The Game Design Reader: A Rules of Play Anthology - Katie Salen and Eric Zimmerman Part One

- Cultural Models: Do You Want to Be the Blue Sonic or the Dark Sonic? – James Gee [2003] – Pg 610

“Cultural models, which cannot be stated in one definitive way, are stories or images of experiences that people can tell themselves or simulate in their minds, stories and images that represent what they take to be “normal” or “typical” cases or situations. In this sense, they are like theories…”

“Cultural models are picked up as part and parcel of acting with others in the world. We act with others and attempt to make sense of what they are doing and saying. We interact with the media of our society and attempt to make sense of what is said and done there, ass well. Cultural models are the tacit, taken for-granted theories we [usually unconsciously] infer and then act on in the normal course of events when we want to be like others in our social groups. People who have no cultural models would have to think everything out for themselves minute by minute when they attempt to act. They would be paralyzed. And they certainly would not be social beings, since part of what makes us social beings is the set of cultural models we share with those around us.”

“Most other academic disciplines operate in a similar way. They leave out a myriad of details to formulate a basic pattern that later can be made more complex to apply in different ways to different situations… leaving out a lot of details to get the basic pattern… People form cultural models from their experience by leaving out many of the details to capture what they take to be the typical cases.”

- Interaction and Narrative – Michael Mateas and Andrew Stern [2000|2005] – Pg 642

“Where gameplay is all about interactivity, narrative is all about predestination. There is a pervasive feeling in the game design community that narrative and interactivity are antithetical…”

- Emergent and Player Constructed Narrative -

“…emergent narrative is concerned with providing a rich framework within which individual players can construct their own narratives…Autonomous characters may be designed in such a way that interactions among autonomous characters and between characters and the player may give rise to loose narrative or narrative snippets [Stern 2002; Stern 1999; Aylett 1999].” (This looks at MMOs and the Sims as examples but is this concept limited to just these types of games?)

- Murray’s Aesthetic Categories – [Murray 1998]

Murray proposed three categories for the analysis of interactive story experiences: immersion, agency, and transformation.

Immersion – the feeling of being present in another place and engaged in the action therein. Coleridge’s “willing suspension of disbelief” – when a participant is immersed in an experience, they are willing to accept the internal logic of the experience, even though the logic deviates from the logic of the real world.

Agency – feeling of empowerment that comes from being able to take actions in the world whose effects relate to the players intention. (Not more interface activity) [empowerment is key, not just interactivity.]

Transformation – 3 different meanings

- transformation of masquerade – the game allows the player to transform themselves into someone else for the duration of the experience.

- transformation of variety – the game experience offers a multitude of variations on a theme. The player is able to exhaustively explore there variations and thus gain an understanding of the theme.

- Personal transformation – the game experience takes the player on a journey of personal transformation.

Transformation of masquerade and variety can be seen as means to effect personal transformation.

- Interactive Drama -

“the characteristics in an interactive drama should be rich enough that the player can infer a consistent model of the character’s thought. If the character’s thought can be understood [e.g. goals, motivations, desires], then this thought becomes a material resource for player actions. By reasoning about the other character’s thoughts, the layer can take actions to influence these characters.,, either to change their thoughts, or actively help or hinder them in their goals and plans.”

“In interactive drama, the understanding of the formal causation from the level of plot to character additionally helps the player to have an understanding of what to do, that is, why they should take actions within the story world at all.”

- Agency -

“A player will experience agency when there is balance between the material [actions] and formal [play] constraints.”

“When the actions motivated by the formal constraints [accordances] via dramatic probability in the plot are commensurate with the material constraints [affordances] made available form the levels of spectacle, pattern, language, and thought, then the player will experience agency.”

affordances means what is allowed (positive) in a game as opposed to not being allowed to do things (negative) or at least being made aware of what you can’t do. Only let the player know what they can do, what they’re afforded in the game.

- Relationships to Immersion and Transformation -

- Immersion

3 ways of inducing immersion according to Murray: structuring participation with a mask [an avatar], structuring participation as a visit, and making the interaction conventions [the interface mechanics] seamless.

“An avatar can provide both material [action] and formal [plot] constraints on a player’s actions. The avatar can provide character exposition through such traits as physical mannerisms and speech patterns. This character exposition helps the player to recapitulate the formal, plot constraints. Through both input and output filtering, the avatar can provide material constraints [affordances] for action.”

