Shadow of the Colossus' simple, spare storyline has been repeatedly acclaimed as a high-water mark in video game storytelling.

Even before Mario trekked through the Mushroom Kingdom to rescue the Princess and Pac-Man was pursued by a quartet of ghosts, video games have been a storytelling medium. As games matured from simple sprites to a multi-billion dollar industry, so the scope of video games increased —in terms of graphical fidelity, size and scope of game worlds, and the potential for storytelling.

The problem, though, is that only two of those three aspects have seen real growth to this point. While our favored medium is still maturing, it’s encountered some growing pains in finding the right way to tell a story — and the right kind of stories to tell.

Warning: Spoilers for Grand Theft Auto IV, Bioshock, Metal Gear Solid, Fallout 3, Fable II, and Shadow of the Colossus follow.

The deep, gritty urban environment of Liberty City created by Rockstar for Grand Theft Auto IV opens up to gamers in a way that both advances the storyline as well as the needs of the player.

While storytelling techniques from books, comics, TV and movies may be applicable to games, the nature of the video game medium means not all of these techniques make best use of the gaming experience. A major difference is that video games are an experiential medium: gamers expect to learn new tricks or techniques, or gain access to new worlds throughout the course of a game. While this may not be as true in sports or racing games, for example, players of single-player-focused games of all genres expect a sort of ramp — both in terms of what skills your character has as well as in difficulty. A game like Ninja Gaiden or God of War would feel stale if your character started the game with the abilities, weapons and skills he or she ended with. In order to increase the difficulty of the game (generally from simple to complex as the game nears its close), those skills are needed to introduce new challenges.

Movies and books do not expect you to make such strides throughout the story— however, the convention of unlocking more and more powerful weapons or abilities throughout a single-player role playing game or action game is a video game standby. An issue games have, then, is telling a powerful story within a framework that also makes sense from a gameplay perspective. Done in a banal or uninspired way, a game feels cliché or trite; but when executed well, games marry storytelling and advancement in a flowing, natural way.

A great example is the post-GTA III Grand Theft Auto games. The game world in Rockstar’s flagship series opens up as missions unlock; the key is that it feels natural. An attempt on the life of GTA IV protagonist Nico Bellic and his cousin early in the game forces them from the first opening area of the game to the next one; while it’s still shepherding the player from one area to another, it makes sense in the context of both gameplay (moving from one level to another) and storytelling.

Another challenge to story is in level structure for many games. While movies and novels go through crests and valleys of action and story progression, games take it to another level and build levels around specific action scenes as well as new mechanics. Take a game like Gears of War 2 as an example. Most every level in the two Gears of War games introduces a new technique or experience — whether that’s riding on a giant excavator and firing from mounted turrets, or working your way through a giant worm, the story is oftentimes molded in such a way as to naturally introduce new scenarios for gamers.

Many aspects of Gears of War and Gears of War 2's storyline rotate around the game's level design, crafting the story around what the designers want the gamer to experience. The chainsaw duel, however, is just badass.

The problem that arises from this is that parts of the story can be cut due to difficulty with getting a level functioning properly. If the game’s engine just flat-out can’t handle a level, or the developers lack the time to finish a scene to their desired quality, it gets cut. Compare this to movies, novels and TV shows, where content is cut in the interest of brevity or relevance — scenes are deleted or pages are cut because they’re excess, not because the director or writer doesn’t know how to shoot them or put them into words.

It’s not the case with games because many story-focused games hone in on gameplay first, with the story built to fit. The Gears of War series is guilty of this, with story built to explain away gameplay concepts, but it’s certainly not the only one out there.

Regardless, the medium is still blossoming in terms of finding new and inventive ways to tell stories. There have been advances in taking the best of post-modern storytelling and combining that with the interactivity of gaming to create something that can only be told through the medium of the video game.

