Happy Friday, everybody!
At the end of every week, I highlight my favorite responses to the "homework" question I ask at the end of my Off The Clock column. It's also an excuse for us to "clock out" of the archetypical work week together and catch up a little. (And, you know, for those of us who still have work to do over the weekend, it's still a chance for a little reprieve before things get busy again.)
This week that question:
I wrote that Star Wars is able to use certain cinematic techniques to convey common feelings in a really evocative way. Can you think of any games that do this, whether with gameplay mechanics, controls, aesthetic design, or something else? If so, how do they do it?
Like always, there were a ton of good answers. Here are some of my favorites.
First up, @stratofarius knocks it out of the park by recognizing something pretty meaningful about the way a new game of The Sims starts.
I think The Sims does what you're talking about in a slightly subtle way.
Every time you start a new family, or even boot up a pre-existing family in some cases, you always start out with the camera panning down to the outside of the house, and the family members are just standing there. In some cases (I think with The Sims 2) you had a moving truck or a taxi, but most of the time, they're just standing there, waiting for you.
I believe that there's a reason why your Sims always start out outside the house, outside of the obvious 'well they just got there where else would they be' reason. I think it's supposed to convey not just that new house feeling, but also that kind of emotion you got when a new chapter of your life starts.
It's also why all the main themes for the games feel so similar to me... they all sound like stuff you'd hear in a movie when the main character moves into a new city or makes a complete life change. This, to me, becomes a thousand times more obvious when you hear the main theme to Sims 4. You can practically see the establishing shots and the images of the main character looking out the car window hopefully at the sights and sounds of the new city.
Might be wrong on this one, though.
Actually, I'm pretty sure you're dead on! I love it when a close reading of an assumedly unimportant element of a game can reveal something a little bit deeper. It's so easy to convince ourselves that games "just are the way they are," which discounts the amount of thought that can go into making a decision like this.
Next up is @RhymesMcFist, who was one of many who wrote about the end of Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons. (So if you're afraid of being spoiled, heads up!)
I believe what I'm about to describe from Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons was awarded moment of the year on this site, but I avoided reading/listening since I hadn't played the game yet.
That whole ending sequence is heart-wrenching - you've been in control of the brothers the whole game, using the two halves of your controller to move them around separately but at the same time. The fact that you have to physically drag your brother's body and bury him is hard enough - I remember just standing still and running around, trying to avoid what I had to do - but the part in the water is what really stands out. The brother you're controlling has been afraid of swimming (I think because of their mother's death?) and he resists moving forward - until you use the older brother's side of the controller as well to guide him. Pushing forward on a stick, pulling down the trigger on my clunky controller had never had so much meaning. Hell, it had never really had any meaning - the controller was just a tool to put myself into the game world until then. I don't think anything else has matched that feeling, but I'm be excited to see if something can.
If I'm being totally honest, I was in the small minority of people who didn't really like Brothers, but I definitely think this moment was well executed. I would've been incredibly disappointed if they had failed to use this bit of mechanical storytelling, and at the end of the day I respect how well they landed it.
More spoilers, this time from @RetroVirus, who writes about a very effective camera technique in Mass Effect 3 (a game I'm also in the minority in, but this time because I think I like it more than most.)
Despite being a game that failed its landing spectacularly, the journey of the main story in ME 3 for the most part conveys the tone of having to fight a seemingly one-sided, impossible war well. There's a large combat memorial wall newly installed in the Normandy that you see every time you go down to the lower deck, listing all the names of your dead crew members, and it's impossible to ignore while exiting the elevator to the lower decks with the camera angle they give you, and you walk by it all the time throughout the game.
After the Rannoch mission ending in peace between Geth and Quarian, Legion sacrificed itself to provide the Geth with upgrades against the Reapers, and I was sad to see it go. But coming back to the Normandy and seeing "Legion" on the wall; this literal collective of programs that had become so much be recognized as an individual who fought and died to defeat the Reapers, I cried my eyes out. That memorial was never going to change and the name will remain there for all time, and whenever I had to walk past it to perform other gameplay functions I felt a pang of sadness. The natural framing of the camera forcing you to contend with this constant reminder of loss did a great job of achieving the tone they wanted.
I love this so much. You see that wall once or twice and it's no big deal, just a few names. At best, with the most sympathetic player, it's a single punch of a dagger. But make it unavoidable, and it's a hammer, slowly working on every player who passes by. And you need to move up and down through the decks of the Normandy. So again and again, the hammer hits.
