Contact me - marensdasein@gmail.com
Movies have always been my entertainment medium of choice, but if I had to name a secondary it would be videogames. I've had access to a reasonably up to date computer for my entire life so far as I can remember, and it was these Windows PCs that have formed my experience with videogames. This is in contrast to many of my peers who were more familiar with the Nintendos, Playstations and Xboxes. Given how much more open of a game publishing environment Windows PCs fostered, (given the lack of licensing fees and standards and diversity of possible hardware) I like to think this gave me the opportunity to experiance a more diverse set of games. For example the first videogame I can remember playing outside of the edutainment games "Mixed-Up Mother Goose" and "Mickey Mouse: Follow the Reader" (both of which I barely remember) was The Neverhood. The Neverhood was only released for Windows PCs in the US (but got a PlayStation port in japan), and was a stop motion animated point and click adventure game. It didn't look like the games the other kids played, as it was comprised entirely of digital photos and videos of stop motion animated clay figures and environments. It didn't sound like the other kids' games with a unique Jazz influenced soundtrack with nonsensical scat infused vocals. It didn't play like the other kids' games with a complete lack of combat mechanics, platforming, and instead featuring slow, first person exploration, and complicated environment and logic puzzles. I also remember growing up with the infamous "MYST" (a game thats much easier and with far better puzzle design than its reputation suggests). These stick out in my mind as some of my favorite games. There were more "traditional" games available to me I absolutely adored: sci-fi spaceship shooter "Fury³", its sequel "Hellbender", the PC Harry Potter Games (which were far better than their console counterparts), the Star Wars Battlefront games, and so on... But, even to this day I'm more likely to play somthing like "The Secret of Monkey Island", "Disco Elysium", or another heavily story driven game like "Baldur's Gate 3" then I am an action shooter or a hack and slash.
THis makes me think that what most people think of as "mainstream videogames" are overwhelmed by violent game mechanics. Sure there are mainstream hits like sports and racing games, cozy games like Animal Crossing, and so on, but those are the exceptions that prove the rule. Far more common are hits like "Assassin's Creed", "Grand Theft Auto", or "Call of Duty" which centralize their violence as a core element. This is weird right? Other artistic mediums aren't like this. Sure Marvel movies may be pretty violent at their core, but there are plenty of mainstream film hits that aren't really about violence: The Shape of Water, Arrival, Gravity, The Social Network... I could really go on forever. Books even less so. Due to the fact that books are more likely to be the creative output of an individual and very cheap to produce, novels are among the most diverse of storytelling mediums. So what is it about videogames? I think it's because it's easy. Most mainstream console videogames come from arcades first and foremost. Arcade games had to communicate their concept and mechanics nearly instantly to get people to put in a quarter to even try them. Whats easier to understand than eliminate the enemy? That's why PC games, which evolved very differently, tend towards greater complexity. This greater complexity allowed for more storytelling nuance and more variety in game mechanics than console games, due to their arcade roots and simplified controllers, were capable of. Of course the two subsets of gaming have grown together over the years. Console games learned how to increase their narrative and interactive complexity, and PC games reduced their own complexity to broaden their audiences to justify ever expanding development costs. This has started to make me feel a bit underserved. I don't think a massive hit like "Tetris" "MYST" or "The Sims" that doesn't focus on violence and uses the medium to explore other ideas and forms of interaction is likely to happen again. It really feels like we just won't get cutting edge high tech non-violent games ever again. Even post apocalyptic delivery man simulator "Death Stranding" felt obligated to include unnecessary and half baked 3rd person shooter and melee combat mechanics.
Contact me - marensdasein@gmail.com