Opera helps to make better Videogames.

Ok. I have to write this one sooner or later. So let’s get it over with.

A regular discussion with an Opera singer is the eternal dispute between singing vs acting. I have found a similar dispute in the video game industry about Story Telling vs Game Play.

At first glance, the answer on both situations seems very easy. Singers sing, if you want acting on stage go to the theatre (I was actually told this by a renown conductor)  and Games are played, if you want story on the TV put on a DVD. It appears that each art form, Opera and Videogames, should add other elements as a sweetener, a something that flavors your already established medium. 

Opera is an art form that feeds from others; fashion and light design, architecture, acting, music composing, singing, choreography, dance, staging, etc. etc. But even if all this elements are present, one rule must prevail: Singing is King. And same goes for videogames, they feed from music, architecture, lighting, level design, game design, writing, etc. and one rule prevails: Gameplay is King.

So why did acting became such a big deal for Opera and Storytelling for Games?, why are we seeing less and less of those Opera casts in which the singers just “Park and Bark” the same way we start too see better voice and character acting on videogames?. Was acting or story telling never important in the first place?. No. Acting has always been important, but in a different way, Mozart, for example, was keen on making each word count, he even accounts for the dramatic abilities of his different singers in many of his letters. I have debated this point in Opera with stage directors who worked at the Metropolitan Opera, with fellow top star singers, composers and conductors, and finally, in the words of one of my favorite stage directors, Renaud Ducet; “People just want to be entertained”. 

Today’s audiences are not in tune with what the Opera world from 30, 15 or even 5 years ago had to offer. They are in tune with Jennifer Aniston (here) and all other gratification candies that spring out from our fast paced zapping society.

Rolando Villazon, Natalie Dessay, Jonas Kauffman, Netrevko, Lucca Pissaroni … I can keep going with the names of so many singers who have understood the way to connect with today’s audiences through singing-acting. (Villazon and Dessay being two of my favorites) I will confess this; when faced with the question: Who’s show would you rather attend, Pavarotti or Domingo’s?, … Domingo. Forever.

Little by little, successful Opera singers have been able to cope with good acting and good singing, not to act while they sing or vice-versa, but embedding one into the other; yes , the natural evolution of the art makes this happen almost automatically, but also because those artists have worked hard on making it happen.

One HUGE mistake that I see happening over and over on the Opera stages is this:

-        
                      We need a different approach to opera for it to survive, better acting! 
         Let’s hire a theatre director!          
         Great idea!

No, … no, no. That’s a stupid idea; it’s actually the worst idea ever. Theatre productions take almost a month of rehearsals, Opera takes 2 weeks, theatre productions do not have choruses, Opera does, theatre stage directors do not read music, everyone on stage in the Opera does. I have found (with it’s exceptions of course) that the most effective Opera stage directors are choreographers. They just get things done effectively and with meaningful results. 

Coming back to our Videogame context, I find the same dichotomy. There is a jewel on the internet that contains a debate between Tom Bissell and Simon Ferrari (here) at some point in the back and forward of their letters the discussion points towards the Videogame critiques based on Game Design (Ferrari) and the Critique based on play experience (Bissell)

Bissell:

As a fiction writer used to, I guess, analog literary experiences, the experience of working some of this stuff out revitalized my faith in what makes video games--at least, those that attempt to tell stories--so interesting and exciting. And nothing about it seemed to me ludological at all. It seemed, and seems, like an entirely new way for the storyteller to think about storytelling.

And he finishes his letter asking if Ferrari cares about storytelling, to which Ferrari answered:

The short answer is, “No, I do not care about videogame storytelling.”

The long answer is indeed long.

Further on Ferrari says:

A more subjective answer to your question is that I tend to ignore videogame stories in order to maintain my sanity—I find almost all of them terrible in every conceivable way. 

And I mildly agree, there’s some terrible stuff out there, but just because there is stuff to be improved does not mean we should disregard it all together. Videogames are made by artists, for the most part; animators, concept artists, writers, designers, hell! , even producers!!, and artists are hungry to tell a story, to “say” something. One would think:

"Hollywood has helped us to define a form of narrative that is concrete and precise for movies. So why not use Hollywood to write our videogame stories?." 

AHA! I’ll tell you why, because it would be as stupid as bringing a theatre director to the Opera stage. Videogames have yet to refine story telling THROUGH game play as Scott Rogers affirms on "Level Up" , the way Opera singers are learning to embed a more refined acting into their singing (which is different than acting while singing). The way videogames tell stories will definitely borrow from writing on TV and Movies, the same as it will borrow from Playwriting, but just borrow, because it will have to (and is currently doing it anyways) spawn it’s own way of delivering the message taking into account the many other players. Once again; Gameplay is King. Telling a story through video games does not mean better writing in videogames:

Anyone of the belief that games will better establish themselves artistically primarily through "better" storytelling is, I have no doubt, absolutely wrong. It's not going to work that way, because it can't work that way. (Tom Bissell)

Those who, like Ferrari said, rely on storytelling to cover poor game play will fail, the same as actors who jump into the Opera stage with a medium well trained voice fail. Those who disregard story telling in favor of amazing gameplay and design, will succeed, just as many good singers out there have done and none knows their names, but it is those who embrace and fuse to perfection the human appetite for telling and hearing stories with game play who will level up our industry and will be remembered. Just as those great singers who where and are more than just another beautiful bird.