The Mechanic is not the (whole) message: Procedural rhetoric meets framing in Train and Playing History 2

the mechanic is not the (whole) message Procedural Rhetoric Meets Framing in Train and Playing History 2 Sebastian Deterding (@dingstweets) Digital Creativity Labs, University of York DiGRA/FDG 2016, August 3, 2016 cb

<0> introduction

“Procedural rhetoric is the practice of using processes persuasively …. Each unit operation in a procedural representation is a claim about how part of the system it represents does, should, or could function.”

ian bogost, persuasive games, 2007, 28, 36

“Rules control the meaning of the game, and players, by following rules, create the meaning that is already predetermined by the designer(s). For the proceduralists, a game means what the rules mean… Players are important, but only as activators of the process that sets the meanings contained in the game in motion.”

miguel sicart, against procedurality, 2011

“Videogames represent in the gap between procedural representation and individual subjectivity. The disparity between the simulation and the player’s understanding of the source system it models creates a crisis in the player. I named this crisis simulation fever, a madness through which an interrogation of the rules that drive both systems begins. Procedural rhetoric also produces simulation fever. It motivates a player to address the logic of a situation in general ... Players are persuaded when they enter a crisis in relation to this logic.”

ian bogost, persuasive games, 2007, 332-333

“Rather than producing assent, ... the game [Howard Dean for Iowa] produces deliberation, which implies neither immediate assent nor dissent. Like literature, poetry, and art, videogames cannot necessarily know their effects on individual players.”

ian bogost, persuasive games, 2007, 329, 339

jfk reloaded, traffic games, 2004

“Although the designers encourage player’s to re-create the assassination as realistically as possible, no player was able to re-create the event successfully within the constraints of reported history. Given that JFK Reloaded had an explicit persuasive goal – to affirm the Warren Commission report and disprove conspiracy theories – it would appear to be a retorical failure. But emergent features in the game’s design facilitate other interpretations, suggesting that the developer’s stated goal was a ruse meant to inspire new perspectives on the historical event itself.”

ian bogost, persuasive games, 2007, 133-134

How and why do different players come to different understandings of the same procedural rhetoric?

research question

Blindly focusing on outcomes and following rules (as in gameplay) leads you to dehumanise the people affected by your actions.

the (meta-)mechanical message

game no. 1: train, brenda brathwaite, 2009

game no. 1: train, brenda brathwaite, 2009

audience responses

media responses

game no. 2: playing history 2: slave trade, serious games interactive, 2013

game no. 2: playing history 2: slave trade, serious games interactive, 2013

game no. 2: playing history 2: slave trade, serious games interactive, 2013

audience responses

audience responses

reader responses

WHY?

same rhetoric, opposite reaction

1. Genre as contextual framing 2. Contextual travel of meta-media 3. Visual framing

three interconnected answers

<1> contextual framing

genres as normative and epistemic frames

What is accepted and expected in …

genres as normative and epistemic frames

educational games for children

artworks for adults

train: expressive medium/art for adults

• Single physical copy • Presented at art

galleries, universities • Always accompanied by

author guiding follow-up debate

ph2: edugame for 8-14 year olds in school

• Digital copies • Distributed through

Danish schools • Accompanied by

educational material for teachers

critiques by audience

controversional topics: known and expected … in art

complicit subject position: challenging but not unknown … in art

<2> contextual travel of

meta-media

released & announced on steam/twitter outside educational context

educational framing doesn’t appear here

in-game framing doesn’t appear in screenshot

how ph2 travelled through twitter & the media

games travel culturally as meta-media

<3> visual framing

visual framing shapes understanding

visual framing shapes understanding

what everyone saw of ph2 in the media

how train travelled through the media

what everyobody saw of train in the media

carefully considered & managed visual framing

summary

1. Genres as contextual frames affect what content and form are expected and appropriate. Thus, activated genre frames shape how a game is interpreted.

2. Games regularly travel through culture and make meaning as (easily decontextualised) meta-media.

3. Visual framing shapes how audiences perceive intended authorial and reader stance toward a game.

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@dingstweets

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thank you.