BookPDF Available

The Intrinsic Semiotics of Video-Games

November 2014

DOI:10.13140/RG.2.2.19968.02560/1

Publisher: KDP

Authors:

The University of Tokyo

This article aims at highlighting semiotic devices that are proper to the field of game design. By analyzing how current games handle their story telling, it will try to identify the process of signification within games in order to understand how it could be enhanced. This article will make use of concepts from Ludology, Semiotics, and Narratology; yet this paper's intent is to give new perspectives in the domain of game-design. It is a first attempt at identifying a language specific to games; a language that would permit the emergence of richer contents within games. It is likely that games have the ability to convey emotions, ethical values or stories. Some games already do. But we have yet to understand the workings of this signification. What really belongs to games? What is borrowed to other forms of art?

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Content may be subject to copyright.

The intrinsic semiotics of video-

games

In search of games' narrative potential

An article by Frederic SERAPHINE,

Animation instructor at the Image Institute of the Indian Ocean

(ILOI).

First published on Amazon Kindle, KDP. ASIN: B00Q1A0170

Table of Contents

Abstract .............................................................................. 1

Introduction ........................................................................ 2

Story Telling, Game and Experience ................................. 6

The semiosis in video games ........................................... 20

Theoretical Design perspectives behind game Semiotics 34

Conclusion ....................................................................... 46

Ludography ...................................................................... 46

Bibliography..................................................................... 47

Abstract

This article aims at highlighting semiotic devices that are proper to

the field of game design. By analyzing how current games handle

their story telling, it will try to identify the process of signification

within games in order to understand how it could be enhanced.

This article will make use of concepts from Ludology, Semiotics,

and Narratology; yet this paper's intent is to give new perspectives

in the domain of game-design. It is a first attempt at identifying a

language specific to games; a language that would permit the

emergence of richer contents within games.

It is likely that games have the ability to convey emotions, ethical

values or stories. Some games already do. But we have yet to

understand the workings of this signification. What really belongs

to games? What is borrowed to other forms of art?

Keywords – Game semiotics, game design, ludology, narratology,

game studies

Introduction

Whichever tool or media might they choose, artists will try to

convey emotions and stories through the mastery of a chosen

technique. And history of art is made of relentless reinvention of the

medias by the artists. Rules of story-telling for cinema were

constantly questioned in 120 years of existence. Video-game being

at the scale of media history, a rather new mode of expression; it has

yet an unexplored potential as a narrative media. Video-games do

have the ability to convey a narrative; and many gamers will share

their memories about playing a game they liked, by telling its story.

Maybe the way video-games are currently telling stories is still

immature. For example the overuse of tutorial levels in

contemporary games is very analog to how story-telling used to

depend on inter-titles in the cinematography of the early 20th century.

Inter-titles were a crutch for a cinema which had not yet identified

the narrative potential of its own tools. Such things as cut-scenes,

and tutorial levels which use is broadly accepted in current games,

are probably of a similar nature: mere crutches.

As a result, the narrative potential of video-games, is still a subject

of debate among game scholars. From the end of the 90s, in

opposition to Narratology as an academic approach for game studies;

scholars of northern Europe started to introduce the field of

Ludology. One of them, Gonzalo Frasca, an Uruguayan researcher

who graduated from the University of Copenhagen in Denmark,

published in 2003 an essay called Simulation versus narrative:

Introduction to Ludology.

In this essay, for Frasca (2003) one of the main purposes was to

challenge the idea that video games should be considered as an

extension of drama and narrative. Opposing the narratological

approach on game studies, and bringing in Ludulogy as the “still-

nascent formal discipline of game studies”(p.222).

For this purpose, Frasca is highlighting the concept of Simulation,

as a ludological pendant to Narration. He splits this concept into two

genres: the Paidia and the Ludus. Paidia could be vulgarized as the

sandbox aspect of simulation, while Ludus is its aspect that relies

more on rules and constraints. The point of his thesis is that games

and narratives provide authors with “essentially different tools for

conveying their opinions and feelings”(p.222).

Nowadays, as opposed to what Frasca was stating back in 2003, the

most natural approach to video-games’ studies actually became

Ludology. And the common idea prevailing in game studies is that

narratology is not the right theoretical tool to study video-games.

Yet, Narration doesn't simply rely on Representation as Frasca was

stating. And, as Simulation is all about reproduction of an

experience, Simulation itself is subtending a strong notion of

Representation. Representation coming from the Latin root

praesento

with the repetition prefix re; basically means make

something — or someone — present anew. Simulation on the other

side comes from simulare

which means copy or reproduce. So it

appears that the concept of Simulation tends to be very close in

signification to the concept of Representation. Simulation with its

underlying meaning of copy or reproduction, is simply a particular

form of representation: a representation of an experience. Making it

the best experimentation tool for scientific studies.

