First off, enjoy this video in honor of Sixth Sense.
Next, use this space to post some thoughts on the game you’re playing and how our theories of narrative might help understand how it works as storytelling.
5 thoughts on “A fun link plus a thread for discussing your games”
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At the beginning of class, we looked into the study of narrative, or narratology, where interpretation is not the focus; rather, our inquiry into narrative pertains to how the formal mechanisms comprising a narrative shape our comprehension of the overall story. But how do we experience the narrative structure as an embodied experience when we play video games? Presently, I’m examining some of these formal strategies/methods storytellers use to construct and manage our knowledge in a narrative. Further, acknowledging the visual cues, as well as other intricacies, made available to challenge gamers and force them to be able to think outside typical linear games (i.e. Mario). The game I have chosen is called, God of War III (March 2010), which by far—in my opinion of course—is one of the best games of the trilogy, as well as the most innovative for platform gaming.
The first scene of the game gives a back-story of the previous titles, which include credits and visuals as if one was watching a film. Once the visuals bring gamers up to speed to where the story has arrived the main menu is brought up from which you start the game as main character, Kratos. For all those who have never played this game before, Kratos is a warlord who gave his soul to the god of war, Aries, wherein which Kratos—due to a disagreement—decides to defy and attempt to kill the god of war. In killing Aries, Kratos become a god, but once again—as played in the sequel—Kratos has not had enough. He begins to make an army to destroy and take over the world of men, but the king of the gods, Zeus, stops Kratos and kills him. After being sent to the underworld, Kratos escapes and is not bent on revenge to destroy Zeus, which is where pick up now.
Immediately after you choose the “New Game” option the gamer is taken straight into another cutscene of what exactly is going on, where the gamer is literally thrown into the battlefield. Though this doesn’t seem very innovative or even near the adjectives I’ve used to describe this game, one must understand that when you start to fight you’re fighting on top of a moving god-like giant Titan, named Gaia. Bordwell could associate this as being part of the syuzhet, where the arrangement and presentation of the fabula (what is not given) allows the viewer to make inferences and possible predictions as to where they are “going” in the media. Here, the gamer is fighting while trying to watch all the ongoing action in his/her surrounding, which is very awe-inspiring. I feel at this point in the game—especially with fans of the series—a large level of “narrational” knowledge referencing the communicativeness of the information is revealed to the audience, while some information is kept restricted for gamers to want to know more; much like a serial television show. Unlike a serial television show, the audience is completely immersed into the game, because one must control the outcome of the protagonist, which dates back to Bordwell’s notion of depth within a text. I feel the basic properties of Bordwell’s theory about the principles of narration are spot on—with minor exceptions—to this type of game.
Here is a sample of what I’m talking about:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CsbtgyRObXo&feature=channel
Don’t forget the self-awareness of the game–the part with the triangle, box, circle, and x being used as part of an obstacle to progress in the narrative.
I was there for that!
Speaking of self-consciousness, as I finish beating another small, but difficult boss, Hercules, I jump a couple of platforms and end up in the illustrious Aphrodite’s palace. Now, normally I keep my funny sexual jokes to myself, but here I notice that as you “choose” to go to bed with her the “camera” peers off towards the remaining girls, who become onlookers to the ‘huh-em’ “conversation” between Kratos and Aphrodite. Although this is entertaining to control your characters actions in the bedroom, as well as outside, the two onlookers comment on Kratos’ performance by exhaulting, “This is definitely for mature audiences only, parents should not let their children watch this.”
This literally had me laughing out loud. I was not expecting commentary on parental guidence within a video game that is rated for Mature Audiences. This brings us to our reality of dealing with game content being exposed to our youth. Here, the game actually includes this within, what Bordwell would call the syuzhet.
I personally feel it’s using its self-consciousness nature to either poke fun at censorship or actually relay a message about game content in regards to selling to underage gamers.
Here’s the link…be the judge for yourself,
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q2oz5wRkRCI
I’m a little less than halfway through Reach’s campaign and still can’t help but compare everything I see to the series’ previously three titles. Surprisingly, however, I find myself doing much more contrasting than comparing in terms of narrative between Reach and Halo’s 1-3. Reach is most definitely a Halo game. The environments, guns, and characters all have the created world’s unique, colorful feel. However, the game being a prequel to the three before it, the replacing of Master Chief as the main protagonist to a group of six Spartan soldiers has changed the way the game’s narrative is presented much more than I could have imagined. The game immerses players in it’s world like never before. cut-scenes have been reduced to brief clips before and after the start of a mission, with much more narrative information being conveyed through in-game interaction between the player and their squad (such as finding out a fellow soldier has died by rendezvousing with the group he was with). Reach also uses it’s squad-based narrative and gameplay to inject different schema’s into the Halo universe for the first time. In one sequence, an enemy drop-ship lands near the player’s squad. In previous Halo games, the camera would leave Master Chief’s point of view, making the gamer aware of an omniscient narrator controlling their progress, and point out the enemy drop-ship. In the same instance in Reach, the narrative never leaves the protagonist’s helmet. Instead a squad members screams “Drop-ship”, leaving the player and his squad to frantically search the skies for the enemy vehicle, a situation found in most military shooters, not sci-fi action games.
One more note; Reach is another example of how the joy of interactivity lets game developers get away with unexplained narrative holes and inconsistencies with little to no loss of enjoyment from it’s fan base. Reach introduces new weapons into the Halo universe, a couple of which are just as powerful if not more powerful than those found in the games three sequels. However, instead of questioning what happened to this technology and why it is not available in games that take place after Reach, I instead take giddy pleasure in blasting away alien scum with the new guns. If a Western Film had an M60-toting character in it, scriptwriters would definitely have some explaining to do.
I’m slowly but surely coming to the conclusion of Halo: Reach as the narrative begins to push towards the beginning of the very first Halo game. The last level I played was of great interest to the narrative and, for the first time since playing, made me notice a disadvantage video gams have over their film counterparts; building narrative suspense. The level’s climax was defending a research base from wave after wave of alien forces as a scientist tried to salvage humanities last hope inside. The cut-scene before the encounter brought the tension to an ultimate emotional high; I could not be more engaged in defending humanities last chance at survival. Then I died. with the cut-scene still fresh in memory, I dropped back into the level as pumped as ever. Then I died again. By the time I completed the objective and viewed the next emotionally-engaging cut-scene, I had died almost twenty times and completely forgotten about the previous cut-scene. While the story was still coherent, I knew exactly what was going on, the narrative suspense was all but diminished, nowhere near what it would have been had I beaten the objective in one try. Granted, I’m playing on a higher than normal difficulty setting (I know, I’m awesome), but any good game should challenge it’s gamers to the detriment of narrative suspense.