The Many Types Of Silent Protagonists (And When They Go Wrong)
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- Опубликовано: 10 июл 2024
- Silent Protagonists are an interesting type of character for a piece of media. I've been paying attention to how games handle a silent protagonist over the years, and this video is just me talking about my feelings on the trope.
Series like Metroid, Half-Life, Portal, and Doom are defined by their silent protagonist. It's an interesting narrative design decision that really allows the writers to flex their brain muscles. But what happens when a silent protagonist goes voiced?
Here, I talk about that, more likely than not, unfortunate situation.
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Production Notes: This is a video that I definitely feel could have been better. I'm not really happy with my voiceover in this one, especially in the last few minutes. Which is weird because this is my latest video and I would think that I would be getting more comfortable recording VO and hopefully find my own "voice". As I've said previously, I'm just working on putting videos out, even if they have parts I'm not entirely happy with. I want to get into the groove of making videos, and rerecording an entire VO would really suck and kill my motivation.
I don't know if I talked about this in a previous video's notes, but I really have a problem with finding accompanying visuals for what I'm talking about in some areas. I like to cut away from a game as background video to hit home a point or just if I'm talking about nothing in particular, and I feel like that's a bad habit. I need to find more footage to use as background and stop cutting to a blank backdrop. Or at least find a more interesting image for the backdrop.
I'm getting accustomed to Davinci Resolve 16. It definitely doesn't run too well on my computer, which is a shame. I really like the tools it has and I feel I could be really productive with it if it didn't hitch up for 5 seconds whenever I switched to another task or clip later in the timeline. I'm gonna maybe try Shotcut, but from what I've seen, it might be too simplistic for the stuff I've been going for and things I hope to do in later videos. But if it runs a lot better, then it might be worth the sacrifice.
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0:00 Intro
0:31 1st Type of Silent Protagonist
2:59 2nd Type of Silent Protagonist
5:17 3rd Type of Silent Protagonist
17:38 Conclusion
18:08 Outro
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Игры
I always think about the protagonists of the Blackbox era Need For Speed games. None of the protagonists are given a voice and only a few are given actual appearances. The ones that do have appearances either have their face blurred out because they're being viewed on police cameras, or have their face covered by a racing helmet they're wearing. In various cutscenes, most of the time you're viewing them from the perspective of the protagonist. You don't even know if all the protagonists across the early Need For Speed games are the same person or not. It's all up to a lot of things. personal preference, speculation, and headcanon. The lack of an identity for these characters gives the player the ability to become the main character.
You aren't playing as whoever is behind the wheel, because you *ARE* behind the wheel.
This could've just been because of time constraints. Anyone who has been in the NFS community will tell you that EA loves to rush these games.
In the long run though, I think it was the best decision.
Interesting. Haven't heard much about those games, but that seems like a pretty good way to handle that kinda thing.
in borderlands the presequel they actually do respond to the npcs, and to a lesser degree in borderlands 3 too. in the presequel they have more back and forth while in borderlands 3 they all have kinda rephrasing of the same dialog with the npcs not changing at all in responses
I remember playing Metro Last Light which has a semi-silent protagonist named Artyom (he only speaks in diary entries as a narrator). As is typical for these type of games, the dialogue is written in a way so NPCs say everything while the protagonist isn't expected to speak. Well there's a DLC where you replay a part of the campaign, same dialogue and everything, but from the perspective of another character. The perspective shift highlights how jarring it is that Artyom never speaks, it's honestly hilarious. You are talking to Artyom and he acts like he didn't hear anything, it's so awkward. This must be how everyone in Half Life 2 talking to Freeman felt.
I would say the best examples of silent protagonists are ones that don't speak during gameplay when they have no reason to, but aren't silent like a wooden stump when being spoken to. I think of the original CoD MW trilogy. Soap was given a face and a voice in MW2. When he's an NPC he's really chatty, filling the player in on any important details, but when you control him in first person he is silent again just like he was in the first game.
It's interesting having played the most recent MW2 and MW3 campaigns, and there's pretty much no separation between that anymore. The player character talks a bunch, and in a handful of missions, is by themselves only talking to someone over the radio.
That Metro Last Light example sounds hilarious, I'd love to see that first hand.
We all know the real silent protagonists are the friends we made along the way.
What an interesting look into this topic thank you
Something tells me that the idea of giving Samus more character isn't the problem, its how they go about it. Now yeah maybe they are personal and more atmospheric when Samus and Doom guy don't talk. Just as much as people find that boring and stagnant who don't want to pretend these characters have personality and calling them emotionless robots. I have seen reviews and the few defining moments that people point to in the butchering of Samus is when she doesn't activate her Varia suit when running into an inferno. Her having PTSD when she meets Ridley and when she doesn't stand up to Adam when he's being too stubborn. Also Fusion while telling us where to go didn't spell out how to get there and thats the difference between being acessable and holding our hand.
I think Metroid Dread solved M:OM’s problem perfectly. SPOILERS:
Having Samus speak only in Chozo let her have a voice without potentially alienating the audience with her delivery. And when she does finally talk, it’s not about a baby, but a reassurance to the last of her people. Plus, having the antagonist recognize *her* as the *actual* galactic-level threat felt very appropriate; this is a person who semi-regularly sends species into extinction, destroys entire planets, and has had multiple shape-shifting entities (SA-X and Dark Samus) choose her as their optimal form for mass destruction. Samus going full-on Doomguy rip-and-tear at the end was the cherry on top.
It’s not some kinda peak storytelling or anything, but it’s (IMO) precisely the simplistic, gameplay-first approach Metroid needed. And yes, I’m definitely reading way too far into it, but I think us fans deserve at least a little slack to over-analyze after M:OM.
I couldn't get used to quick time action as a necessary mechanism for the newer doom games.
They should have made an option where it was not needed like the older games
All the mute people in real life are silent protagonists.
Only 14 comments on a really facinating video? Sad! Have my own thoughts albeit late.
On the MMO note, it's been a while since I played Phantasy Star Online 1 or 2, but I don't really remember it having the whole "chosen ones" problem. All the players are simply adressed as operatives on the mother ship, and the side quests really make you feel like a proper team of people (or robots, or androids, or space elves...) as opposed to everyone being a chosen one with the NPCs ignoring the other 5 chosen ones. I really admire it for that alongside the stellar art & music.
Is that xan? Final boss of pc unreal tournament?
Oh please. Metroid is not Sakamoto's IP. It's Gunpei Yokoi's! ...or, was...
In Borderlands 3 the characters DO respond to NPCS