Invited talk for the 2nd GALA Alignment School. Organized by GALA - Games and Learning Alliance, Network of Excellence on Serious Games, funded by the FP7. Carcavelos, Lisbon, 25 June 2012.

1. GALA - Games and Learning Alliance, Network of Excellence on Serious Games, FP7
Storytelling & Games: Interactive Expression
Nelson Zagalo, University of Minho
Lisbon, 25 June 2012

2. Serious Games
Serious Games
=
Educational tools / Learning Software

3. The purpose
The purpose of Serious Games is not just putting
game strategies at the service of education or
training, but rather take the training and
education to the game.
Use games to teach, is not something new, we
had a lot of that in the 1990's, with the idea of
"Edutainment." Now we started over again with
this new label "Serious Games".
The main problem has been a total absence of
interest in the Player. Betting everything on the
teaching, on message conveying regardless of
form, structure and gameplay used.
We forgot the player and the uniqueness of
games as a communication and art form.

4. Why people Play
Games are trial structures, and people like to be
judged.
But beware, because they do not want any kind
of judgment, they want to be judged favorably.
The rewards are what explain to the player that
he performed his duties properly.
People play to be rewarded through:
Compliments, Points, Empowerment,
Self-Expression, and other forms.

5. We Play, We Do, We Become
Storytelling is the art of creating structures of consistent
events in order to stimulate specific audience effects.
In the games case, these events can only be triggered by
user participation in the course of interaction, fulfilling some
rules.
Thus looking into art and media comparison we have,
Literature - we read (ideas described symbolically of) what happened.
Film - we see (ideas displayed of) what happened.
Videogame - we do (actions that become ideas) happen.

6. The mechanics are the message
Learnign about Middle Passage at schools
Brenda Brathwaite, Gaming for understanding, at TEDxPhoenix (2011)

7. Mechanics on Middle Passage
New World , board game improvised
by Brenda Brathwaite
Families in Africa Boat to take people to the US

8. Interactive expression, not film
The approach and attempt to glue the aesthetic universe and cinematographic
practices, is a natural step in the creation of video games when we think of sending
messages throughout any audiovisual medium.
But to some extent this glue has done more harm than good to the media, because
like what happened with the passage from theater to film, it is limiting the potential for
artistic expression of the games.
Film to games problems:
1 - inputs of cinematic stylitics
2 - very long cut-scenes
3 - a linear succession of dramatic events credible
4 - creating characters, dialogue and coherent fictional worlds
5 - obsession with graphic realism to support the need for coherent representation
What is ultimately the singularity aesthetics of videogames?

9. Singularity
Theatre
[Drama + (Architecture, Painting, Literature, Music)] Live
Film
[Editing + (Theatre)] Cinematography
Videogames
[Interactivity + (Film)] CGI*
Videogames Singularity: Interactivity
* CGI – Computer Graphics Images

10. Interactivity
Non-interactive, when a
message is not related to
previous messages;
Reactive, when a message is
related only to one immediately
previous message;
Interactive, when a message is
related to a number of previous
messages and to the relationship
between them.
(P) Person
(O) Other
(M) Messages
(Mj) Temporal sequences
P(Mj) or (OMj) - Messages based in Previous Messages
P(Mj/Mj-1) or M (Mj/Mj-1) - Previous messages based in earlier messages

11. Communicate through digital interactivity
Interactivity is the Singularity of Game. Interactivity is a consequently
communication cycle and between the object and person.
Questions,
- Can I communicate complex messages through interactivity?
- How can I do it?
We can start by taking the following
- Create Art is Playing with ideas from our Reality
- Structuring Play is creating Games
Without forgetting that,
- In videogames we make happen actions that become ideas.

12. playing with world representations
“The circles represent outside elements entering the
marriage.
The size of each square represents the amount of
space that person is taking up within the marriage.
The transparency of the squares represents how
engaged that person is in the marriage. When one
person fades out of the marriage and becomes
emotionally distant then the marriage is over.
The game mechanics are designed such that the game
is fragile. It’s easy to break. This is deliberate as
marriages are fragile and they feel fragile, I wanted to
get this across.”
The Marriage, (2007), Rod Humble
http://www.rodvik.com/rodgames/marriage.html

13. playing with world representations
“On the surface, the point of
Passage is to open as many
treasure chests within the allotted
time. But that's not what Jason
Rohrer's award winning game is
really about. What it is really about
is love, the passing of time, saying
goodbye to youth and freedom,
grief - ultimately life itself.”
Passage, (2007), Jason Rohrer
http://hcsoftware.sourceforge.net/passage/

14. playing with world representations
“As a mother, it's your job to
keep your little tyke in the
safety of the homestead
until they have enough
experience to survive the
monster-infested woods.
Don't expect any gratitude,
though. The brat will
continually try to give you
the slip and escape into the
wild. After a while, like many
a parent, you may well be
tempted to let it go find out
the hard way what the
world's really like.”
A Mother in Festerwood, (2011)
de Austin Breed
www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/560920

15. playing with world representations
Distance (2010) de Austin Breed
“Austin Breed has created a split-screen tale of a couple separated by, well, distance. You follow
their separate, daily routines and at night get to pose one of two questions while they chat on the
phone. But will their eyes start to wander? What would you do? Find out!”
www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/55682
8

16. playing with world representations
"One Chance is a game about
choices and dealing with them.
Scientist John Pilgrim and his
team have accidently created a
pathogen that is killing all living
cells on Earth.
In the last 6 remaining in-game
days on Earth, the player must
make choices about how to
spend his last moments. Will he
One Chance, (2010), AwkwardSilence spend time with his family, work
on a cure or go nuts?"
www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/555181

17. playing with world representations
“Gray is a riot - quite literally. In this
cerebral, experimental game, you
play the part of a lone dissenter,
trying desperately to win a seemingly
never ending horde of rioters over to
your cause. It seems like a helpless
task but one by one you manage to
woo the rioters until eventually you
have the majority following you. But
what does any self-respecting rebel
do when they are a member of the
majority, well in this game, they
switch to the other side of course,
and repeat the whole process again
but from the opposite direction.
Gray raises some interesting
questions about the individual and the
possibility of one person changing the
course of history.”
Gray, (2009), Greg Wohlwend
www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/495076

18. playing with world representations
Connections, (2011), mindful xp
http://www.kongregate.com/games/mindfulxp/connections

19. playing with world representations
Every Day the Same Dream, 2007, Paolo Pedercini
“Every day the same dream is a slightly existential riff on the theme of
alienation and refusal of labor. The idea was to charge the cyclic nature of
most video games with some kind of meaning (i.e. the "play again" is not a
game over). Yes, there is an end state, you can "beat" the game.”
www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/540741

20. Storytelling & Games: Interactive Expression
Nelson Zagalo, nzagalo@ics.uminho.pt@ics.uminho.pt
H. http://nelsonzagalo.googlepages.com
B. http://virtual-illusion.blogspot.com
F. http://www.facebook.com/nelsonzagalo
GALA - Games and Learning Alliance
Lisbon, 25 June 2012