So Narration doesn't simply rely on Representation; for instance, in

the context of literary narration, words are not representing, they are

rather signifying. Representation itself is just a mere tool in the field

of semiotics. Even if Frasca is stating that “the storytelling model

Gonzalo Frasca, “Simulation versus narrative: Introduction to

Ludology”, The Video Game Theory Reader, Issue n° 1,

September 18, 2003

Wikitionary, http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/praesento (accessed on

October 25, 2014)

Wikitionary, http://en.wikitionary.org/wiki/simulare (accessed on

October 25, 2014)

— for game studies — is inaccurate and limits our understanding of

the medium along with our ability to create more compelling

games”

; it is unlikely that the will of narration could limit the

evolution of video-game as a medium. Quite the contrary, there is

still a lot to explore in the narrative aspect of game design. Narration

might not be the core of game design, it is still an immeasurable tool

to convey emotions. And semiotics could be the key to a better

understanding of the narrative potential underlying in game-play.

One of the dimensions of semiotics is the field of semantics. The

concepts of semantics are at a deeper abstraction level than

narratological concepts. Semantics are based on the relationship

between two key concepts: The signifier, and what it stands for, the

denotation.

Can we find signifiers in the constitutive elements of game-play?

Video-game being by nature a mixed media, when can we consider

that a signifying element is part of the game-play? If the game-play

can be the vector for a meaning, will this meaning derive from

semantics or from pragmatics? As game-play is an ontologically

abstract concept, does it have a potential of denotation as well as

connotation? Finding out how to signify using the tools provided by

game design could, in the end, allow the emergence of a form of

video game auteurism. Narration has this incredible potential to

convey strong emotions. Only mediums that have this experiential

ability to convey emotions and meaning are broadly considered as

art. In his thoughts about game ethics, the game philosopher Miguel

Sicart (2013) defines his will for the recognition of games as a form

of art.

If a new medium is considered to be art, then

it becomes culturally legitimate for it to

explore and communicate important meanings

about our lives and culture.

The present article is making this vow its own, and places it as a

leitmotif to devote this reflection. However there is still a whole

grammar and vocabulary to identify and establish for story-telling

in video-game design. Despite its high subtended level of

Frasca,”Simulation versus narrative:”.221,

Miguel Sicart, “Beyond Choices: The Design of Ethical Gameplay”,.

17, Kindle locations 375-3379, MIT Press, 2013 (Kindle Edition)

abstraction, game-play has an unfulfilled potential as a narrative

language.

I Story Telling, Game, and Experience

According to the game designer and theorist Jesse Schell

(2008), the designer — may he design games, chairs or

whatever — always aims to create an experience. However,

in the case of game design, the game itself isn't the

experience. The game is the tool to trigger an experience

for the player. Schell presents us the Story as one kind of

experience among others. He describes the will of “true

interactive storytelling” as an unreachable goal and

presents us two “real world” alternatives to this dream.

The first method is the “String of Pearls”, consisting in

telling a “completely non-interactive story” within the

game. This story is the “string”, and along this string, the

player is given moments of “free movement and control”

where he will have to reach a fixed goal. These moments of

gameplay are the “pearls”.

The second method presented is described as “The Story

Machine”. This method consists in creating a free

playground proper to create interesting stories that the

player will be able to enjoy and retell.

Schell also states that an artfully shaped and balanced story

can be handled within a game, through indirect control over

the player's freedom. Formulated in another way: to keep

control over the story, the designer shall manipulate the

player's impression of freedom within the game; control his

experience.

But Schell is making a mistake invalidating the possibility

Jesse Schell, “Chapter 2, 15 and 16” in “The Art of Game Design: A

book of lenses”, Taylor and Francis, 2008 (Kindle Edition)

of a “true interactive story-telling”. He tends to impute his

reasoning to others. As he thinks that only a technological

leap, permitting players to establish communication with an

artificial intelligence, could permit the existence of this

“true interactive storytelling”

; he states that it is not worth

trying, as long as the technology is still not there. He does

not even consider that maybe, this solution of his own he

proposes, is not the only possibility.

Maybe we have been taking this issue from the wrong side

for years. The common belief concerning storytelling for

video games is that we should aim at telling “interactive

stories”; and it is indeed a noble goal, and a difficult task.

Perhaps should we simply aim at telling a story — may it

be linear or interactive — with interactivity as a semantic

tool. In other words, we should not try to create interactive

stories, but rather stories interactively told.

The String of Pearls and the Story Machine are totally

efficient storytelling tools for video-games. They are doing

exactly what players expect from them. They convey an

experience and keep it interesting. The method of the String

of Pearls is using storytelling as a reward for the player; as

it is in the human nature to enjoy a good story. In words of

Schell:

The string of pearls method gives the player

an experience where they get to enjoy a finely

crafted story, punctuated with periods of

interactivity and challenge. The reward for

succeeding at the challenge? More story and

new challenges.

But, when it comes to the “string” phase, as the player loses all

Ibid., Kindle Locations 5172-8075,

Schell, “The Art of Game Design:”, Kindle locations 5076-8075

control over the game, it kind of ceases to be a game. It may become

a great movie or novel, but it relies on principles which are not those

of games.

The method of the Story Machine, is for the moment the only

storytelling method that truly relies on principles intrinsic to games.

However, the stories it conveys are in fact randomly generated.

They are not the fruit of authorship. A game based on the Story

Machine method will make a broad use of mechanics to randomly

generate story-telling modules. One could tell the story of his

character in The Sims for example; however nobody would be the

author of this story. The story would, in fact, become peculiar to the

player. This method is extremely rich and has broad perspectives of

evolution. In truth, the utopian method that Schell was imagining to

reach the dream goal of a “true interactive story-telling” is in

absolute, just an evolution of the Story Machine method. A

simulated world with AI crafted so finely that communication with

non-playable characters (NPCs) would become so natural and

transparent that it would be difficult to make the difference with real

players.