- Middle Ground Positions -

[Jenkins 2005]

- evoked narratives – elements from a known linear narrative are included in the spatial design of the game (Star Wars Galaxies)

- enacted narratives – organized around the player’s movement through space (Adventure Games)

- embedded narratives – narrative events [and their consequences] are embedded in a game space such that the player discovers a story as they progress through the game (Half-Life)[LocoLobos?]

emergent narratives – narratively pregnant game spaces enabling players to make their own stories (The Sims)

-Summary- [How it applies to me]

looking at emergent and embedded narratives to create a linguistic-less game experience with a narrative. The environments you go through tells a story(embedded spaces); the character’s design/presentation(looking at social psychology for design) tells a story. These two form the formal (plot) constraints (affordances). The material (action) constraints are informed (afforded) through the level layout and the character’s design. This informs the player of all their affordances and allows them to interact and proceed in a way that they should, making meaningful choices, and achieving agency (kind of like flow). What they do also affects the game/narrative. [Things done in the level should effect the game (narrative and mechanics)] – example – boss at the end of the level is harder/easier, different altogether, etc. based on what the player did in the level getting to the boss [for my visual component Loco Lobos]

- Game Design as Narrative Architecture – Henry Jenkins [2004] – Pg 670

- Enacting Stories -

“We might describe musicals, action films or slapstick comedies as having accordion-like structures. Certain plot points are fixed where-as other moments can be expanded or contracted in response to audience feedback without serious consequences to the overall plot.”

“The introduction needs to establish the character’s goals or explain the basic conflict, the conclusion needs to show the successful completion of those goals or the final defeat of the antagonist.”

- Embedded Narratives -

“…narrative comprehension is an active process by which viewers assemble and make hypothesis about likely narrative developments on the basis of information drawn from textual cues and clues. As they move through the film, spectators test and reformulate their mental maps of the narrative action and the story space. In games, players are forced to act upon those mental maps, to literally test them against the game world itself.”

“The heavy-handed exposition that opens many games serves a useful function in orienting spectators to the core premises so that they are less likely to make stupid and costly errors as they first enter into the game world. Some games create a space for rehearsal, as well, so that we can make sure we understand our character’s potential moves before we come up against the challenges of navigating narrational space.”

“…a game designer can somewhat control the narrational process by distributing the information across the game space. Within an open-ended and exploratory narrative structure like a game, essential narrative information must be redundantly presented across a range fo spaces and artifacts, since one can not assume the player will necessarily locate or recognize the significance of any given element. Game designers have developed a variety of kludges which allow them to prompt players or steer them towards narratively salient spaces.”

Character-Driven Game Design: Characters, Conflict, and Gameplay - Perti Lankoski and Staffon Bjork

Abstract: “…gameplay design patterns…related to how specific features in a character design can support gameplay.”

Empirical evidence that characters are important for playing experience:

Ermi, L. and Mayra, F. 2005 Fundamental Components of the Gameplay Experience: Analyzing Immersion

Mallon, B. 2007. “Towards a Taxonomy of Perceived Agency in Narrative Game-Play,” Computers in Entertainment

“However the existing game design literature discussing game characters has focuses mainly on visual design storytelling or narrational principles of character design.” [Bateman, C. 2007 Game Writing Narrative Skills of Character Design; Gard, T. 2000. Building Characters. Gamasutra; Isbister, K. 2006. Better Game Characters by Design; Krawczyk, S. 2001. Building Character: An Analysis of Character Creation. Gamasutra; Sheldon, L. 2004. Character Development and Storytelling for Games.]

“The relation between game characters and gameplay design, in the game design literature mentioned above, can, at most, be said to be discussed implicitly given when the method was developed. Since not all games have characters but it is difficult to imagine games without gameplay, the design of the latter can be said to be more generally applicable for game design.”

“Gameplay design patterns ‘are semiformal interdependent descriptions of commonly reoccurring parts of the design of a game that concern gameplay,’ [Bjork, S. and Holopainen, J. 2005. Patterns in Game Design] that not only support but design and analytical work.”

