In the first chapter of Isbister’s How Games Move Us, she talks a lot about the ways in which player characters, their design, and they way they interact, allow us to ‘self-insert’ and feel personal responsibility for actions in the game world. I think this is an interesting concept and one we’ve talked about in class. The kind of agency that is given by a player character who relates to you in some way is what makes gaming creatively separate as a medium from other art forms. Creating a player character whom you can relate to can come in a few different forms. The first of course being the heavily customization character editor. Obviously, a character who looks like you (or how you want to look) can improve the feeling of personal inclusion in a game. After all, why would AAA games create huge character customization features if it did not improve the experience of the game? But it is not just about characters who look like you. We discussed the faceless, blocky characters in That Dragon, Cancer-I felt that it was a very deliberate decision to allow for self-insertion to be easier, so you can relate and feel personally involved in the story and life of Joel. If you had a blocky, undefined character in a movie, it might just come across as weird.
In chapter 2, she talks about the meaningful, even if “virtual”, social interactions experienced when people play games with/against each other. I can relate to this and I think many of us in the class can. Multiplayer gaming (especially local for me) is at the heart and soul of what’s great about gaming for me. Playing games, immersing yourself in them, self-insertion and feeling what the characters feel, is great, but doing this in tandem with real-life deep bonding and friendship, is what makes games unique and special to me. Many incredibly popular games thrive on this fact and this fact alone. Nobody plays Smash as a single player game. Melee is nearly 15 years old. But it retains popularity to this day because it lets us experience personally some of our favorite characters, and bond over shared social play experiences together with them.
Side note: 15.”RanDumbVidz, Sim’s 3 TORTURE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!, YouTube video, 1:52, July 6, 2009″ has to be the best citation I have seen in academia yet.