However, Schell thinks that to tell a story in a way that would be

peculiar to game design; there would be a lack of verbs. To prove

his claim true; he makes a quick comparison between the verbs of

games and the verbs of movies.

The things that video-game characters spend

their time doing are very different than the

things that characters in movies and books

spend their time doing:

Video-game Verbs: run, shoot, jump, climb,

throw, cast, punch, fly

Movie Verbs: talk, ask, negotiate, convince,

argue, shout, plead, complain

Actually, this list is biased and aims at orienting the reader's point

of view. In fact, a movie character could also do everything listed as

game actions. And even though the listed verbs proper to the

vocabulary of communication in movies are arguably difficult to put

Ibid., Kindle locations 5150-8075

into game actions, game verbs cannot be summarized into

stereotypical actions that most game characters usually execute. In

truth, the right point of view on what video-game verbs are, should

be less centered on characters' actions. It should put the focus on

any possible interaction between the player and the game. To cite a

precise example, in Blizzard's (1995) acclaimed real-time Strategy

game (RTS), Warcraft II

, the player is given control over a

medieval army to defeat his opponent's troops. The player does not

control a particular character, the player controls a godlike

disembodied warlord. His control over his units is indirect, he can

tell a soldier to attack an enemy unit, but will not have any control

over the fight itself.

Strategy games are revolving around verbs that are from various

lexical fields. If we take a look at any strategy game, we realize the

player can command, select, build, explore, spy, economize, spend,

harvest, mine, lumber, upgrade or destroy. However, those verbs are

aiming at entertaining and building the gameplay experience of the

player. These are verbs that are used as mechanics within games.

Those verbs are the game-mechanics of Warcraft II.

Game mechanics could be defined as patterns that always occur

when the player executes a given action. Generally, the game

mechanics are the tools given to the player in order to beat the

challenges proposed by the game. Miguel Sicart (2008) in an early

article attempted a formal definition of game mechanics.

I define game mechanics, using concepts from

object-oriented programming, as methods

invoked by agents, designed for interaction

with the game state.

To cite a handy example for vulgarization, let us apply this

definition to the central game mechanics in a game that

Ron Millar, Chris Metzen, “Warcraft II: Tides of Darkness”,

Blizzard entertainment, PC version, 1995

Miguel Sicart, “Defining Game Mechanics” in “The International

Journal of Computer Game Research”, Volume 8 issue 2, Game

Studies, http://gamestudies.org/0802/articles/sicart , December

2008 (accessed on October 30, 2014)

everyone knows.

In Miyamoto's (1985) Super Mario Bros. the main

mechanics of the game is the Jump ability. The agent — the

A button when pressed — triggers the method, which is

Mario's Jump. Mario's jump can interact with the game

state in many different ways. Mario could jump over a

platform; defeat an enemy by jumping on his head; or

discover bonuses by jumping under a special brick.

Even a game such as Super Mario Bros. does have a story

to tell. In truth, classic games are generally using a common

pattern to tell a story. This pattern is making use of two

layers of story-telling. A general layer that applies to the

game as a whole, and a layer that will apply to the levels of

the game. This pattern is inherited from a game design

necessity. Classic game design needs to give the player a

goal in order to make him achieve a challenge. In Super

Mario Bros. the two layers of story are modeled on this

game design necessity. The first layer is the main goal of

the game, this goal's aim is to motivate the player to finish

the game. In this case, the first layer of story is Bowser

kidnapping the Princess Peach and Mario trying to save her.

This story line will constitute the motive for the player to

keep playing until he reaches the end of the game to free

the princess.

The second layer will constitute the level design, when

Mario is reaching a new zone he will have to cross this zone

from left to right; so he will be able to continue his

adventure. Yet the levels he will have to cross are never

peaceful straight lines, and he will have to make full use of

the jump mechanics to reach his goal. In a way, it is already

a story — a very simple one — told with game-mechanics.

The story of Mario, who will save princess peach from the

Shigeru Miyamoto, “Super Mario Bros”, Nintendo, Nintendo

Entertainment System, 1985

infamous Bowser, thanks to his ability to jump.

Undoubtedly we can affirm that if there is a video-game

language, some of its verbs would be Game-mechanics; and

later on, we will study in depth the workings of its

signification. However, game mechanics are verbs only

when the subject is the player himself. One could not

imagine a novel in which all the verbs have the main

protagonist as a grammatical subject. So in video-games,

game mechanics are just one kind of verb. Eventually, what

form could take verbs with other subjects than the player

within a game?

A game featuring a story always happen to be set in worlds

in which the player is given some liberty. In most situations,

this freedom is given through the control of a character. But

as previously stated, with the example of real-time strategy,

this is not a rule that applies to every type of games. Thus

there are three distinct types of actions — verbs — we can

identify in games.

The first type, is actions executed by the player; the second

type concerns actions that affect objects controlled by the

player, and the third type is actions occurring between non-

playable elements of the game. The game experience as a

whole is feeding on all the three categories. We will name

these categories later on, in the chapter about game

semiosis.(p.32)

To illustrate, we will take a look at a fairly recent game.

