Transcript Beyond Linear Narrative Augusto Baal Enters Norrath

Beyond Linear Narrative
Augusto Baal Enters Norrath
Katie Whitlock
"Play is older than culture”
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It is inherent in our nature.
Used to transcend reality, breaking from the mundane to experience the
extraordinary.
Huizinga points to "dressing up" as the highest level of this, suggesting that the
donning
of disguise or mask equals perfection of play – “becoming another being”.
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The culture of play remains strong within our society.
The manner of play is changing, adapting to the mediatized culture of the present.
For Rushkoff, video game is a "mediated dream space," which allows individuals to
join in fictional realities to play "dress up" and to pursue a hero's quest unavailable
in modern society
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The video game player of today is a performer. He/she is actively engaged in an
interactive state that is both physical and mental, playing a character. Narrative,
however simplistic, houses this performance in a virtual world, a performance
space that can allow an unlimited creative freedom.
Games versus Stories
• This is the essential difference between game
designers and storytellers:
• The game designers see the universe everything! - as a gigantic physical system
that need only be simulated with sufficient
fidelity to achieve any goal.
Gamification
• Early Industrial games use film structures: which
ignores the dimension of interactivity available
to gaming and the use of an emotionally
evocative dramatic experience.
• Later games emerge that use Post-Aristotelian
theater narratives: create interactive fantasy
systems i.e. MMORPG, WOW.
• Rather than following Aristotelian rules of drama,
these massive worlds parallel the writings of
another, more modern, theatre theorist - Augusto
Boal.
MMORPG
• Introduce social relationships in games:
– Dungeon “like” Role playing games
– online communities
• MUDs (text based)
• MMOs add AI in games
– Games became situational: a simulacrum of the
real-world (or a fantastic version of)
Augusto Boal's Forum Theatre
Spect-actor
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A meld of audience and actor
An active participant in drama
Influencing the narrative
Altering the narrative to suit the individual's
ideas.
• Theater becomes at the cross-road of narrative
and action
• It becomes a place of revolution via democratic
theater
Everquest- Boal’s theater
• Massive multiplayer games are unique in that they
depend upon the community to survive, just as Boars
Forum relies on society to thrive.
• The community is the reason to play the game as its
presence and involvement alters the experience.
• The player becomes a part of the game and its virtual
community, joining a social network that gives the
player agency, a capacity for change in every action and
choice.
• Player immersion
• Hyper reality
For example
• As technology continues to improve and becomes
further enmeshed in everyday life, the potential grows
for gaming to extend its presence.
• This connection between real life and gaming will
further Boal's concept of the Forum by providing a
place for the exploration ideas and narratives.
• With the integration of computers and cell phones,
virtual worlds hold the potential to become active
theatrical forums in which individuals become
characters in ever-changing narratives that are
influenced and shaped by the people
Gaming Industry
Gaming layer to the world
Impact of games?
England 2011