Posted in: Games, Movies, Video Games | Tagged: bioshock, bioshock infinite, entertainment, games, ken levine, Middle Earth: Shadow of Mordor, Shadow of Mordor, video games

Ken Levine, Creator Of Bioshock, Hints At Radical New Game

It's not often audiences remember the names of game directors. There are of course recognizable names like your Kojimas and Miyamotos, but it's rarer in the West. One of the biggest exceptions to that rule is Ken Levine. The director's work on Bioshock and Bioshock Infinite speaks for itself on a narrative level and I'll always be interested to see what he's working on next.

That's why I'm excited to hear about the concepts Levine is playing with as outlined in an article he wrote for Medium. Earlier this year, Irrational Games was closed and he went to work on another game with a smaller team, but we hadn't heard much since. While it isn't clear what it is, he posits at least vague concepts he's working with in the post. It turns out, Shadow of Mordor is a big indicator on what's coming.

So two years ago, I started thinking about how to build a system to let story be as variable as gameplay and still be awesome in the way story can be awesome. Could you have characters, conflicts, and dialogue that could end not in 100 states, not in 1,000, but in X to the Y states? Goodbye linear, hello geometric! And that's the new big thing that my colleagues and I have been working on at our yet-unnamed new studio.

You should really go read the entire article. It's an interesting look into the future of gaming narratives and Levine goes on to explain just why Shadow of Mordor may go on to be a really important title for storytelling in games.

I really am curious to see what Levine is working on here. I got to sit down with the guy once and it was clear he was fascinated by the storytelling potential of the medium. Having him mess around with some of the narrative ideas presented in Shadow of Mordor could make for some incredible content.

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