Games and emotions, part 2/3

Hello youse!

A long time ago in a post far, far longer than any one of you would've liked to read, I wrote about our love for the artificial agents, mean machines, rad robots and inanimate individuals. I was hopefully able to convince you of the inherent funniness of the notion that we, as reasonable human beings, can develop strong feelings towards artificial and sometimes even abstract contraptions within fiction. Sounds complex and posh, but means simply that you all loved BB-8 in Star Wars, right? Yeah, me too. And, I mean, that's great stuff! Let's celebrate that.

Getting back to the topic took a fair bit longer than I expected, and at this point I think we're all well past the Star Wars frenzy (that's so December 2015). I'm also back to normal, so let me take the discussion down a notch from the sci-fi spheres and onto the firm ground. Let's take a short look at human characters in games, and how we experience them.

If we can feel strongly about an orange-white ball that beeps and bobs, shouldn't it mean that we can feel even more fiercely for fictional human characters? Why, yes - I mean, that much was confirmed in the studies referred to in the last FUUUDGE (i.e. 'Games and emotions, part 1). How do games utilise this beautiful notion, then? Do game makers seek new ways for us to empathise with their characters? Can you find, like right now, sublimely written and fleshed out portrayals of human characters and relationships? Yes, absolutely. But the gamers aren't looking.

Games, at large and taken at face value, simply haven't and still don't aim to portray human characters that feel human. What they indeed do is put considerable resources into higher fidelity, which means moar polygons, moar animations and moar spoken dialogue. Which, when judged by the current selection of triple-A offerings, usually constitute absolutely nothing more than wax museum facsimiles. And I mean this, mostly, in relation to film, TV, books and graphic novels.

But for a moment, let's give games as a medium a break here, shall we.

For what it's worth, I tend to think the lack of empathetic, responsive or semi-life-like-wannabe characters is perhaps not so much a result of simple-minded or ultra-masculine design aspirations, but rather an implicit consequence of the avatar's influence over others and the environment. Writing interesting characters in linear narratives is hard, and writing ones that accommodate all sorts of actions by the avatar must surely be a daunting effort - a losing proposition in the face of ever-growing budgets. Even when making it the number one core engagement in a game, the best triple-A efforts still struggle with this. Bioware with their Mass Effect series? They only reach halfway, at best.

(Mind you, I haven't played any of the Witcher games yet, but I've read good things about the characters - and some pretty atrocious things, too, so... I guess tit-for-tat, right? Gedit, tit for... moving  on.)

And really the best-selling games don't even try. And looking at the past and present lists of most popular ones, we're looking at games such as GTAs, Call of Dutys, Battlefields, Halos, Gears of Wars, Diablos, Far Crys, Quakes, Half-Lifes, Resident Evils, Assassin's Creeds, God of Wars, Tomb Raiders, and the list goes on.

Actually, the last two Tomb Raiders do try hard to give us a living, breathing, understanding Lara. But they largely fail nonetheless, as described in an earlier, pea-soup-themed POFFT-instalment. A concise summary of the latest game can be heard in Carolyn Petit's review over at feministfrequency:



"We're meant to see Lara as a survivor, a person with deep, real emotions, who doesn't relish violence but does what needs to be done... But meanwhile the game revels in violence. It celebrates your marksmanship every time you shoot someone in the head (while on the screen there's a popup saying: XP +25 HEADSHOT! or XP +65 STEALTH KILL! - and no, I didn't add the caps or exclamation marks). Blasts from shotgun can send enemies flying. It all feels powerful and satisfying. Playing as Lara you don't feel like someone desperately fighting to survive. You feel like someone who is very, very good at killing people, and doesn't hesitate to do it. The game just doesn't want to acknowledge that Lara clearly enjoys it... Despite what she says, Lara does have a choice, and she chooses to put herself in this position."

Okay, so she's a thinking, feeling human being. And she chooses to go on a hunt for a mystical relic, because her dad was obsessed by the myth, even if it means killing hundreds of people. Okay. I imagine his papa turning in his grave to give her an approving thumbs up. By the way, if you ask me, if you jump to the 9:20 mark, you'll see the potential. It is there. If only the crass gamey bits of superfluous action and violence could be peeled off... Oh, what you say? So, what have we here? A survival-themed DLC for the game with perma-death and almost all gratuitous people-killing removed?

https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2016/01/29/rise-of-the-tomb-raider-endurance-dlc-review/

If that were a standalone, I'd buy that.

But after all, Lara is but a small player in this day and age. I'll now take two of the absolute largest behemoths of this generation and present to you how they do not only fail to make human characters human-like, but actually go to considerable lengths in order to make escapist-teen-power-fantasy-smoothie out of their high-poly, skeleton-animated and Havoc-physics-enhanced limbs. I do this because these two series damn near define the modern mainstream gaming landscape, if not among the gamers, then at least to the prying eyes of the outside world.