A game like Bioshock is a step in this right direction. It takes a rather ordinary story idea, with a relatively simple plot progression throughout, but throws the player for a loop by manipulating the story within the context of gaming. Bioshock doesn’t succeed because its dystopian, Ayn Rand-inspired story is groundbreaking, but because it takes certain video game tropes — that gamers have a choice, have control, and that a person giving them instructions can be trusted — and uses them to bring meaning to the player. It takes the idea that the narrator and guiding voice in a game can be taken for gospel and stands it on its head. While it’s a simple concept (and one explored in books like The Catcher in the Rye or Catch-22), it’s one that has not been explored in detail in videogames.

Metal Gear Solid creator Hideo Kojima utilized many interesting technical tricks with the PlayStation, including reading from the memory card for other Konami games in the form of Psycho Mantis reading Solid Snake's mind.

You think you have the game figured out, then it turns out you’ve been a pawn all along. Metal Gear Solid did this, too — along with other mind-tricks that took advantage of the medium. This is best exemplified in the battle with Psycho Mantis, a specially trained super-soldier who could read the protagonist’s – and the player’s – mind. How was that achieved? Psycho Mantis could “read your mind” and counter all of your actions if you left the PlayStation controller in the first control port; this boss also read the PlayStation memory cards to see if there was any save data for other games by Metal Gear Solid’s publisher, Konami. Players had to learn to either adapt to the fight…or just move the controller to the second port.

Fortunately, more games are playing with the structure of the narrative for dramatic effect. PlayStation 2 classic Shadow of the Colossus uses bare minimalism to create an emotionally meaningful experience. It’s gaming structure at its simplest — the protagonist must go defeat a series of bosses to save his beloved princess — but the sparseness of the world that the player rides and hunts in creates a stillness, a narrative white space that contrasts with the brutal climbing and killing of the gentle yet gigantic colossi the player must slay. It’s powerful and moving in ways few other games are.

Bioware’s RPGs, including the Baldur’s Gate series, Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, Jade Empire, and Mass Effect, all seek to evoke emotion through a different method: choice. Knights of the Old Republic popularized a trend towards good/evil choice in games — actions and dialogue in KOTOR affected your character’s development and standing within the game’s community, as well as storyline options that were available. Some characters’ quests were only available if you were good or evil enough, and the theory was that gamers would go for one path or another but must live with their decisions.

Fallout 3's Broken Steel downloadable content retroactively changes the ending to the game from a hard, final conclusion, to a jumping-off point for more end-game content.

Other games, like the Fallout series and the Fable series, have highlighted this as well, but the concept of choice and decisions making last affects on characters hasn’t been executed as well as possible. Why? Gamers right now do not want these choices to be permanent. Downloadable content for Fable II allowed gamers the opportunity to shortcut around the game’s end-of-storyline decisions; everything from weight (gained or lost by diet) to the story’s final impossible choice are reversible now, albeit for a price. A similar effect is achieved in Fallout 3’s Broken Steel downloadable content, which ret-cons the game’s ending, adds new storyline content, and allows the player to continue playing with their character. In Fallout 3, enough good (or evil) karma will balance the other side out; some choices are permanent, but many aren’t. The emotional impact choice and living with decisions can have is washed a bit when it lacks permanence.

One of the highest achievements for all art — including television, music, movies, and, yes, video games — is to convey a strong emotion. Whether that’s happiness, sadness, fear, joy, or whatever the case may be, if a song moves you to tears or a movie makes you laugh for days, that piece of art has succeeded. With gaming, there is a unique opportunity to provide an even stronger emotional connection with a medium because of the interactive nature of video games. While games have not had that watershed storytelling event — there hasn’t been “a Citizen Kane of gaming” as of yet — watch how developers continue to find new ways to tell powerful stories that utilize interactivity and personal choice.

Gunnin' for that #1 spot: Sales of Call of Duty: World at War helped Activision post earnings of nearly $1 billion this past year, the company announced today. Guitar Hero and World of Warcraft were also named as leading Activision-Blizzard franchises.

