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[KimDongHwan]

Hi all, I just wanted to share this video that goes into a theory of why we are stuck on this AAA writing style which I found really interesting watch. It doesn't go into any of the political world but stays grounded on how people develop things.

Spoiler: AI Summary for TL;DW

This video explores why modern AAA video games often rely on a sanitized, quippy writing style—frequently dubbed "Marvel Dialogue"—despite widespread criticism from both audiences and the writers themselves (0:09-1:03).

The video highlights two primary structural reasons for this phenomenon:

• Disciplined Production over Artistic Freedom (1:09-4:12): The creator argues that large-scale game development teams are dominated by "piano carriers" (managers, producers, and coordinators) rather than "piano players" (purely creative writers). Because games are complex, successful studios prioritize organization, internal guidelines, and risk-aversion, forcing writers to prioritize adherence to rules over bold, nuanced creativity.
• The Cult of "Readability" (4:13-6:43): Studios strive for extreme accessibility and universal appeal. They aim for characters that are easily legible to global audiences and resistant to feeling dated. This results in writing that is scrubbed of unique cultural textures or risky, specific creative choices, aiming instead for a "safe" corporate middle ground.
• The Role of Iterative Design (6:45-10:56):
  • The narrative process is often plagued by "death by a thousand cuts," where undefined or subtle character traits are viewed as inessential and thus cut during development. To protect their work, writers often rely on "high-contour" characterization—making characters immediately recognizable through quirky or defined behaviors—which often leads to the overused, corny dialogue tropes seen in many major titles.

Conclusion:

The creator suggests that this writing style is rarely the intentional goal of a singular creative vision. Instead, it is an unfortunate byproduct of a massive, bureaucratic system that wants the appearance of creativity without the risks associated with true, challenging artistic expression (10:57-11:33).

 

[Pagusas]

The Joss Whedon style of writing (rewatching Buffy right now and getting the full dose of it). I remember when it was cute, new and novel. As with anything, its become overplayed, templated and now used in everything. It'll go out of fashion soon, than come back in a few decades.

 

[Omnipunctual Godot]

I think the problem with modern writing is mainly people who grew up/live on the internet and have no life or experience outside of it.

 

[Grildon Tundy]

I've been in serious situations where friends try to lighten the mood, and their "quips" aren't typically things that downplay/diminish the threat. They're callbacks to better times or doubling down on the threat being the worst thing ever in an ironic way.

Meanwhile, this Whedonesque writing cuts all tension from a scene. Takes me out of the experience and reminds me I'm not watching how real people react.

 

[Generic]

Writers work for movies and tv shows.

 

[Northeastmonk]

I got over it and couldn't defend it anymore. It made me start skipping cutscenes just to get on with it. I didn't have that problem during the 360/PS3 gen. I got tired of it last gen. This gen I could barely sit through a few of them. It's just the same type of drama over and over again. I'd much rather have something like Wukong or Phantom Blade 0.

 

[StueyDuck]

Younger writers are less talented, universities went to shit

 

[BennyBlanco]

It's awful. Combine it with slow walk and chats and I'm uninstalling your game.

 

[Zannegan]

I think the problem with modern writing is mainly people who grew up/live on the internet and have no life or experience outside of it.

Hmm… Lots of people who want to wrote studying writing instead of something they can write about and then living insulated lives. Checks out.

 

[Hari Seldon]

I think the problem with modern writing is mainly people who grew up/live on the internet and have no life or experience outside of it.

1000% this. Boring writers yield boring writing. It is a problem plaguing all writing right now, not just video games.

 

[VEZ1R]

For writers, writing Marvel-style dialogue is a sort of emergency exit. You know how when you find yourself in an embarrassing situation, the embarrassment only deepens if you try to keep a straight face so you turn it into a joke to try and take the edge off? It's the same thing. Since writers have to obey to political correctness, any attempt to write the dialogue authentically and serious would come across terribly, so they turn it into a joke instead.

Almost all the problems in the western gaming industry are related to political correctness and woke ideology.

 

[Northeastmonk]

It's awful. Combine it with slow walk and chats and I'm uninstalling your game.

I hate how they always, always have to freaking talk to themselves. If we could mute the self dialogue I would do it 90% of the time.

 

[Plague Doctor]

There's just way too much bitch in Western AAA writers.

The layoffs can't happen soon enough.

 

[PeteBull]

Hi all, I just wanted to share this video that goes into a theory of why we are stuck on this AAA writing style which I found really interesting watch. It doesn't go into any of the political world but stays grounded on how people develop things.

