When Worlds Collide: How Video Games Reinvent Storytelling and Why It Matters

A video game insider reveals how stories power the best computer games

Imagine joining a team of heroic warriors to defeat a monstrous king in a sword and sorcery-themed fantasy realm. Imagine being a Wild West cowboy and robbing a steam train, or a samurai battling the Mongol hordes in feudal Japan. Imagine becoming a cat and fending for yourself in a sprawling urban environment, or shepherding a group of survivors through a wartime fictional city. Imagine, too, if you could build your own character to explore these new realms, or even create your own world.

From collaborative raids with people you’ll never meet in real life to intimate, character-based dramas where you get to inhabit a completely different personality, video games are transforming how we tell stories. It’s a medium that’s always in flux, exploring the capabilities of ever-changing technology and coming up with new ways to engage, immerse and surprise by putting you in the story.

When Worlds Collide speaks to leading writers and narrative designers in the video game industry to look at how video games are taking age-old storytelling techniques and twisting them into new shapes, as well as establishing fresh ways of telling tales unique to the medium. From genre to character, from dialogue to performance, from emergent narrative to transmedia storytelling and the Metaverse, video game writer and academic Colin Harvey explores the particular challenges and manifold possibilities this new medium offers storytellers and worldbuilders.

Interactive, spatial and connected, the influence of game storytelling is spreading way beyond the screen, into wider culture and society, throwing up new ethical challenges in its wake. Colin Harvey takes us on a journey through these myriad compelling domains, tracking their evolution through pixels and polygons to a future in which the real and virtual are increasingly entwined.

Reviews

'Drawing on his expertise as both a practitioner and a storyteller, Harvey skillfully examines the ways in which games are revolutionizing how we engage with, experience, and create stories. Each chapter blends theory with practice, making the ideas accessible and engaging, while inspiring both creators and fans alike to rethink the boundaries of narrative. Whether you're a gamer, writer, or simply a lover of storytelling, When Worlds Collide is an eye-opening and thought-provoking read that will forever change the way you look at stories.' – Damien Goodwin (Star Wars Outlaws, The Casting of Frank Stone, Returnal)

'People often ask why I care about storytelling in games. From now on I'll just give them this book' – Antony Johnston, (Dead Space, Resident Evil Village, Middle-Earth:Shadow of Mordor)