Creative Expression Before The World Ends
Games are better than movies and TV - this is just my opinion, it isn’t my fault it happens to be right. The interactive element of video games is something that can’t be matched by other artistic pursuits (aside from emulating traits of it) and technology is rapidly catching up to insane developer dreams. Except, until recently that was a load of horse poo, as most games can adequately be described as “move the guy to the thing then stuff happens”, with some variation. Amazing graphics and fun gameplay aside for a moment, the average game is somewhere between a reward-based trick simulator and being cast in a bad film (probably one about shooting aliens). What has been missing is something I have always thought set games well apart from anything else - the chance to create an experience.
Enter two games in particular: Little Big Planet (Media Molecule - PS3) and Fallout 3 (Bethesda Game Studios - PS3, Xbox360).
Little Big Planet is just a platformer on the surface, albeit an embarrassingly cute one. Navigate a small avatar called a sackboy - because he’s a sack boy (or girl), obviously - through a series of almost-3D levels, avoiding traps and obstacles and solving puzzles. Get points for winning. Jump. Feel good about yourself. But the real genius of the game is it’s focus on user-generated content. It’s extreme focus. The ‘big idea’ of the game is that you can create your own levels, create your own objects for use within the levels, position, decorate, engineer and build whatever you damn well please. The concept is so huge that it almost defies description, and you should go and check out some gameplay videos to really see it in action.
As well as being able to endlessly fiddle and create the perfect playground, the game is designed with community in mind, so you can upload your level to the network and anyone who wants to can play it - you can play other people’s levels as well, of course. There are rankings, showing which stages are most played and most liked, and the ability to set prizes for completing one of your creations - usually a part of the level itself. The fol
low-on from this is that when other people play their levels, they may see this object and want to find out where it came from, feeding people back to your work. It’s all so delicious.
You can also customise your sackboy as much or as little as you like, and play with up to four others on any level - either online or in the same room (if you like that sort of thing). The whole idea works so well and circles back onto itself, making the potential for a truely dynamic community of creative people and adoring sackfans. The tools are amazingly versatile, allowing you to create pretty much anything if you can dream it up and allocate the time. Some impressive wonders already made include: a transforming car cannon, a full working model of the human body as a level, a simulated Street Fighter match, a working calculator made from hundreds of moving parts, and the deed to my eternal soul. The incentive the game gives to create is a real step forward in involving the the player in the experience. I love the simple idea and execution of this game enough that I have been mouth-frothingly encouraging other people to get it, so they can experience the joy. This game has turned me into a god damn fanboy.
Fallout 3 is an entirely different bullet-riddled kettle of radioactive fish. Set in post-apocalyptic Washington, you create a character and set out on a mission to avoid looking for your father so you can dick around instead. The game is part first person shooter, part turn-based RPG, as you roam the ruined city shooting mutants and blowing up innocent civilians. It has all the usual aspects of this kind of open-world, choice-based sandbox game (although executed brilliantly) - good and evil actions, dialogue trees, battles against creatures and badasses, etc. However, what really shines is the immersion level. The developers at Bestheda have really managed to make it feel like a trek through a destroyed wasteland, and as a result it adds a weight to your actions usually not found in games of any genre. Not even Cooking Mama.
The prevailing theme of comments I have heard from people about the game is that it feels less like playing as a character, and more like actually being a person. Metaphysical bullshit aside, what this means is that when people talk about their experiences with Fallout 3, they are less inclined to detail how they managed to take down a band of raiders by switching expertly between gun #5 and explosive #3, and more likely to talk in terms of experiences they had as their fictional human. There is a tendancy to fill in details about their avatar not explicitly shown on the screen - something more like a tabletop RPG game, but less terrible.
What these two games have in common is a successful engagement with the audience. Instead of just thrusting the contents in our faces, the player is encouraged to knit themselves into the game. And we all know how much gamers love themselves.