Men in Gorilla Suits

Of Video Games and Culture (and Stories)

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Alaskan girl and white fox - Never Alone video gameOur current podcast is all about multiculturalism. The week before was about video games.

In the video games episode, we talked about games as art and having the potential to tell stories as meaningful as movies and novels.

Here are two examples…

Never Alone

What happens when the art of video games teams up with native Alaskan storytellers and elders? You get a game like Never Alone.

Never Alone – Game Trailer from Never Alone on Vimeo.

Sure, it’s a game, so there’s running and jumping and looking at the environment in order to get from one side of the screen to the next, but surviving in Alaska is often about examining one’s environment to get from one place to the next as well.

Bonus points for this: I can’t say I’ve heard a book trailer in a native Alaskan language.

Valiant Hearts

Valiant Hearts looks like no other game I’ve seen. In addition to its look, it pushes its marketing with story.

Not the first video game to tout the effort put into the story behind it all, but this could easily be a movie or a novel.

Playing a Story

There have always been stories in video games, but in recent years — especially with so many independent companies creating and distributing games — things have gone from the occasional game with a story grabbing my attention, to so many games making me take notice. Valiant Hearts takes place in WWI, but it’s stuck in my head almost as much as my initial exposure to a novel about WWII released this week, All the Light We Cannot See.

Stories are powerful things no matter the media used to tell them.

I’m glad we live in a time where there are more ways than ever to experience a good story…

Inside the Mind of a Game Designer

I’m fortunate enough to know enough writers that I have heard them talk about creating. I am also fortunate to know some great artists and musicians…and have heard them talk about creating as well. We all talk about those things others create that not only blow us away, but humble us and make us aspire to so much more.

Game designers are no different.

Whether it’s sharing links to the videos above with a sense of awe, or writing about creating worlds that seem real, Lee Perry writes about making video games at his Game Dev Thought Fodder blog.

Lee stepped away from a AAA game company to help start BitMonster…and then stepped away from that to work on totally solo indie development. By totally solo indie development, I mean Lee is tackling game development like Shawn and I tackle novels: wholly alone in the creation.

I’ve always liked hearing Lee talk about game development because I’m such a geek for seeing parallels in the way things are created, but with the leap to wholly independent creation, listening to Lee talk about creating is not much different than listening to novelists, artists, and musicians talk about creating something from nothing.

– Gorilla Christopher

Men in Gorilla Suits Ep. 65: Last Seen…Playing Video Games

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Space Invader: Men in Gorilla Suits Ep. 65: Last Seen…Playing Video GamesIf Christopher had his way, this episode would have been called “ALL HAIL GOAT SIMULATOR!!!” But that would be a bit limited in scope — especially when the world of video games practically knows no bounds.

We live in a time when many who complain about how much time their children play Call of Duty spend just as much time on their phones playing Candy Crush and other mobile games. Lines have been blurred from the days of the Atari 2600 and arcades full of cigarette smoke and stand-up cabinet games. Today, almost everybody in America plays digital games of some sort.

We start out in the 70s and 80s, discussing the first video games we remember seeing…and asking if they were actually the first game we ever played. Then it’s a hop to the future, asking what the last game we’ve played is. (Hint for Christopher’s last game played: “BAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!”)

Video games have come a long way, crushing movie box office totals and pushing well beyond what we could imagine in their infancy. We dedicate some time to discussing whether or not video games can be art.

Since we both write, we take a side road into the writing of video games, which is often secondary…but have some games hit on great writing? What’s the future of writing in games? In this section we talk about:

  • The influence of video games on our writing.
  • If video games can even be as interactive (or more interactive) than a novel, evoking the same experience one gets from reading a great work of fiction.
  • Our general feelings about writing in video games.

Putting writing aside, video games get a bad rap for being the same old things. Is there truth to that, or are there original games? After that, we talk about how mobile devices have changed the way we look at video games.

Many people view video games as frantic, loud things, but…can they be a meditative experience? We also devote some time to these questions:

  • How have video games linked us socially?
  • Is there a place for video games in education?

We close this episode out listing some of our all-time favorite video games and discussing what we think the future of video games looks like.

So grab a handful of quarters and listen. If you’re so inclined, share some of your thoughts about video games in the comments.

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