A Multidisciplinary Approach to Serious Games: How serious Topics Permeate the Development Process
Starting at the beginning and defining the boundaries of serious games
Officially, serious games are defined as a game designed for a primary purpose other than pure entertainment. This definition can have a broad spectrum of application, from learning games to training modules and everything in between. And though they may not focus on entertaining the audience, that does not mean that entertainment is entirely absent from the media. For the purpose of this log, I want to look into a very specific kind of serious game, games that handle serious subject matter.
What are some references we can use to build a shared baseline understanding of what serious games are in this context?
First, a more traditional serious game, Minecraft Minecraft is known for its educational approach to sandbox game worldbuilding, teaching players about the world as they interact with it and offering players the opportunity to develop their own unique vision and the creative freedom to address problems of varying difficulty in a multiplicity of interacting systems. Though it does have entertaining qualities as well, this game has a distinct absence of what we would traditionally see as narrative entertainment. The story behind the game that players often connect themselves to and find arguably the most entertainment in either discovering or unlocking is predominantly absent… Or is it? More on this a little later. Next let's look at a less traditional example of a serious game, Hyper Light Drifter
In hyper light drifter, you as the unnamed drifter, have contracted a unknown illness that is slowly consuming the player character both in body and mind, as you explore the world looking for a cure you come across the relics of a war long passed as well as ongoing conflict and strife between the people of the land.
A unique feature of this game is its complete lack of dialogue or written narrative, all storytelling is done environmentally and through brief slideshows of events. The core conflict in this game is not so subtly reflective of the developer Alx Preston, who suffers from a congenital heart defect, which has the possibility of taking his life at any time. Hyper Light drifter embodies the kind of serious game I want to focus on through the course of this Devlog, As a game that handles serious topics and that has significant impact and meaning to both the player base and developers. Touching on hard topics while respecting them, and creating unique immersive and impactful experiences.
The main way we as people have entertained each other through centuries is with stories, real or fantasy that we tell each other and learn from. Going back to the topic of story in Minecraft, this occurs in the form that the story the player creates for themselves takes as they build with and explore the world around them. Upon “completing” Minecraft, the player is given the first and only bit of narrative in the game called “End Poem” A part of which I'll share here. “That is how it (The player) chooses to imagine many things, when it is deep in the dream of a game… Words make a wonderful interface. Very flexible and less terrifying than staring at the reality behind the screen… And the universe said I love you, and the universe said you have played the game well and the universe said everything you need is within you, and the universe said you are stronger than you know and the universe said you are the daylight, and the universe said you are the night, and the universe said the darkness you fight is within you, and the universe said the light you seek is within you, and the universe said you are not alone, and the universe said you are not separate from every other thing, and the universe said you are the universe tasting itself, talking to itself, reading its own code, and the universe said I love you because you are love.”
This narrative has become well known both within and outside of the Minecraft community for the way it speaks to the player and the impact that the words have on the readers. It is a poem about you, a story of how you see yourself and how you have an impact on yourself and what you interact with. This is the story of Minecraft.
How Does This Apply to Me or My Team?
I believe that as game developers we have the unique opportunity to make this story interactive, and that the story of a game (with or without dialogue) reflects a shared story as well as a shared responsibility to tell serious stories in a way that is respectful and impactful.
Serious games, that is, in this instance, any game or interactive media that touches on or directly confronts a serious topic such as death, life, mental illness, grief, loss, war or any other number of serious or tense subject matters, hold great power over their audience as well as their creators. When we interact with these kinds of games, it can influence our world view and how we put our own lives, morality and wellbeing into perspective.
This has become increasingly relevant to me and my own development approach and process as I learn and grow as a game developer. Understanding how to take these serious topics and stories and gamify them in an engaging and respectful way has become an almost subconscious and integral part of my design philosophy when solving design problems or developing games regardless of my role on the team. In my capstone game Dead Line Terminal, you play as a recently deceased individual who is tasked with fixing purgatory and connecting with other lost souls to move on to rebirth. When my idea was first pitched to the team I knew from the very earliest conception of it that I wanted to tackle serious subject matter that I resonated with, and the stories that these subjects could have the unique opportunity to tell as depicted in the initial pitch slide below.
