An Open Letter to Telltale Games Concerning Their Adaptation of "Game of Thrones"

Dear Telltale Games,

First and foremost, I want to recognize how necessary of an evil you are. You came to the world when we had RPG's, FPS's, RTS's, MMO's, and MOBA's. In the 21st century, we had every kind of game, with every kind of story to supplement the lack of cohesive storytelling in our real world and every kind of killing. But we didn't yet have games based solely around player choices affecting the story progression, and Telltale, since then you've monopolized it. I have to hand it to you: you know what works, and you know how to stick to that formula, having chugged out first The Walking Dead, then The Wolf Among Us (and others) and now Game of Thrones.

Some years ago, creating games like this wouldn't have worked. Even now, I find it pretty incredible. When I look at a game, my criteria is the following: does the game have good gameplay? If so, I will put the game into my disk tray and I will embark. But if the game doesn't have a credible, realistic, or gritty enough story line, I won't keep it after I'm finished, if I finish, and I won't pay it a second thought. Then, as an afterthought, I consider the graphical fidelity. Notice how gameplay is the first telling sign? But Telltale completely throws out gameplay for petty quick-time theatrics... but still releases largely successful titles. All the more, props to you, Telltale. Considering that the graphics are daft and gameplay bugs out at times, downgrading from cheap and repetitive to incompetent, it is a greater testament to the seamless excellence of the story. And, after all, it's the story that keeps us coming back for more...

Abuse, as the case would be in Game of Thrones. Not only does the story expand upon GRRM's book canon and D&D's show canon, but it would almost completely pull it off if the others didn't exist. Of course, if Game of Thrones didn't exist, where would Telltale get the idea of creating a House as a foil to the Starks, bound and damned by honor, doomed to fall to the treachery of the Boltons. As they would have it, the crowning joy is the choices, the loaded, dire, choice-less choices that we the player have to make. To be fair, though, before Game of Thrones was an apple in its mother Telltale's eye, the evil gleam was there, the tendency to make us play God over the fate of characters. When combined with gritty Westeros and the notoriety that the HBO show has gained for shameless massacring of characters, both at the behest of Almighty Martin and free of his influence, only one thing can come of it... tears.

So, here I am, after completing episode 5, titled "Nest of Vipers." I've played through it twice, having made the choice once and, distraught with it, reversing it. And I can only look up at the person who put me through this, or the entity, I should say. I'm sitting at Telltale's feet. I've been kicked down, and I can't get up. I can't forget the pain, and I won't forget it. And I can't heal. I can only sit here and take it until episode 6 comes out, or next season, or whenever the onslaught ends.

All the melodrama aside, I really think Telltale has a problem, a will, an urge, a hunger to put authority in our hands over fictional beings to damn them at our pleasure. But it's not at our pleasure, of course. We don't choose to deliver justice or mercy or forgiveness. That is, we don't get a choice in enacting any sort of behavior that confirms our humanity. Our conscience is always enclosed by two cheese graters, because we can only save one of two worthy persons, and we have to judge the merit of these fictional humans. We have to say "what's this person's value to the narrative?" Or "what makes this person indispensable in my eyes?" In episode 1 of The Walking Dead, it's an easy call. We haven't been introduced to the two characters long enough, and there's no history or chemistry or even character motivation to make the choice hard. It's a matter of deciding which character you care about less. So, naturally, I chose to save the hot girl. Well, to be honest, a girl can only look so hot with cel-shaded graphics. But in 5 episodes of Game of Thrones, a lot of attachment can build up to the characters, and it's dreadfully cruel to make an innocent player disrupt their conscience and the toy with the results and try to strike the best balance. There's something wicked about it, when done right, and I can't be the only one that notices that.

In movies or TV, or in books, we are merely spectators. Video games afford us a certain delusion that we are filling in the shoes of the protagonist. Many games appeal to our new identities that they instill in us, and that's why they sell. Nobody needs to be told that video games aren't real, but still... in a very real way, games paint a world that's accurate enough to make us adopt it, at least for a time, and our emotional centers are tied to the story.

And that's why a problem arises with ethical choices in games, not with the stark black and white ones, but with the abstract gray. BioShock has a moral choice: devour or save. Game of Thrones has a moral choice, also. Either devour one person or devour another. Preferably devour the most deserving of a good devouring, but the choice is really up to you, and that's why it's called a choice-based game. For two reasons I find fault with this second model, and with its implementation in this last episode.