- General Aspects of Character Design -

- Physiology (sex, age, height, weight, appearance, distinct, and physique)

- Sociology (occupation, education, family life, friends, enemies, and hobbies)

- Psychology (moral standards, goals, temperament, obsessions, intelligence)

[Egri, L. 1960. The Art of Dramatic Writing.]

- Character Engagement -

[Smith, Murray. 1995, Engaging Characters: Fiction, Emotion, and Cinema]

- Recognition -

perceivable traits of the character – body, face, voice

descriptions of characters – name, title, profession

actions of the character and reactions of other characters to the character

Recognition of a player character can be guided by regulating player’s actions. [Lankoski, P., Ekman, I., and Helio, S. 2007. "A Method for Designing Multifaceted Player Characters in Computer Games" (Art & Design), 72-75.]

- providing goals

- providing possible actions (including making actions impossible, and making some choices hard or easy.)

- defining predefined functions such as voice over narration triggered by event, attack movement as a feedback to the player’s choice.

- cut scenes and scripted events.

- Alignment -

How the player and character are related in terms of control and kind of access to information that enables recognition. – access offered to a character’s thoughts, affects, and actions.

Character goals can be stated explicitly or implicitly. Ico uses implicit goals. “Goals are not explicated to the player, but enforced by the game system: for example, a failure to protect Yorda, the main NPC in the game, lead to game being over.”

- Allegiance -

“…how the players evaluate a character; to be allied with a character, the players typically need to perceive the player character having desirable or preferable positive traits or qualities. The positive traits are relational to the standards the game set via the other characters. [Murray; Lankoski, P.: Empathic Engagement with a Player Character in Computer Games.]

- physical beauty (beauty relates to symmetry, v-shaped body for male, hour glass body for female.)

[Reber, R. etc. 2004. "Processing Fluency and Aesthetic Pleasure: Is Beauty in the Perceiver's Processing Experience?", Personality and Social Psychology Review, vol 8, 364-382.]

- expressions of affection or fear

- moral evaluation in relation to standards set in the game world (i.e. character needs to have morals better than other characters)

- via gameplay

“For sympathy the player does not need to evaluate the character positively in every aspects, but find something positive.”

- Interactive Gameplay Design -

orchestration – selecting and creating well-defined characters in oppositions

“Given the first draft of the characters that can drive the premise, the next step is to operationalize the ambitions or goals of the designed characters. What players will be trying to achieve in the game and what means they can use in this? This requires designer to identify possible gameplay actions the [player character] PC supports and what task should be easy or hard to perform.”

Combat to Conversation: Towards a Theoretical Foundation for the Study of Games – Matthew S. S. Johnson

“…narratology/ludology debate has followed its course…”

“Persistence of treating these approaches as oppositional is now ‘particularly unproductive.’ – David Ciccoricco.”

“…I argue that not only is the debate weary, but that it has actually begun to stand in the way of valuable scholarship.”

“Espen Aarseth (2004:45) claims of ludology and narratology that a ‘controversy rages’, that there is currently a ‘great stake-claiming race’, a competitive ‘land rush’, and ‘fight for academic influence’ going on.”

“Markku Eskelinen (2004:36) comments that computer games studies is ‘very open to intrusions and colonisations from the already organized scholarly tribes’ and that ‘resisting and beating them is the goal of our first survival games’.”

“‘[t]he dimensions of Lara Croft’s body [...] are irrelevant to me as a player, because a different-looking body would not make me play differently. When I play, I don’t even see her body, but see through it and past it.’” – Aarseth (2004:48)

“Details, details: the gamer does see Croft’s body, both in cut scenes and during gameplay. The game itself may not be different, but the gameplay experience certainly would be. … whatever hermeneutic we set up, the game plays differently in our minds, if not on the screen.” (is Croft sexually objectified or a strong female role model? how does that change the gameplay experience? – hermeneutic examples)

The Game Design Reader: A Rules of Play Anthology - Katie Salen and Eric Zimmerman [2006] Part One

- Player and Character: What is the complex relationships between game player and game character? – Pg 26

Notes from Page 27

Games are identity factories where characters are constructed and put to work.

Games give us permission to play with identity because they give us characters to play.

How do players relate to their game characters? How are identities absorbed and played out? What skins do we take with us when play ends? (these point to important lines of inquiry regarding how players relate to games; cognitive, psychological, and emotional levels)[how designers tap into these relationships to produce deeper and more engaging play.]

