Feature: 'It Builds Character: Character Development Techniques in Games'

Today's main Gamasutra feature about character development in games is by Red Storm Entertainment game writer and designer Rafael Chandler, a veteran of titles including Majestic, Motor City Online, Ghost Recon 2, and Rainbow Six: Lockdown, and discusses techniques to help game creators craft memorable in-game characters and situations. As Chandler explains in his introduction to the feature: "As games continue to mature and become more sophisticated, the expectations for production values become higher. These production values include graphics, music, and story. Story is the result of character development: what happens to the characters as events transpire around them. Character development in and of itself isn't going to make your gameplay any better, but it will create a more satisfying experience because you're furnishing a more well-developed context, a more immersive world for the player to explore. You can't read a review of an adventure game or shooter without seeing some kind of reference to the storytelling, the dialogue, the characters. Can you relate to the characters? Are they well-developed? Are they interesting? It's become an expectation, an industry norm. Cliches and stereotypes are unacceptable." You can now read the full Gamasutra feature on the subject (no registration required, please feel free to link to the article from external websites).