How would you go about subverting the player's expectations?

[MastertheX]

Title really says it all. In a story, how would you subvert the players expectations within a story? I often times think of this while working on my game and while it's nearly a 10 year plot that has been revised over and over, I feel I still have little grasp upon subverting the reader's expectations.
So I'm curious, how would you go about it?
And no, not killing characters who have no purpose but to die to begin with, or the characters failing at things that was obvious for them to fail at to begin with.

I'd just like to hear the communities' perspective on this.

 

[Mrs_Allykat]

The best example of this, without killing characters, that I can think of it "Tales of the Abyss." You can probably find a synopsis on wiki, but the main character is not who he thinks he is. He is not who his party thinks he is, and he isn't what the story presents him to be at the beginning either. Other examples include a character who sees themselves as a hero, but discover through the course of the game that they are working for the "bad" or "evil" faction. The latter is used quite a bit, and is not as dramatic as it used to be.

 

[MastertheX]

Oh, I'm actually a large Tales of fan and plan on playing Abyss next after I finish Symphonia, which I just started. Thanks for that- now I'm even more excited for that game, but back on task,
I agree. The latter is used more often nowadays. I'm kind of on the fence with it being 'bad' however. I think it's an okay trope.

 

[Milennin]

Taking a cliché, and doing something different with it. Like, run with the classic story of knight on a quest to the castle with a princess locked within it. But when he beats the boss and finally gets to the princess, she turns out to be the arch-demon all along who was sealed away in the castle and you've just set it free. The apocalypse happens, and then the real story begins (in the sequel).

 

[seryphi]

I think the game Eversion did a great job of the kind of subversion you're talking about- if you look it up, the title screen makes it look like your average cutesy platformer, if a bit more blindingly vivid than some of its peers.
(It is not a cutesy platformer. It is a horror game. Also obnoxiously difficult.)

There's no dialogue or "hints" that it's a horror game outside the title, and it's not a place you'd expect to even find a horror theme. You discover it naturally too, which I think is why it worked so well at subverting my expectations as a player.

So in answer to your question, what I'd try to do if I'm aiming for that trope is give the player questions- and hint at plausible but completely wrong answers. You then have a convenient set of player beliefs that you can let sit for as long as you like before upending them.

 

[MastertheX]

I think the game Eversion did a great job of the kind of subversion you're talking about- if you look it up, the title screen makes it look like your average cutesy platformer, if a bit more blindingly vivid than some of its peers.
(It is not a cutesy platformer. It is a horror game. Also obnoxiously difficult.)

There's no dialogue or "hints" that it's a horror game outside the title, and it's not a place you'd expect to even find a horror theme. You discover it naturally too, which I think is why it worked so well at subverting my expectations as a player.

So in answer to your question, what I'd try to do if I'm aiming for that trope is give the player questions- and hint at plausible but completely wrong answers. You then have a convenient set of player beliefs that you can let sit for as long as you like before upending them.

Interesting. I took a look at it as well and I can see why it can subvert expectations. (And yeah- just looking at it, it seems uber hard xD)
I suppose my issue was I didn't exactly understand how a game can subvert expectations. And I have to admit, I really like the concept. But I'll need to experience it more to really get a better grasp of it.

 

[seryphi]

And I have to admit, I really like the concept. But I'll need to experience it more to really get a better grasp of it.

Yeah, it's much easier to understand with firsthand experience and/or practice. Good luck~

 

[Kes]

Misdirection in the story, dialogues etc., without ever giving false information, so that the player thinks they know what's going on, and only later discover that they didn't. It needs to be written well so that the player can still see how it logically is the way it is, even if that's not the way they thought it was.

 

[MastertheX]

Misdirection in the story, dialogues etc., without ever giving false information, so that the player thinks they know what's going on, and only later discover that they didn't. It needs to be written well so that the player can still see how it logically is the way it is, even if that's not the way they thought it was.

Hm. That's actually sounds sort of difficult to get a grasp of.

 

[Kes]

It needs careful planning. It could be done, for example, by only giving partial information which sounds like it's the full thing. Or having a character say something which sounds like they are saying X, but is in fact ambiguous.