Naughty Dog's (2013) latest masterpiece of survival horror,

The Last of us is making a broad use of these three

categories of actions to craft a very fine story.

It is a game centered on two survivors of a biological

apocalypse. Indeed a kind of fungal disease have spread

around the world. Infected persons are turned into blind

zombies as the incriminated mushroom, the cordyceps,

colonizes the brain of the parasitized hosts. The pandemic

has lead to an uncontrollable societal situation; and civil

war outbreaks all over the territory of United States. In this

context, Ellie, one of the main characters, who is the only

known human to have survived the parasite, represents

mankind's only hope to find a vaccine. Joel, an aging man

who lost his daughter — by the hand of a non-infected

soldier — in the first days of the pandemic; is sent to

protect Ellie on her trip to join the Fireflies, a group of

paramilitary rebels who are conducting clandestine

research to find a vaccine.

What made The Last of us stand high in esteem for players

is mainly its way to handle story-telling. Yet primarily, let

us not be fooled, The Last of us is not centered on a story-

telling game-play. The Last of us is basically a third person

shooter with a story-telling based on the String and Pearls

method. The game's main mechanics are, walking, running,

taking cover, shooting, aiming, reloading, grabbing objects,

throwing and searching clues. It is a mix of mechanics of

third person shooters and survival horrors. In other words,

it is very close in terms of game-play to the latest Resident

Evil games.

However, a lot of efforts were put to tame and enhance the

archaic structure of String and Pearls. Wherever the String

phase could be avoided, the designer chose to handle the

story-telling within the game-play sequences. Let us walk

through the first minutes of the game and analyze how it is

making a brilliant use of in-game actions/verbs.

The story starts with a very short cut scene introducing us

two characters, a father, and his daughter. We will start our

detailed description from the moment the gameplay starts.

But by now, we will make it short about the introduction

Neil Druckmann, Bruce Straley, “The Last of us”, Naughty Dog,

Sony Computer Entertainment, Playstation 3 version, 2013

cut-scene.

The story starts in 2013 in Texas; the set is a living room; a

father is coming back late at home and his daughter

presumably fell asleep while waiting for him. When he

comes back, he is on the phone with a certain Tommy,

talking about work. His daughter hears him and wakes up.

She was waiting to give him a watch as a birthday present.

Later in the evening as she fell asleep again on the couch in

front of television, her father is carrying her to her bed.

After an ellipse, later in the night, the phone is ringing,

waking up the girl. It's her uncle Tommy on the phone, he

calls her by her name, Sarah; and asks in an anxious tone to

talk to her dad. But suddenly in the middle of his sentence,

the communication is cut.

From this moment the game starts and the player takes

control of Sarah. The player has a very limited choice of

actions. Sarah can only walk around and execute some

contextual actions. To put it briefly, Sarah can walk, very

slowly; she can also open doors and observe some objects

of the house.

By limiting the range of possible actions, the game is

orienting the way the game should be played. It helps to

build up an ambiance. Indeed, simply by experiencing the

limits of the gameplay, the player is likely to understand

what to do to unfold the story; in this case, mainly exploring.

The fact Sarah is walking slowly in addition to the

environment of her home at night is modeling the anxious

mood of the game experience. If the player decides to

wander around in Sarah's room, she can observe objects in

the room. In particular, a birthday card Sarah forgot to give

to her father. For instance, even if it is not the most obvious

example, there is a dialog between Sarah and this object.

Sarah has to make a contextual action — using the cross

button of the Playstation gamepad — to observe the object

on the table. It is an action of the first category — just like

walking or opening doors — triggered by the player himself.

Yet when she observes it, it triggers a dialog part where she

explains what it is. So the object affected the player's

character, it is an interaction of the second category.

Basically, an action of the player triggered a sequence of

narrative actions. Some may say it is a short term return to

the String and Pearls pattern. But Sarah could as well not

observe this object on the table and continue to walk in the

house. It is a way to reward players who like to explore, by

deepening their experience of the game's background story.

When the player leads Sarah outside of the room, she starts

to call for her dad. The player controls her movements, but

she does not cease to be a character with her own motives.

The player now understands why he is moving the character;

he is not the character, but he is her accomplice and he now

knows the goal to reach. The player could directly take the

stairs and go to the ground floor. However, there is light and

the sound of a television coming from the room next door.

Other recent games would have used an artificial trick —

like a red glowing contour — to indicate to the player where

to go next. The use of logically integrated visual clues —

without any Heads-up display (HUD) — is a really simple

way to show the path, but it keeps the immersion, and as a

result enhances the experience. It is a brilliant use of visual

and audio cues to control the player's actions. When

addressing the correlation of storytelling and level design,

Schell advises the same observed solution. He describes it

as control over the player's eyes.

One of the keys to good level design is that the

player's eyes pull them through the level,

effortlessly. It makes the player feel in control

and immersed in the world. Understanding

what pulls the eye of the player can give you

tremendous power over the choices players

want to make.

However the examples given in the book are merely

scratching the surface, Schell was mainly addressing this

issue with pure level design, in the sense of design of the

environment. While in this example from The Last of us,

not only visual clues in the environment are used; but the

game also makes wide use of the camera's position and

spatialized sound effects. The game keeps control over the

overall shape of the environment, the signs it conveys, the

point of view from where it is displayed and even the sound

it emits; but the player keeps his feeling of freedom. The

player does not even seek control over those parameters

because he is too busy controlling the character and

experiencing the story.

