How World of Warcraft keeps its story straight
In these days of cinematic universes and endless sequels, stories that used to be simple are becoming increasingly complex, loaded with backstory and lore that practically requires a degree to wrap your head around. But this phenomenon? To get more news about
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Since at least the days of Tolkien, fantasy-rich tales like Lord of the Rings have relied on cohesive systems of lore, history and universe-building to attract audiences.But often that's easier said than done. In 2020, as megabrands like Marvel and Star Wars stretch themselves thin across movies, TV, video games, books and comics, someone needs to be responsible for making sure things retain a modicum of consistency.
Starting life in 1994, but reaching critical mass with 2004's World of Warcraft, Blizzard Entertainment's Warcraft universe is one of the best examples of a long-running, multimedia narrative. Five core video games, five tabletop card games, over 30 novels, 10 comics, six manga and a film adaptation have all been released in the space of the last 26 years.
How the hell does everyone keep the story straight?
We spoke to Steve Danuser, lead narrative designer for World of Warcraft, to find out how one gigantic multiplatform universe can cohesively function across so many different forms of media. "A big part of my job is to focus on the game and make sure that our team is telling great stories within the world, but another big part of it is also interfacing with all the other departments at Blizzard," Danuser said.
More often than not, it comes down to three C's: consistency, context and credible growth. As the story grows, it needs to do so for constructive reasons -- not just for the sake of it.World of Warcraft lies at the heart of the Warcraft universe's continued success. The massively multiplayer online role-playing game has consistently attracted millions of players over its 16-year history.
Danuser's role is to create the story at the heart of this massive universe, from coming up with plotlines and dialogue through to corralling a huge team of writers, designers and other creatives.
To keep the narrative in line with supplementary novels, comics, manga and more, the most critical element is the capacity for intense communication. Establishing the cadence of these supplementary media forms is paramount in evaluating how they fit into the story.When it comes to books, for example, we have long-term strategy meetings where I tell them what's going on in the game and then we talk about ideas for books that can arise out of that," Danuser said.
But this relies heavily on the development of a central narrative, capable of spanning pages upon pages of content, planned months -- sometimes years -- in advance. It's something Tom van Laer, a professor of narratology at the University of Sydney, Australia, refers to as a "signature story."
"A signature story has a couple of features," explains van Laer. "It's perceived as authentic, while at the same time is incredibly involving. There's a lot going on. They tend to be quite epic -- big searches for cradles of knowledge, for example."It's this narrative thread that links across platforms to tell a linear story, even when the individual elements might span different timelines or worlds.
"My brain is always living in multiple points in time," said Danuser. "I have to be able to dial in on the story at any given point in time and be able to speak about it separately from all the other parts, so it's definitely a challenge."
