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Time To Play
Time To Play
While reading this article, I was familiar with all of the different concepts that were mentioned. Which focus of the overall experience of the player and how their time is translated to 'game time', and the overall model of games. I can actually recall my first PC game, “Blues Treasure Hunt: A Learning Adventure”, I believe I was about 4 years old and I never finished the game. This was my introduction to a lot of what Jesper Juul wrote about. I never had to think about these concepts or really have to explicitly understand the idea of game time or mapping; a lot of it felt like a given.
The videos I play currently are common games, like Stardew Valley, and games in the Super Mario realm, so I have always taken advantage of saving and pausing and reloading. However, I do remember when that was not always the case. As a child I had a Play Station 2 and only had two games, The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie game and Tony Hawk Pro Skater 3. I also did not have a memory card and vividly remember one summer trying to beat SpongeBob while also having that PS2 running nonstop until I was about 3 levels from the end and someone turned the game off. So, with every save and reload I will remember my roots.
My mother is the best I’ve seen at playing Ms. Pac Man, opening levels I had never seen before. With those, came cute cut-scenes that told a story of Pac Man and Ms. Pac Man. Those cut-scenes are short and to the point; however not all cut-scenes are built the same and the torture of sitting through some of them, especially as someone who is not the best as playing games, (knowing I would eventually have to rewatch the clip) was brutal.
The only way I feel I could connect with this reading is applying some of the concepts like mapping to the task of web developement. As developers we cannot stray too far from the norm. The mapping that we are used to using most likely will not change unless we move away from computers as a whole in the future. Thinking about the next few weeks I plan on using familiar mapping, like arrow keys and possibly mouse clicks to interact with the application.
Game Design as Narrative Architecture
Game Design as Narrative Architecture
It’s always interesting to me to be introduced to something you never thought would cause such a divide. The conversation about whether there should be narrative within games seems silly to me. As described, there are games without characters and a storyline that I would say focuses mostly on strategy, like Pong or Snake. I like to think a lot of these games are inherently telling a story. Theres a beginning, and end, and a conflict or challenge that the gamer must overcome. To me, these are the basic bare bones of storytelling. There are so many ways to add narrative without feeling cinematic, and I almost want to say,“So what if it does”. This monolithic approach to games seems to go against games and why we play them. I understand the breakdown given by Henry Jenkins, however, I don't understand the relevance. I believe we have enough people playing games where all types of games with or without a narrative can exist.
I enjoy both approaches to games because sometimes life only calls for a puzzle, or other times you want to build a Sim and decorate the house. I interpreted this reading as more of a warning of how to navigate the different approaches of game architecture so things remain consistent and familiar to the player.
Towards a Game: Theory of Game
Towards a Game: Theory of Game
For this article, I enjoyed the author's take on how storytelling can be done within games, but I also don’t agree with everything mentioned. Combining cinema and games reminds me of “Bandersnatch” by Netflix. A one-off story from the creators of Black Mirror that was recently removed from the platform. This was the first and only interactive movie I have experienced. I thought it was interesting and was not sure how I felt about it. I didn't feel like I was watching a movie or playing a game, which left me in a weird limbo about my experience with this kind of ‘Interactive Media”. As far as the game to movie pipeline goes, the only one I have watched, that was mentioned, is Mario Bros (which I thought was fairly entertaining). What I have always found curious is the movie to game pipeline and how the movies are translated into quests and challenges. I think the consumers of these games that are depicting movies are more willing to accept a random side quest than adding a random scene to a movie that was never in the game to begin with. I wonder why that is.
I can say this for both the last two readings that there seems to be a sweet spot. Understanding how much free will you want to give the player, versus how much is already planned or destined for them. I feel like that can easily be applied to visual art and understanding how much you want to explicitly tell the person consuming your art, vs how much they need to interpret on their own.
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