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Ludology
Narrative vs game... Eskelinen argues that we should think of narrative and game / interactivity as entirely different things.
He says:
“A sequence of events enacted constitutes a drama, a sequence of events taking place a performance, a sequence of events recounted a narrative, and perhaps a sequence of events produced by manipulating equipment and following formal rules constitutes a game.�
Sure we might question the unproblematic application of traditional narrative theory to games as texts, but we might also wonder whether his categorisations here don’t circumscribe the definition of narrative a little too much? Is drama not narrative? And, this definition of game (manipulating of equipment, formal rules) could easily describe the process of making a video. Maybe ‘making media’ is a form of game?
Tags: game ludology narrative narratives-4
Imagine a Brechtian Epic Videogame
People who like videogames, such as those of us who celebrate interactive media and the participatory web and the interactivity of computer culture, don't really like to be reminded of the reactionary critics of videogames who rail against the violence, and accuse violent games of encouraging and conditioning us into acceptance of extreme violent behaviour and ultimately leading the more vulnerable types into some kind of copy-cat action. Campus shootings, child pornography - all these are uncomfortable reminders that mediatised experiences often mask subterranean kinds of perversity.
Costikyan notes the violence in role-playing games (he isn't even specifically talking about videogames as such), and remarks that they are "unintellectual, even anti-intellectual, and tend to emphasise combat and violence at the expense of exploration of human issues."
In this context, Costikyan offers a imaginative case study of a role-playing game – Bestial Acts – in which he proposes a game in which the only ‘honest’ solution to intolerable moral dilemmas is to ‘act in vicious, brutal ways’. Instead of role-playing games as entertaining diversion, he proposes a role-playing game which is an emotionally harrowing ordeal. Imagine if your first person shooter, instead of rewarding you with progress every time you kill a non-player-character, instead stopped the gameplay and demanded to know why you had committed the awful act of murder against someone with a family? This, Costikyan suggests, is the Brechtian drama which is absent from the performances we engage in today.
As an immense fan of Brecht and of games, it is an arresting thought: what would Brecht do? What medium would he work in? Where are the Brechts of today?
Tags: alienation brecht epic game media-effects narrative narratives-3 narratives-4 verfremdungseffekt videogame violence