Next up is @CenturyPunk, who references an aspect of Metal Gear Solid 2 that was, frankly, essential to me eventually becoming a game critic.
Metal Gear Solid 2 repeats the story of Metal Gear Solid 1 on purpose because characters fabricated events to happen that way. Then when things start going off the rails and changing, its incredibly unnerving for the player. I especially like how they portray Raiden as a poor imitation of Snake how has only done VR training, then begin to develop him into Jack, a person with a past and troubles of his own.
Kojimas writing about "memes" and how information can be passed on is really strong in MGS 2.
If you're interested in this even a little, go read James Howell's Driving Off The Map: A Formal Analysis of Metal Gear Solid 2 immediately. It's the essay that convinced me so many years ago that writing about games could be something other than just consumer recommendation.
@DCam calls out a technique used in games ranging from Deus Ex to Depression Quest, the "frustrated choice":
It's not a technique available in cinema, but I immediately thought of the "frustrated choice" mechanic from some games and game books. This is a greyed out dialog choice with some pre-requisite that hasn't been met, whether the requirement is a skill ("[Speech: 80]") or an item ("If you have a rope and would like to climb down the cliff, turn to section 132"). For me, these evoke a common feeling of being able to see an opportunity, but not being able to act on it. Often this is with an emotional prerequisite, which is how it ties back, for me, to your excellent Star Wars analysis. If I was less nervous, I could strike up a conversation. I know breakfast will make the day better, but I don't have the motivation to quite get out of bed. If I was more confident in what I've learned previously, I could jump in to this discussion about audio streaming (or whatever).
Obviously we don't always have "perfect information" about why we do or do not choose to do something. But every day of my week is filled with moments where I say "God, if I only I knew how to do X...", so I really appreciate it when games use this technique smartly.
User @onemanarmyy is short and to the point, but what a point it is.
I always thought Final Fantasy games did a good job conveying the sense of adventure by presenting you with an overworld at some point. Especially when you get an airship, that feeling that you can explore more of that world and find it's secrets, is really cool.
That shift in perspective is huge in conveying the scope of those early RPGs. An interesting side question here is about what is gained and lost as technologies have allowed for more "consistent" scaling. For instance, Final Fantasy VII presents its world in at least four different quality levels: The high quality CG in cutscenes, the character models during battles (which resemble the CG designs), the "in-town" super-deformed/chibi perspective, and the world map. You could also count character portraits and even their stat sheets as additional representations. Moving from one perspective to the other has always been jarring for me, but it did communicate importance and signal change. Compare that to contemporary RPGs, many of which keep the same perspective throughout the whole game. It means that things are more cohesive, but you don't get these big, sudden switches. Something to think about.
Finally, and also referencing classic Final Fantasy games, @DrWhat writes about a key element of that series: Music.
All of my formative game experiences were in the 8- and 16-bit era, and when I think about really evocative moments, I think back to then. Going back, trying to isolate what they actually used to summon the right emotions for a moment -- they didn't have that many tools -- and I think the most key thing, for me, was music and sound design.
I'm just going to be really obvious and say that maybe the most effective straightforward common emotion evocation was the scoring (hey, scoring, get it? videogames!) in Final Fantasy 4 and 6. 4 will always be my favourite, but they really figured it out in 6. (I barely remember the music in 7 and beyond, it felt more like it was just a subtle backdrop to the overwhelming visuals.)
The opening moments of Final Fantasy 6 - as soon as you fire up the cart - with the long, dark organ chord played as the title shows up - it was like, hey, this isn't just some goofy bullshit game, this is adult and serious and bad shit is going to happen. The game wasn't talking down to you, that wasn't kiddie music, it was fucking serious. And then you were playing something that was more of a story than anything that had ever been released on a console.
It's amazing that the organ opening to Final Fantasy VI once struck us as "serious"--now I think it might read as campy, a little like the "Resident Evil" title screen voice. It's a great reminder that our standards for these things actually do change, and speaks to the point I was trying to make about Star Wars: Great artistry can evoke feelings in a way that you forget that a human hand was ever even involved in the process. There isn't an eternal, perfect formula for causing your audience to feel things--what seems "grim" to one generation might seem corny (or even taboo) to another. It's valuable to pay attention to how these things change throughout the history of medium, and to remember that we're not necessarily getting "better" at making art, we're only changing with the times.
If you missed the chance to answer the question before, feel free to do so below. Or just use this thread to chat a bit about what you're up to this weekend. I'll try to pop into the comments over the next couple of days.
Have a great weekend everyone!