Go ahead: Try and explain this heads-up display to a nongamer. Try and explain
this HUD to someone who doesn't play role-playing games. I'll pray for you.
Editor's note: Inspired by Leigh Alexander's recent piece on Kotaku about her inability to communicate the essentials of Fallout 3, Isaiah suggests that it's not her fault she couldn't find the right words. He maintains that it's better to experience certain media than to have someone explain it. If that's the case, I desperately need someone to explain Pokémon to me. -Jason
By now, many of you have read freelance writer Leigh Alexander's article on that
Kotaku. In the article, she goes into great detail as to how difficult it was to translate her excitement for Fallout 3 in terms her parents could understand. Aside from the fact that Fallout 3 isn't the most accessible game for — well, gamers — it's slightly perturbing to see the conclusion Alexander comes to. Because of the lack of a developed language or lexicon in describing games in simplified terms [no matter the complexities that currently exist], Alexander feels that she has in some way failed games by failing to least convey the appeal of a postapocalyptic world from a first-person perspective
role-playing game.
At this point, we twentysomethings and younger would be hard-pressed to find a parent who hasn't at least played Solitaire on a computer. It may not even be that big of a stretch to assume that a fair amount of fortysomethings and fiftysomethings have touched a joystick at some point in their lives. So it's pretty interesting that gaming has come far enough that we can finally acknowledge that, yes, a generation gap exists. So it may be difficult to explaining how a game filled with desolate grays and browns could be appealing to a group who played in a generation where putting as many limited colors on the screen
I have to be the only kid who had nightmares
about playing Double Dribble with my mom.
In her article, Alexander said her parents are versed in very specific genres of games, and I believe this makes the task more difficult. This past weekend I went home and saw my mom rifle through her cabinets in order to show me how much fun she and my sister were having playing Wii Sports Resort.
Considering my mom forced an old, battered NES controller in my hand as punishment when I didn't do so well on a test as a youth — only to then get dominated in a 20-minute game of Double Dribble or Ms. Pac Man — I can safely assume my mom's taste in games now haven't changed since her gaming addiction of the past. Though I am sure I could show my mother the 'technical' advancements and achievements games have made in the past 20 years, her question, though simple, would apply to any child explaining any media to their parents: "Why would I want to play this?"
But maybe Alexander has a point. Maybe it "isn't a generation gap either." I would partially agree and add it isn't
just a generation gap. Nongamers are usually nongamers for a reason, much like those who don't want to hear someone pouncing on piano keys for minutes on end may not be into classical music. Trying to explain the core concept of
BioShock to a nongamer could be just as difficult as explaining Chopin's relevance to classical
music.
It's taken years and plenty of hard-working pianists to convince me that classical music isn't just a bunch of hoity–toity douchebags punching a keyboard and calling it beautiful. It'll take years of refinement of the media — and subsequent years of writing about said media — for a game of any genre to attract the average nongamer's eye.
Then Alexander travels down a road set with pitfalls and traps buy exclaiming:
"So why is it so much easier to 'get' a game like GTA, or by extension, Red Dead Redemption, than other titles, even those with far fewer elements going on? It's because GTA is universal: Everyone's wished they could just act out against their environment without real-world consequences, just for fun, from time to time. Not all games are built on such accessible ideas — nor should they be. We could explain to our friends why we relate to them anyway, if only we had the right words."
The crux of Alexander's argument is something I can only partially agree with, because I strongly believe that we can have as many words in as many different languages — we'll always have to deal with a barrier of entry when it comes to games (much like any media). The concept of Grand Theft Auto isn't actually accessible — it's design is. And I'm willing to argue to the death that this cultural phenomena of GTA didn't occur, wholly, until Grand Theft Auto 3. The game had the same concept, the same personality, but once the design of this game appeared in a more presentable manner (a little controversy doesn't hurt, either), it intrigued more eyes. GTA wasn't always universal, but hats off to the Rockstar guys for working hard in making the series as universal as it is now.
Look at Super Mario Bros. for the NES. Look at Castlevania: Symphony of the Night. These are games that sound quite ridiculous when explaining to anyone — gamer or nongamers alike. Words of any kind will only get you so far. Sometimes it's best to just be as vague as possible, or in most cases, pass the controller.
Super Mario: Modern Warfare — maybe it's time Mario got an
unnecessary reboot. (Image from AgentScarlet from Deviant Art)
The language does need to improve — not just for the sake of attracting outsiders, but to make sharing within our fragmented community more popular. I'm sure a lot of women (and some men) got into gaming because of their significant others. As much as it takes words and sharing to get people into gaming, we have to give more credit to people's capacity for inquisitiveness. The concept of a plumber jumping down a sewer to save a princess by butt-stomping mushrooms and defeating a reptilian overlord takes more of an adventurous personality than a shmuck like me writing about the fun factor of the game. For the more complex stories and concepts of gaming, we do indeed have a failing of language. This failing isn't applicable to just nongamers. Several gamers I know have no interest in playing BioShock simply because it doesn't look like something familiar.
It's good that our crowd of nerds and geeks are getting more diverse. It is also good to hear that more and more gamers are sharing with others our hobby (or obsession) and subsequently running out of words to paint the picture of our very intricate pixelated experiences. Though our language in describing games could stand for a tune-up, it's my firm belief that explaining any media with words pales in comparison to a 1-on-1 experience with it.