Inside this room, judging the environment, the player

understands it might be the father's room. It now looks even

more natural that the character came here first to look for

him. The player doesn't realize it, but he was manipulated,

he was given an impression of total freedom as in fact he

was on a rail track. A player feels he could go downstairs

first, but the camera angle, the light under the door and the

sound of the television will convince him to take a little

look into that room first. Without this implicit rail track, the

rhythm of the storytelling would have been weaker. Player's

could have visited the entire house before entering the

father's room; it would have discredited the controlled

character as being part of this story. The television

broadcasts a live report about a fire in Boston. Sarah

realizes it is nearby her home.

Suddenly, there is an explosion and the broadcast stops.

Schell, “The Art of Game Design:”, Kindle locations 5466-8075

Then the player is urged to press the left stick, with a quick

time event — an icon appearing on the screen to tell the

player to press a given button — When the player presses

the button, the camera automatically turns toward the

window. At this moment, there is another explosion in the

district, this time, visible from the window. As in the rest of

the game, quick time events will take a prominent place; this

sequence serves as a kind of gameplay tutorial; yet it is less

intrusive than popping up a verbose explanation about

game controls on the screen

However, if the player had decided to go downstairs

anyway, the explosion would have been triggered while

Sarah was walking down the stairs. And the player would

definitively miss the sequence with the television, but the

rhythm of the storytelling would be kept intact.

When Sarah finally reaches the ground floor, through a

window, we can see police cars with sirens wailing,

crossing very fast. Suddenly her father's phone is ringing.

Once again it is a way to orient the player. if the player

decides to pick the phone, Sarah can see her uncle left

several messages to her father. Now Sarah is in the kitchen

and she can see the note her father left earlier on the fridge.

A message she supposedly already read before; left to tell

her he would come back late from work.

Outside the house, we can hear a dog barking, as if

something very unusual was happening. But while Sarah is

crossing the house, the dog barks of pain one last time,

Sarah startles and then the ambiance becomes strangely

silent. The dog got killed by something out there. Even if

there was no real “dog object” in the game, we could

consider this event as belonging to the 3rd category of

actions: An action of a non-playable object on another non-

But later in the game, Last of us is no exception and also makes use of verbose HUD

pop-up tutorials.

playable object. This use of sound is a method often used

in movies to build up the suspense, but in this situation, the

game-play didn't stop at all.

When Sarah reaches what seems to be the office of her

father, he arrives suddenly through the door.

He is very distraught; he talks about the neighbors who

seem to be sick and urges his daughter to keep away from

the doors. At first, while he is talking, the player still can

play and move Sarah around. But when suddenly the

neighbor enters the room, the player loses control, and we

go back to the string phase. In a cut scene, her father shoots

the neighbor turned into a zombie and takes his daughter

outside where his brother is waiting to take them away.

This first gameplay sequence of The Last of us is one

example of today's game story-telling at its best, for the

following reasons:

First of all, The Last of us is a survival horror game based

on third person shooter mechanics; however, the game is

introduced without the shooting mechanics. It is focusing

on a character which is not the main protagonist of the game,

and it forces you to experience what it is like to be a

harmless little girl in that apocalyptic situation. Even if the

game doesn't give the player an experience fully playable

— as there are some non-playable cut-scenes — it makes

an admirable effort to build up most of the story telling in

the playable sequences.

Secondly, we will later discover there was a dramaturgical

reason for this introduction to the game.

Indeed, further in the introduction, the player starts to

control the main character of the game, Joel. In this first

sequence, Joel has to carry his daughter Sarah to protect her

from the infected people who attack them. He puts himself

in a situation of danger, and this gameplay sequence is just

about escaping the zombies. In other words, the player's

freedom is still limited to locomotion. At the end of this

sequence Joel fails, and Sarah is shot by a soldier who

received the order to let no one leave the city.

This whole sequence was dramaturgically speaking, a

prologue to the story; as we will discover that it was

introducing the game's main theme: the filial relationship.

The rest of the story happens 20 years later and introduces

us to the character of Ellie, that Joel will have to protect,

even though he is afraid of this responsibility — because

of what happened to his own daughter. Slowly, the

character of Ellie will echo the character of Sarah. She will

not replace Sarah, but she definitely puts the character of

Joel in the same situation again. A father struggling to

protect his “daughter”.

This opening sequence is entirely part of the game's

dramatics, and the scene where Joel carries his daughter to

save her, is a variation on the principle of Chekhov's Gun,

at the difference it is told through gameplay. In words of

Anton Chekhov (1889), “One must never place a loaded

rifle on the stage if it isn't going to go off. It's wrong to make

promises you don't mean to keep.”

By extension, in dramatics, Chekhov's gun, became the

generic appellation for the principle of placing an element

or a situation that will take a wider importance later in the

story.