(Pre-Team game pitch slides) Full Pitch Slide Deck : https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1u4Cou4bDtsi8ZGBkkKZ9HZ5wHsnCT1ihHQCUWskD5G0/edit?usp=sharing
A Cross Disciplinary Approach
As The Gap became Dead Line Terminal I was challenged to consider how the story of the game might also change, not only through my own work but through the input and ideas the team contributed as well. This was my first real look into how serious games permeate the game and its development across disciplines. Taking a deep dive and closely analyzing how systems in the game communicate with each other and what they communicate to the player. My process for this became very closely tied to my passion for cross-disciplinary collaboration. Having all or as many members of the development team working with each other to increase shared knowledge and vision was something that I enjoyed from the beginning though it took considerable time to get off the ground to work in a way that was efficient. As the team opened up communication and work processes, I, as the level designer, was able to integrate this shared vision and understanding into the game, working with every discipline to ensure that the game was able to share this new story with respect and care from narrative to systems and technical development.
How Did I Come to This Conclusion and What Does This Mean for Serious (All) Game Developers?
Another key component to this process was research and lots of it. Ensuring that I was respectfully bringing death as a central focus to the game without dishonoring or minimizing the impacts of death across not only other games but cultures and personal experiences of myself and others was important to not just my own process but the success of the game as well.
Some of this research included looking into articles and play throughs of other games that may have mishandled serious topics, and trying to learn from the mistakes of others as I continued to develop the game in collaboration with my team. An overwhelming amount of this research helped to reinforce something that I already understood, that apathy is the death of empathy. When game designers make games that suit a single goal or vision, that tell a story for the purpose purely of entertainment without regard for the topics that might even subconsciously have an impact on the player, they do both their games and themselves a disservice. Understanding this reinforces my belief that all games are serious games and should be handled with respect, empathy, and with the goal to teach these traits through their game in both mechanics, narrative and technical execution. This article by “Bob the Hollow'' “Wolfenstein2: A Dangerously Mishandled Narrative” highlights and condenses a lot of this ideology in an easy to consume format.
Some of the key takeaways from this article revolved around this idea that apathy from the developers in favor of a game with more blockbuster like action, narrative and mechanics ultimately lead to a failure of execution on multiple fronts. Particularly the “Lost in translation” and “America under siege sections” help reinforce how Wolfenstein failed to appropriately handle serious subject matter, not by intention but by apathy, and neglect of respect for serious subject matter and the parts of their audience it may affect.
Another helpful source of research was the TED talk “Seeking Truth: The Luminous Power of Serious Games & Simulations” by Zofia Rybkowski
From this talk I was able to extract some more knowledge on the influence of games and their handling of a serious topic or a game from a serious perspective in a classical sense (where the purpose of the game is not focused on the entertainment of the player). Additionally this talk helped highlight the importance of collaboration and learning from and with other team members. This was reinforced by a step by step guide that is applicable to any kind of development process, and I found it to be incredibly helpful in my own conduct and processes towards game development. As shown in the talk as well, the overall cost of implementing this in my own workflow, as well as the teams development cycles is minimal, and scalable to accommodate for large teams as well making it ideal for implementation in cross disciplinary work.
A Condensed Wrap Up
To reframe all of this, the best practices towards developing an entertaining serious game, in my own practice and in a way that is engaging and empathetic includes.
Open team communication and collaboration, commitment to a shared vision and understanding. This will propagate motivation and empathy.
Treat every game like a serious game. This results in a more engaging, higher purpose interaction on every level, especially when combined with cross-disciplinary collaboration not just with the devs in mind but the player as well.
The stories we tell and how we tell them matters, don't allow complacency or apathy space to grow in your story, make room for different perspectives but pay proper respect to yourself, your audience and your subject matter.
Be aware that the subconscious is a strong tool, but can also be a blind spot or pitfall when not taken account of seriously.
Take pride in what you make! Every collaborative effort make your game stronger
So lets go out there, collaborate, empathize, and honor the timeless tradition of storytelling in a way that only games can, through interaction, meaningful reverberations in our stories and entertainment!
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