Koopman's Response + My Thoughts

Response to my article by Kimiko Koopman

Koopman here brings up the interesting point that when we consider possibility and impossibilities in a game, what will feel an arbitrary restriction on our freedom is also largely dependent on the identities of the people playing the game.

I argued that just because FFVIII doesn't offer certain experiences that I didn't come to experience that it does not feel arbitrarily limited. Koopman makes the point that, when players have more exploratory playstyles, the arbitrary borders between the possible and impossible become more immediately apparent and grating. In their words:

The waist-high fence is annoying (feels like it limits your freedom) because there are other fences that you can jump over or break through.
The painted-on door is annoying because it's the only door there's no keycard for in the game [. . .] These examples draw attention to them by being exceptions to rules that apply elsewhere in the game's world. They stand out because we (are led to) think things should be possible that turn out to be impossible.

(Note: I tried to format this quote to be centered, but blogger's system ended up jumbling the words by doing so.)

I would like to note that this is why consistency in design, something I've been rambling about quite a bit on twitter and on various streams is so important in games. After all, the arbitrary waist-high wall will feel arbitrary when it's placed as a deliberate barrier that should be easy to pass, but most games worth talking about barely ever feature this particular design problem. What some games do have, however, is arbitrary differences between examples of waist high walls. Personally speaking though, I am fairly forgiving when a game is completely consistent on it's position: I would rather play a game where waist-high walls are a consistent barrier rather than a game where some waist-high barriers are climbable, thus leading to a situation where I as a player have to test each of them for the HUD climbing indicator.

This is applicable to every facet of design: I may not enjoy SFIII's parry mechanics very much, but I believe that the game is a better game for making every hit parry-able.

Moving on: Koopman also make the point that the personal identities of players can rub against what experience a game wants to offer and therefore make that experience itself meaningless to that player. This is when a player of color is playing a game that "just so happens to have an all-white cast", to name one example.

Koopman makes the point that these are all arbitrary decisions on the developer's part that reflect the worldviews of the developer and I would like to emphasize that I absolutely 100% agree with that.

However, Koopman seems to make the argument that the decision for a game to star a straight, white character is already an inherent and arbitrary limitation on player freedom for a queer player or a player of color. To this I would respond with a modification original point that when a game is upfront about the experience it intends to offer than players do not expect the choice to play as a character of color or a queer character, and therefore in the confines of that particular experience the restriction does not feel as arbitrary.

But of course, when every "particular experience" offers us the same kind of characters, that's where the problem is.

This again brings me back to a point of cultural criticism. To me, the problem isn't that any one videogame does not offer the experience of being a character of color or a queer character, but that the larger culture of games (mainstream games at least) offers these experiences in stunningly less numbers than offering the experience of playing a straight, white male.

To be certain, this is worthy of loathing even when we consider that, to my knowledge, there are not any major AAA directors who are women, queer, or genderqueer (a fact that is loathable in and of itself), and thus these people may not be experts on the lived experiences of these groups. But mainstream games are made by absolutely gigantic teams of people, and the more people who work on them it becomes impossible to deny that there are definitely trans people, queer people, people of color, and women who work on these games who, in addition to their job as an animator or a UI designer, could also be part of the central creative team to assist in the creation of games that respectfully and responsibly depict those lived experiences, to say nothing of the lack of diversity in the upper echelons of AAA development.

I cannot condemn an individual game for it's omissions without condemning the culture that produced it, without considering the lack of diverse experiences that games offer. To me at least, an individual game's lack of diversity or lack has to be used as a jumping off point to criticize the larger culture of games.

I would also apply this logic in reverse to system and world design: we notice the problem of the waist-high wall (in games where the waist-high wall is a genuine problem) because of the large number of games that have this problem. However, unlike when we consider representation, it's easier to argue that if [x] game's treatment of a particular design idea is not to your liking than perhaps it's time to play a different game, because games by and large do offer lots of different choices for games to play that treat similar design ideas differently. Do you wish you could use a quieter approach when achieving objectives in the last Call of Duty or Battlefield? There are Splinter Cell games that call out to you. Do you like how first-person stealth works in Skyrim but wish there was a game that focused on those mechanics, rather than a sliver of those mechanics in the same basket as slivers of others? There is always the Thief franchise to consider. Going back to FFVIII, if the highly scripted experience it offers is not to your liking, there are plenty of games that offer more freeform approaches to gameplay, for example the RPGs made by Bethesda. To be certain, diversity in mechanics is important in games, but it's something that games seem to be handling pretty well. Even in the most mainstream publications, selections for the possible "Game of the Year" award tend to be across multiple genres including shooters, stealth games, and RPGs among a number of other choices that are harder to define, or games that blur genres together to create unique experiences.