First, it betrays the narrative. If we are to really be immersed in a video game as a character, we have to have our control limited to that character. With Game of Thrones letting us control multiple characters, we get to a point where we have to choose between them, not as a character, but as a puppeteer manipulating the situation. This interrupts the story flow and betrays the intent of giving the player a chance to make decisions for a character and see out their consequences. All this characterization is thrown aside so that we can step outside of both characters' bodies and play judge, jury, and executioner. The credibility of the story is wrecked by not acting from the character's motivation but from arbitrary ethical judgment that will be weighed in episodes to come. Let's just hope that my call was the same random one that the developers think is the best. Is this a game? Yeah, a guessing game.

Second, the circumstances leading up to the choice are contrived to a bloody pulp. While we play as Rodrik, every decision that we make damns us in the eyes of one of our advisers (whichever one we didn't choose to be our Sentinel). If I don't mess up one, I'll mess up another. It's as if the character is static and the story is predestined (oh wait, it is). The spurned adviser never lets up, and never forgives an affront. He is made to lack empathy for the sole purpose of being the person that sells my plans to the Whitehills, which in turn puts me in the cheese grating position of deciding which character I like more or which one is more critical to the story. And need I mention? Betrayals, when not developed with believable motivation, are trite, bland, and cliche. It's as if some people think that betrayal in and of itself is a strong story element and stands on its own merit. Spoiler: it isn't and doesn't.

So, Telltale, I think your formula is near perfect. However, I see the chink in your armor when it comes to setting up hugely critical choices like the one in episode 5. It was weak and unnecessary, and it made me very sad. So maybe it's time to lay the whole "we need one HUGE decision to decide the fate of two characters" to rest. If you can't make a game without an obligatory moral quandary, maybe you are just the sociopath that Dan and Dave at HBO are. It's pretty despicable to build up characters to simply further the plot and knock 'em down like bowling pins at a minute's notice and leave fans and gamers to piece together what set their undoing in motion.

Love, Jonny

P.S. Quit the pretenses, Telltale. You killed those characters, not me. Don't put a smoking gun in my hand here. You made me choose between two characters that I loved, hoping that I'd puzzle on the complexities of life and go pump something beneficial that I gleaned back into society. Instead, I just think you're mental.

P.P.S. I still love your work.

Game of Thrones: The Bones of a Meaty, Ambitious, Intriguing, and Well-Crafted Story

Game of Thrones used to make me cynical in response to the hopeless idealism that's taken cinema, television, and literature by storm. I loved the introduction to the genre of fantasy that felt more realistic than fantastical. I enjoyed seeing issues of morality on a rainbow of a color pallet instead of zebra stripes. I was thrilled to see glorious men do inglorious things, and for inglorious men to find glory. I was riveted by character development, story progression, and climax.

But now Game of Thrones has made me cynical, not of idealists and optimists, but of Game of Thrones. This HBO drama, always trying to raise the stakes, has come too close to the sun, and alienated the most passionate fans of the series and of the ASoIaF universe. Such fans that know the house names better than the names of their cousins; that know the geography of Westeros and Essos better than the geography of real world America and Europe are losing interest in what was supposed to be a visual retelling. Fans that defend the Stark chivalry and spit upon Bolton betrayal... are reeling at the show's betrayal to George R.R. Martin's cause. Each season of Game of Thrones up to this point we've taken for granted and we've assumed that they stood on their own merit and not purely the success of the book series.

 But this season, the show ha had to ride down the hill without Martin's training wheels and find its way in the world without Martin's compass... and the results have been catastrophic. Moreover, the results were fatal, to a vibrant and promising series. This series with doom on the horizon that always makes us optimistic to see what will happen has doomed itself, and we're getting bored of hearing about it. Many shows are a lot of things. Some are slow, some are violent, some are gratuitous, some use too many C words and F words. But none of them, with the budget and the cable protection of Game of Thrones under HBO and the source material from GRRM want for quality so much that they need to rely on cheap cliffhangers and trite twists and turns. Character development sits in prison; story progression fell on its sword; climax died screaming, honey ask me, I should know.

So why exactly is this season worth quitting the show? Well, season 5 has revealed several things about the men that brought the books to the small screen, David Benioff and D.B. Weiss.