Indeed, the game is introduced with this sequence where

Joel has to carry Sarah in his arms, and ends up failing in

saving her life. At the end of the game, Joel finds himself

in the same situation and have to save Ellie who fell

Wikipedia contributors, “Chekhov's gun”,

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chekhov's_gun (accessed on

November 1, 2014)

unconscious. Even though the game is based on mechanics

of shooting and infiltration, the fact it starts with Sarah and

ends with Ellie reveals the game's intention to address

deeper issues. The classic video-game theme of survival in

a post-pandemic environment becomes incidental to the

father-daughter relationship that Joel — who lost his

daughter — and Ellie — who is orphan — are building

throughout the game.

To summarize, in this introductory sequence, the game is

establishing a dialog between the player's actions and

environmental actions. Player's actions being therefore

limited to basic locomotion movements; environmental

actions and camera scripting were vectoring the passive

narration. A narration that serves to convey strong emotions

and ethical questions to the player. Cutscenes aside, it was

an interactive experience making sense and questioning

morals throughout a story deeply nested into the gameplay.

The game is a tool conveying an experience to the player.

This experience can be ethical, emotional, fun or immersive.

However, a game experience should never limit the feeling

of freedom of the player; because it is the heart of what

makes it a game experience. Yet a better understanding of

the signification workings specific to games is necessary to

enhance the story experience games can offer.

II The semiosis in video games

The field of Semiotics is often defined as partitioned into

three different sub-fields: the Semantics, the Pragmatics

and the Syntax. However it is unlikely that all the three

fields could intrinsically apply to games. That is why this

chapter will focus at first mainly on Semantics and

Pragmatics; but also on concepts proper to Semiotics.

Syntactics being implicitly affiliated to Linguistics, and its

main purpose being the construction of sentences; study of

game semiotics through Syntactics would seem difficult

and unnatural. However by the end of this chapter, we will

try to approach a definition of what could be game

Syntactics.

Trying to understand the underlying semiotics in games, is

arguably a necessary step in the evolution of game design.

This article will intend to bring a highlight on this field

which seems to be still rarely explored.

For explanatory purpose, we will expose a few basics of

semiotics as described by Charles Sanders Peirce (1894).

Semiotics is generally described as the theory of signs and

symbols.

First of all, the basic studied concept in semiotics is the sign

or representamen. Representamen are denoting objects.

And Sanders separates representamen's way to denote

objects into three categories: the icons, the indexes and the

symbols. The icons, also called likenesses, are signs that

intend to look like the object they stand for. Photographs,

sound recordings or even imitations are relevant examples

of this category of signs. Icons are generally standing for

the object, just as if they were the object; it is a unary

signification.

The indexes, or in Peirce's early words, the indices, are

signs denoting their object in virtue of a real relation. Peirce

gives us the example of a clock indicating the time of the

day. Another handy example to add could be smoke as an

index of fire. An index is generally defined by a binary

relationship between the sign and the object. The sign being

ontologically different from the object it stands for.

Finally, the symbol is a more complex sign. Symbols are

signifying through conventions or rules. It is a ternary

relationship between the sign, the rule and the object it

stands for. The word bird, for example, is signifying the

actual animal through the convention of the English

language. Thus there is a ternary relationship between the

word, the rule of the language, and the actual bird.

But Peirce does not only define signs with their way to

denote objects. He also defines them intrinsically, with the

terms of qualisign, sinsign, and legisign; and as represented

by an interpreter with the terms of rheme, dicisign, and

argument. Peircean semiotics defined three trichotomies of

signs.

The first trichotomy defines signs' own phenomenological

categories. This first trichotomy starts with the qualisign.

The qualisign is the first possibility of signification; a sign

yet to be embodied, a unary impression prefiguring a sign.

Then comes the sinsign, which is a sign with an actual

connection with reality, it is determined in space and time.

And thirdly is the legisign, a sign existing as a convention

or a rule.

The second trichotomy, the one described at first; it is the

trichotomy of icon, index, and symbol.

The third trichotomy is based on the interpreter's perception

of the signs. The rheme is the primary interpretation of a

sign, it represents all possibilities of interpretation. It is a

variable data affording some information, but not

interpreted as doing so. A dicisign is also called a

proposition, it necessarily involves a rheme as part of it.

This proposition may be true or false but does not give any

reasons for its truthness or its falseness. And at last comes

the argument, which could be defined as a sign denoting

another sign as its object. The argument is the rule

Charles Sanders Peirce, “What Is a sign”,

http://www.iupui.edu/~peirce/ep/ep2/ep2book/ch02/ep2ch2.htm,

§3-§6, 1894 (accessed on November 5, 2014)

defending the truthness or the falseness of a proposition.

Those nine words and their mutual relationship are defining

Peirce's Theory of Sign as a whole.

However this short article will focus on the way signs

denote their objects in video-games; thus we will mainly

refer to game representamen with the terms of icon, index

and symbol.

In words of the field of Semantics, we would talk about

signifiers for representamen, and about denotation to

designate the object. This article will also make use of these

words when it judges it necessary for a better intelligibility

of the thought.

In semiotics, the whole process of signification is called the

semiosis, it is describing the production of meaning in a

complex system of signs, might they be intentional or

unintentional, human or non-human. Semiosis is

commonly described as a triadic concept. A sign and a

context producing a signification. If someone raises her

hand in a classroom, it will mean she is asking the teacher

for the authorization to talk; however if that person raises

her hand in the street, it may mean she is asking for a taxi.

The sign is the same but they belong to a different semiosis.