Spoiler: AI Summary for TL;DW

This video explores why modern AAA video games often rely on a sanitized, quippy writing style—frequently dubbed "Marvel Dialogue"—despite widespread criticism from both audiences and the writers themselves (0:09-1:03).

The video highlights two primary structural reasons for this phenomenon:

• Disciplined Production over Artistic Freedom (1:09-4:12): The creator argues that large-scale game development teams are dominated by "piano carriers" (managers, producers, and coordinators) rather than "piano players" (purely creative writers). Because games are complex, successful studios prioritize organization, internal guidelines, and risk-aversion, forcing writers to prioritize adherence to rules over bold, nuanced creativity.
• The Cult of "Readability" (4:13-6:43): Studios strive for extreme accessibility and universal appeal. They aim for characters that are easily legible to global audiences and resistant to feeling dated. This results in writing that is scrubbed of unique cultural textures or risky, specific creative choices, aiming instead for a "safe" corporate middle ground.
• The Role of Iterative Design (6:45-10:56):
  • The narrative process is often plagued by "death by a thousand cuts," where undefined or subtle character traits are viewed as inessential and thus cut during development. To protect their work, writers often rely on "high-contour" characterization—making characters immediately recognizable through quirky or defined behaviors—which often leads to the overused, corny dialogue tropes seen in many major titles.

Conclusion:

The creator suggests that this writing style is rarely the intentional goal of a singular creative vision. Instead, it is an unfortunate byproduct of a massive, bureaucratic system that wants the appearance of creativity without the risks associated with true, challenging artistic expression (10:57-11:33).

Female lead director, nuff said, they cant undertand male pov coz never need to, we as guys have to otherwise we never get kitty

Think about it logically? Can this creature emphatise with what juvenile and later on young adult male has to go tru in life? She obviously cant, so obviously she cant make a game us guys gonna fully enjoy.
We want gore, brutality, sex, hero's journey, mountains of "toxic masculinity" among other things, u dont learn about that durning gender studies, to know what it all really is u need decades of living life as a guy...

 

[Fake]

You can thank generation Z and that trash called Fortnite.

 

[ShadyAcshuns]

The current video game industry has shown us time and time again that they are creatively bankrupt. They'll use any and all slop to fill the void of emptiness that somehow became the standards for AAA games. Honestly I have no idea what happened to original ideas other than the fact that so many developers decided to focus on visuals while ignoring everything else.

 

[Signalis]

They can't move on because they will actually have to find writers with talent.

 

[Bloody5]

Because games are written by smart boys who think that sarcasm and quips equal wisdom and wit.

 

[samoilaaa]

people used to have depth and it translated into everything they did , now all this new young blood grew up with doomscrolling , tiktoks , meme , you cant except depth /maturity from them

i saw an documentary last year i cant remember the name , it was basically saying that people have become dumber and their have shorter attention span because of all this short content like tiktoks , people cant even watch a 2h movie anymore because their dopamine sensors are fried

 

[StueyDuck]

It's awful. Combine it with slow walk and chats and I'm uninstalling your game.

At least slow walks you know its talking time.

These days games just blab utter shit and blurt at you 24/7

Been playing darktide with mates and holy hell they just keep barking shit non stop and they never shut the hell up.

Its like tiktok brain cant process life unless there's shit attacking all your senses non stop.

Before this wed played split fiction and that was even worse

 

[intbal]

What this video tells me is that "William B. Campbell" has never played any gaming device other than a Playstation, or else he thinks this problem is almost entirely exclusive to Playstation games.

Gears 4 or 5 easily could have been included as bad offenders.

 

[xanaum]

A lot of this whole mess started getting made back when those Marvel-style quips were considered "the coolest thing ever." I think that trend will die out soon.

 

[The_hunter]

Probably because sweat baby is writing a lot of these games.

 

[ChorizoPicozo]

Not even Nolan can scape from that it.... It's not marvel... It's the other thing

 

[Holammer]

Writing is a collaborative effort in a big budget development where every word is weighed and measured for marketing reasons, for political correctness.
That's why you get true wit & pathos from small indie games.

Imagine Undertale having a writers' room instead of Toby's singular vision.

 

[Pagusas]

Probably because sweat baby is writing a lot of these games.

