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| Michael |
 Posted: Sun Mar 20, 2005 7:58 pm |
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Site Administrator
Joined: 07 Jun 2002
Posts: 8065
Location: Gent, Belgium
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Humans are inclined to imitate each other. As babies, we do it automatically. Later in life, this biological inclination is used in education. But even as grown ups, we never quite kick the habbit. We pick up ways of moving, ways of talking, facial expression, etc, from the people that surround us. If we see someone yawning, we're inclined to yawn as well. Ditto laughing and puking. Even when somebody starts running, we have to supress the urge to run with him.
Perhaps this inclination extends to the emotional as well. And if so, perhaps this why certain works of art make us feel something. Perhaps we're trying to imitate the emotion that we think the character presented in the work of art is feeling. The most succesful pieces will be the ones that make you understand which emotion the character is feeling.
If this is true, and it is a major element of emotional participation, then most videogames have it all wrong (at least in as far as they want the player to feel something other than frustration and victory). First person games don't give us anything to imitate. And third person games usually feature bland characters with no personality. The idea is that you are playing yourself and that the game character is just a vehicle for you to travel through the game world in.
If a game aims to emotionally involve its players in its narrative, perhaps it needs to offer them things that they can imitate emotionally. Since emotions, unlike actions, can be mostly invisible, the succesful game will give the players sufficient hints from which they can deduce what the characters are feeling. So that they know which emotions they should "pretend" to have. In the tradition of mimesis, soon enough this pretending will become reality. |
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| Staci |
| Posted: Fri Apr 15, 2005 12:51 am |
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Joined: 14 Apr 2005
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Location: Southern California
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I might counter with the possibility that perhaps the reason computer games are as popular as they are is exactly because they offer no emotional involvement.
Consider films lthat demonstrate the emotional cost of war: Saving Private Ryan, Platoon, and so forth. Two or three hous watching one of these films leaves you feeling emotionally drained. Do you really want that kind of experience to last for 10 or 20 or 50 hours of gameplay?
And we certainly wouldn't want to encourage players to identify with or imitate a character who enjoyed the violent acts that so many video games are filled with!
"Escapist" is a word too often used in a derogatory sense in gaming, but I think it's very true, because video games allow you to participate in a wide variety of activities that you normally wouldn't, without having the emotional response that would typically make the activity unpalatable to you. Even games that aren't violent (puzzles, etc.) allow the player to do something without having to experience an emotional response (aside from frustration at not doing well, or the thrill when you're winning). People game because they want a break from the emotional demands of life, and (if you'll allow some stereotyping) the most hard-core gamers are traditionally those who have the hardest time expressing themselves emotionally in a real situation.
Not that I think including an opportunity for emotional mimesis in computer games is a bad idea, but it would definitely be a break from what has been desireable by gamers thus far. |
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| Michael |
| Posted: Fri Apr 15, 2005 8:29 am |
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Joined: 07 Jun 2002
Posts: 8065
Location: Gent, Belgium
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That's an interesting observation. And you're probably right to the extent of what games have been thusfar.
But
1. Even emotionally less deep movies (Hollywood) do succeed in affecting the viewer much more than games do. And this is not draining at all. It's in fact often quite the opposite. As much as you suggest that games might be an escape from emotionally-heavy reality, these movies offer an escape from emotionally-poor reality.
2. "Emotion" does not means "sad" or "depressing". Many works of art give people a very positive emotional experience which is just as deep and meaningful as the negative one that you get from certain war movies. How about making games that make you feel happy? (rather than feel nothing) |
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| MoriartyL |
| Posted: Sun Nov 06, 2005 10:29 am |
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Joined: 05 Nov 2005
Posts: 69
Location: Israel
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| I would argue that The Legend of Zelda is a step ahead of you in this regard. The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker has a very expressive player character. The eyes alone give the player enough emotional information to empathize with the character. But Zelda has another, older technique which is more effective: It crafts the player's experience so that he actually is feeling the character's emotion, without even having to empathize. The number of emotions the game achieves with this technique is impressive: isolation, tension, desparation, thrill, pride, suspicion, surprise, curiosity. These are usually enhanced with facial expressions, but the game needn't have bothered: There is no more direct way of expressing an emotion than by forcing the player to experience it for himself. |
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| Michael |
| Posted: Sat Nov 12, 2005 9:46 pm |
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Site Administrator
Joined: 07 Jun 2002
Posts: 8065
Location: Gent, Belgium
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| Since Zelda didn't make me feel anything at all (apart from annoyance with its design), I guess we need to conclude that this is all very subjective stuff. |
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