This comprehension of signifiers through a context is

commonly accepted as what defines the basis of Pragmatics.

Thus as stated earlier, the game is conveying an experience,

and an experience is a form of context; so what we will try

to understand is the workings of the semiosis in video-

games.

So basically, to understand the semiotics of video-games,

concepts from semantics and pragmatics will have to be

identified within games. To recognize those processes we

Charles Sanders Peirce, “Philosophical Writings of Peirce”, Dover

Publications, Kindle locations 1997-7992, 1955 (Kindle edition)

will have to identify the different signifying units from

games, from the shortest to the most complex. This paper

does not pretend to be able to find them all, but it will

attempt to establish a basis for future research.

Of course, there is the easy part of game semiotics; games

being simulations, they will often try to reproduce a

realistic experience. For this purpose games will make a

wide use of icons. In most cases, the constitutive elements

of a game level will be mere icons. Within a game level, a

3d representation of a tree is a sign that intend to look like

the denoted object. So this representation is an icon. The

same statement can be made about the sound of the wind in

the branches of the tree, it is an iconic representation of the

real sound. As long as there is no interaction with the player,

or with other game objects, every signs in a game

environment are icons.

However, to get a better perspective, let us come back to

the lifeblood concepts of ludology Frasca borrowed to the

French Sociologist Roger Caillois (1961): the paidia and

the ludus. Caillois, back in the 60's was talking about games

in the conventional sense; he was classifying games on a

continuum going from ludus to paidia. Ludus being a game

existing under a set of rules of play, while paidia defines

games existing as an unstructured and spontaneous

experience.

Games belonging to the paidia are more

likely to use icons as their building blocks. On the other

hand, games belonging to ludus are based on rules, in virtue

of what — as symbols are based on a relation with a rule —

they are likely to make more use of symbols. One of the

most archaic occurrence of the ludus is the game of chess.

The rider in a chess game — considering it is representing

a horse — can be perceived at first as an icon; but it is in

Roger Caillois, “Men, Play and Games”, trans. Meyer Barash,

University of Illinois Press, .13, 1961

fact a symbol because it is implying the rules of movement

attached to it in the chess game. Only the rider can move in

L pattern.

But for now, let us come back to video games. For this

purpose, we will take again the well-known example of

Super Mario Bros., in which every level feature special

yellow blocks with a question mark symbol. The question

mark in itself is a linguistic symbol; when used at the end

of the sentence, it signifies the sentence should be

interpreted as a question.

In this case, the question mark and the yellow block are a

symbol peculiar to the world of Mario. This symbol notifies

the player that if he jumps under this particular yellow

block, he will get a special bonus without knowing what it

is in advance. It could be a mushroom, a flower or a green

mushroom. Please note that all these bonuses are also

variations on symbols.

The world of Super Mario Bros. is making use of a symbol

everyone knows — the question mark — to formulate a rule

of its own that everyone may understand at first sight. In

this way, it creates a symbol proper to this game. It is

already a form of semiosis.

But if we imagine a player coming from a culture that does

not use question marks in its writing system — despite how

unlikely it might be in our contemporary society — this

player might have to experience several times the use of the

question mark block in order to understand empirically the

random factor of the bonus generation.

On the other hand, in a 2d platformer, a floating platform is

an index. A platform alone indicates a surface on which the

player's character may stand. In most classic platformers,

the level design will involve three key features in order to

create a challenge: goals, risks, and paths. And these

features will appear in the game as signifiers.

Let us now place the previously described platform sign in

a situation we may encounter in a Mario game. We picture

a game situation where there is a goal, a path to reach it,

and a risk. Mario is in a castle, on the right side of the screen

there is a door. This door is a sign — more precisely an

index — it indicates there is an exit to this part of the level,

so this door will be a goal to reach.

In the middle of the level, there is a pit full of magma. The

magma as an icon represents fire, but as an index, it

indicates one may be burnt if he touches it, so it becomes a

symbol of danger. The magma is a risk.

Also, over the magma, there are several levitating platforms.

As a singular sign, the platform is an index; it barely

indicates that Mario could stand on it. But the combination

of the door on the right side, the magma — that prevents

Mario to simply walk to the door — and the platforms,

irregularly aligned over the magma, is transfiguring what

would be an abstract patchwork of decorative platforms,

into a path. The signification of the path arises from the

combination of the signs.

The combination of the signs is a virtual context, a game

semiosis. This path of platforms would not have been

comprehensible in a different game semiosis.

This example is a very simple one, and the semiosis serves

the designer's objective. In a platformer, the designer's

objective will be to challenge the player's ability to

correctly jump from platform to platform to reach a given

goal. What if the designer is driven by a different type of

goal? What if the designer aims at conveying an ethical

message or a story?

The three ideas of goal, risk, and path mentioned before, are

there to be symbolized in the context of a platformer, and

by extension in the context of action games. But other types

of games, with other types of motives, may involve other

types of concepts.

For example, in The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time

;

one of the hidden objectives of the game design was to

enhance the identification process of the player. In the

Legend of Zelda series, the main character — generically

called Link — is an avatar of the player. The player can

name him however he wants. The Legend of Zelda is one

of my all-time favorite game series since my childhood. If

I grew an interest in video-games, it is because of this

particular game. For me, Link's name had always been

“Fred” and not Link. He is a projection of my own

personality. And this strong identification process was

brilliantly controlled by the game semiosis. Link is a mute

character, except a few “Yes” or “No”, he does not

pronounce any sentence in the game. However, he is

unconsciously perceived by players as a talking character.