Loupe, meet GTA and the modern military shooters.

First, let's tackle GTA. And let me preface this by saying that if you enjoy the games greatly (which many of my friends are doing), I can't and wouldn't try to blame you for that. There are great many things to these game that make me want to play them, but the underlying currents feel so shady and vile that I wouldn't want to put up with them just to enjoy the better bits.

Now, while I've only actually played the games 1-3 (though completed none of them), I've been following the fourth and fifth chapters closely from reviews and let's plays. Based on that experience I find it hard to dismiss what Nathan Ditum at Rockpapershotgun is saying about GTA V:

https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2015/03/30/why-i-love-and-hate-gta-v/

"The fact that GTA did realistic dogs before it managed realistic women

I stole that line from someone on Twitter and I can’t remember who, but the important bit is that it’s true. GTA V’s Chop the dog is more like a dog than any of GTA V’s women are like women I’ve met or who exist.

And even then, unrealistic women are potentially fine. Mrs Incredible, for instance, can turn into a parachute and yet I consider her a good role model for my young daughter. The problem really is that the depiction of women in GTA V is hateful and mad. Every substantial female role is characterised by sex. Michael is married to Amanda, a one-time stripper and prostitute turned tennis coach-fucking wife. His daughter, Tracy, is a cam girl going by the name Tracy Suxx who flirts with the porn industry. One of Michael’s missions is to forcibly retrieve her from a party thrown by porn execs, putting you in the odd position of ‘saving’ a woman from sexual exploitation in a game which revels in rubbing women’s faces in the shaming idea of sex like a dog grabbed by the scruff and forced to contemplate its own indiscreet and steaming shit."

It's a good read, just not tremendously light. You don't have to stop playing or enjoying the game after doing so, but you just might start to question if all the design decisions that have gone into the game - which is clearly trying to depict a semi-believable imaginary reality - were made simply to add to the "fun". Or if the game creators have - and are knowingly communicating to us - a certain world view that distinctly lacks empathy and understanding towards select groups of people and beliefs. What do you think, are they implicitly pandering to a certain demographic? Do you belong in that group of people? How would you feel if you didn't?

Chris Franklin at Errant Signal opens his review with these words:

"The most striking thing about GTA V is how much playing it feels like visiting a real place. Most games sculpt their environments as a space for gameplay first and then try to dress themselves up like a real place afterwards. But GTA V is committed to its universe in a way few other games are. ... Los Santos in the greater San Andreas area don't feel like they exist for you, the player. They exist as a place where people live and work and play."

Go on, watch a minute or two to see to which lengths the game makers have gone to make Los Santos a real, lifelike place. My favourite is the hilarity that ensues after Chris starts to talk about the fragile illusion.

"GTA V looks gorgeous in motion, but terrible when interacted with in pretty much any way."

https://youtu.be/lZcX_ZdlW3Q?t=1m51s

The makers obviously knew that delivering realistic interaction with other human characters in a game this huge would be impossible. Look-but-don't-touch - that was to be the core engagement in GTA V. It opens the door to a massive display and flux of poorly balanced humour and misplaced cynicism, which directly support that core engagement. But if they found a way to reach their goal efficiently, I would argue they should assess if it's still a goal worth striving for.

Could GTA, today, be a rebel without a cause, properly swollen and afraid of not being able to deliver anough sense of danger to the audience? Speeding with  a nice car in the middle of a busy street is a rush and huge fun, I get that, but does it also require pandering to a young and ignorant audience looking for a hell-raising power trip with all the dick jokes and horny college-kid's understanding of sex? Or to misogynists and "racial realists" with lazy, prejudiced and harmful jokes at the expense of people who don't belong in the game's core target demographic?

Is this vitriol simply an essential part of "the fun"? The effects of popular culture on people's behaviour won't be stopped by saying it's just fiction.

Perhaps games can be utilised to instill fondness, care and affection for imaginary characters. For the players these feelings are quite real, even if they know the characters aren't. But why shouldn't it go the other way, too? Why couldn't a nihilistic environment designed to tap into the real-life prejudices and fears of people enhance those feelings? What do you think, if games and other media can provide you with positive memories and beliefs, can't they also and just as easily feed you with negative ones as well?

See, I told you so. I would rain on this parade, eventually. But I've got some really, really good news as well, which I will save for next time.

In the third and final episode of FUUUDGE I will let you in on how modern military shooters value and respect the human condition within the games. Then I'll present Spec-Ops: The Line, a curious little gem intent on showing just how far-removed the shooters have become of their real-life counterparts.

And then there will be cake. All sunshine and daisies, with many positive examples, the likes of which I don't believe we've had in the past. Until then, take care.

- Janne