It's a technique I like using, so that plot twists are more plausible, and it allows for deeper stories.

Or you simply come up with an unexpected way of handling something. For example, my game The Tale of a Common Man looks initially like it's going to be a standard "man seeks revenge for the killing of his family" sort of thing. But constantly the question he's confronted with is: how can he get his revenge without becoming no better than those who did that to him? How can he do it and still be the man his wife loved? The player might well dismiss that as mere rhetoric and expect the story to pan out in the usual way. It doesn't - and players have said that the ending is immensely satisfying, but not what they had expected. That, I think, is a reasonable example of subverting the player's expectations. That game also has an example of what I was referring to before - the player thinks they know what the big bad is up to, but they learn only late game what his real plans are. And that revelation causes the party to change what they were doing.

 

[MastertheX]

It needs careful planning. It could be done, for example, by only giving partial information which sounds like it's the full thing. Or having a character say something which sounds like they are saying X, but is in fact ambiguous.

It's a technique I like using, so that plot twists are more plausible, and it allows for deeper stories.

Or you simply come up with an unexpected way of handling something. For example, my game The Tale of a Common Man looks initially like it's going to be a standard "man seeks revenge for the killing of his family" sort of thing. But constantly the question he's confronted with is: how can he get his revenge without becoming no better than those who did that to him? How can he do it and still be the man his wife loved? The player might well dismiss that as mere rhetoric and expect the story to pan out in the usual way. It doesn't - and players have said that the ending is immensely satisfying, but not what they had expected. That, I think, is a reasonable example of subverting the player's expectations. That game also has an example of what I was referring to before - the player thinks they know what the big bad is up to, but they learn only late game what his real plans are. And that revelation causes the party to change what they were doing.

That's interesting. While I don't have anything significant to say, this really does help me. I feel like I can think about how I go about these character's plots in a new light now that I have more to think about. I highly doubt I can come up with something over night but it's something to think about.

 

[Countyoungblood]

maybe I'm not understanding the question but wouldn't this be as simple as just picking any common trope and following it for a while then breaking away in an unexpected direction? tropes basically are what we expect the player to expect so if you want to surprise someone who plays rpgs you'd have to do something they can follow (from expirience with other rpgs (tropes)) then break the pattern.

some of these might be surprising in a less than dramatic way though..

for example hero chases love_interest into the woods resolves drama then begins returning to starter_village and stops on a hilltop to see a big fire . oh no! says the love_interest..and she races off to town. hero follows..

..
..
we...missed...the bbq...

NOOOOOOooooOOOOOoOoOOoOOoOoOoOOOO

 

[MastertheX]

maybe I'm not understanding the question but wouldn't this be as simple as just picking any common trope and following it for a while then breaking away in an unexpected direction? tropes basically are what we expect the player to expect so if you want to surprise someone who plays rpgs you'd have to do something they can follow (from expirience with other rpgs (tropes)) then break the pattern.

some of these might be surprising in a less than dramatic way though..

for example hero chases love_interest into the woods resolves drama then begins returning to starter_village and stops on a hilltop to see a big fire . oh no! says the love_interest..and she races off to town. hero follows..

..
..
we...missed...the bbq...

NOOOOOOooooOOOOOoOoOOoOOoOoOoOOOO

Hm, since I am still trying to understand it, I wouldn't say you're wrong(So someone argue that it is otherwise). I feel like the subversion is what leaves a massive impact on the player. Again, I can't argue that it's not what you just said haha, so I actually agree that's what it is.

 

[Countyoungblood]

Hm, since I am still trying to understand it, I wouldn't say you're wrong(So someone argue that it is otherwise). I feel like the subversion is what leaves a massive impact on the player. Again, I can't argue that it's not what you just said haha, so I actually agree that's what it is.

The same mechanism could be used in more of a dramatic context though. You could kill off a main character from just about anything theyre expected to survive from being a hero. A bit of reality in a fantasy setting and it would legitimise the danger that any survivors face since they can really die.

For example game of thrones

Edit: im also reminded of the shaggy dog story..and the war story variant.. should find/read those.

