The plot, let everyone speak about it.

GreenVamGreenVam ✭✭✭✭✭
edited February 2021 in The Investigation

I would like to swing at the most sacred for many agents, swing at the plot of the game

And reflect on the connection between the plot and the gameplay. All the more I want to do this after rumors that all the writers were fired.

As an agent following the plot of the game, I noticed one thing from the very beginning. Most agents do not understand the plot, they do not see it at all. For them, the media falling out of the portals is incomprehensible garbage, which is absolutely incomprehensible for what it is needed. If the newcomer does not meet another agent who knows the plot, then he will never understand that to get new information on the plot, you need to go to this forum or to special chats in popular instant messengers! The process of introducing a new agent into the game is primitive and not informative in terms of the plot. And in the gameplay, the plot is not revealed at all. Let me give you an example. The team from my city, which is more than 10 people, was not a fan of the Tessellation event at all. Because this event was not presented in the scanner. I had to translate information from this forum, and help my comrades understand the plot of the game. Now imagine that there is no agent in the cell who sits on the forum and conveys the essence of the event to his fellow agents. This means that such people cannot provide important assistance in storyline events to their faction. 

The plot must be embedded in the game at a deeper level. At least at the level of messages from Jarvis and ADA.

It is important! We need to create some kind of text or voice explanation from the leader of the Faction about what is currently happening in the game, and a short retelling of the plot should be immediately after training!

We also need to make a manual on the basic terms of the game, which can be accessed directly from the scanner.

@NianticBrian ! I said that many agents, including myself, who are native speakers of different languages ​​will help you with competent translations of texts. Use our services, do not hesitate. Many agents note that the translation into Russian that your company has done in many places is simply illiterate. Like my English here, because I write quickly and try to translate incomprehensible words as much as possible through the translator from Google.

And @NianticBrian, most importantly, stop trying to befriend enlightenment and resistance. This only worsens both the plot and the attitude towards it. No joint events, they only destroy the basis of the game - the opposition of two factions. You can add to this the confrontation of corporations if you want, I wrote about this just below. . The factions are different, and we do not need to reconcile or turn our game into Pokémon, where two dozen players from different factions together fulfill the same goal. We must have a growing confrontation between factions! And not a walk on a predetermined course from NIA, Ezakil Kelvin and so on. We must decide for ourselves whether to help NIA, this or that corporation, and so on. You can even do an intra-factional vote from Jarvis or ADA, which will poll on important plot decisions. Agents must write the history of their faction themselves, responsive to changes in the game plot. 

Post edited by GreenVam on

Comments

  • The storyline of the "Prime World" left the game long ago. Dunraven and Nemesis had zero relationship to the actual game, aside from providing names for unrelated events.

    IMO I'd prefer a reset even if it's a return to the 1218 style, where we're considered part of the story not simply observers of an alternate reality bubble.

  • GreenVamGreenVam ✭✭✭✭✭

    I would like to separately touch upon certain points in the plot that infuriate many players.

    • Mind control

    Radiation artificially created by connecting three portals in a field, or emitted by rift portals and special artifacts. It is capable of harming humans and some other developed beings. A person under strong influence of this radiation can lose control of the mind. This point should be revealed in more detail, introduced into the game more deeply. It is very little disclosed at the moment. Radiation of the fields does not provide any practical benefit in gameplay or plot. Mindunits do not affect the gameplay at all, except for the counting at the end of the cycle.

    • Corporations

    Corporations of China, Russia, USA, NATO countries and other countries. Their task is to investigate the anomalous influence of exotic matter on people and to obtain benefits. However, they often break the rules, quietly collecting artifacts themselves and negotiating with agents.

    The introduction of corporations into the game will significantly revive the plot and gameplay. The main corporations and their achievements must also be described in the history of the game in the scanner itself. Otherwise, having received the next part of the drawing from the portal network, beginners will simply throw it out without attaching importance.

    • In-game items 

    They usually have beneficial properties. In addition to their practical properties, they are of great scientific value. They can be developed by exogenous creatures and represent samples of exogenous technologies, adapted for example by corporations for use by agents.

