Week 10

In her paper “The Puppet Master Problem: Design for Real-World, Mission Based Gaming”, Jane McGonigal suggests that “the success of the puppet master challenges our assumptions about the kinds of action and interaction that qualify as gameplay, reveal dramatic interpretation to be a viable game mechanic, and demonstrate the value of a dramaturgical perspective for pervasive game design.” Discuss how these ideas could be applied to designing elements of narrative and gameplay in interactive media systems.

When I thought about it, I didn’t see a large conceptual difference between puppet masters and dungeon/game masters, save the medium. If anything, a puppet master is remarkably like a webmaster, or a sitemaster. I think they essentially perform the same functions – organising people in real time. Like how livejournal communities have moderators, who organise events for the visitors to enjoy and rally around – to keep visitors coming, and interested! Visitors choose to be there and subject themselves to the rules of the community as laid out by the sitemaster. If they don’t like it they can choose to leave and join another community. It’s the the second-most ultimate emergent game (Life, in general, being the first)

I think, from the second project, I’ve learned that making a game merely progressive with emergent aspects (ala MMORPGs) is not enough. (At the moment, I’m playing Pokemon Mystery Dungeon, and finished the storyline, and now, there are so many options, I don’t really feel like playing anymore). It adds weight to the puppetmaster problem – you really need rules to make a game interesting, to add motivation to play.

Therefore, games definitely need a strong element of direction – that someone out there knows what’s going on, and it’s up to you to find out what it is and what to do about it – your interpretation. Isn’t that just like life? You’re not living life for no reason – you live life to find the reason for living. If this desire can be translated to game design, it’d be an excellent game. The idea that there is a plan to everything that happens, and that you have a choice as to how to reach the final point. Like a “puppet”, you play the game insofar as you derive satisfaction from knowing that what you do has a point. Even in the case of flashmobs, a seemingly pointless action gains meaning when many people do it together. You’ve =participated= in something, not did something random on your own.

Therein lies how the concepts can be introduced to game design – the sense of community. A puppet-master run game wouldn’t nearly be as enjoyable if you did it on your own. “No man is an island”, “You can’t do it alone”, are as applicable to the gameworld as they are in life. I think games need to go towards this – that there’s an ultimate aim, a reason for what you’re doing, and people to do it with! Games already head in this direction – even games where you play on your own have a sense of community (you play against other people, or have an NPC party/companion, or you go online and talk to people who have played and find out how to best get through the game, etc).

Week 9 Questions

Markku Eskelinen, an independent scholar and self-professed “ludologist”, in his response to Jenkins’ paper “Game Design as Narrative Architecture”, says:

According to the well-known phrase of David Bordwell, narration is “the process whereby the film’s sjuzet and style interact in the course of cueing and constraining the spectator’s construction of the fabula.” In games there are other kinds of dominant cues and constraints: rules, goals, the necessary manipulation of equipment, and the effect of possible other players for starters. This means that information is distributed differently (invested in formal rules, for example), it is to be obtained differently (by manipulating the equipment) and it is to be used differently (in moving towards the goal).

By systematically ignoring and downplaying the importance of these and other formal differences between games and narratives as well as the resulting cognitive differences, Jenkins runs the risk of reducing his comparative media studies into repetitive media studies: seeing, seeking, and finding stories, and nothing but stories, everywhere. Such pannarrativism could hardly serve any useful ludological or narratological purpose.

Do you agree with Eskelinen’s dismissal of Jenkins’ approach? Why/why not?

(In other words, [do] you agree that Jenkins’ approach is just reducing games to narrative, and therefore has no value?)

I agree that games are essentially narratives, even if they are not explicitly ‘games of progression’. Thinking of games as narratives gives us a framework to start from and to develop furthur theories of game studies. That said, Eskelinen does have a point – if we consider games solely as narratives, we will definitely lose sight of what makes a game a game.

Referring to earlier comments – I think games as narratives are a form of escapism which effectively let us live other lives. It’s what makes games so successful. Even when you’re playing something as simple as Pong, something about the game draws you in and immerses you in the gameplay – it doesn’t feel like you’re part of “reality”.

You could argue that this is merely the result of flow – that whenever you’re concentrating on something, you lose sight of everything else, and it does feel like you’re in another world. I think games, however, are =designed= to … incite? flow. To be as immersive as possible. Narratives, I think, are the best way to do that. It gives you backstory, tone, direction.

There are also different sorts of narratives. It’s all in the way you tell the story. I think Eskelinen is looking at the term narrative too linearly – he doesn’t take into account the many facets which make up and influence the… power? of a narrative, which may very well translate into the other points he brings up, like rules, goals, and manipulations of equipment. The translation willl not be perfect, but it definitely has some bearing on the way the narrative plays out, and therefore your experience of it.

Ultimately, I think there is some use in “reducing” games to narratives (If you could use the term “reducing” in the first place. I think of them more as… a point of view. You don’t really lose anything in the process), because the elements used to carry the narrative may translate into the elements which make up the game. At the same time, that is only one point of view. It may also be possible to come from the other direction – examine the elements of game, and find that it is decidedly similar to a narrative.

Postscript: I realised I had saved this but not published it >< Published it monday morning as soon as I got up. Sorry!

Week 8 Questions

Jesper Juul distinguishes between games of emergence, where a game is specified as a small number of rules that combine and yield a large number of game variations, and games of progression, where a game presents the player with a series of puzzles or challenges which must be accomplished in a certain order. Discuss whether games of progression, which often attempt to combine a narrative structure with gameplay, are unique to computer-based games.

I think it largely depends on -what- constitutes gameplay. If it’s merely getting over a series of obstacles, then no, I think games of progressions are not limited to computer-based games. You could argue that a masterful storyteller in the days of old were masters of games of progression. The narrative was immersive, and they may have incorporated “interactive” elements in order to bring their story to life, like say, for example, have the audience react to their satisfaction (applause, cheers, or the like) before continuing with the story. Anything can be a game, really, depending on how you see it. I think there was an example in class, about how some things may seem like games when you’re younger, and completely boring when you get older.

I would have argued that forum theatre, in a sense, was a game of progression, but it’s slightly different as the narrative hasn’t been determined yet – it’s a form of exploring what the narrative could be, by involving the audience, and the actors as obstacles adapting themselves to the partipant’s actions, before a desired outcome is reached.

However, in the usual context of games of progression being games where the narrative is already determined, I would agree that these days it is unique to computer-based games. Most other games involve deriving a narrative from what happens inside the game. I think computer games are essentially narratives – a form of escapism. You don’t buy games in search of the most satisfying button-pressing combinations. There should be something that compels you, and I think in most cases, it’s the narrative. The thing that keeps you playing over and over though, is the gameplay. Yaolong and I were discussing this in class – he buys games for the narrative and graphics, and watches the cut scenes only once. If he ever plays it again, it’s because the gameplay is good.

Admittedly, I think games of progression were created for the computer. That the availability of the computer turned an otherwise niche category of games into a gaming staple. I wouldn’t say it was entirely limited to being played on the computer, but it is definitely the most common.