In any case, I thank Koopman for taking the time to read my piece, and for responding, and I look forward to hearing back. 

 - Austin C. Howe, Maryland, 2014

Response to Masayuki, Matsunaga and Street

"It Simply Doesn’t Exist": Responding to Shinji Matsunaga and Zoya Street.

If you haven't been paying attention to Zoya Street's efforts to translate pieces of non-English games criticism, you really should take a look at it. All of it is brilliant, but I want to focus on his most recent piece about a conversation between two Japanese game critics regarding what you might call the scientific "laws" of games that dictate what is and is not possible within the context of a videogame, and how that relates to the social norms and "rules" that inform them.

I ask that you read the entire piece, as Street himself has important things to say about this interpretation of freedom in games given the recent scandal regarding gay couples in Nintendo's Tomodachi Life. (UPDATE: Shinji Matsunaga, the critic on whom Street's piece mainly focuses, has recently written a terse response to Street’s article as well.)

On “Freedom” in Games with Highly Authored Narratives

I would suggest that the choice not to have a gay relationship is an encroachment on players' freedom in the space of that game because Tomodachi is among the types of games where the players' choices to do what they like is the entire point of the experience they want to offer. It feels restrictive, in a game that offers the possibility of romance, marriage, and childbirth, to limit that experience to straight people because it is an entirely arbitrary restriction, especially since the option did technically exist in the first place.

But what about in a more strongly authored experience of a digital possibilities? Does it feel like a restriction on our freedom in the space of Final Fantasy VIII that we can only pursue the one romance with Rinoa because it is the only possibility? Does FFVIII become or feel less free because it is impossible to pursue other straight relationship options? Does it become or feel less free because we can't pursue queer relationship options? If I’m reading Matsunaga correctly, I think he’d argue (and I would as well) that FFVIII doesn't make players less free by restricting our choices to the one when other romantic choices are impossible in FFVIII's digital space. The critic whom Matsunaga was discussing with, Masayuki Hambalek, stated this with devastating clarity:

“When you can’t do something in a digital game, it simply doesn’t exist, so it doesn’t lower the degree of freedom.”

(UPDATE: This quote was originally attributed to Masunaga. I personally apologize for the error.)

But more importantly to me is that the choice of a romantic partner is not the fantasy that FFVIII is trying to sell, whereas in Tomodachi it is. Picking our partner is not part of the fantasy in FFVIII, and in fact being able to do so would throw a wrench into the game's vision of what it wants to achieve, which is a highly authored narrative.

In other words, I would really only argue based on the type of game do certain sets of arbitrary "laws" feel restrictive to play, even though I agree with the rhetoric that, regardless of game, a lack of certain choices does not mean less freedom.

The Social Contract

When we enter a space that promises us the ability to live out a happy fantasy of our lives and we cannot tailor an experience that is supposed to uniquely ours to feel that way, it feels much more restrictive than when we enter a digital space where we are inherently agreeing to certain sets of rules to fantasize about a certain experience. We as critics and players more often than not highlight the fantastical things that games allow us to do over the mundane things that they do not. In reality, the amount of things you can't do in a videogame far outnumbers the things that you can, but the appeal of most digital games are those specific possibilities they do offer.

This is a social contract. When I play a game, I sacrifice most of the freedom I have in the real world to imagine the possibility of a specific set of experiences and enter a world where that imagination comes alive. In Final Fantasy VIII I can't drink a cup of coffee or get a job, but those are not the things I came to experience, and therefore it does not feel restrictive that I cannot make my avatar do them. It would only feel that way if any of those things would make it easier to enjoy the things I came to experience. (See, for example, the arbitrary nature of the infamous Insurmountable Waist-Height Fence.)

What Game Are You Making?