This style of writing isn't a political style, its just a template of a once new and popular style that the (bad/cheap) writers grew up with, thus it influenced their output style (and for many becomes their adopted identity, they have no real creative soul inside of them, so they can only mimic). Its in all forms of media, conservative, liberal, middle ground, all of it. The same thing happened in every generation of writers and its just something that has to reach a saturation point before society as a whole gets bored/annoyed by it and it goes the way of Westers/Disco/jeggings for awhile.

The real (long term) fix for it is simple: Strongly unique creative leads and writers who have their own style. Those people cost serious money and companies don't want to pay for it. The REAL creatives with talent in the world don't rely on current political winds to capture a built in audience, they break through all the noise with something unique and timeless. They are rare and the best of the best, but also aren't the types that would normally latch onto a AAA game or blockbuster film.

 

[NeoIkaruGAF]

I'm sorry, but is that thumb implying that Uncharted was nuanced? The series of "admit it, you're gonna miss this ass" and "that's gonna hurt in the morning"?

Marvel quips is the main type of pop culture dialogue millennials and Gen Z grew up with. Combine it with most of those people growing up with tons of entertainment, helicopter parenting, and zero risks before leaving home, and it's obvious why current writers resort to it so much. People who never found themselves in real danger obviously tend to think that everyone keeps yapping one-liners like Spider-Man when facing any kind of real trouble.

 

[The_Observer]

This is one of the worst things in modern gaming. It's disgusting.

 

[KimDongHwan]

I'm sorry, but is that thumb implying that Uncharted was nuanced? The series of "admit it, you're gonna miss this ass" and "that's gonna hurt in the morning"?

Marvel quips is the main type of pop culture dialogue millennials and Gen Z grew up with. Combine it with most of those people growing up with tons of entertainment, helicopter parenting, and zero risks before leaving home, and it's obvious why current writers resort to it so much. People who never found themselves in real danger obviously tend to think that everyone keeps yapping one-liners like Spider-Man when facing any kind of real trouble.

I think the one that started it all was Uncharted 2 - but when Uncharted 2 did it, it felt new and fun. Now it has just been beaten to the ground but they still keep going at it.

 

[Gonzito]

 

[[Tact]]

Hi all, I just wanted to share this video that goes into a theory of why we are stuck on this AAA writing style which I found really interesting watch. It doesn't go into any of the political world but stays grounded on how people develop things.

Spoiler: AI Summary for TL;DW

This video explores why modern AAA video games often rely on a sanitized, quippy writing style—frequently dubbed "Marvel Dialogue"—despite widespread criticism from both audiences and the writers themselves (0:09-1:03).

The video highlights two primary structural reasons for this phenomenon:

• Disciplined Production over Artistic Freedom (1:09-4:12): The creator argues that large-scale game development teams are dominated by "piano carriers" (managers, producers, and coordinators) rather than "piano players" (purely creative writers). Because games are complex, successful studios prioritize organization, internal guidelines, and risk-aversion, forcing writers to prioritize adherence to rules over bold, nuanced creativity.
• The Cult of "Readability" (4:13-6:43): Studios strive for extreme accessibility and universal appeal. They aim for characters that are easily legible to global audiences and resistant to feeling dated. This results in writing that is scrubbed of unique cultural textures or risky, specific creative choices, aiming instead for a "safe" corporate middle ground.
• The Role of Iterative Design (6:45-10:56):
  • The narrative process is often plagued by "death by a thousand cuts," where undefined or subtle character traits are viewed as inessential and thus cut during development. To protect their work, writers often rely on "high-contour" characterization—making characters immediately recognizable through quirky or defined behaviors—which often leads to the overused, corny dialogue tropes seen in many major titles.

Conclusion:

The creator suggests that this writing style is rarely the intentional goal of a singular creative vision. Instead, it is an unfortunate byproduct of a massive, bureaucratic system that wants the appearance of creativity without the risks associated with true, challenging artistic expression (10:57-11:33).

I found this video to operate on a lot of unexamined assumptions.

 

[Denton]

The Joss Whedon style of writing

Joss Whedon was actually a good writer. When someone tries to write like him but isn't a good writer, results will be poor.

 

[Pagusas]

Joss Whedon was actually a good writer. When someone tries to white like him but isn't a good writer, results will be poor.

oh 100% agreed, he was such a good writer he influenced a whole generation of copy cats, who, like the majority of copy cats, suck ass.

 

[IntentionalPun]

It's awful. Combine it with slow walk and chats and I'm uninstalling your game.

The absolute worst thing to happen to gaming.