Notes from Page 28

Play theorist, Roger Caillois – “The Definition of Play: The Classification of Games.”

“A Theory of Play and Fantasy,” – anthropologist Gregory Bateson explores play as a complex and double-edged act of communication. [Metacommunication - communication about communication.]

Notes from Page 29 – 30

“Frames And Games” – Gary Allen Fine

3 layer model of player identity:

- 1st is the person: the real world social being as defined by outside contexts

- 2nd is the player: the participant as someone who is playing a game

- 3rd is the character: the fictional persona depicted by the player through the mechanisms of the game

(these three happen simultaneously)

Example: “Booting up World of Warcraft, a player is simultaneously the orc warrior character named Scarzan, an experienced WoW player with several characters and a set of online game-playing buddies, as well as a person in the real world, with values, ideas, and knowledge that comes from outside the game.”

Further Reading – The Fantasy Role-Playing Game: A new Performing Art, Daniel Mackay

- Games and Narrative: What are the relationships between story, game, and narrative play? – Pg 32

Notes from Page 34

Henry Jenkins argues that game designers are less storytellers than narrative architects. (Spatiality, spatial storytelling)

Spatial stories can evoke pre-existing narrative associations (evocative spaces); they can provide a staging ground where narrative events are enacted (enacting stories); they may embed narrative information within their mise-en-scene (embedded narratives); or they provide resources for emergent narrative (emergent narratives). [4 approaches to creating immersive narrative experiences: evocative spaces, enacting stories, embedded narratives, and emergent narratives].

- Cultural Representation: What aspects of culture do games model and represent? – Pg 70

Notes from Page 71

“Fanciful words can speak about make-believe places, but these words can only be spoken in the real world.” – Erving Goffman.

Games are not only spaces of strategic possibility-places to battle, puzzle, explore, and socialize, but are also spaces of representation, of things both real and make-believe.

A system of game representations – whether depictions of gender, race, class, power, history, religion, or politics – forms a whole “universe of discourese…”

Notes from Page 72

Games are unique spaces of both representation and interpretation

Notes from Page 75

Games reflect the values of the society in which they are played because they are parts of the fabric of that society.

Playing for Plot in the Lost and Portal Franchises – Jason Mittell

“In the scholarly arguments over narrative and games, the puzzle genre is frequently hailed as the proof that gameplay trumps story via examples like Tetris, as the compelling mechanics of such games need no narrative frame to engage players. … ‘If I throw a ball at you I don’t expect you to drop it and wait until it starts telling stories.’ [Markku Eskelinen. 2001] But I would argue that this dismissively pithy phrase captures much of what makes Portal such a compelling experience on both ludological and narrative terms: midway through this puzzle game, the ball starts telling a story.” This is what elevates the game beyond just an engaging puzzle game into a landmark of the medium

What You Can’t See Is What You Don’t Get: Paradigms of Game World Visualization – Jaroslav Svelch

“In this paper, we cannot provide a theory of the ontology of a game world. Our version of modality cannot therefore be based on comparing our perception of the fictional world to its representation – because we can perceive the fictional world only through the representation [the signifier IS the signified] – but on the discursive strategy used in the game. We will focus on the visual representation, but we believe a similar approach could be applied to procedural representation (i.e. game mechanics as a signifying system).”

“…separate production of dialog and animation.” – “Why can’t I see it if it obviously is happening ‘in the reality of the game world’?”

The complexity of game worlds today make it difficult for the developers to represent the game world visually on a constant level of detail.

UI and HUD elements liken to voice-over exposition in film. (can be an obstacle to immersion.)

Feelies: The Lost Art of Immersing the Narrative – Veli-Matti Karhulahti

Feelies – the materialization of story world entities that are distributed with game packaging as props that support narrative elements in story-driven digital games. The map that comes with Skyrim for example.

“The narrative support is suggested to function on global and local levels, where the first one refers to the immersive effects concerning the story world, and the latter to the immersive effects concerning the situation in which the player is accommodated to via a player character.” The whole aspect of feelies is not relevant to my thesis but the rest of the article can be.

