Why the Best Video Games Lie to You
Creators are using misleading, forgetful, or deceptive protagonists to force gamers to think about subtext — and ask more questions as they play
In the 2016 action adventure game Uncharted 4: A Thief’s Legacy, the rakish series protagonist Nathan Drake learns that reports of his older brother’s death have been greatly exaggerated. Samuel Drake tells an astonished Nate that he has spent most of the last 15 years in prison, and then the game transitions to a flashback in which the player controls Sam as he embarks on a daring escape with the help of his cellmate, Hector Alcázar. But later in the game, the primary antagonist Rafe Adler reveals to Nate that he was the one who freed Sam from prison. That whole playable story was a lie.
Sam Drake is a classic unreliable narrator. Examples from literature include the likes of Gone Girl, Fight Club, and Life of Pi, but this narrative device has also been used in film, television, and video games. In some games, like Uncharted 4, the unreliable narrator forms just one part of a wider story, but in others it is the central conceit around which the game is built.
In 2015’s Her Story, the player tries to piece together the truth behind a murder, searching a virtual database for full-motion video…