Just a couple of days ago, Electronic Arts announced its quarterly and yearly financial statement; today,  Activision followed that up with its own release, and the returns are very impressive. Activision-Blizzard posted a $981 million net revenue in the first quarter of this year — no, that’s not a yearly figure. That beats the publishing giant’s own projections for the quarter by more than $100 million, and has caused the company to raise its revenue expectations for the 2009 calendar year to $4.3 billion.

“Our better-than-expected first quarter results were driven by strong global consumer response to the Call of Duty and Guitar Hero franchises and Blizzard Entertainment’s World of Warcraft, despite challenging economic times,” Activision CEO Robert Kotick said.

Of course, as happens from time to time, some games that were rumored to exist were confirmed in the financial release. Guitar Hero 5, Band Hero, and DJ Hero were all confirmed in the report, and Guitar Hero: Van Halen was made official later in the day. GH5 is a follow up to 2008′s Guitar Hero: World Tour and 2009′s Guitar Hero: Metallica (our review of which is here.) Band Hero is going to be family friendly, and DJ Hero will feature hip-hop, R&B, electronic, techno, and dance music and a turntable peripheral.

In non-music-game-related Activision news, during the earnings conference call, word leaked out (repoted by Kotaku) that details on the next entry in the Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater franchise may be coming at next month’s E3 convention. One of Activision’s older cash cows, THPS went underground (as opposed to Underground) last year as developer Neversoft focused on Guitar Hero games. Looks like EA’s Skate series may have some competition once again.

Nintendo's Wii Fit helped the company sell 26 million Wii systems worldwide last year, rocketing the little white waggle-tastic console to the 50 million units sold mark.

Meanwhile, Nintendo continues to print money. They also released financial numbers today, and they are ludicrous – GameSpot reports $2.8 billion in net revenue and $6 billion in operating profit in the last year, more than $18 billion in total sales worldwide, and a total rise of 8.5 percent over the numbers Nintendo turned over last year.

Even crazier is the amount of consoles sold to fuel those numbers: 26 million Wii consoles sold worldwide, which puts the system above 50 million sold in its lifetime, and 31 million DS units sold, lifting the handheld above the 100-million mark. Even though Nintendo gets the short end of the stick from many jilted hardcore gamers, it’s clear their bottom line is hardly hurting because of that.

We mentioned earlier in the week the anticipation for the newest piece of Fallout 3 DLC, Broken Steel, but it seems that Bethesda’s add-on fell on its face upon launch – Xbox 360 gamers were having problems with the achievements, and PC gamers couldn’t even install the DLC whatsoever. Apparently that has been fixed, with threads in the Fallout 3 forums saying that both issues have been resolved. Hopefully no problems will beset our brave editor Aaron Thayer as he tackles the Fallout 3 DLC suite this weekend.

Despite the title, Daniel Benmergui's Flash game "Today I Die" really isn't all that sad of a game.

Lastly, a little indie gaming to lighten the mood after all that financial talk. “Today I Die,” a simple yet very moving poetic flash game, has been released by creator Daniel Benmurgi, who previously made “I Wish I Were The Moon” and “Storyteller.” We found this game via Kotaku, and will share the same hint that they suggested: Try the jellyfish.

But hey — that’s gaming weather, and it’s time to dish the news for another week. So, without further ado…

Time to fire up Fallout 3 again for the most anticipated DLC for the game yet, Broken Steel, which drops tomorrow.

The third piece of downloadable content for Fallout 3, Broken Steel, is dropping by the time you read this. However, what we have right now is a teaser trailer, which is super spoiler-heavy. You can find it right here on Bethesda’s official site, but again, it’s not suggested for those (like your humble news writer) who haven’t finished the game.

While it is the third chunk of DLC produced for the game, it’s also easily the most anticipated because it opens back up the end of Fallout 3 while adding in new story pieces and locations to explore. Will it be worth it? Look for some Fallout 3 DLC coverage soon.

