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Fran Tufro
Fran Tufro

Posted on • Originally published at onwriting.games on

a rhyzome of game narrative archetypes

Did you see how many video games have a "character creator" that presents a finite set of hair, eyes, nose, face shapes, etc.?

What if we take this concept and apply it to the archetypes of our characters or NPCs?

We can generate a combinatorial explosion in our favor, and be able to create characters that work in unexpected but consistent ways in different narrative situations.

I think this could be implemented with some variables, like D&D does with alignment:

Chaotic / Neutral / Lawful
Good / Neutral / Evil

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With 6 values, we get 9 very clear combinations of how characters behave.

What can we do if we apply this to archetypes?

I would be interested to see someone explore this... do you know if someone has already done it?

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