    From the point of view of "scientific value" would be to present artifacts in the gameplay and plot. And also describe the history of each item in the game. There are corporations, why not bring them into the game? And for example, why not give them artifacts found in the portal network in exchange for ... Or make, for example, corporations that will help a particular faction, and in return for providing collected samples, they will make various bonuses or even special items for the faction. Imagine an event where you need, together with a faction, to collect around the world for example "100 shards" of ancient technology and scan them to transfer to your corporation, which adapts the technology for agents. Yes, the opponent has the same opportunity, and until they also collect the same 100 fragments from the key portals, then they will not have the same item that drops out of the portals. And the winning faction would receive a temporary advantage for several months. This would force agents from different regions to move even to the most distant portals. It would be nice if the portals were chosen randomly ... Many agents would have a chance to play in this competition ... And world anomalies of the same type could be arranged ... Or, for example, events where agents need to get 100 unique parts of samples of a certain technology, which could then be exchanged upon meeting. Or through a certain capsule, the exchange point whatever you want and call it. As in the torrent protocol. I found a shard number 5, someone found a shard number 20, but when we meet on the same portal (it is possible with the help of drones), then an exchange will take place, and my friend and I will have the sum of all the collected fragments. And imagine that some of the shards will be rare, and some ultra-rare ... and sometimes you will have to get the shards of technology from Australia and England and Russia, teamwork around the world! Having collected a completely ancient artifact, we can transfer it to the corporation, which then adapts it for our own and their purposes. I am sympathetic to the problems of the pandemic. And yes, while drones cannot carry inventory items, they will be able to carry technology shards, data scraps, and so on for exchange between agents! Or you can make, for example, a faction capsule for the exchange of found materials, which can be placed in a specific place on the map and it will not disappear even during anomalies. Synchronization and exchange of technology fragments with such a “stationary exchange point” will occur when the agent approaches him.

    This is much more interesting than just adding a new type of item to the game. 

  • aaronviannoaaronvianno ✭✭✭✭

    Some things like the deciding the fate of the researchers via shards really messed things up. Not sure where the story was supposed to go from there. And then there have been obscure win/lose scenarios that no one really understood and didn't make a difference. That was in 1218. While some mistakes were made, it was better than the Osiris story.

    The Osiris story is just hanging out on the middle of the line with nothing much for actually taking your faction past the line. Somewhere someone forgot Ingress is a competitive game.

  • GreenVamGreenVam ✭✭✭✭✭
    edited February 2021

    One wise agent said, these are his words:

    - There is no single place for the plot. Now, if a newbie asks me "where to look at the portals", I will throw off a link to intel. But if he asks about the plot, I myself do not know where to look for it.

    - Some kind of constant change of universes. All I hear is "no, this is Henk number 1685, here he is alive, this is after Prime." What are the universes?

    - Lack of localization. Even in the same Harry Potter, where at each event some plot dialogues pop up, I just skip them, because I am too lazy to deal with the translation.

    @NianticBrian Which of these buttons will take the agent to the plot?

  • aaronviannoaaronvianno ✭✭✭✭

    I think Media drops were originally supposed to lead people to the storyline. But it's never really been in an organised manner.

  • 100% they were originally one of the connections, with the Investigation Board being the main "in a timeline" version.

  • aaronviannoaaronvianno ✭✭✭✭

    I guess YouTube playlists don't really do the same thing.

  • I haven’t gotten a media item in forever. Perhaps a new kind of media could be hackable, like a case file, that would explain past events, characters, different universes (nodes?) and other important plot details. I’m reasonably proficient in researching obscure stuff. Yet I still cannot figure out what the Techthulu actually WAS. I can only imagine how difficult it must be for new agents to find the plot. Case files in the form of media would be extremely helpful, and a welcome change!

  • I’ve done some more research, and found a page. https://niantic.schlarp.com/investigation:characters:lore?s%5B%5D=lore however, the main problem lies in the fact that a lot of the story was kept track of on Google Plus, which is now inaccessible, leaving very few sources to work off of.

  • FWIW, I thought that the Tessellation story was *really well done.* Unfortunately, I only figured out what was going on after it was all over, when I managed to find the time to track down the game board and walk through all of the tiles. This was a huge waste: a lot of excellent, creative effort went into that (the twist with e.g. Nemesis Jarvis turning against the Shapers and becoming a hardened foe, or what happened to Nemesis Carrie, was lovely, heavy stuff), and almost no players ever saw it. Although I was not a fan of the main Osiris/Dunraven plot - it was much less mature and well-developed than 1218 - it too had its moments. But in the end, it all comes back to OP's point: there aren't enough points of contact for players to get into the story, and too much of the story these days seems to be hidden behind decoding exercises and obscure collection games. (Don't get me wrong: I'm glad that those things are in the game, because there's a whole community who is into that. Fantastic! But other folks would like to be able to keep up the story without having to play those subgames, and not all of us have the time to spend tracking down breadcrumbs (even if it would be fun if we could afford to do so).)

    Such a waste, alas. I wish Niantic would make better use of the work they are paying for!

  • HydracyanHydracyan ✭✭✭✭✭

    Plot could be done inside game, with NPCs and quests like it was done in HPWU with them driving the main story and events. It also have books, letters, and other things with text about the storytelling about that game (I didn't paid attention of the content, since I dislike HP, and eventually stoped playing on the first month, but looked how the things worked and it was great).

    The whole Archive menu of that game is a perfec fit for ingress, maybe even the stickerlike system.

  • I always dreamed about a Storychanel ingame which lookes like the person talking to you in Borderlands. Taking half the Screen and beeing half blured, obviously with an Option to skip

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