1. It's revealed that they won't slow down the pace of Game of Thrones for anything, not even for the source material to catch up. There are several arguments that someone could use to defend this. For one, the actors are growing up, such as Maisie Williams, at a noticeable rate, and their child character won't line up age-wise any more. Additionally, if they slow the show down, they could reduce their profits. Lastly, some would say that slowing the show down doesn't matter, because the show has become its own this season.
      a) The child actors are growing up, yes, but the stories have already been bent to make them more adult-oriented. You can't pull the child card when Arya Stark has been transformed into someone that will stab Meryn Trant, who has been transformed into a pedophile to justify cruelty, in the eye and prolong his suffering out of enjoyment and sadistic glee.
      b) Maybe if the story gets slowed down it would weed out the ones that only watch for cheap satisfaction instead of development and payoff, which in and of itself would be a good thing, but I can express the economics in such an equation:

more seasons = more episodes
episodes x viewership = moneys
viewership = directly proportionate to quality
higher quality = higher viewership
consistent quality = consistent viewership
consistent high quality = consistent high viewership
therefore,
more seasons x consistent high quality = more consistently high profits

       c) Yes, the show has become its own entity, but that's not inherently a good thing. If the show still wanted to follow the books faithfully, the adaptation would be slowed down by that, to include all the depth and complexity as detailed in the books. And in adding content, the lifespan of Game of Thrones would be prolonged.

2. It's revealed that they will abandon the structured source material the first chance they get. Given that the show could have slowed down to provide more time for the next book to come out, it logically follows that since they didn't slow it down, it's because they didn't want to. And since they didn't want to, that logically means that they want to be able to write their own story and not be hindered by the preexisting one. The show wants to branch off and enjoy full control.

3. It's revealed that as a separate entity, the show is illogical at best, and, at worst, hellbent on tearing down Martin's creation.
       One example where logic was absent : Jaime goes to Dorne to make his sister happy again. Firstly, why should he want to make her happy? Before he was on the path to righteousness and, just to put the record straight, Cersei is basically Satan. Therefore, Jaime has to abandon his quest for absolution to make an evil woman happy. So his character is butchered and his story line descends into mush to do something that makes no sense, like go to Dorne undercover to kidnap his daught--niece. Then, when he gets there, he is caught in a fight to the death and encounters gold hand-ex machina. Just so we're clear, we have an illogical character with illogical intentions, topped of by a typical TV trope. Are we talking about the gritty realistic Game of Thrones we've come to know? But wait... he goes to kidnap his daughter, but OH NO! He gets in a fight with the Sand Snakes, some illogically overly angry girls that are Oberyn's daughters that follow their illogically overly angry mother and never question her logic (something they should have done). Additionally, they don't understand the rules of trials by combat and they don't realize that their dad was just a hothead and got the head smashing he deserved (but not the one he needed). And have I mentioned that they're angry all the time for no really good logical reason? This time, they fight, and Bronn, a proven fighter, takes on two Sand Snakes, like we'd imagine he could, while Jaime fights the other, but before he can win, Doran's guards stop the fun. Right, so now our illogical character with illogical intentions is saved not once but twice when he should have been killed. You know, you'd think that if Game of Thrones would bend the rules to save a character, it would be a well-liked character that isn't duplicitous, smug, and untrue, like any one of the Starks. But yeah, nah. Then, Prince Doran, despite being attacked in his own home by a stranger, spares Jaime. Then Bronn is about to die of poison from the snakes, but is given fun boobs that save his life. But I don't have a problem with that, 'cause Bronn is awesome. And Jaime wants Myrcella to go with him back to King's Landing, so Doran lets that happen too. Then, Prince Doran makes his crazy and overly angry sister-in-law apologize and he buys her bullshit for some reason. Fool me once... Then they all say goodbye and crazy overly angry lady makes out with Myrcella, all kinky like, and it turns out to be poison. Fool me twice... Lastly, in Jaime's Dorne adventure he is encouraged twice that it's okay to sleep with your crazy crazy sister. We don't choose who we have sex with...


Thanks for your time. The End.

A Song Of Ice And Fire (Game of Thrones) Book Review-- 100% Spoiler Free

I just finished George R.R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire, and before anybody jumps on me for one reason or another, namely to scrutinize the series, I'd just like to give my honest review.

