Contextual Studies: Creating Coherent Worlds (lecture 1 notes)

One undeniable fact about a video game is that the player will be entering a world upon simply deciding to play it. The game space will have its own rules, its own setting and environments and its own history – all of which has been created from scratch and can often completely differ from the world for which the player has “escaped” from. But despite this the player will completely accept that which is presented to them and proceed to be completely immersed in this world. This is what it means to have created a Coherent world.

Coherent (Dictionary definition):

1.

logically connected; consistent: a coherent argument.

2.

cohering; sticking together: a coherent mass of sticky candies.

3.

having a natural or due agreement of parts; harmonious: a coherent design.

4.

Physics, Optics. of or pertaining to waves that maintain a fixed phase relationship, as in coherent light.

Often a game world can be described as being broken down into the Narrative and the physical world that the player experiences, but in actuality it can be viewed in a much different way:

The two crucial elements; Environment and Gameplay Mechanics, must remain ultimately connected (coherent) in order to create a complete world. The task itself is not a simple one and if it is executed well the work that has gone into creating the world can be completely overlooked due to how it flows as a singular universe in its own right. The environment plays a large part in this because the world that is created will often act as an active entity within the story.

The example of how this is that was given was the sentence: “A long time ago an old woman lived in a forest”.

Immediately connotations are created between that statement and a traditional fairy-tale – which in turn might tell the audience to expect conventional events of that genre (happily ever after, etc.). Furthermore the inclusion of “forest” and “old woman” indicate that both of these elements will feature in some way into the narrative, be it the forest as the main location of the story, or the old woman as an integral plot character.

To further illustrate the more immediate impact of the environment into drawing the viewer into a complete media world, a number of films were listed:

Brazil and Twelve Monkeys:  A director (Terry Gilliam) creating a specific Auteur style in face of pressure to conform to conventional styles. In both of these films, complex issues about human nature are explored – not necessarily to the liking of a conventional audience due to the light it shows our race in. These films show that coherent worlds can be created that show the world in a negative light, but still act as a complete universe.

Edward Scissorhands and Sleepy Hollow: This time the director (Tim Burton) has created two uniquely coherent worlds that are different but at the same time could be said to continue the predecessor. This can be seen through most of his work.

Unforgiven and Dangerous Liaisons: Films tasked with historical accuracy and authenticity in order to remain coherent in the eyes of the audience.

Amelie and Micmacs: Using and celebrating culture as an active element to the world that is created.

In addition to that the 1982 Ridley Scott film Blade Runner was mentioned. Having never seen Blade Runner, I briefly analysed the opening 2 minute segment to understand the techniques used by the director in creating the audiences state of disbelief (immersion into the film):

Beginning with a short description of the rise and subsequent fall of a cloned race called replicants (which gave birth to the titles namesake: Blade Runner units), a Los Angeles cityscape fades in. The cityscape is immediately considered to be futuristic due to the date displayed before the fade in (2019) and due to the unrecognisable nature of a real life location; Los Angeles. At 1.20 a flying car flies towards the screen and disappears out of view. This is yet another representation meant to create connotations in the audiences mind (Flying Cars – Science fiction/ the future) and further immerse them into the world they are seeing on the screen. Every so often, fire erupts from the towers in the cityscape – at points a close up will happen to reinforce this. Fire is associated with words like dangerous, uncontrollable, and damaged and the fact that this is happening to a number of buildings throughout Los Angeles might be a metaphor for the state of the futuristic world, that it is a dangerous world that is fundamentally damaged but uncontrollable in its growth.  However by presenting the audience with these ideas of conflict within the world, it undoubtedly draws them into the world and in turn the plot.

In addition, by first presenting the audience with a brief timeline and a reference point (calendar/ real life location), before dropping them into the long shot of the cityscape, the director Ridley Scott has given the audience the information that allows them to be immersed before the visual world is shown. They would know that it was set in the future and not only that but it was a future relative to our planet. They would also know the current state of affairs and the central organisation to the plot (Blade Runners). Should the Audience not have had the information that was given, they would not be able to distinguish what the world in front of them was (whether it was another planet, dimension or timeframe) and what the narrative focus would be – and in turn their state of disbelief would be broken.