Video Game Spaces as Architectural Metaphors

Transcription

1 Video Game Spaces as Architectural Metaphors Stephan Günzel One way to understand video games is to think of them as narrative architecture. This term was coined by Henry Jenkins from the media department of the MIT in Boston in He actually borrowed the idea from Celia Pearce, who already wrote about this aspect in her Interactive Book from The basic idea of Pearce as well as Jenkins is to say that in computer games we experience spaces that were built by game designers with a certain intention. Gamers should recognize these places and spaces due to a former experience. This experience doesn t have to be limited to the experience of a real place, but could also come from films or other media a simulated place. Furthermore, these experiences do not have to be explicit; they can be more or less stereotypical, like castles, war fields, dungeons, motorways, etc. But no matter how explicit the reference is, Jenkins points out, that in any case we should think of those places in terms of theme park rides, like Pirates of the Caribbean, in which the audience is driven through an artificial environment on guided vehicles. Referring to the work of Disney-designer Don Carson, Jenkins calls this an environmental storytelling. 3 The Pirates of the Caribbean ride in fact is an interesting example as that particular theme park existed prior to the famous films with Johnny Depp: 1 Jenkins, Henry, Game Design as Narrative Architecture, in Wardrip-Fruin Noah, Harrigan, Pat (eds.), FirstPerson. New Media as Story, Performance, and Game, Cambridge/London: MIT Press, 2004, pp Pearce, Celia, Architecture as a Narrative Art, in C.P.: The Interactive Book. A Guide to the Interactive Revolution, Indianapolis: Macmillan, 1997, pp Carson, Don, Environmental Storytelling. Creating Immersive 3D Worlds Using Lessons Learned from the Theme Park Industry, 2000,

2 4 stephan günzel The first version of the ride has been already installed at Disneyland in 1967, which was already a condensation of an existing cliché of the pirate world fed by films, which again were inspired by literature and fiction in general. The respective medial processes can be understood in terms of transference. The Australian media theorist Angela Ndalianis has written in her influential book Neo-Baroque Aesthetics and Contemporary Entertainment from 2004 that we live in a neo-baroque world, because everything has become serial. 4 It is not just that media went serial, media as is shown with Ndalianis main reference, Henri Focillon 5 have also always been metaphorical in the sense of providing translations, transpositions and transfers. Alongside computer games it can be demonstrated, how such a transfer of urban, architectural and spatial structures or configurations in general appears in regard to the visual and navigational aspects. This idea has already been raised by the Norwegian game researcher Espen Aarseth, who in 2001 wrote in a key essay of computer game studies that space in video games must be understood as allegories, 6 hence as metaphors, that have been made interactive. Inspired by this idea Jenkins term of narrative architecture can be revised, as a narration is not specific to computer games, which first and foremost are games or interactive items (and not narratives). 7 One must then extend and specify the understanding of metaphors. It might be even more helpful to think of these metaphors as antecedent metonymies: in games not only can elements be found that were transferred from a given structure, but also a condensation of that structure or a reduction to the spatial essence. 4 Ndalianis, Angela, Neo-Baroque Aesthetics and Contemporary Entertainment, Cambridge/London: MIT Press, Focillon, Henri, The Life of Forms in Art [1934], New Haven: Yale University Press, Aarseth, Espen,z Allegories of Space. The Question of Spatiality in Computer Games, in Eskelinen Markku, Koskimaa Raine (eds.), Cybertext Yearbook 2000, Jyväskylä: University of Jyväskylä, 2001, pp Frasca, Gonzalo, Simulation versus Narrative. Introduction to Ludology, in Wolf, Mark J.P., Perron, Bernard (eds.), The Video Game Theory Reader, New York/ London: Routledge, 2003, pp

3 Video Game Spaces as Architectural Metaphors 5 To give an understanding of how computer games function in this regard, I first of all want to show you an example in which not the computer game is not the result of a transposition or condensation, but in which the spatial structure of a computer game itself is transposed: the famous Russian game Tetris from 1984, whose gaming principle is a purely spatial one, as the task of the game and likewise the problem it poses is: Where is the right place? The falling variety of brick shapes cannot be stopped, but only increased in speed and have to be turned by the player to fit a particular gap. Image 1: Tetris, 1984 An advertisement for the Honda automobile Jazz shows a transfer of the spatial problem of Tetris back into real life more precisely into the urban context. This is how the urban landscape would appear when the game is taken as a metaphor. As Tetris was said to be in itself a metaphor for capitalism, 8 it seems to be consequent that Tetris could also be used as a metonymy for the lack of free space in megacities. 8 Murray, Janet, Hamlet on the Holodeck. The Future of Narrative in Cyberspace, Cambridge/London: MIT Press, pp

4 6 stephan günzel Image 2: Honda Jazz advertisment Another example of the way in which games provide metaphors for the city is Super Mario: It is one of the ten games that were classified by the Library of Congress to be amongst the ten most culturally valued games in human history. 9 The game is a so-called platformer a game in which the player Image 3: Super Mario, Is That Just Some Game? No, It s a Cultural Artifact, in The New York Times, March 12, 2007, html.