 

[Silversmith]

So my first jrpg experience was "Tales of Symphonia," and I still think it's a good example. There's a Chosen One. She's cute, she's all-loving, she's off to save the world. Only, being the Chosen One (a) doesn't mean what people think, and (b) purely sucks. And pretty much the rest of the game is a struggle to fix a messed-up situation that few of the characters were even aware of at the start.

So, if I had to give advice, I would say, start with a fairly standard plot. There's a chosen one who needs to save the world. There's a princess in a tower who has to be rescued. There's an evil empire that has to be stopped from invading. That sort of thing. Except, make it so that solving the problem represented by the standard plot creates a much larger and more massive problem. Saving the world put something else in crisis (or else it wasn't really saving the world in the first place). Freeing the princess unleashed an ancient evil (like Millenin suggested). The evil empire was actually holding back something far worse.

Much as I hate to suggest such a time-sink, you can actually gain some inspiration for this sort of thing from tvtropes. It's pretty easy to see where and how the twist happens when it's laid out for you in bullet points. You can use the format "X is actually a Y," and plug in tropes until something sounds good. "The Barrier Maiden is actually the Apocalypse Maiden?" Could be interesting. "The Hero is actually Brainwashed and Crazy?" That could go in several cool directions. And so on, and so forth.

I would also say, don't worry about making your twist completely original. First of all, you can't, and second of all, the way you do the twist is bound to be different from the way other people do it.

 

[Countyoungblood]

Ah...i miss that game..

 

[Conflictx3]

I think the best way to subvert expectations is shock value, just like in the real world all books/games/shows have common rules too.

For example, if a character talks about their Hope's and dreams for the future and all these plans of things they want to do at some point in time, that character has a 90% chance that there going to die, 95% chance they'll turn evil. Hell having that character not do either would be more surprising.

For me, I'm not going to kill myself making one huge plot that's suppose to deceive the player cuz the players going to have 2 or 3 options in their head of how the story will.play out, I rather pick small moments In the story to absolutely flip things with shock value, let me explain a bit.

Let's look at how tragedy is dealt in stories: Death, in today's mediums you can almost always find death of a main or supporting character being the BIG MOMENT in the story, the bad guy or one of his men kills your best friends cousins mom. Horrible, just horrible, but come on its expected, but theres more than one way to tackle tragedy isnt there?


What if the bad guy didnt kill your best friends cousins mom? What if instead he/she kidnapped her and tortured her gruesomely by ripping off nails and burning off her hair, or what if the bad guy broke her spine leaving her confined to a wheel chair?

What if the bad guy is a pervert and after he defeats your entire party, he captures the Male and female members of your party, but when you go to save them you find out the bad guy sexually assaulted BOTH the male and female because bad guy is bisexual

The problem with this method is it's easy, ESPECIALLY with rpg maker, for this to come off as tacky and tasteless when done without lots of planning, but if done artistically and with the proper world setting things like this which are not the norm are what make players/readers/watchers go nuts.

Theres not a single FF7 fan who doesn't love sneaking into the Don's mansion by dressing up as a woman &
I dont know a single game of thrones fan who doesn't dry heave in self satisfaction when you mention the words "red wedding" to them. These moments are not the norm and were nowhere near the viewers expectations the first go around.

 

[Countyoungblood]

I think the best way to subvert expectations is shock value, just like in the real world all books/games/shows have common rules too.

For example, if a character talks about their Hope's and dreams for the future and all these plans of things they want to do at some point in time, that character has a 90% chance that there going to die, 95% chance they'll turn evil. Hell having that character not do either would be more surprising.

For me, I'm not going to kill myself making one huge plot that's suppose to deceive the player cuz the players going to have 2 or 3 options in their head of how the story will.play out, I rather pick small moments In the story to absolutely flip things with shock value, let me explain a bit.

Let's look at how tragedy is dealt in stories: Death, in today's mediums you can almost always find death of a main or supporting character being the BIG MOMENT in the story, the bad guy or one of his men kills your best friends cousins mom. Horrible, just horrible, but come on its expected, but theres more than one way to tackle tragedy isnt there?