Just a disclaimer: I haven't read any book series over this last year, surrounding myself with stand alone famous works, in the frame of mind that aside from a few exceptions, books written in series cannot evoke sincere human emotion and moreover, aren't mentally and psychologically stimulating in the least. So I'm glad that the one series I decided to read was A Song Of Ice And Fire.

For starters, these are not books for the faint of heart. They contain graphic mature content, sexuality and medieval themed violence, recurring all throughout the as of yet 5 published books. But you know what? All of this will pale when compared with the emotions that you will experience at the hands of George R.R. Martin. Would I say that Martin is a stooped over and perverse author? Far from it. He is very ambitious with what he puts forward in his books and it is evident that he is firmly in touch with human nature. Do I wish that he would polish that and dumb it down in such a way that people would feel more comfortable about having them in their schools? No. He describes all the aforementioned elements in brutal clarity, in such a way that each of us, Christian or not, should address the motivation, the lust that we are all akin to, and more than anything the heart of the matter and of us as humans. Now, to delve into setting and characters.

One of the strong points of the saga is the realism, not just in reference to the more extreme elements, but also to the characters and the forces that drive them, for good, for bad, for ugly, and for a constant gooey blend of all three. When you read, you become immersed and the ancient histories of Westeros become YOUR histories; the deeply engraved honor in the family names becomes YOUR honor and YOUR name. And what better genre to give you that delusion than epic fantasy? As to the characters, it’s hard to keep track of the names at first, but even at the end of five with two more books on the way, there’s no way of knowing where the many many (remaining) characters are going, but when they get there, you’ll look back and know the telling signs. Nothing is without reason and no action goes neglected. And what more can you ask for from a narrative than unpredictable but logical flow? That is, logic takes the place of good vs. evil, so if you’re expecting all your favorite characters to get through without making fatal, bad, and morally compromising decisions, don’t even pick up the books. And if you’re expecting all your passionately hated characters to die painful deaths and not experience redemption, I repeat, don’t even bother. Welcome to Westeros.

One more thing I’d like to note is the religious aspect of the series, another thriving point from Martin in my opinion. Each god is well developed and for each sect there are zealots. There’s the northern gods, the Drowned God, the Red God, and the Seven. Now, to all my Christian friends, know this: these books are good for it. Martin doesn’t come out with a half-baked and ignorant take on religion. There are many half-truths to what he brings across, which are directly targeting us as Christians. So rise to the occasion. I for one find the entire infrastructure of lore fascinating, reminiscent of Greek Mythology in that you find yourself wishing they were real. But for the most part, these books are atheistic, and they represent all of the faiths and gods in a way that abides with people who just plainly don’t understand religion. They see several theologies that run directly contrary to one another in an incongruent, sloppy mess. Don’t interpret what I’m saying as a religious rant, but don’t fault people for what they believe or don’t believe.

To conclude, the pacing behind A Song Of Ice And Fire is very solid for the most part: there is build-up, excellent character development, and the big bang and revelation that follows them. I’ll have you know that the least favorite in the series is the fourth, “A Feast for Crows.” At times it can be a trudge, but know that the author understood what he was doing, rightly naming it “A Feast for Crows” which in plain English would just be “The Leftovers.” And lastly, I want to celebrate George R.R. Martin as an author. Every word that comes from his mouth and onto paper is controversy. Some people hate the series and some people love the series, namely the characters he makes and hate to see them go. Naturally, they fault the person who made the characters for taking them away. Not to purposefully get more religious than I have, but Martin at his pen is a parallel to God’s design. In the same sense, every good thing comes from God and every good thing is taken away by him according to his design and purpose. Matthew 5:45 says “For he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust.” So what I’m trying to say is that if you think these books are your cup of tea, don’t hesitate about getting around to reading them. And if they’re not, it’s your preference and your preference is not divine authority, just as mine isn’t. Don’t read books stupid. Don’t turn off your brain for one second and don’t stop questioning the world that we live in. Nothing in Westeros is entirely invented and every fragment of the narrative appears in our world on a daily basis.

And one last thing, aside from all the depth that I’ve addressed, these books are fun. They are good reads and they keep you on the edge of your seat. And the medieval combat and maps and warfare are AWESOME. A Song Of Ice And Fire (Game of Thrones) is not a book series or a TV show, to be honest. It’s an entire virtual universe.

My score: 9.0 on the Richter Scale (Great Intensity)