The Magic of Wii Sports Resort

[famousringo]

WereKitten said:

Figlioni said:
Halo is simply another FPS.

There is nothing out there like WSR. Nothing. Obviously, this article is too deep for some people in here.

Wii Sports Resort, Wii Sports, Wii Fit are certainly original products and important in many ways. They succeeded at introducing a certain kind of videogaming to a whole new mass audience and they pioneered some new ways of direct interaction. I only own WiiSports, as they are not my cup of tea, but I can even understand if someone finds them great and wants to write enthusiastically about what he/she likes.

But regarding the article: where is its "depth"? I asked if it was ironic in a previous post because there are so many silly statements, wrapped in a pretentious prose. It truly led me to think that it was a satire of some of the over-analyzing and opaque works that sources like Edge are sometimes guilty of.

I could quote the worst offenders, but frankly they are there for anyone to read them, such as the way the author stretches the meaning of narrative way beyond the breaking point, so much that I suppose he must by the same means consider the report of a chess game an accomplished "narrative by gameplay".

Or the final paragraph about how this game will answer some important and completely unrelated questions about the interactive medium, though I can't see exactly how.

So in the end, leaving aside the obvious excitement the author shows about the direct action controls and the originality of this new kind of titles, what deep concept is he conveying behind the smoke-heavy barrage of prose? Try for a moment to forget that he's going nuts over a game you like or even love, and just point me to what you think in the article is significant, original, informative or thought-provoking.

I understand why you think the word 'narrative' is being stretched here, but I really can't think of a more suitable word. The author is talking about experiences and ideas that various media create for an audience, and he's using the word narrative to represent those ideas.

All creative media try to craft an experience for the audience and convey certain ideas through that experience. And the kinds of experiences and ideas which can be conveyed are limited by the particular media. Photography conveys an experience with angles and light, cinema focuses on motion and sound, writing uses symbols, rhythm and emphasis, etc.

Many video games borrow heavily from ideas that were designed for other media, as a text adventure borrows heavily from writing techniques or a Metal Gear Solid game borrows heavily from cinema. It wouldn't be that hard to turn a text adventure into a novel or a Metal Gear Solid game into a movie. You'd strip out the interactivity and be left with a dull, but functional set of ideas for a story in one of those media.

The Wii Sports franchise is nothing but pure interactivity. It can't revert effectively to any other media, because the core of it is a dozen different styles of interactivity, rather than a cinematic or literary story with a layer of interactivity woven through it. That's why he describes WSR as a 'pure' video game. The writer of the article finds himself more curious about Wuhu island and drawn into its world as he interacts with it more and more, and not because an author is giving characters dialogue or because a director is showing him sweeping camera arcs. It's an experience where interaction doesn't have to compete with plot, dialogue, or interesting audio/visuals for the attention of the audience, and the audience finds it engaging despite not having any of those aspects.