When making a game, developers need to actively consider what the experience is that they intend to offer. If Nintendo intended to make a game that accurately reflected the various choices one has in human romance, they failed when they patched gay relationships out of Tomodachi because, at the very least, they closed off what made the game enjoyable to a significant portion of the game's potential audience, to say nothing of how absolutely fucking repugnant it is that someone can want to make a game about life and yet deny the lives and existence and basic humanity of so many people. However, I cannot say that FFVIII meaningfully reduces player freedom though it has the same lack.

Postscript: On Queerphobia in FFVIII

This is of  not to say that Final Fantasy VIII does not have problems with it's presentations of sexuality. In FFVIII of course, the only romantic relationships that exist are between cisgendered men and women of the same race. Indeed, under Matsunaga's theory (as interpreted by Street), FFVIII, by not depicting queer relationships or genderqueer characters, denies the existence of such people, and as such codes the views of what is permissible and impermissible by it’s creators (or, to be generous, those who forced their hand,) into the possibilities and impossibilities of FFVIII.

I can concede that, in a vacuum, it would be hard to call the game homophobic simply by omitting queerness from it's world, but of course it does not. It exists in a wider culture of games and other mass media that continues to either not depict or irresponsibly depict queer and genderqueer characters, and therefore in part contributes to a culture of homophobia.

All that being said, I still cannot say that players are less free for not being able to choose queerness in FFVIII when the game is fairly upfront that it intends to put you in the body of a straight character. That being said, I am still open to see queer readings of FFVIII, though I feel wholly unqualified to construct one.

- Austin C. Howe, Maryland, 2014

New Blog!

I started a new tumblr called Heavy Metal Poets which is about exactly what it says on the tin. I sincerely believe that there are lyricists in metal whose work is subtle and complex enough to deserve the sort of detailed analysis I provide to videogames here on this blog. This is part of a larger mission I have to take serious analytic approaches to what have previously been considered works of low-art entertainment.

For my first post, I wrote about one of the absolute greats: "Embody the Invisible" by In Flames, with lyrics by Anders Friden, and I talked about how the song describes a sense of existential loneliness and a yearning for a god that we can never be sure is or isn't there.

Read it here!

I Have Seen The Enemy, and He Is Us

Link

"Eyes on Me" on The Ontological Geek

I wrote an article analyzing Squall, Rinoa, their relationship, and my relationship to Final Fantasy VIII for The Ontological Geek, check it out here.

On Black Waltzes and Foreshadowing

The Black Waltzes as Foreshadowing in Final Fantasy IX

I’ve been replaying Final Fantasy IX as of late and had some thoughts on the Black Waltz setpieces, number 3 in particular. Black Waltzes have stuck in people’s minds as one of the more memorable parts of Final Fantasy IX, and Square has produced two statues of Black Waltz 3 in honor of his popularity. In theory, his reputation doesn’t make a lot of sense. Each of the Black Waltz fights are relatively easy boss fights that occur early on in FFIX and carry little relevance to the story as it goes on. Black Waltz 3 reappears later in the story, but not much is made of the event. 

            That would be the conventional wisdom, but upon closer inspection, each of the Black Waltz encounters have enough distinguishing characteristics to make them continuously memorable both as gameplay challenges and story events. The Black Waltzes, and Black Waltz 3 in particular, are all attached to important plot points in the game, and they each allude to important reoccurring motifs and thematic discussions that make FFIX so particularly memorable.

To start with, each Black Waltz fight is a fun and unique gameplay challenge. The first puts Zidane up against two formidable enemies, the first Waltz and the Sealion, by himself with clearly defined roles such that the strategy for beating him is self-explanatory: the Waltz will heal the Sealion with Ice spells, so it behooves the player to take out the Waltz first and then confront the Sealion.

The second asks if the player can handle the onslaught of damage handed out by Black Waltz 2 (who will use second level magic only a few hours into the game), as long as he won't hurt Dagger, the party healer.

The third modifies this scenario to see if the player can handle the same aggressiveness in Black Waltz 3 without the assistance of a white mage, relying only on their stock of healing items, and taking away the immediate option of Vivi, who given his need to spend MP to cause damage, would be the obvious option. Instead, Vivi does a Patented FFIX Plot Trance and for the first few turns of the battle becomes the most damaging character in your party.[1] In addition, #3 will also in phases take flight, during which time he will use second-level magic against the entire party for lots of damage, and he becomes impervious to physical attacks. Gameplay challenges with restricted party member selections will go on to make up a big part of FFIX’s design, due to the game’s constantly perspective-switching narrative.

