POSTED BY SAM BRAMLETT

Videogames have been a part of my life ever since my brother won a bet with my dad, saying that he could do 100 push ups a day for a year. He won, and earned us a Playstation 2. From then on, I played games any moment that my parents allowed, and many moments that they didn’t. There are scripts and dialogue in games; they are placed within depictions of worlds that require exploration and commitment to the game itself. The introduction of gameplay to stories is meant to cause immersion and allow people to view themselves as the protagonist, or when this is not case—build relation with the character one is playing as. Games introduce different facets to storytelling such as complete immersion and interactivity, and though they are first and foremost games—meant to be played and enjoyed as such, empathy for the plight of protagonists and other characters inevitably develop. If one seeks to understand the current and growing culture of men and women who have played games since their youth, having a knowledge of them is imperative. Like genre fiction, though there are plenty of games that should be considered narrative realism, videogames, as well as the formulas of story and gameplay found within them—are indicative of how the current generation prefers to fantasize. Games should then be studied or else it will become increasingly difficult to judge the fantastical standards of newer generations.

Though classic arcade style games like Galaga, Dig Dug, Mrs. Pacman, and Joust are all great games, their hardware allows for only a minor semblence of storyline. Though this has nothing to do with the arcade style itself. In recent games, developers place much more emphasis on story and cinematography. Creating the perception of a world where the player can jump right into the story, and the game world jumps straight into questioning their morality, tantalizing them with rewards in exchange for committing either heroic or unspeakable acts. Leaving the player with the freedom to choose his own path, but clearly advocating a particular moral stance in the form of how people react to the protagonist, allows the player to develop their own backstory and characterization for themselves in game.

Take for example Bioshock, a first person shooter game. After a plane crash and the exploration of a mysterious lighthouse, the player is dumped in the middle of a sprawling metropolis hidden away from the world at the bottom of the Atlantic. Very quickly, the player becomes aware that the city, based on a 1950’s vision of utopia, has descended into something reminiscent of one of Cormac McCarthy’s fever dreams. The city was founded by a man named Andrew Ryan, who greets the player through a recording at the beginning of the game as they descend into the city, Andrew Ryan, as well as all of Rapture, is meant to be the embodiment of idealism taken too far. Yet this idealism is a reference to the game itself, as the player is required to choose to power himself up at the expense of others, or to weaken themselves for the benefit of others. All the while Andrew Ryan tries to influence the player’s choices, saying “Whenever anyone wants others to do their work, they call upon their altruism. Never mind your own needs, they say, think of the needs of… of whoever. The state. The poor. Of the army, of the king, of God! The list goes on and on. How many catastrophes were launched with the words “think of yourself”? It’s the “king and country” crowd who light the torch of destruction.”

Bioshock was released in 2007. Developers have continued to develop games that attempt to offer players new perspectives on their lives since then, creating beautiful works of fiction like The Witcher 3, The Evil Within, and the Stanley Parable. The list goes on and on, and today, 40% of adults in the United States report having a game console such as an Xbox or PlayStation.

John Cawelti said that, “If we can isolate those patterns of symbol and theme that appear in a number of different formulas popular in a certain period, we will be on firmer ground in making a cultural interpretation, since those patterns characteristic of a number of different formulas presumably reflect basic concerns and valuations that influence the way people of a particular period prefer to fantasize.” It would be a shame then to deny oneself such knowledge of culture considering that seventy-one percent of people aged six to forty-nine in the United States played video games last year according to the Entertainment Software Association. Skilled writers and developers use videogames to influence the minds of the players who are growing up with them. To understand the way in which minds of the current era enjoy fantasizing, the curious critic may not want to leave videogames out of the discussion.