Rockstar’s Sam and Dan Houser, creators of the Grand Theft Auto series (including GTA IV), have been recognized on TIME Magazine’s 2009 “TIME 100″ list. They’re part of the “Artists and Entertainers” group along with Tina Fey, M.I.A., opera performers, artists, and more. And that’s just the artists – world leaders, scientists, and more are on the list, too.

While the rumors and first images of a remake of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Turtles in Time dropped late last week, we now have some footage to really substantiate things. Gamervision scored the video, and here it is, to boot:

Not much there from a gameplay standpoint, honestly, but wow — that art style is perfect. It’s the Saturday morning cartoon come to life in 3D. We can’t wait to see the rest of the details and demo eventually.

Quick hit of something that might be nothing, or might be something: TheStreet.com’s Jim Cramer dropped a juicy tidbit into a blog post – Apple (yes, THAT Apple) may be considering buying Electronic Arts (yes, THAT EA). No other details other than that, sadly, but man…what an entertainment juggernaut that would be.

It's just a school project, but Theyab's work brings up profound questioning of what exactly is going on in the Mushroom Kingdom.

Lastly, a little fun here as Kotaku reader Theyab – a student at Carnegie-Mellon – has taken a touchstone of gaming, the flora and fauna from the Mushroom Kingdom, and made a textbook describing some of the more famous examples. Super Mario series power-ups like the Star, Leaf, Fire Flower and – pictured above – Mushroom all receive a breakdown that the Kotaku post says was for a project in a communication class. Certainly worth a quick look for any Nintendo fans in the audience.

Another bright, hot day in Portland, Oregon. I mean, I love blue skies, but the true Oregonian in me screams for rain and gray. I’m weird; I realize that.

The gaming world was flooded with mostly release-date related news  and a few droplets of real information, all of which you can read on the next page. Click that link!

Didn't get too inventive with the logo, did they?

Surprise (?): LEGO Rock Band was announced for release this holiday season. LEGO videogame gurus TT Games are working with Harmonix on the family-oriented title. The debate around the Silicon Sasquatch “water cooler” is one of sheer relevance. Personally,  I see a blocks-based music title to be puzzling (no pun intended), as the Rock Band franchise is already kid-ready with its censored lyrics, cooperative gameplay and vast categories of music for parents and younglings to enjoy. And even though the LEGO game mainstay of constructing avatars is in place, something still feels off. Regardless of my concerns, let’s hope the songs exclusive to the title are eventually released in Rock Band proper–because, even without a synth peripheral, who doesn’t want to play “The Final Countdown“?

Earthworm Jim papa-san papa Dave Perry, now an executive at Acclaim, is saying that piracy can be combated if game and media companies lower the prices of their products. A noble idea, but Perry’s comments are really promotions of his new ventures instead of feasible pursuits. It’s true that gaming is an expensive pastime, but when gamers passively demand better technology each generation it’s logical that purchase prices will match the money poured into increasingly high-tech offerings. Free-to-play concepts might beat back pirates, but asking the videogame industry to take a collective step back by somehow offering triple-A titles for nearly free to stop pirating is laughable. As long as there have been tasty goods to covet, there have been thieves.

Variety has a great article up offering a behind-the-scenes of sorts on composers making videogame music. It’s great to read more about the people behind what have been some of the most memorable parts of games (granted, these days it’s mainly orchestrated arrangements). It’s equally great to see how much these composers can make, though the lack of  backend royalties is very concerning. Another talent strike somewhere down the road? No.

Now for the release dates!

Tesla cannon trumps Vertibird

Fallout 3: Broken Steel is dropping on the Xbox Live Marketplace this May 5th, [Ed's note--in honor of the third and most important piece of Fallout 3 DLC, we'll be reviewing the first two DLC packs before the May 5th release of Broken Steel, with that review to follow shortly thereafter] and Brütal Legend is coming out this “Rocktober” 13th. Gamers may now rejoice.

[Update]: Apparently, the face-mapping technology supposedly coming to Age of Conan that we mentioned in yesterday’s Recap isn’t coming after all. Drat.