Why even use structures at all?

Narratorika
Nov 5 · 2 min read

Before we even start with this whole structure crash course, we need to cover why the hell to even use them.

Think about them as writing prompts.

The story goes on for a while, it meanders, it doesn’t have a way out and you don’t know what to do. You consult a structure. It tells you that you had to escalate two scenes before. Congrats! You’re now unstuck.

Of course, structures don’t tell it precisely. Except for one, but we don’t talk about the nuclear option. It’s too dangerous! It doesn’t actually save cats.

Different structures suit different things.

While Puzankov claims religiously that 3 acts is all you need, he also uses a bunch of others. Some suit TV format and have been developed for that, some don’t work for branching narratives.

Despite differences being kinda superficial, using a wrong one for the wrong purpose may feel awkward and hinder your work.

Not just for linearity.

Repetitions, flashbacks, in media res, all this non-linearity and interactivity. What a nightmare! No really. Just try to arrange a complicated value-dependent system-driven mess so that you can at least try to edit it. Add jigsaw narrative or roguelike and you truly need to organize the chaos.

Branching templates help with, well, branching. Some structures help perfectly positioning the twist.

And there are ways to implement repetition/replayability into your game.

Everyone has their pack.

Kinda like with game engines, writers and designers have their favourite toolbox and approach. Whether it’s a mix of two or a personal twist, developing your own style on the structural level is as important.

A few structures — that we know — won’t get a spotlight in this course, but we will do our best to mention the rest. You need to know about them to use them. And you need to practice them.

No game runs on one structure.

Yup. One for levels, one for sidequests, one for the main story. And of course, the player replaying the level has to be taken into account. Death of a player is never the end.

Here’s our course on structures: http://narratorika.com/ccstructure

Narratorika

Written by

Gamewriting & Narrative Design school based in Russia

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