An analysis of 11 drunk guys immersed in Slender

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aXwkfSmYkf4


In this blog entry, I argue that there is another kind of videogame immersion unconsidered by Laurie Taylor. A person experiences diegetic immersion when they fade into a text and become unaware of the relation and creation of its elements. Though the 11 drunk players are most definitely scared of the game, their experience of it as a group ensures they don’t forget their independent existence from it. They actually continuously discuss the relation and creation of textual elements as they play asking who made the game and complaining about the “shitty” frame rate and quality of the lap top (which results in some lagging). They are never lost in the text because they talk about it as a game yet they are interestingly still scared out of their minds. Laurie Taylor’s ‘situated immersion’ only partly explains their fear. In this kind of immersion the videogame space becomes experiential space and the player acts within the game as oppose to upon it. This results in them responding unconsciously and instinctively. Yet for this to occur, ‘conventions of video game space and the interface must become naturalised.’ The drunk gamers are never playing within the game space. They ask others to play complaining it’s too hard. When Slender approaches, instead of responding instinctively within the game space and turning and running, a player slams the laptop closed. The controls are not naturalised. One viewer repeatedly yells at the player to hold ‘shift’ to sprint but he continues to walk at a vulnerable pace because he is holding caps-lock. There is structural incoherence as players cannot escape the woods due to a climbable chain link fence standing in their way.’ I was admittedly completely freaked out playing Slender. I talked to my mates about it and was puzzled to find out they found it lame. I regularly watch horrors and I like to consider myself not easily scared. The reason for different reports on the game is become of different worlds of concern. Taylor argues that for a player to have a context within the overall game space, there must be a narrative context (thought this requirement is very low). For Slender, to be scary the player must have background knowledge of this meme-generated monster who appears in the backgrounds of photos, has tentacles, no face and kills children (depending on what source you read). There is no concrete knowledge on Slender because he was created and added to by countless bloggers. This ambiguity was taken advantage of in the video game. Gordon Calleja distinguishes between designed and personal narrative. Designed narrative is the game world’s history and background that the creator presents us with and personal narrative is the players interpretation of the game playing experience. There is deliberately no designed narrative in Slender. You are in the woods with a torch at night and have to collect scary letters while being hunted and none of this is explained what so ever. The creator’s idea is that you’ll bring in background knowledge. Like all good horrors, the creator knew that it is what you don’t see/know, that which is left to the imagination which has the potential to really scare you. Taylor argues that games played in the third person lead to ‘an experience more complex and closer to the corresponding encounter with the extra gaming world than first person.’ The restricted nature of first person is exploited in a genius way. He can sneak right up behind you, when you turn around he could be right there. Gordon Calleja’s ‘spatial involvement’ defines the player’s ability to locate oneself within a wider game area than is visible on the screen. If you know exactly where everything is on the map you will feel a sense of habitation and belonging. So in Slender, the map is purposely hard to navigate. The trees all look the same; it’s dark, misty and easy to get lost. Hypermediacy is avoided, you don’t have a health bar, inventory, map, or even battery life limit for your torch. The 11 drunk guys playing Slender were not immersed in a diegetic or situated way as defined by Taylor because of the outside discussion. What immersed and freaked them out was the affect of dread, the not-knowing/seeing of horror films creatively applied to a video game.

Lloyd Thomason (2691650)
Word Count: 717
I realised John Kwon had already written on Slender after I posted. he had some really interesting points which make me want to alter my conclusion. The main thing about immersion is that it always ultimately depends on the player and their context. For this reason, I believe Laurie Taylor's distinctions are obviously useful but not the only ways a player can become immersed in a text as I feel I have demonstrated here.