            The appearance of the Black Waltzes is well-timed foreshadowing as well. Until the first Black Waltz shows up, Vivi is the only Black Mage we’ve seen. The appearance of Black Waltz 1 shows us that Vivi is not the only Black Mage. His appearance being previewed by an appearance from Zorn and Thorn shows us that the Waltzes were artificially created, which suggests what we learn shortly thereafter: that all of the Black Mages are artificial creations. The fact that Zorn and Thorn, minor villains, are the creators of the Black Waltzes, unique varieties of Black Mages, also acts as foreshadowing towards the fact that the original creator of the Black Mages, (including Vivi,) is Kuja.

Black Waltz 2’s focus on killing the other party members, including Steiner, so he can capture Dagger gets us asking why the situation might be so desperate that Alexandria is willing to treat the Captain of the Knights of Pluto, the Princess’ personal guard, as collateral damage. That foreshadows Black Waltz 3’s even higher disregard for the lives of the innocent, and also foreshadows the revelation of their involvement with Kuja and his corruption of Queen Brahne’s rule.

The encounter with Black Waltz 3 is particularly loaded with important narrative notes. When he first shows up, he seems to have the singular objective, like the other Waltzes, of capturing Dagger and returning her to Alexandria, attacking Vivi. However, when provoked by the Black Mages banding together to protect Vivi, he unleashes powerful thunder magic that damages the ship and, shockingly, kills most of the black mages onboard. This causes Vivi to go into an untamed rage, choosing to confront #3 even before Steiner or Zidane have come to his aid, and at the beginning of the battle, he goes into Trance. When the party has defeated #3, he gets desperate, commandeering Zorn and Thorn’s ship and gives chase to the cargo chip the party is driving to Lindblum, but he ends up damaging the engine on the airship and thus seemingly dying with it when he crashes into the closing South Gate, which causes major damage to the gate.

            Just for the sake of structure, let’s arrange of all the allusion and foreshadowing in there into dot notes:

·         The Black Mages banding together to protect Vivi suggests early on that they have their own sentience and are aware of each other as a community of similar beings, previewing the conscious Black Mages we will meet later in the game.

·         #3’ abuse of untamed power such that he kills innocent Black Mages (who in theory are on his side,) causes the destruction of a major landmark, and brings about his own downfall previews the pattern of massive destruction and unbiased death that will become recurring motifs, and it foreshadows Kuja’s own inability to control his own power.[2]

·         Vivi’s early encounters with the lifeless Black Mages just before causes him to question his own creation, and the validity of his existence.

·         His encounters with the living Black Mages onboard the cargo ship cause him to question his sense of community both as a Black Mage and within his group of friends in Zidane, Steiner, and Dagger.

·         His encounters with #2 and #3 who “exist only to kill” causes him to doubt whether his increasingly adept command of powerful magic means the he is also only meant to cause death and destruction.

Each of these events affects Vivi directly and deeply, helping to build his profile from “cute sidekick” to a character whose struggle with his sense of identity and with his own mortality, and his place among the Black Mages that he is so similar to, but differing from, places him effectively within FFIX’s cast characters (each of whom struggle with similar crises) and makes his presence an integral part of the story.

            All of that allusion and foreshadowing is really tight: I may have played the game god-knows how many times and I may not have a grind-heavy playstyle, but Vivi is introduced about 10 minutes into the game, and by about 3 hours in, I’ve already reached Lindblum. This bypasses the need for the game to keep foreshadowing certain plot points and making it obvious whilst taking hours upon hours to reveal it, or conversely only foreshadowing early on such that when the revelation comes, the player has already forgotten the question. It also establishes the game’s points of thematic discussion early on, previewing much of what is in store for us in the rest of Final Fantasy IX. As always, thanks for reading.

-          Austin C. Hower, Maryland, 2014

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[1] Each of these fights also has the tension of making the player choose whether they want Zidane to steal from the boss or attack, but I honestly think the bosses holding good equipment is one of FFIX’s weakest design choices. It’s a discussion for another time.

[2] His reappearance later arguably previews Kuja’s non-death at the end of the game.

Nobuo Uematsu Turns 55 Today

Happy Birthday to Nobuo Uematsu, who turns 55 today. I can think of nothing better to say than that the games he has composed for would be infinitely less without him. Here are two of my favorite tracks of his.