Pathing, Walking Simulators and Architectural Theory

With the advent of games such as Dear Esther, The Stanley Parable and Gone Home amongst others the discussion of the medium of ‘video games’ has gone onto have some great (not so great) debates to whether these fringe cases can be considered games and to what extent do they portray an experience.  Although the term ‘Walking Simulator’ has negative connotations, I am in the school of thought that does believe that the term does have use and it should be used until we can come up with  better one.  I see it similar to the term ‘Moba’ that I personally don’t feel fits the genre of games such as Dota and LoL but do see that nothing suitable has come up yet. 

I have written a couple versions of this outlaying my thoughts on the subject and it’s been a difficult task to finish due to the nature of the above term creating some heated debates, but I feel that after a couple attempts I’ve got as close to my thoughts on the matter as I can.  Overall, I’m looking for it to be expanded upon greatly, but here’s some detail regarding this hypothesis. 

When I first experienced this genre it was one of intrigue; seeing an alternative means of engaging the audience in an experience that avoids the traditional method of creating conflict (whether that be with a direct battle or a task to accomplish).  I strolled through their environments, listened to their stories and felt a great deal of overlap with the essays on architectural theory I was reading at the time that focused on the fluidity of architectural form (something that if you’ve read this blog before will understand that’s one of my fundamentals from the medium).  Reading about the Heidegger Lodge or the re-purposed version of the Lake District made a game like Dear Esther play the theory out on my screen while theorists like Leech and his critical analysis of the above theory presented a nice counter point.  Finding ways to interact with a space in a virtual world is a key point for many people who play games because of the exploration factor (more on that here) and having something which focuses on that has the potential to open games up to lots of new people who may be put off by the traditional image of games being a competition or similarly ranked challenge.  The thing is thou, this original feeling was 5 or so years ago and I feel some significant things have happened in that time that caused me to develop my thoughts on the genre.

Over the past couple years, I’ve played three games that I believe are brilliant in presenting a narrative while marrying it with a number of other factors of game design to further improve the experience.  These titles (Thomas was Alone, The Stanley Parable and Transistor) present story through the actions of the player which has become a sticking point for many of the ‘walking simulator’ games that today look to grab my attention.  As I have experienced others say it was a new way of thinking 5 years ago but now it’s established and needs its next step.  

Thomas was Alone gives character to squares and rectangles by their dimensions making the regular red square (Thomas) an everyman to the smaller minded orange block or welcoming, larger blue block against the backdrop of a simple, but enjoyable puzzle-platformer.  

The Stanley Parable puts the player at the forefront of decisions as the narrative flex’s and bends to your will whether the narrator agrees with you or not.  Its ability to recognise the exploring player’s desire to search every cranny with a section like ‘the broom cupboard’ is brilliant by design and hilarious upon discovery.  

Transistor creates a world where everything adds to the narrative with the player’s use of the mechanics only reinforcing this feeling.  Learning more about characters through playing with different ability setups as the world changes throughout the playtime subtly but inevitably means a lot even if I don’t personally feel fully knowledgeable on the finer details of the story.  

Stanley is of course a game that would fit the ‘walking’ genre, but it’s so much more than where we started; not even taking into consideration how traditional games have found ways to tell a story.  They all take that earlier theory of the ‘map’ and ‘path’ which I originally felt with the genre and makes it all the more relevant as a player plots their path and takes note of personal experiences they had along the way.  The earlier titles have a certain feeling of the vernacular to them which is where we bring us to the newest title from the Chinese Room called ‘Everybody’s Gone to the Rapture’. 

Last week I got to play some of Rapture and over a couple hours I would say that my time on this game was somewhat lacking.  Yes, the title look great and it had snippets of an interesting story, but with my above experiences in games I just felt like it was missing something to give it character.  For those of you unaware of the game, Rapture takes place in a quiet English village where the aforementioned rapture has happened and we as the player are tasked with exploring the landscape and piecing the story together.  Although this game has received positive praise, others have commented on the ‘dead-ends’ and movement mechanics (a run function wasn’t fully discovered until after the game was released) alongside a story with not particularly likeable characters who take part in the story.  All that being said however, I feel that the subject of ‘paths and maps’ in theory could have given it more character to enhance the story and potentially make the overall package a greater experience. 

So what do I mean by this?  Well, the game’s environment of a quaint English village is lovingly crafted that is understandable, but when I look at the finer details it has a certain feeling of the everyday / vernacular.  If they were going for a rather typical village outline then yeah sure the game has accomplished its goal of that look, but I feel that it could of played with the interiors a bit more, akin to a modern day village with its planning permissions.  With this concept, I refer to the means of which places like villages tend to have a designated look to make sure dwellings fit into the overall aesthetic of the place, but this doesn’t stop augmentation of interior features and personal touches which allows home owners the ability to make their home special.  To take this back to my earlier point of ‘paths and maps’ this practice is there in Rapture but only in a simple format in that I’m taking a path that doesn’t feel mine.  I may be asking too much from this game to look to consider this idea of player mapping through architecture, but I hope it’s something they may consider in future titles they work on. 

As I said at the start of this piece, I have generally positive thoughts for the ‘walking simulator’ genre of game but it has shown that from its humble beginnings the way in which we present a narrative has evolved over time to where you can’t just move through a space and tell a story.  Through playing with the environment, diverting the player’s impression of what will happen and making them an integral part of the story rather than a camera; all games have the potential to create an interesting narrative however they classify themselves.  Whether you like walking simulators or dismiss their nature, we’re all getting better ways to tell stories that I hope continue into the future.