Hello again, it has been too long . . . I cannot remember the last time I had a free evening (or, in this case a free morning!) to sit down and update SGP. I have three posts backlogged and handwritten at the moment, but putting them together is rather time intensive, and Academia tends to consume all my free time.
Here is the topic for this post: Immersion. It is discussed, debated, and sometimes villified on mass media sites due to its effect on the minds of players: It makes us want to stay in the game world, to relate to the heroes and villians from our favorite games, movies, and novels, in lieu of their real-world counterparts. Personally, I could argue on morality and subjective opinions all day, but for your sake I will avoid the inane banter that News channels tend to saturate themselves with. So!
Last term, I enrolled in a class titled "American Novel till 1900," with a professor fresh from grad school. For the sake of anonymity, I'll call him Professor Hydrocarbon. It is an appropriate name, since it is a pun on his surname and also on his near-explosive enthusiasm in literary discourse. In "American Novel," we suffered through the phallic symbolism and meglomania of Melville's Moby Dick, the spiritually-enriching monologue of Hawthorne's Scarlett Letter, and, most importantly, a little known text by a feminist writer named Mary Chopins. The text, titled The Awakening, deals with a young, well-off woman who awakens her intellectual and emotional curiosities by delving into art and sexual flirtation. Her eventual conclusion is that American society would constantly shun and suppress her individual desires for art and sexual independence, and she would be forced to live a lie for the rest of her life. So, in the text's closing chapter, the young mother simply walks out onto the beach, strips off her clothing, and swims out to sea, chasing the sinking sun until she can no longer swim, then submits to the sea and voluntarily drowns herself.
You can imagine how gruesome the concept of young mothers committing suicide was at the turn of the 19th century, and journalists criticized the shit out of The Awakening.
Now, you are probably wondering "Why the hell is this guy talking about a feminist novel that was published in 1900? I want a discussion on Immersion!"
We are getting to that point, actually. After finishing The Awakening, Professor Hydrocarbon turned on the assembled body of students and demanded an analysis of both the text and why the novel was a perfect example of several interlacing themes in American media at the turn of the 19th Century. We each stumbled through our notes, stuttered out half-thought answers and claims which sounded as if they actually ended in question marks, and in the chaotic jumble of voices I patched together a set of six points in The Awakening that signify Eda's progression from an ignorant housewife to a self-aware young woman with artistic and sexual curiosities. Hydrocarbon loved the list! He even asked for permission to include the listing in his next installment of the class (I gave him permission. I actually felt proud of my analytic skills for the first time in my academic career at the University).
During the same semester that I was taking the class, I also returned to my life of Console Gaming, going after several of my favorite games with a gusto born from Achievement-Lust. It wasn't until I started playing through Mass Effect 1 (Working for those damnable squad-mate Achievements!) that I realized I was playing through an interactive narrative which used the same six steps I had found in The Awakening as a structure for character devlopment! Even more shocking was that I honestly felt a need to point this connection out to others at the University.
I remember revealing my finding during a dinner discussion that night, to a table composed of theater geeks, card-collectors, and fellow video game enthusiasts (All of them highly intelligent, I might add!), and the resulting phrase from all of them was: "So?"
Those two letters (Perhaps more words were said) turned my enthusiastic discussion into a rather embarrassing monologue which ended with the phrase "You're excited. We don't care." Now I offer my findings up to you, the reader, to do with as you will.
Step 1: Open the character's eyes
This step is also referred to as setting the stage for the upcoming narrative. This Step is not necessarily synonymous with the term "Tutorial." Step 1 involves providing the character with an awareness of the world he/she exists in, while a Tutorial is generally regarded an an introduction to the mechanics of gameplay. Some games, like Mass Effect 1, achieve this with little-to-no player action required. See below:
Okay, so in that single intro cinematic, you (the player) are given a summary of your chosen background, a visual representation of technology which uses mass-effect fields (The big blue burst of energy. Remember that?), your character's name (Shepard), and even the freaking title of the game!
Mass Effect 1 : Step 1? Check.
Step 2: Distinguish the character from other individuals in the
game world
This Step is simple: People like to think they are special. And we game enthusiasts are not different in that regard. We love when our characters are idolized, feared, respected, and even worshiped. The desire to be the center of the universe is an innate facet of being human, and Mass Effect 1 strokes the player's ego without fear of competition. See Below:
After you deploy a verbal and rhetorical barrage against the Turian ambassador, and after suffering through Ambassador Udina's failed argument for deploying the entire Council Fleet, you (The character) are appointed as the first Human Spectre (Quasi-secret agents of the Council). The Council just ranked you above their entire armada of futuristic war-ships. If that doesn't swell your ego and prod you on to greater glories, you might want to get your mental-health evaluated by a trained professional.
Mass Effect 1: Step 2? Check.
Step 3: Provide obstacles for the character to overcome en-
route to the goal
This Step is actually part of a two-part process which entails the majority of actual gameplay. During this Step, the character is presented with several obstacles to overcome. Good games tend to provide the character with several paths to overcoming the obstacle, each with a different outcome and different rewards.
After all is said and done, the character should be rewarded with a tangibile reward: In the case of Mass Effect 1, Shepard continually gains rewards in the form of the development of your crewmembers.
Shepard starts off with five members on his command staff (Kaiden, Ashley, Garrus, Wrex, and Tali) and is given command of the most advanced stealth warship in the Alliance armada (The SSV Normandy). The Council then points out three leads on Saren's involvement on three planets scattered across the galaxy (Noveria, Therum, and Feros) and the player is allowed to pursue whichever lead he or she desires.
These are the three obstacles (The last two obstacles are revealed when Shepard finds clues that lead him to Virmire and Illos) that prevent Shepard from defeating Saren. In Mass Effect 1, Step 3 is presented in the form of five unique planets, each with different information on Saren and his plans.
Step 4: Assimilation of experiences and/or resources in
response to overcoming obstacles in Step 3
This Step is the second step in the two-part process which entails the majority of actual gameplay. During this Step, the character recieves rewards for overcoming an obstacle. In some games, the rewards are as crude as "XP & Gold." While it is true that characters have a better chance of overcoming future obstacles if they have Health (Progressive improvement of the character, through gaining abilities or increasing statistical attributes) and Wealth (Form of in-game capital, not necessarily currency, which can be used to artificially decrease the difficulty of specific obstacles or sub-obstacles. Buying better weapons and armor may make it easier to overcome an obstacle, but they are simply supplements for actual power in the game world), these two forms of rewards do not alter the character from who he or she was before the obstacle. Health will only increase the character's exisiting status, and Wealth can only be applied in limited instances to supplement for a lack of character growth.
[[Steps 3 & 4 can be repeated until the character is ready to face the final goal.]]
I had a hard time finding any kind of video which could give an accurate depiction of this process. I feel that this is the best option on YouTube:
I apologize for including an off-site link. YouTube has an option which prevents public videos from being embedded in blogs.
>>>
Wow, I only got to Step 4 of 6. I will post the final Steps soon, but at the moment I need to get the visual metaphors for the 6 Steps finished (I am trying my hand at Gimp, and it is not going so well). I have always loved graphs, diagrams, and other visual metaphors because they make explanations simpler, albeit less precise.
Until next time!
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