Even an un-skippable cutscene is better as at least you don't have to sit there and pointlessly interact with the game. Not that un-skippable cutscenes aren't also a travesty.

 

[Ristifer]

The current video game industry has shown us time and time again that they are creatively bankrupt. They'll use any and all slop to fill the void of emptiness that somehow became the standards for AAA games. Honestly I have no idea what happened to original ideas other than the fact that so many developers decided to focus on visuals while ignoring everything else.

This is a good way to put it. There's always a sense that silence needs to be filled and it really doesn't have to be this way. There has to be contrast for dialogue to be interesting and worthwhile.

It's the same with mission/quest design and characters giving hints or constantly bugging you with details about the puzzle/mystery. Less is more in these cases. You don't need the silence to be constantly filled with pointless chit chat, hints, or canned humour. Especially when the humour is so quippy and out of context.

 

[NeoIkaruGAF]

I think the one that started it all was Uncharted 2 - but when Uncharted 2 did it, it felt new and fun. Now it has just been beaten to the ground but they still keep going at it.

"That's gonna hurt in the morning" was from UC1 if I remember correctly,

Joss Whedon was actually a good writer. When someone tries to write like him but isn't a good writer, results will be poor.

Joss Whedon writing is perfect for Joss Whedon shows. The dialogue in Firefly was impeccable considering the setting, the characters and the direction.

When you start using that kind of dialogue in, say, Oppenheimer… that's when it sounds moronic and out of place.

 

[Zacfoldor]

When movies take place in times that are hard to understand there is often an audience surrogate added in order to bridge the game between the audience and the world.

The most famous audience surrogate is Dr. Watson from Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes. As a regular human accompanying a genius, Watson's questions force Holmes to explain his complex deductions, naturally feeding the reader the exposition they need to understand the mystery. [1, 2, 3]

An audience surrogate represents the reader/viewer during the story.

Because gaming is trying to appeal to the same mass audience that MARVEL is trying to appeal too, then the use of Marvel dialogue is a way to represent the viewer during the story. It is an appeal to modern audiences. You don't hate it enough.

 

[RafterXL]

There's just way too much bitch in Western AAA writers.

The layoffs can't happen soon enough.

That's also the case in television and movies now. The zero denying that the current massive change in the demographics of writers and the decline of writing in western media are 100% linked.

Joss Whedon was actually a good writer. When someone tries to write like him but isn't a good writer, results will be poor.

I actually liked all of this stuff back in the day, but yes, every hack writer who grew up on his stuff literally just copies his homework. Unfortunately for them it was written in another language and all they speak is idiot, so it comes off as vapid and annoying.

 

[owandeseis]

 

[Angry_Megalodon]

Please, don't call these people "writers". They are not. This is why they produce this fucking shit. Writing is a job that demands thousands of hours of READING and PRACTICING. If you haven't gone through that, you are not a writer, regardless of your undeserved position in a prestige company.

In indie games, though, you often see genuinely great writing. Because those are actual writers who took the time, effort and talent to learn their craft.

 

[simpatico]

He's standing right behind me isn't he?

 

[Metnut]

The other two GoE didn't really have much "Marvel dialogue" aside from a few one-liners by the talking head. Was pretty minor in the grand scheme of 30-40 hour games, and I didn't mind it.

I imagine the new GOW will be similar.

 

[Holammer]

He's standing right behind me isn't he?

correct.

 

[Killer8]

We gotta ask ourselves if the problem isn't actually the other way around. Maybe audiences today are just so mindraped that the only thing they respond to any more is funny quirk chungus dialogue. If the focus testers love it then chances are high that the wider audience will too, which is why developers keep doing it. And other things too, like making live service slop - because people keep playing it!

It's high time for gamers to look in the mirror. We got the godforsaken industry we deserved. If you have any Fortnite trophies on your profile, don't speak to me.

 

[Angry_Megalodon]

We gotta ask ourselves if the problem isn't actually the other way around. Maybe audiences today are just so mindraped that the only thing they respond to any more is funny quirk chungus dialogue. If the focus testers love it then chances are high that the wider audience will too, which is why developers keep doing it. And other things too, like making live service slop - because people keep playing it!

It's high time for gamers to look in the mirror. We got the godforsaken industry we deserved. If you have any Fortnite trophies on your profile, don't speak to me.

No.

People didn't ask for this quality drop in their entertainment. And they react positively when a mainstream movie, series or game has great writing. That's why Expedition 33 or Attack on Titan are also hits among normies.