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Episodic video game

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Template:Current-GCOTW Episodic gaming refers to a distribution system of selling computer and video games in a sequence of episodes, akin to a serialized novel, where each episode is sold as a separate purchase and in the end together form a continuous story or experience. Episodic games have become increasingly popular of late with the advent of low cost digital distribution methods.

Though the term was coined in the early 21st century, it has roots in both shareware gaming as well as in the expansion pack. The primary difference here is the issue of completeness, as in those earlier cases, it was assumed that the complete game could be purchased, inclusive of the demo or trial in the case of shareware, and that expansion packs were considered add-ons or semi-sequels to the original product. In episodic gaming, all episodes are considered equal to the completed sum of all of the episodes, by parceling out portions of a full game over a longer period of time. In some cases (such as MMOGs) episodic content is planned to continue production indefinitely over time, comparable to a long-running television series.

Episodic gaming has come into prevalance in the early 21st century, due to the rise in popularity and feasability of digital delivery platforms such as Steam and Xbox Live Arcade, which have cut the costs involved in traditional publishing (manufacturing and packaging etc.).

Advantages and disadvantages

The advantages of episode gaming include:

  • A cheaper purchase price per episode as compared to a typical full-priced retail game.
  • Higher quality games (per episode) as compared to limited trials or shareware demos.
  • Lower risk investment for the developers, as the games cost less to develop and to sell and are quicker onto the market.
  • Faster games to market, as many high production titles often take anywhere from 2-5 years to complete - with episodic gaming, the wait time is often reduced to an annual or bi-annual basis.
  • Developing in smaller chunks means developers can more quickly adapt to community feedback in between episodes.

Possible disadvantages potentially include:

  • After buying all episodes, the total purchase may be more expensive than the typical retail game.
  • If earlier episodes fail to sell, then funding for future episodes may be non-existent, thereby cheating customers out of promised future episodes.
  • Possibly counter-productive using this method as opposed to plainly producing a full-fledged sequel or series of titles.
  • Most episodic content seems to be distributed primarily or exclusively over the internet, to offset the potential extra costs of distributing more physical copies to retail (i.e. 5 hard copies for 5 chapters over 4 years as opposed to shipping a single item once) - this is a disadvantage to those who have limited or slow internet access.

Single player episodic gaming

Single player games, particularly real time strategy games and first person shooters, have in the past experimented with a very limited form of episodic gaming, by adding new stages, levels, weapons, enemies, and/or missions with expansion packs.

Valve Software's Steam platform is to be used as a content delivery platform for two episodic games: SiN Episodes by Ritual Entertainment and Half-Life 2 Episodes developed by Valve Software themselves.

Telltale Games's Bone is an adventure title that is literally adapting chapters from Jeff Smith's Bone comic book saga into game episodes on a periodic basis. The first two episodes have already been released. Telltale's future Sam & Max title is also planned to be distributed episodically.

Episodic content

Another development in digital delivery is the advent of smaller (in comparison to traditional expansion packs) episodic expansions for established games. Examples such as The Wizard's Tower and Horse Armour for Bethesda Softworks's The Elder Scrolls: Oblivion have taken advantage of both a digital distribution platform as well as a micropayment system. Digital Illusions's Battlefield 2 also has a series of small download-only booster packs for sale, examples include Euro Force and Armoured Fury available on EA's Downloader service.

Responses to these episodic expansions has been mixed, with some users balking at the prices demanded for "trivial" upgrades and yet others embracing the stream of new content as a good value. Hostile reaction towards pricing for Bethesda's Horse Armour add-on may have lead Bethesda to drop the prices for their future expansions. Another worry is that episodic content may encourage developers to release incomplete games, in the hope that consumers would pay extra for a more satisfying experience.

Massively multiplayer online gaming

Since episodic gaming is mostly driven through linear storytelling, outside of story-driven single player games, it is mostly found in MMOGs. Much as they worked for offline games, expansion packs have often been sold to increase available content to MMOG players by adding additional worlds to explore and additional gameplay features, such as new weapons and characters.

As the term relates to this genre, episodes are typically contrasted to the traditional expansion pack, as in the Asheron's Call franchise, where episodic content was downloaded without an additional fee (to the standing subcription price). This included new expansive story arcs comparable to those found in offline RPGs and were updated on a bi-monthly basis. It should be noted that retail expansion packs were still created for the Asheron's Call games.

Another MMOG featuring an episodic design is the Guild Wars series developed by ArenaNet. The company's business model involves releasing new, independent chapters for the game on a six month basis. Since Guild Wars does not charge a monthly fee, and there is no requirement to own the newer chapters, it is one the few games entirely reliant the episodic games model to continue its service.

Problems with episodic content in MMOGs

For the most part, purely episodic games in a multiplayer environment have met with mixed success. The problem is twofold with the first being linearity. To create an episode there must be a linear story. While there have been some successful linear stories in stand-alone games, they are usually coupled with puzzle-solving or roleplaying or some other gameplay element. Their main purpose is to provide a storyline to move the player forward through a game environment. In a multiplayer environment, linear stories don't usually offer enough flexibility to players who want to control a story. A linear story creates the second problem, synchronization. In online worlds everyone moving to the next episode must be in the same place at the same time in the story. Difficult to arrange. In persistent worlds, carefully introduced episodic content can be a nice addition to a certain segment of the online population. Bit in both circumstances there is a danger; one or two bad episodes can bring the entire game to a halt.

In both cases the concept of episodic driven game content derives from literature and especially television where the viewer is essentially solitary and in a controlled environment. Though Tivo and the new mobile release of television programming is altering the synchronization process, the controlled environment of passive programming still makes episodes possible.

Synchronization of players in online worlds is much more difficult where login times, session length, and player attributes differ between all players. Also, content authors are outside the game structure and like television, if they write good episodes the game survives, maybe even thrives. But if they miss a beat, maybe even just a couple of bad episodes, the chain is broken and the game can be badly damaged.

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