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Marvel Guardians of the Galaxy is both linear and non-linear. An open-world game might tell you, "See that mountain?" You can climb up." But Eidos Montreal's Marvel games are ingenious and set the exploration point on "memory".
When we discuss whether a game is linear, we usually ask: What kind of structure does it have when advancing the game? If the sequence of processes is basically set by the developer, we would say that the game is linear. For example, Marvel Guardians of the Galaxy, Call of Duty: Vanguard, and The Last survivor part II are all considered "linear games" because the flow of different players to get through the game is much the same.
This type of game is like a train, the content is divided into multiple blocks, each block neatly arranged in a straight line like a carriage. If you want to get from the rear of the car to the front of the car, you have to go through the middle of the dining car section, and you can't jump off the train and run to the vast countryside.
Games in which the player can decide for themselves most of the process sequence are called "non-linear". So what do I mean by the fact that Marvel Guardians of the Galaxy is both linear and non-linear? Isn't that a contradiction? Does this contradiction suggest that our discussion of "linearity" has its limits?
Marvel Guardians of the Galaxy begins with Peter Quayle in control, but not the Peter Quill you know in the movie or comics. This Peter is a fan of the band Star Lord—he hasn't given himself the name of the unmodest bit, but the word is embroidered on his sleeveless denim jacket.
His room was filled with the imprint of an era: The Star Wars Chubaka's handiwork, the headphones attached to the tape drive, the wood-grained walls. Decades later in the game, Peter forms the Guardians of the Galaxy with Camorra, Drax, Rocket, and Groot. He changed his hairstyle from a mullet head to a forklift head, left his cheesy '80s bedroom, and boarded a slightly dilapidated spaceship.
There's nothing to elaborate on in the opening itself. In fact, this passage borrows a lot from the "rolling guide" James Gunn.com. Written and directed by Gunn, Guardians of the Galaxy begins with a flashback from Peter's childhood: we see Peter standing in front of his dying mother's bed and then kidnapped into outer space.
But the way Marvel Guardians of the Galaxy switches from the past to the future is worth talking about. Before the camera cuts to the future, Peter's mother is all right and nothing particularly concerning happens. She asked Peter upstairs to celebrate his birthday, but when he opened the bedroom door, the camera went black and the next second we were in the future. Players who pay more attention to detail may wonder: Is the story of the past not finished?
That's right, in the first half of Marvel Guardians of the Galaxy, we'll go back to Peter's childhood several times. So Marvel Guardians of the Galaxy is both linear and non-linear.
The limitations of language mean that we will also use "linear" and "non-linear" to explore the relationship between story and time. Anyone who has seen Pulp Fiction should be surprised by the lively Johann Khuvta — wasn't he already killed by Bruce Willis with a silenced Uzi in the previous shot? This is the unexpected element that non-linear storytelling brings to the audience.
While real-world time is a straight line forward, storytellers often disrupt the order of the story to provide an interesting experience. For example, tell a "frame story" (which can be understood as a "play within a play") and let the current character recall what happened in the past. Call of Duty: Vanguard uses this structure, so that while the protagonists are captured, players can still manipulate them and experience their heroic feats in their memories.
Naughty Dog's The Last survivor Part II (skip this paragraph if you don't want to be spoiled) shows the same three days from two perspectives, and uses various flashbacks and dreams to take the player back to the past. In terms of gameplay and game structure, The Last of Us Part II is linear, but in terms of narrative order, it's probably one of the least linear games I've ever seen.
Marvel's guardians of the galaxy's non-linear narrative is not as radical as The Last survivor part II. It also doesn't need to be so radical. The game takes players back in time and allows us to experience the defining moments in Peter Quill's life. The narrative function of this flashback is to tell us who Peter Quill is, and more importantly, it tells us what Peter's strongest desires are.
But it also plays a big role in terms of gameplay. Non-linearly structured games use a series of side activities to increase the diversity of gameplay. Games with non-linear narratives can take players into a new environment and experience a different rhythm from the game trunk. For 95% of the time, Marvel Guardians of the Galaxy is a space action game, but a few clips of Peter Quill's time on Earth as a mortal give players a chance to catch their breath and take a break.
In these segments, Marvel Guardians of the Galaxy abandons combat in favor of an environment similar to Life strange. Peter Quayle would pick up tapes and comment on his favorite bands instead of picking up the Elemental Gun and shooting at the enemy. Peter didn't need to look at the alien terrain around him, what could be moved, what cracks could be passed through, or which enemies needed to be solved. Now he just needs to explore his and his mother's home in the '80s.
Not all information is directly stated, and there are some environmental narratives here, such as the fact that a single mother in the 80s could afford a house, which is very different from the current economic environment. In addition to Peter's relationship with his mother, we also learn about the world that shaped Peter, not the alien world in which he now lives.
And we have this opportunity because Marvel Guardians of the Galaxy isn't just about the present. Montreal understands very well that in order for people to like a character, in order for the player to resonate, sometimes we need to experience the character's past.
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