevator. The close of the act involves an in-atmosphere slipspace jump:
Cut to black, and that's the last part of Earth you see in Halo 2.
Halo 3 opens up on Earth, with the Master Chief crash-landing back near south Kenya. Tsavo Highway is the third mission in the game, and involves MC having to follow the road to the town of Voi.
N.B.:
Along the way there's also piles of various wreckage from the space elevator everywhere:
...including, in the skybox, a trail of this wreckage:
...which points back in the direction of New Mombasa. Between "here" and "there" is also where the Covenant are excavating a Forerunner Artifact, to open a portal to the Ark:
I absolutely adore that they built this level around a very distant aftermath of what is, in-universe, a really major event, and never call any particular attention to it. It's just there on its own.
Relatedly, you also get to see the space elevator itself collapse in Halo 3: ODST, which is set in New Mombasa shortly following the slipspace jump in H2:
I do remember the fish thing actually. Is that in the building where you get the tracking RPG thing?
The Evil Within 2 does this very well. It has scribbling on walls but it also has a lot of other things that are cool to see
This essay does a good job outlining some of it http://www.deltaheadtranslation.com/TEW2/MOF_TOC.htm
Isn't this is a FROM software motto? Since the days of Demon's Souls, the lore and stories have been embedded in level design, collectible and usable items.
Yeah, to fight the antlions. Thats why a bunch of the ships are stranded on land, they used to be docked but the entire world's sea level is dropping because the oceans are being drained.
Not a whole ocean, at least not in the released game.
There was an idea initially, to have some combine apparatus draining the oceans, and a desert-wasteland like level with more shipwrecks and such.
Came to say this. The HL2 timeline shit is nuts with how much they pulled from the environment.
Not a whole ocean, at least not in the released game.
There was an idea initially, to have some combine apparatus draining the oceans, and a desert-wasteland like level with more shipwrecks and such.
You were eventually supposed to travel to one of the draining portals eventually, and see some enormous whale bones in the middle of what would have by that point been a desert. I wish we would have gotten to see that.
I remember before it came out people pinpointed it to taking place in post-apocalyptic Colorado based on the landmarks that were in the promotional screenshots.
Horizon excels in environmental storytelling/world-building (even if it's not part of the main story), as does the likes of The Witcher 3 and Bloodborne.
Breath of the Wild does an amazing job at telling small stories with environmental storytelling. When you're first going down the hill from the Chamber of Awakening, near the first tower, you'll find a couple arrows lying in the grass, warning you of the first bokoblin armed with a bow that you'll encounter. One place in the mountains, there's an isolated burnt up house where a fire wizzrobe prances around. And of course Hateno Fortress shows you the aftermath of one of humanity's last defenses from 100 years ago.
Yup. It's a really interesting way to do the storytelling and gets you invested in it since it's based around real-world locations. :P
Fallout: New Vegas.
The whole "going backwards through a Vault where they hold elections to become Overseer and each candidate is describing how terrible they are for the job and begging you to vote for someone else" was particularly brilliant and dark as hell.
The whole "going backwards through a Vault where they hold elections to become Overseer and each candidate is describing how terrible they are for the job and begging you to vote for someone else" was particularly brilliant and dark as hell.
Inside does it amazingly.
This was my first thought, I love that game so much and the atmosphere and surroundings are an important part of it. The way you slowly pick up little clues here and there as you progress without any dialogue or cutscenes is so good.
Halo 3. Tsavo Highway.
So, the first act of Halo 2 is set in and around New Mombasa in Kenya, which has become a massive port city owing mostly to it being the first city to have a space elevator. The close of the act involves an in-atmosphere slipspace jump:
Cut to black, and that's the last part of Earth you see in Halo 2.
Halo 3 opens up on Earth, with the Master Chief crash-landing back near south Kenya. Tsavo Highway is the third mission in the game, and involves MC having to follow the road to the town of Voi.
N.B.:
Along the way there's also piles of various wreckage from the space elevator everywhere:
...including, in the skybox, a trail of this wreckage:
...which points back in the direction of New Mombasa. Between "here" and "there" is also where the Covenant are excavating a Forerunner Artifact, to open a portal to the Ark:
I absolutely adore that they built this level around a very distant aftermath of what is, in-universe, a really major event, and never call any particular attention to it. It's just there on its own.
Relatedly, you also get to see the space elevator itself collapse in Halo 3: ODST, which is set in New Mombasa shortly following the slipspace jump in H2:
I never really thought about this but yeah, I love this too.
Games that don't make it obvious that "here, ENVIRONMENTAL STORYTELLING", by e.g. putting very specific clues in a room so it really stands out at the expense of its believability.
I think Rockstar games have some of the best environmental storytelling because their designers did not seem to design it by label; did not say "Let's create environmental storytelling(TM)" but rather, "let's decorate this room to suit Roman's style"
I kinda hate "Environmental Storytelling" honestly. I think coining it as a term has made it a shorthand for really on-the-nose depictive content in games like that Horizon picture where... I mean, it's like art. An artist loves this kind of stuff because they get to design a map in a game so that just taking one gander at it you get "the idea", but personally I hate this because this isn't just art (as in painting) this is an interactive media, and so often "environmental storytelling" only results in a very non-interactive moment of entering a place in a game and you're supposed to passively be wowed at how "the room tells a story" and holy fuck if that isn't squandered potential in this medium.
Here! Try dragging the camera around while doing nothing. GREAT STORY!
I think my last point to make is that good environmental storytelling is not a feature, it's a bonus feature, but since people started fussing over the term and GDC talks were held and "higher-art" indie games were made with it in mind, it has become "THE FEATURE" which is lame... and I say it is "lame" because it's a passive form of interaction, it's at the direct expense of the medium's strongest abilities to make you feel something by doing something. It's an optional, on-the-side bonus, not a main attraction but it has become the latter for no good reason.
I think Rockstar games have some of the best environmental storytelling because their designers did not seem to design it by label; did not say "Let's create environmental storytelling(TM)" but rather, "let's decorate this room to suit Roman's style"
I kinda hate "Environmental Storytelling" honestly. I think coining it as a term has made it a shorthand for really on-the-nose depictive content in games like that Horizon picture where... I mean, it's like art. An artist loves this kind of stuff because they get to design a map in a game so that just taking one gander at it you get "the idea", but personally I hate this because this isn't just art (as in painting) this is an interactive media, and so often "environmental storytelling" only results in a very non-interactive moment of entering a place in a game and you're supposed to passively be wowed at how "the room tells a story" and holy fuck if that isn't squandered potential in this medium.
Here! Try dragging the camera around while doing nothing. GREAT STORY!
I think my last point to make is that good environmental storytelling is not a feature, it's a bonus feature, but since people started fussing over the term and GDC talks were held and "higher-art" indie games were made with it in mind, it has become "THE FEATURE" which is lame... and I say it is "lame" because it's a passive form of interaction, it's at the direct expense of the medium's strongest abilities to make you feel something by doing something. It's an optional, on-the-side bonus, not a main attraction but it has become the latter for no good reason.
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Bloodborne, Horizon, Inside, SOTC, TLG are all amazing at this. Horizon is a bit less subtle than the others but it's incredibly well crafted.
Journey is another game that does it on a whole other level.
Journey is another game that does it on a whole other level.