Electronic Games and Entertainment

Electronic Games and Entertainment – Where are they going?

Upon the emergence of gaming, it’s structure was relatively tedious and straight forward.

In comparison to gaming in the past to now, we are given a vast array of playfield, stories and force projections as seen in the diagram above. ie. note the comparison to space invaders and scrolling shmup.

As stated in the article  “How a Videogame God Inspired a Twitter Doppelgänger — and Resurrected His Career”,  “Up to that point, most game designers saw themselves as something like film directors” ; it was through the creative mind of Peter Molyneux that led to the gateway of out of the ordinary gaming, where story lines are endless and the roles of the gamer are non-conforming.

With all this being said, I feel that electronic games and entertainment through our present technological advancement  gives power to game designers to create the unthinkable while also inspiring the audience to be in tune with their creativity. Unfortunately, there are corporate and prevailing barriers that limit both the designer and the gamer.
The article “A Theory of Fun for Game Design” – What Games Aren’t / Raph Koster takes note of such barriers as stated “Games are largely about getting people to see past the variations and look instead at the underlying patterns. Because of this, gamers are very good at seeing past fiction.” 

Consequently, games tend to focus on the technicalities of its structure as oppose to the significance of a story line.

Also noted in the article “By and large, people don’t play games because of the stories. The stories that wrap the games are usually side dishes for the brain.”

I don’t blame the gamers for having such mentality, mainly because through mainstream media they aren’t given enriched games that sets emphasis on stories. This is mainly caused by the companies the solemnly in focus on creating a universal game that favors exaggerated content such as violence, or fancy power armor, and free roaming etc. I enjoyed reading the article that spoke highly of Molyneux; mainly because it spoke of the oppression and limitations that designers have in creating something out of the ordinary, iIt’s unfortunate that such designers have to become independent in order to do so. Games and entertainment have the potential to enhance a great wave of creativity and expression to both the designer and gamer, just as long as they set emphasis on artistry. Once that is achieved soon games will have a respect as movies have.