- Clash Between Games and Imaginative Immersion -

“‘Clash between game and narrative’ (Juul 2001), which refers to the capabilities provided for the player to affect story events… The more narrative control is given to the player, the less narrative control is left for the author.”

Similar clash happens with the relationship between game and imaginative immersion. “…imaginative immersion in games provides a correspondingly augmented position for the player at the expense of the author. This concerns both levels of imaginative immersion…” – global and local levels.

- Clashing Player Characters -

“…player’s identification and feelings are usually intended for a player character, which is distinct from other game characters due to the player’s exceptional control over it.” – Erm and Mayra.

“In the context of story-driven games, player characters are occasionally left unidentified. … character identification does not necessarily refer to identification with scripted identities but can also refer to identification with undefined identities…”

Scripted narratives/events create potential clashes between what the player wants the character to do and what the author has scripted them to do. (Common complaint from gamers in forums and comment sections in gaming sites about the choices given to them at the end of Mass Effect 3. They said that their Shepard would never make any of those choices.)

- Clashing Story Worlds -

Spatiality as the defining element of the digital game – Espen Aarseth (This article simplifies the concept by “discussing it in terms of the environments in which stories take place…” as story worlds.)

“The reader constructs in imagination a set of language-independent objects, using as a guide the textual declarations, but building this always incomplete image into a more vivid representation through the import of information provided by internalized cognitive models, inferential mechanisms, real-life experiences, and cultural knowledge, including knowledge derived from other texts.” (Narrative inferred by drawing upon schemas? [Look more into this route?])

Story world appears most complete at the beginning of a game before the player enters it and grows as the player explores, but can start to seem small as boundaries are discovered. Exploration can intensify the player’s imaginative immersion in the story world but can equally undermine it. (reason for choosing to do side scroller, maybe?)

Narratification: Unifying Narrative and Gameplay – Nils Sorensen and Mette Podenphant

Narratification – process of implementing narrative elements into games. makes a game narrative more intentional and reflective.

(term created by Nils and Mette to reference the above process.)

“Narratives can be powerful vehicles for empathy and perspective and are therefore being used as arguementative and immersive devices.”

Keywords: narratification, gamification, storify, goal, empowerment, motivation, conflict

“We want to raise a discussion concerning quality. We believe that if designers want to make great narrative games, they will have to make great narratives as well. When the great game and the great narrative unite, they create a platform for engagement as well as an empowering interactive experience. We believe this unity should take place through an iterative and thoughtful design process, instead of an implementation during the last phases as is normally the case.”

“The nature of merging narrative elements with new narrative activities is nothing new, however no term for this exists that is applicable to video game theory.”

“The -fication part implies a foundation that is of another domain…”

“Marie-Laure Ryan introduced the terms narrative games and playable stories in 2009, and observed a shift of focus in the game industry, as well as a rising demand for games where story acts as a key element in the game experience [From Narrative Games to Playable Stories. Story Worlds: A Journal of Narrative Studies, Vol.1.].”

“This dualistic approach to game and story combined with the likely dominance of either of the two is something we share. Whether this dualistic approach is in fact beneficial to both the designing of games as well as the understanding of games is uncertain. We believe this perspective to be deeply rooted within the tradition of game studies, yet we feel that there is an imbalance. For many years the discussion ‘are there narratives in games?’ has dominated the theoretical scene of game studies, meanwhile the game industry as well as the game audience has been discussing the quality of narratives in games.”

Juul, Jesper. 1999. A Clash between Game and Narrative

Jenkins, Henry. 2001. Game Design as Narrative Archeticture

Atkins, Barry. 2003. More than a Game: The Computer Game as Fictional Form

Murray, Janet. 2004. From Game-story to Cyberdrama

Aarseth, Espen. 2012. A Narrative Theory of Games

Eskelinen, Maarku. 2001. The Gaming Situation. Game Studies, Vol. 1 Issue 1 July

“…Interactive Goal, Motivation and Conflict – IGMC. IGMC model derives from the GMC techinique conceived by Debra Dixon which is designed to aid novelists and script writers in developing interesting character-centerd plots by focusing on the character’s goals, motivations and conflicts [the character's GMC].”

IGMC looks at the goals, motivations, and conflicts for the character like Debra’s GMC, but it also looks at the GMC of the player. “The ‘Character Motivation’ cell should be carefully linked with the motivation of the player, since this relationship can result in meaningful and engaged play.”