What if the bad guy didnt kill your best friends cousins mom? What if instead he/she kidnapped her and tortured her gruesomely by ripping off nails and burning off her hair, or what if the bad guy broke her spine leaving her confined to a wheel chair?

What if the bad guy is a pervert and after he defeats your entire party, he captures the Male and female members of your party, but when you go to save them you find out the bad guy sexually assaulted BOTH the male and female because bad guy is bisexual

The problem with this method is it's easy, ESPECIALLY with rpg maker, for this to come off as tacky and tasteless when done without lots of planning, but if done artistically and with the proper world setting things like this which are not the norm are what make players/readers/watchers go nuts.

Theres not a single FF7 fan who doesn't love sneaking into the Don's mansion by dressing up as a woman &
I dont know a single game of thrones fan who doesn't dry heave in self satisfaction when you mention the words "red wedding" to them. These moments are not the norm and were nowhere near the viewers expectations the first go around.

Does it have to be rape and gore? Really dont think either are good options for surprising people without disgusting them there isnt a tasteful way to present rape. Crude tools for simple minds.

 

[Conflictx3]

Does it have to be rape and gore? Really dont think either are good options for surprising people without disgusting them there isnt a tasteful way to present rape. Crude tools for simple minds.

No it doesnt have to be either of those options, I was just giving easy examples of shock value. Theres other ways to shock people without resulting to gore or other extremeties. If your familiar with the movie "split" that was a great level of shock value for me just on what I learned about ppl with dissociative personalities, it caused me to read up and learn about true cases the movie was inspired by. To put it simply you can SHOCK someone just by TEACHING them something they never knew about if done well.



However to go back a bit I do disagree with you, you said there isn't a tasteful way to present rape, to stay with TOS guidelines I'll simply put it this way: the act in and of itself is disgusting and wrong, but so is the act of killing, the thing is killing has become so common we see it as a simple mechanism we're farrrr too desensitized to take death in a book/TV show/game for much more than entertainment. Sure some deaths hit viewers hard, might even give up on the series over it but we can turn around and watch 50 nameless people get slaughtered that same day in a seperate medium and not bat an an eye.



When we're talking tasteful I mean you can show something and instill emotion in the viewer and make them say "how could someone do that, I couldn't", I feel like people who write realistically and avoid these topics are pulling punches, I HATE reading or watching something gritty and you can literally see them mention something as horrific as rape or Torture in the vaguest way possible and try to gloss over it just so they can say its included.
I.e some guy kidnaps a girl and when hero comes he's like "my men took her and they had some..fun...bwahahaha", you never see the girl character ever again, theres no grievance. But you put that in the plot, why?

If your writing something fun and lighthearted then that's fine, I dont wanna see someone get sexually assaulted in Dragonball Z. But to me you cant say you have this story of this other magical world where killing, vandalism, barbaric warriors reside full of fights and deception, conquering cities. Etc. but nobody in this world thought to violate another human, man or woman. To me it shows the writer is scared to step outside "what's accepted" and definitely cant say it cannot be tastefully done when a writer can use the angle of such events to build a character up beautifully, as that happens in real life to.

Everybody loves the queen of dragons. and not a single person forget her first scene with drago almost 10 years ago.

Just saying

 

[Countyoungblood]

To put it simply you can SHOCK someone just by TEACHING them something they never knew about if done well.

Lol ok so how would the complicated explanation go? Does such exist?

However to go back a bit I do disagree with you, you said there isn't a tasteful way to present rape, to stay with TOS guidelines I'll simply put it this way: the act in and of itself is disgusting and wrong, but so is the act of killing,...

Great quote but I think your own post is highlighting the problem.

We're talking about subverting the players expectation aka surprises. Your answer is rape/gore. To surprise the player rape/gore would need to be unexpected.

Look at this.

If your writing something fun and lighthearted then that's fine, I dont wanna see someone get sexually assaulted in Dragonball z

I agree. Rape/gore should only be in dark work for the people interested in seeing rape/gore. And if/when this is the case it wouldnt be a surprise after the first time at which a separation occurs between those who do/dont want to see such.

Simply to put it simply its bad taste to suprise people with things they likely didnt want to see to try to shock them.

Just. Saying.