5 Video Game Spaces as Architectural Metaphors 7 steers the character Mario who has to jump from platform to platform and has to master obstacles. Thus, the game-space functions as a metaphor for a new use of the city. Given the influence of Mario it is remarkable, that the sport Parkour (or FreeRunning) was not invented earlier. It seems to be a transfer of the game into the urban context. Invented by David Belle, whose father (being Image 4: Parkour a member of the French Army) taught him, how to get from point A to B by the quickest means possible using gymnastic moves between buildings and other elements of the urban environment, the traceur transfers the spatial problem or task of the game in the city and its architecture. In terms of theory this art of movement represents as a fulfillment of Michael de Certeau s diagnosis that space is constituted by making use of places, especially when the prescribed usage is challenged or contradicted. 10 The first examples were specific transpositions of game-space-structures into reality. A more common transfer is the way in which games are met- 10 De Certeau, Michel, The Practice of Everyday Life [1980], Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984

6 8 stephan günzel aphors for architecture, urban landscapes or space in general. The most dominant metaphor in this context is that of the container space. 11 Image 5: Pong, 1972 As can be seen in early games like Pong from 1972 the space is simply the frame of the screen containing the possible places in which the white spot or ball might move. Still, the container is not closed. In fact it is the task of the game to close the space by moving the foreshortened lines (representing the ping pong paddle) up and down to function as a blocker. Through this example the container experience is even more direct; contrary to architecture, in which the container needs to be open up (at least with a door and windows) in the game the open sides of the container space need to be closed. Another metaphor or metonymy (as it is always a condensation of a given space to its very elements) is the labyrinth: It can even be found in combination with the container as is the case in the famous game Pac Man from The labyrinth here appears having a new function and is thus not totally the Cretan labyrinth of antiquity nor the labyrinth of the baroque that 11 Lakoff, George, Johnson, Mark, Ontological Metaphors, in Lakoff, George, Johnson, Mark, Metaphors We Live By, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1980, pp

7 Video Game Spaces as Architectural Metaphors 9 took the form of a garden maze. 12 In the case of Pac Man the player does not have to cope with the problem of a maze i.e. not knowing where the exit is as the aim is not to leave the labyrinth, but to visit all places within it. It is thus a combination of the Cretan and the modern labyrinth where Ariadne s thread has to be eaten up by Puck Man (as the figure originally was called in Japan) in the maze, which is monitored by the player. Image 6: Pac Man, 1980 A modification of this situation can be found in Doom from 1993, a socalled first-person-shooter, in which the gamer is thrown into the maze. In those games the point of view of the image coincides with the viewpoint of the character. Still the labyrinth is a pseudo-maze, in which there is actually only one way to go. The shooter s labyrinth is more or less a folded 12 Reed Doob, Penelope, The Idea of the Labyrinth from Classical Antiquity through the Middle Ages, Ithaca/London: Cornell University Press, 1990

8 10 stephan günzel road, with some detours. Instead of Pac-dots or power pellets that have to be eaten up, in the game obstacles or enemies have to be destroyed. Image 7: Doom, 1993 Although it is quite common that in first-person games monsters have to be killed, it is not the only subject. The city itself is often the subject of games. And the gaming principle can be that of a traceur that has to cope with the architectural structure of a city. This is the case in Mirror s Edge from Thus, this well known game is a condensation of a problem that has transposed from other computer games (platformer) into the urban space (Parkour) in respect to the architectural conditions and combined with the first person view. Image 8: Mirror s Edge, 2008

9 Video Game Spaces as Architectural Metaphors 11 In the final example is the city itself as a metaphor in games. In addition to action games like shooters, platformers and maze-games, there also exist also strategy games and so-called simulation games. Technically speaking every computer game is a simulation, but what some games do is they provide models for what is called reality or what is offered as a possible reality (as it is the case in flight simulations or war simulations which have already existed prior to the computer games). For this purpose one can look at a strategic game which is a city simulation or a metonymy of the problems that can appear in a city. SimCity from 1989 is also amongst the ten most important games identified by the Library of Congress. In it the growth of a city is simulated and the user is confronted with urban planning problems. Image 9: Sim City, 1989 Sometimes these games are said to put the gamer in the position to control a certain territory this is only partially true as once you made a decision, what to build where, one can only counter-steer the results by developing new grounds. Thus, one does not control the territory as such, but you are only in charge of keeping the urban structures in equilibrium. Here every aspect of the city is reduced to its very function within the urban context: Even people and leisure areas are considered only in their particular value

10 12 stephan günzel for the system. It is as if Talcott Parsons view of society has turned into a computer game Parsons, Talcott, The Social System, New York: Free Press, 1951