Helper Voice

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Synopsis

Conveying guidance through the voice of disembodied or remote entities.

Relationships

Context:
Awareness .
May relate to:
Narrative , Recordings , Radio .
Differs from:
Narrator .
Uses:
Dialogue .

Description

One way to provide the player with aid while playing, regarding the gameplay but also dynamic notifications (Awareness for a critical state, for instance), is to design a Helper Voice who provides such information through Dialogue in a diegetic way.

Helper Voice may indirectly contribute with pieces of Narrative but it is different from Narrator. While Helper Voice provides information about the gameplay, i.e. about what to do or how to do it, the Narrator tells the story of the game.

The Helper Voice is sometimes "a voice from above", frequently conveyed by a reverberated Dialogue and possibly some additional Sound Effects that approximate it from the archetype of the voice of fantastic or divine entities.

Yet, perhaps the most commonly designed solution for the Helper Voice is to have a NPC in a remote location providing information over a communicator. The same channel and character is often used to provide Narrative (in which case such character also behaves as Narrator).

Examples

Shadow of the Colossus: A voice from above explains the strategy to defeat a particular boss. In case the player is not able to progress the voice repeats after a while.

Portal:

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Uncharted:

Assassin's Creed: The Animus ('a projector which renders genetic memories') serves gameplay hints while loading levels.

Half-Life 2: Both the Radio emission (semantically directed to the NPC) and the NPC provide helpful information.

Papa Sangre: In the beginning of the game, 'a fluttery watery thing' presents itself as someone the player cannot see but who is there to help.

Halo:

Commandos BCD:

Crysis:

Demon's Souls:

Ocarina Of Time:

Chaos Theory:

Mirror's Edge: A partner, over a communicator, explains the best strategy for the next piece of gameplay.