RMMV A game without speech

[NinjaKittyProductions]

Although the title says RMMV, this topic could easily be available to most rpg makers.

I have been reading a few webtoons as of late and one in particular has caught my attention.
In the webtoon, no one ever speaks. The main character, the side characters... absolutely no one. Now there are signs as well as other things that have words that can be read (Newpaper, TV screen subtitles, etc.) that sometimes will give a hint as to what is going on around.

I was wondering if something like this could be done in a rpg. Say using Yanfly's Icon Balloons to help get across what the player and the npcs are talking about. I am not sure how the execution would go however or even if it would be something that wouldn't just bore the player or annoy them.

Maybe even the use of facial expressions or animated bust would be more helpful in designing this type of interactive system.
Thoughts/suggestions?

 

[MushroomCake28]

Hmmm, I think it would be hard to do. Don't get me wrong, I love the idea of having no word spoken and still deliver a story. The problem is that when there is no words exchanged, other ways of communicating a message become way more important. So that means: body language, facial expression, environment, behavior, character movement, etc. Unfortunately, it's harder to have things like facial expressions and character movement in a 2D game. It is still doable though, but I think it will be more of challenge than actually having some dialogue.

 

[NinjaKittyProductions]

Hmmm, I think it would be hard to do. Don't get me wrong, I love the idea of having no word spoken and still deliver a story. The problem is that when there is no words exchanged, other ways of communicating a message become way more important. So that means: body language, facial expression, environment, behavior, character movement, etc. Unfortunately, it's harder to have things like facial expressions and character movement in a 2D game. It is still doable though, but I think it will be more of challenge than actually having some dialogue.

I agree with everything you said. However, it seems like a fun challenge to try and do and see how far you can get with it. I believe it would be a fun exercise to see if you can get across the point of the story without adding dialogue. If you could accomplish it, how much more depth would dialogue then add to your story?

 

[Milennin]

That's what I went for with my last game. It went pretty well, going full in on gameplay with zero dialogue. There's a story... somewhat, but it's super simplistic and you have to fill in the blanks yourself. I don't think it's really that difficult if you go with the gameplay route. If you want to tell a deep story without dialogue, yeah, it's going to be a lot harder.

 

[MushroomCake28]

@NinjaKittyProductions It can be a fun challenge indeed. All I'm saying, is prepare to work a lot haha! I think visual art will be a lot more important in that kind of game (maybe you can draw characters with different emotions), bubble emoticons like you said, and even music has now become much more important.

 

[Traveling Bard]

Are you talking about the webtoon Choco Latte? If you are, that webtoon communicates with beautiful artwork, subtle facial expressions, and pictures of conversations (like via text message). It's an interesting challenge and one that I think would be fun for an adventure game style game, but it would be an art heavy experience. There would need to be something for you to lean on to communicate for it to work, in my opinion. Perhaps audio queues as things happen or leaning more into pictures, facesets, character movement, etc to tell the story. What you are doing is letting the player fill in on the dialogue that is being missed in their head based on these things. Choco Latte also has the benefit of being heart warmingly cute with it's lighter/dreamy art style and show-without-telling design. What sort of story would you be trying to tell without words?

Edit: Another idea would be to use events like battle processing (for a disagreement or competition) with specific skills & descriptions to help illustrate a story moment. Or even shop processing with specific currency for items that might illustrate a story moment. One could be rather creative like this but I think it would lend itself more to something cutesy or comedic better than something that is more serious.

 

[NinjaKittyProductions]

Are you talking about the webtoon Choco Latte? Choco Latte also has the benefit of being heart warmingly cute with it's lighter/dreamy art style and show-without-telling design.

Yes, Choco Latte was one of the webtoons that I have been reading. Love the style and pretty much everything about it. It was one of the main culprits that put this idea into my head.

What sort of story would you be trying to tell without words?

A friend of mine is deaf. She is part of a support group and one of the things that the support group does is play Pathfinder. It is really interesting to watch them play without a word (spoken or sign language otherwise) being used to convey to the GM what they are doing and what they have done.
So the idea arose from their game about a fantasy world of silence. A world where a spoken language has never been invented. Everything is hunky-dory until a Wordsmith (a wizard that uses primordial language to manipulate reality) shows up and starts terrorizing the denizens of this world. Thus our Heroine/Hero emerges/is summoned.

Another idea would be to use events like battle processing (for a disagreement or competition) with specific skills & descriptions to help illustrate a story moment.

This is a fantastic idea! I wish my brain was working correctly to have thought of this. There is so much that can be conveyed in this manner. Thank you ^_^

 

[Wavelength]

If you're really good at showing-not-telling, and at evoking emotions using some combination of tone, atmosphere, and visuals... then you can create something truly special using this technique. No words or immersion-breaking message boxes to get in the way.

For inspiration, you could read through the entire Wanda thread, as well as heading to YouTube and checking out some Pixar shorts.

 

[AcetheSuperVillain]

Have you ever watched silent movies? When I was in animation school, they used to suggest watching Charlie Chaplin movies because he was a master of conveying emotions. A lot of his work told very emotional stories with no or very minimal text. Of course, when the first cartoons were developed, they followed the same principles as the films of the day, so they are also good to check out.

Off the top of my head,
The cartoon Tom & Jerry is of course famous for doing everything without speech.

Pink Panther (the cartoon, not the movie) doesn't talk.

Disney's Fantasia was a really impressive animated music video. A lot of it is very atmospheric, but Sorceror's Apprentice, Pastoral Symphany and Dance of Hours are very story driven.

Courage the Cowardly Dog couldn't talk, although there was talking in the show.

The short film Paperman is a modern Disney take on their old cartoon legacy.

Shaun the Sheep is a claymation thing without words.

As an exercise, try watching some Anime or other TV that is not translated to english, and see how much of it you pick up. Try to think about what you are missing and what you are able to understand and why. If you'd rather do it with games than animation, you can find a lot of Flash games in other countries. A lot of my Flash games used to find their way to 4399.com, which is Chinese, so if you have Flash, you can visit them to play some Chinese games that you probably won't understand. (assuming of course, you can't read Chinese) But I'd get hits from all over the world, so I did these exercises to try and make sure my games where as playable as possible for people who can't speak or read english.

 

[Marquise*]

If you are over 14years old... I would recommend to see the game Inside. No tutorials, no dialogs and it is what makes it so good.

 

[TheOneEyedOne]

I would say Animal or something inhuman would be easier to convey a lack of speach

 

[gstv87]

checking out some Pixar shorts.

.....in fact: Pixar shorts are a master class in animation principles.
might as well skip the end product and go right to the base theory, it's the same thing.