Married Couples in Games

[Paladin-Cleric of Awesome]

Ok, so I've been thinking of making a modern/futuristic, shortish, sort of game (because I own the futuristic, modern and zombie packs and really need to actually use it at some stage). Buuuuut.... I have two characters;

John Valentino: SWAT/Military/Security/Black-Ops main character.

and;

Dr. Cidney Sheppard: Creater and designer of a number of things that could be weaponised in the wrong hands.

Now the premise was that the two met when Valentino was sent in to rescue Dr. Sheppard when she was kidnapped by terriorists to build weapons.  They fell in love (as often happens in these sorts of situations) and five years later are married with Dr. Sheppard working in a secure lab, with Valentino as one of the main security people.  The lab is then targetted by more terrorists (or the same ones or something)

(I promise there is an actual question in all of this).

Now, my questions is, how do people deal with having a married couple in a game? I mean, a lot of games and films of this type, have the typical falling in love through adversary storyling going on. I didn't really intend to have that, their backstory was going to just be a backstory, or possible the training stage of the game, where he rescues her.

Or (in the very few cases I have seen) the characters are in 'committed relationships' or 'married' one of them either ends to be kidnapped at the start of the game and needs to be found, or dies. What I wanted to do was to have Valentino start off the game searching the labs for Dr. Sheppard, and when he finds her, the two of them sort of work together to finish the game. If that makes sense...

So, how do *you* deal with the idea of (mature, as in 30 years or older) married couples or comitted relationships in games? Is it a concept you would try out, or would it be difficult to implment? Is it easier to just have some teens running around falling in love?

I myself like the idea (because I suck at romantic entaglements in games), but how can you show clearly in a game that they are in that sort of relationship without taking away from what should be a fast paced sort of a thriller game?

 

[Vexed]

I think for a lot of people, following a couple as they fall in love is considered more compelling than seeing a married couple interacting. At least that's the assumption, but I think a lot can be said for exploring a committed relationship between two mature people in an intense situation. It's certainly a lot more original than the tried and tested boy meets girl, saves girl, falls in love with girl the end.

For me, personally I think if I were to play your game, one of the things I'd be interested to see is the conflict between the characters. Does the fact that they know each other so well lead to problems? Do they only think they know each other well? Is the relationship strong? Have they been having difficulties? Are these difficulties going to intensify due to the situation they're in or fall along the wayside as they fight for their lives? Is one more invested in the marriage than the other? Is the flame of their love rekindled by this second life-or-death situation or is it snuffed out? These are possible questions I would explore if I were making your game or one like it.

There's a lot of scope there to explore romantic interactions that a person wouldn't normally see in a videogame and I personally would find that pretty compelling and different.

 

[whitesphere]

I think, if we are dealing with a 30-something married couple, the issue of "Do they have kids?" becomes rather important, since many people do expect marriage to lead to kids, especially after a few years.  If so, where are the kids?  Off with a sitter?  In a foster home?  Maybe the kids are older, say in their late teens, so you can have a family adventuring.  Or they are estranged.

It sounds like you're almost aiming for a "Mr and Mrs Smith" type of game, where the married couple goes on an adventure.  In that particular movie, the couple is pretty listless, until they find they are both assassins for rival organizations, and they've been ordered to take each other out.  The experiences of the movie dramatically rekindle their failing marriage.

Beyond that, I think the fact that the PCs are married can be conveyed through brief snippets of dialog.  The content of the dialog completely depends on how happily married the couple is.   That could be things like:

*upon encountering a very large, deadly opponent*

"Diana, why don't you ask THAT to keep the toilet seat down?"

Or with brief cutscenes within the action, perhaps.

Since I have no experience myself, I'd take a look at tvtropes.org for various couple dynamics used in TV and so forth.

 

[Sharm]

I think the reason you don't see established couples more often isn't because it can't be compelling but because it's a completely different skill set and writing a relationship from the beginning is much easier. There are a lot of well established writers who never take the time to learn the skill, or worse, think it's the same as writing a budding romance and then have to break them up and put them together all the time to get their method of writing to work.


I would looove to see more established relationships in my entertainment, telling me that there's a married couple as the main characters in your game makes me much more interested in it than I would be otherwise.

 

[Vexed]

I think the reason you don't see established couples more often isn't because it can't be compelling but because it's a completely different skill set and writing a relationship from the beginning is much easier. There are a lot of well established writers who never take the time to learn the skill, or worse, think it's the same as writing a budding romance and then have to break them up and put them together all the time to get their method of writing to work.

I would looove to see more established relationships in my entertainment, telling me that there's a married couple as the main characters in your game makes me much more interested in it than I would be otherwise.

^ I second all of this.

Though I do think that some people - more-so younger people perhaps - have preconceived notions that a marriage between people who have known each other for several years is far less interesting than a new, budding romance. They're wrong, obviously and it really does come down to the writing [and I also agree that a lot of people don't take the time to learn how to write such relationships] but I do think some people have that view.

 

[Paladin-Cleric of Awesome]

I love 'married peoples sarcasm', it amuses me greatly. lol.

I hate the idea of characters being broken up and getting back together. It was much less of a Mr &Mrs Smith, and more smiliar to... Doom? Sort of... I intend it to be a very action packed game, where the two are together (no kids n the horizon just yet), they both happen to work at the same secure lab and then *boom* bad guys attack! (because that's what bad guys do). I didn't intend to have any conflict as such, mostly because  hate it when couples get broken up for stupid reasons (like in films a lot), it was more of a

"I need to find my wife and then she is going to blow the s**t out of these terrorists with her awesome brain!" and

"Oh my God! Why are you trying to get yourself killed before rescueing me? Stop playing hide and seek and get your ass down to my lab now!" and

"You owe me big time for this you know? It was my day off, I was gonna have a lie in, but noooo, you went and invented something that attracts the wrong kind of attention!"

Bbecause I like that sort of interaction, where they fight and squabble, but you just sort of... know they love each other, and are completely panicking on the inside that the other is going to be ok.

Edit:  Oddly enough I find writing couples (sarcastic couples 'cause I love them) to be much eaiser than writing two people falling in love.

 

[Vexed]

Ah OK. That sounds pretty much just as awesome. I'm a sucker for sarcastic, borderline cheesy one-liner style games and movies. My chips are all in on this haha. Just as long as they are people with personalities outside of their one-liners that we actually get to see at some point.

 

[Paladin-Cleric of Awesome]

Oh yes. I have backstory and personalities for them. Very Water and Oil sorts (because those are the best).

I always just found it interesting that couples do tend to be broken up and brought back together. there's really not a lot of things that have a good established couple in them. Though I didn't really consider it might be a writing thing (because it's what I write). I just sort of assumed everyone knew that married couples have the same sort of flare as new couples (sometimes even more so).

My parents are hilarious to watch all the time.

 

[whitesphere]

If you have a bickering couple, it's also really nice to see a few Pet The Dog moments, where we see precisely HOW these two love each other.   

One nice example was in the Princess Bride book:

Buttercup's parents bickered so often they literally kept score.  But, at one point, after they met the royal family, the father said "I've seen everything.  Now I can die."

His wife looked at him tenderly and said "Don't."

These can be pretty infrequent; their impact is that much stronger when they are.

 

[Paladin-Cleric of Awesome]

that's true... you only ever seem to see things like that in tv shows with old couples I find. who have been together practically their whole life. but it's always nice to see. it's definately something worth implementing in a game with a married/committed relationship couple.