Donald Norman [2004. Emotional Design - Why We Love (or Hate) Everyday Things.] introduces the “behavioral” level and the “reflection” level. Cutscenes and monologues, which are the most explicit narrative elements in a game, are able to inspire reflection and empathetic identification between player and character. The gameplay (behavioral level) makes the game entertaining also for those uninterested in a narrative in their games.

Player generated narrative combined with scripted narrative is known as emergent narrative [Walsh, Richard. 2011. Emergent Narrative in Interactive Media. NARRATIVE, Vol 19, No 1 January].

Aside from blogs and online articles, I’m also gathering sources from many other places such as academic journals, books, and other theses. I’ve gathered quite a bit at the moment and have decided that I should probably start reading through what I have before adding more; though I feel like I’m still lacking in the social cognition department at the moment. This is a list of my various sources broken up into sections of type and topic.

I’ve started looking at a book called The Game Design Reader: The Rules of Play Anthology – edited by Katie Salen and Eric Zimmerman.

Sections of interest in the book are:

Player and Character

Games and Narrative

Cultural Representation

Games and Design Patterns

Cultural Models: Do You Want to Be the Blue Sonic or the Dark Sonic?

Interaction and Narrative

Game Design as Narrative Architecture

Other books of interest include:

Better Game Characters by Design: A Psychological Approach – Katherine Isbister

The Visual Social Cognition – guest editor Elaine Fox

Color Harmony Compendium: A Complete Color Reference for Designers of All Types – Terry Marks, MINE, Origin, Tina Sutton

Colors: Symbols, Histories, Correlations – Luciana Boccardi

Drawing and the Non-Verbal Mind: A Life-Span Perspective

Some Place Like Home: Using Design Psychology to Create Ideal Places – Toby Israel

Articles, Journals, and other Academic Research:

Design:

Chromoscale and Chromotone – Paolo Di Pasquale

Design as Speculation – Carlo Fanzato

Games:

Choice in Destiny – Joseph Moore

Combat to Conversation: Towards a Theoretical Foundation for the Study of Games – Matthew S. S. Johnson

Character-Driven Game Design: Characters, Conflict, and Gameplay – Petri Lankoski and Staffan Bjork

Feelies: The Lost Art of Immersing the Narrative – Veli-Matti Karhulahti

Narratification: Unifying Narrative and Gameplay – Nils Sorensen and Mette Podenphant

What You Can’t See Is What You Don’t Get: Paradigms of Game World Visualization – Jaroslav Svelch

Playing for Plot in the Lost and Portal Franchises – Jason Mittell

Psychology:

Enactive Aesthetics: Philosophical Reflections on Artful Minds – Daniel D. Hutto

Design Psychology:

Of precious artefacts, utilitarian metaphors and archetypal shapes: Psychological insights into the aesthetic experience of art, design and craft – Rafael Lacruz-Rengel

Drawing Connections: New Directions In Drawing And Cognition Research – Angela Brew

Game Psychology:

Neu: How Brain Activity Can Change an Animated Scene – Marco Marchesi

Game Design for Cultural Studies: An Experiential Approach to Critical Thinking – Sabine Harrer

Improving Game Design by Understanding the Gender Differences: The Cognitive Approach – Maizatul H.M. Yatim, Lennart Nacke, and Maic Masuch

Social Cognition:

Enactivism & Social Cognition: In Search of the Whole Story – Leon de Bruin and Sanneke de Haan

Systemic Cognition: Human Artifice in Life and Language – Stephen J. Cowley

What Makes an MMORPG Leader? A Social Cognitive Theory-Based Approach to Understanding the Formation of Leadership Capabilities in Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Games – Andrew Ee and Hichang Cho

Cognition:

Skill and Collaboration in the Evolution of Human Cognition – John Sutton

Human Thinking Beyond the Brain – Frederic Vallee-Tourangeau and Stephen Cowley

Other Theses:

Graphic Design:

Pictorial Symbols More Efficient Communication Method than the Spoken Word – Nicole Guerrero

Adaptive Design for Visual Communicators: Reexamining Relationships and Making Theory Apply – Rene’e Marie Malloy

Game Design:

A Study on the Implementation of Stereotypes in Video Game Character Development – Brad Jerod Madison

Narrative-Driven Gameplay Mechanics Through Narrative Quest Design & Character Development – Connor Scott

Empathy and Attraction: The Role of Purposeful Beauty in Video Game Character Design – Lucas Simon Slominski

Advertising Design:

Is Successful Advertising More Psychology than Design? – Brian L. Steele

Here’s a list of all the articles I came across in my search on ludonarrative dissonance:

First and foremost is the original article by the man who coined the term - Clint Hocking(has been the creative director for both LucasArts and Ubisoft) - Clicknothing.typepad.com

Next I’d like to follow up with a couple of articles by video game theorist - Tom Bissell - Grantland.com/MaxPayne3 and Grantland.com/L.A.Noire

The rest are other interesting articles that touch on ludonarrative dissonace and also offer insight into potential ways to reach ludonarrative resonance.

Forbes.com

Sesquipedalianish.wordpress.com

Escapistmagazine.com

Gamasutra.com – Kevin James Wong

Versusclucluland.blogspot.hk

Errornotfound.org

Ravesilo.wordpress.com

Destructoid.com

IGN.com

Criticalcommons.org

All I’ve really known for a while until recently is that I want to do a thesis that has to do with character design for games. I’m also very interested in psychology so if I could somehow marry the two into a thesis that would really get me motivated. I want to look at design psychology and social cognition, take what I learn from that and implement it into my character designs. When I finish my thesis I’m theoretically an expert in my field so I need my thesis to be relevant to what I want to pursue as a career. I’ve been having issues trying to find the right context to validate pursuing this topic as my thesis though. I’ve started to look up potential needs/issues that I could try to address through character design and psychology. During my search I came across an interesting term; Ludonarrative Dissonance.

Ludonarrative Dissonance, a term coined by Clint Hocking,  is when a game’s mechanics and it’s narrative are in complete contrast with each other. But what does that have to do with character design? Well, at the time I was just looking for current issues with games and I just found this interesting so I kept reading and then I came across the terms Ludonarrative Harmony and Ludonarrative Resonance. Both are essentially the same thing and they are when the gameplay mechanics and story work in harmony with each other and reinforce the other. There’s also the idea of Ludonarrative Alienation (when the mechanics and story don’t go in harmony but aren’t in opposition) but that’s ultimately not in my radar of concern. The disconnect of game mechanics and story is a present, recognized problem with games and there are methods/suggestions being looked at as solutions to bridging the gap. One such article brings up Journey as an example as an elegant solution to dissonance. The article post suggest taking the written component out of the game and having the mechanics tell the story:

“The entire narrative is conveyed through scenery, music, and the actions of the player. There’s literally no way for the story to conflict with the mechanics because the mechanics are the story. Even if you refuse to reach the goal and just dick around in the desert, that’s actually part of the story; that’s how you chose to experience the adventure.” - sesquipedalianish

They’re not stating that this is the only approach to reaching Ludonarrative Resonance and do admit that it’s not applicable to all kinds of games. But it’s an approach that caught my interest and upon further reflection became a potential context for my topic.

Looking at reaching ludonarrative resonance by having the mechanics be the narrative amplified by character design informed by design psychology and social cognition.

Okay so that’s a mouthful but I’m still trying to organize my thoughts into words. By looking at having the mechanics, music, and scenery be the means of telling the story, the design is much more important in being able to communicate as much as possible since there’s no exposition or dialogue. By understanding the way people think and perceive each other (social cognition) and what different design elements communicate (design psychology) the concept artist can create characters that best compliment this style of narrative telling.

Going into my thesis, the critical analysis and written side of it, I’ve been asked to think of 10 open ended questions that I should strive to find answers to. They don’t even have to be answered by the end of my thesis, at least not all of them. They’re the start of a journey as I search for answers.

1) What does my thesis add to the industry, academia?

2) How is it a worthy contribution?

3) Why is this relevant specifically to game design?

4) Why game design?

5) What are conclusions of existing studies?

6) How can these principles be made practical outside of an academic setting?

7) What need do these principles fulfill?

8) How can this actually improve the production pipeline and the user experience, or is it superficial?

9) What is my actual contribution, what will others get out of my work?

10) How does this thesis help advance my career?