The ultimate end?

So as the first blog post of the year and really the start of my own experience with the gaming world, I thought I’d begin with the ultimate end- death. Of course, in the virtual world, “death” doesn’t have quite the same ultimate, irrevocable quality. In the gaming world when you die, you’re perhaps set back a bit in time, effort and patience but it’s not really the end of your virtual life. Well, or so I thought until I found this article online that noted a new trend in gaming- the trend towards inevitable, or even irrevocable, death.

http://www.gamasutra.com/blogs/KevinNg/20130107/184394/Death_is_not_the_end.php

Basically for those that might not click on the link, there is a trend in games for death to be either extremely, frustratingly frequent (as in you may not last 30 seconds) or as in the game ‘One Chance’, as a far more real punishment. In One Chance, you literally have one chance at the game. If you die, then that’s it, you can no longer play.

The article discusses how this affects the way that you experience the game but it’s also interesting to consider why this trend is occurring and what this might indicate about the dynamics of the gaming community. It certainly reinforces what Kevin was saying in the lecture about the appeal of the challenge and the rising elitism of the gaming community. If you can survive One Chance or get to a certain level of Dark Souls you must be a real gamer, someone others can really respect. Perhaps it’s also true that after years and years of experience, today’s gamers are wired with an unprecedented resilience. I know personally, when challenged in an area I would consider myself good at or have had years of success at, frustration breeds obsession rather than disheartenment. For those that have for years prided themselves on their skill, to be defeated is simply not an option, with the dangling satisfaction of triumph more and more alluring with each “game over”.

Finally, because these games heighten the realism and sense of danger it’s interesting how games like One Chance could be explored deeper from a psychological/philosophical standpoint. In single player games, there’s no real human connection or interaction with other characters, making game play more predictable. Yet it would be interesting to have death as a very real punishment in a MMORPG strategy and/or team work based game. As demonstrated in the reading, MMORPGs bring games somewhat closer to the “real world” by demonstrating the interactions within a community. They can also make the gameplay more tense and unpredictable.  I guess in such a game there would need to be a lot of build up and strategizing before there was much possibility of you being killed (in order to make the game workable and worthwhile). However, I think it would make an interesting case study from a range of academic viewpoints- political, psychological, game theory, etc. What do you guys think?