The Walking Dead, CS Idea

The Walking Dead and Transmedia storytelling

After some confusion about the brief, I think I finally have it pinned down. Well I hope so! As it is a very broad brief I am hoping this will be right! After discussing with my team mate Liam, we decided to look at The Walking Dead and how it uses Transmedia storytelling. The definition of Transmedia storytelling is the aspect of telling a story across multiple platforms and formats. Each different method of storytelling uses different techniques to appeal to an audience who enjoy storytelling through that selected type of media platform. E.g. a graphic novel will tell the story through visuals, a game will tell it through the game play, music and character interactions and a film/tv show will tell it through characterization, character interactions, sound and visuals.

The series was first a graphic novel created by Robert Kirkman.

 It then became a television series on AMC, and was then turned into a 5 part game. 

There is also another game in production set for release at the end of 2013. 

This is a perfect example of Transmedia storytelling and the coherent world they have created around this one narrative and its many characters. I decided to look at the Graphic Novel to the Game, with my question being:

How does The Walking dead successfully create a coherent world throughout the Graphic Novel and Game through the use of Transmedia Storytelling? 

Graphic Novel

The Graphic Novel was first released in 2003 as a series of comics created by Robert Kirkman and Tony Moore. It is based around the story of Rick Grimes, a police officer who awakens from a coma to find he is in the middle of a zombie apocalypse. It follows the story of how he reunites with his family and his struggle for survival. The Graphic Novel has been extremely successful, now on its 89th comic, and still going strong.

The Game

The game is a 5 part series created by Tell Tale Games based solely on the Graphic Novel. Created in the same style, the thick lines and bold colours give the same feel as a comic. The game however follows the story of a new character called Lee, who, after being arrested finds himself in an apocalypse. He meets a young girl called Clementine. The narrative then follows these two characters as they group together with others to survive, while searching for Clementine's parents.The game has also been very popular with its story really strong along with its characters. 

The world in which these stories are set is a large a diverse one. It is our own. Characters can come from all walks of life and have their own personalities and morals. One of the main reasons why these worlds are still so coherent, even through lots of different media is the links they make to one another. For example, a player of the game could start reading the graphic novel and see a familiar character, they have already grown this emotional attachment to that character so they read on. It is the same for the TV show, characters and locations are mimicked in the game, and players feel like they can relate to these faces and areas. 

Propps Theory in Relation to The Walking Dead:

• The Hero- Lee
• The False Hero- Andrew St John
• The Villain- Zombies, plus Bandits
• The Donor- Doug
• The Helper- Kenny
• The Dispatcher- The World, and Bandits
• The Princess (and her father)- Clementine

What I decided to have a close look at is how the characters and locations are coherent throughout the game and comic. Firstly I had a look at which locations and characters were the same in each.

Another game I looked at was AMC's small game based on Shane. It illustrates the coherent world of the Walking Dead. It shows how he survived the zombie outbreak before he went to check on Rick in the Hospital.  Below is screens from the game, and how they have used the graphic novel style.

Below is Shane from the comic.

From the Tell Tale game a character as well as his location that is used from the comic is Hershel and his farm.

Below is Hershel's farm in the comic. 

 This is Hershel's farm in the game, and as you can see it is almost identical to the comic. For fans of the comic this is a coherency that had to be kept in detail.

This is Hershel in the comic.

He is quite old, with a rugged, bearded face, and wears an army looking jacket around his farm.

Below is Hershel from the game. As you can see, they are identical. The creators of the game have put a lot of effort into creating the characters as identical as possible.

Another example of this is the character Glenn. Glenn appears in the comic and in the game, and the games narrative serves as a prequel to how he meets Rick. 

House design and Floorplans

 Here are the drawings for the Kasumi house and an extra area.
The Barn is an example of an extra area on the Kasumi land.

This is the Kasumi house, (Helianthus House) as well as floor plan.

More Artwork

This is a generic cultist. They all wear the same robes when part of the cult meetings. When a member is possessed the members mouth is sewn shut as to ensure the demon does not escape. The cultists skin slowly peels away while they are possessed, meaning the longer they have been under the demons control, the less human they look. To free the member, the cultist mouth must be un-stitched so that the demon can escape.

Below is an example of the evidence the player collects in the tutorial house. A torn photo, a knife and a note. The glowing knife is an example of what objects will look like in game when they can be interacted with.

This is the Kasumi Family who live at Helianthus house. They are Hana, Maddy, Light and Shadow.

Below is the office space that Jason inhabits while staying at the Kasumi family house. He has a small room at the top of the house with a tiny window. He has a desk, a shelf and a bed. The desk is used to look over evidence and to use the laptop for research. The shelf contains all the evidence the player has collected. The player can also use the walls to piece together notes and photos. There is also a floor plan of the house the player can interact with. The bed is where Jason can sleep to either advance to the day or save the game. The bed is also where Jason awakens if he blacks out.

PSN and PC Icons

Here are our ideas for the icon of our game. This will be on PSN and for the PC icon on steam.

Gameplay drawings

 Here is the gameplay pictures for our game, showing the third person view with the cross hair. This is the room in the daylight.

This image illustrates how the surroundings change at nighttime.

The below image shows what happens to the screen when Jason is near to blacking out. The screen gets blurrier until it is just darkness and Jason awakens in his bed.

We wanted the player to be able to know when it was going to get dark as to either investigate a certain area or hide. This watch has a sun that spins around in the day until night and the moon appears underneath.

The player can also get different objects out of Jasons utility belt. The player scrolls across the pockets to get what they need. He has a radio to talk to his partner, as well as a torch and whatever he picks up.

This is the players first person view when Jason is looking over evidence.

Case for our game

Here is a mock up case for our game, what it would look like on a case. As we decided it will be digitally sold we decided this would be the icon on the Xbox marketplace. I am also working on some icons for the PSN etc.

I decided to go for a very Japanese look to follow the theme and setting of our game, having the Japanese translation of the title underneath. The symbol in the centre is the Cults symbol in the game. The Japanese letters stand for 'Sunflower' in the centre.

Contextual Studies lecture, 7th Nov

In this lecture we looked at the role of the story in construction of different games. But first we had another look at the project brief.

"Creating Coherent Worlds"
Coherent basically means consistent and realistic. Therefore we are looking at how a world is created coherently throughout different medias.

"Transmedia"
Transmedia is basically the use of different types of media to convey a world and narrative. A good example of this is Star Wars, as it has films, short animated films, games, Lego, etc.

After this we began to look at Coherent worlds and the notion of 'Theme'.

Games have themes, and these themes make the overall experience stronger and more realistic. All elements of a game, TV show or film work towards creating this one theme. The theme has to be precise, it cannot be just 'pirates' as this is far too open. A theme must be specific.

It can be said that all themes derive from childhood stories, and are themes that follow a particular pattern. These stories have always been told to children, but another influential movement was of the comic strip which started to be printed in the 1930's. They started as strips in the local paper, as cliffhanger episodes with compelling characters and narratives.

From this we went on to talk about the ultimate Coherent world; The Theme Park.
The way a Disney theme is set up, for example, is just like a game. With writing on the floor directing you to a certain area, moving around a jungle and then a castle etc. An early example of this is world fairs and expos. These were the earliest attractions which follow the same theme, as well as 'freak shows'.

Storytelling in games has grown over the years to become a major part of their design process. Early games such as Centipede or Astroids have no set narrative. The earliest narrative game was called 'ZORK' and this was a text based adventure game. Narratives in games must be compelling and have meaningful challenges and obstacles so the player feels immersed in this environment.