10 Artistic Things Video Games Can Do That Movies Can't
9. Using Villains Sparingly
Sometimes, movies rob their antagonists of their menace simply by having them on screen for too long. You know what I'm talking about: The Joker in Tim Burton's 1989 Batman film, a terrific antagonist who appears so frequently one wonders why the film is even entitled "Batman" at all. No matter the quality of the performance or writing, even a great movie antagonist can grow wearisome when taking center stage for too long. Video games have had the solution to this problem thrust on them long ago - given that you are controlling the protagonist, the natural choice is to have the vast majority of the in-game time devoted to spending time with the protagonist, limiting the antagonist's screen time in a big way. The result? In a well done game, the appearances from the antagonist are more intimidating because of their paucity - it is almost a shock when you and the big baddie cross paths.
Self-evidently a man who writes for the Internet, Robert also writes films, plays, teleplays, and short stories when he's not working on a movie set somewhere. He lives somewhere behind the Hollywood sign.