How come is this even possible?

The player's perception of the dialogs is manipulated by the

virtual semiosis. For instance, when the player presses the

interaction button in front of an NPC, the game never

displays the line of the avatar; the NPC will directly answer

a hypothetical question. His answer to this unasked

question will include enough indices of the question's

existence to have the player formulating the question in his

own mind afterward.

Even when the game gives several options to the player, the

options will take the form of very general topics. It is only

when the player chooses a topic, that the answer he gets,

will give him indices about the question he supposedly

Shigeru Miyamoto, “The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time”,

Nintendo 64, Nintendo, 1998

asked.

Here's a made up example to clarify this point: When a

player interacts with an NPC, the game may ask her to

choose between talking about flowers or clouds, without

any more precision on the nature of what Link will ask. If

she chooses flower, the game will not display the sentence

Link supposedly pronounced. The NPC will answer

something like: “Oh, you want to know more about the

magic flowers of the north? Maybe you should see my

grandmother, she might be able to help you!” The NPC is

summarizing the question of Link within his dialog part.

With this summary, the player can formulate the question

in his own words. Thus he will be able to assimilate his

avatar as an extension of himself. After all, the choice of

the generic name Link might not have been innocent. The

main character is the link between the virtual world and the

player.

Now let us regress to the example of real-time strategy, for

it is a type of game that proved itself an excellent

storytelling device. In strategy games, even if in most cases

the goal will consist of destroying your adversary's

infrastructures, it does not stand as a law.

The motive of strategy games is to challenge the mind of its

player. Unless it is challenging for the player's mind to do

so; the motive of a strategy game is not to have the player

crushing his enemies.

Even in Westwood studios' (1992) Dune 2: The Battle for

Arrakis

— considered as the earliest real-time strategy

game — mission goals were more heteroclite than mere

confrontation. This game was the first RTS, but every

ingredient of modern games was already there.

Joseph Bostic, Aaron E. Powell, Brett Sperry, “Dune: The Battle for

Arrakis”, Westwood Studios, Virgin Interactive, 1992

In this game, to earn credits — Dune's currency — one

would have to harvest the Spice. In some missions, the goal

could be simply to harvest a certain amount of Spice. In

another mission, the player would have to send a single unit

in an enemy building. In every mission, the player would

have to get to know the terrain and build the necessary

infrastructures to reach the goal of the mission. So, in fact,

an RTS game would need signifiers for the following

concepts: goal, knowledge, and resources.

In opposition to a platformer, for example, enemy units

don't only play the role of obstacles. Despite the fact they

may attack you or defend themselves, they may be

obstacles, just as they may be themselves the goal of your

mission

. In an RTS, any object geographically localized

on the map, or anything quantifiable may become a goal.

So in Dune, the goal could be identified only through

knowledge. In a classic mission, if the player has to destroy

the enemy's basement, she will have to find the basement's

location first in order to prepare her strategy. In Dune —

just like in Warcraft later — the player sees the map from a

top-down point of view. But the player can only see the

parts of the terrain already explored by his units. When his

units will leave a part of the terrain, he will know the

topography, but will not know if an enemy unit walks in

there. This system is called the Fog of War

, it is an index

of unexplored or unmonitored parts of the map. It takes the

form of a totally black zone when it is yet to explore. When

units leave a portion of the terrain without proper oversight,

it becomes grayish, and would not update in case of an

enemy intrusion. Black zones indicate that a part of the map

is unexplored, and the gray layer indicates that we can't get

For example if the goal is to capture particular enemy units.

From the German military concept Nebel des Krieges introduced by

the Prussian military analyst Karl Von Clausewitz in 1837

enemy’s position unless we send our own units there.

Knowledge is symbolized through the contrasted semiosis

of unexplored, unmonitored and occupied parts of the map.

The resources are indicated by the amount of credits

displayed in the HUD. But knowledge of the terrain will

also help to find the reddish fields indicating the presence

of Spice to harvest. One may decide where to settle a

basement only after checking if there is Spice nearby.

A player may have a lot of credits, if she has no more Spice

to harvest, the context indicates her that she will soon run

out of resources if she does not explore to find other fields

to exploit.

Also in Dune, any infrastructure the player may build need

power. To furnish electricity to her infrastructures, the

player will need to build wind-traps. Those are small power

plants capturing the wind power to transform it into

electricity. But building wind-traps will cost credits and

space. In fact, ludologically speaking, the wind is not the

resource. Arrakis, the planet where the game is set, is wind-

swept literally everywhere on its surface.

No, what indicates the second resource after credits/Spice,

is exploitable space. On Arrakis, you have two types of

terrain: Sand and rocks. Sand indicates that exploration is

possible but not settlement; as black rock zones are the

index of a plausible settlement. But these black zones

constitute a really small amount of most game maps.

Resources are quantifiable only within the semiosis of

collected credits, available settlement space, and

exploitable spice fields.

To summarize, in Dune, knowledge permits to identify the

goal's position and to find resources in order to establish a

strategy to reach this goal. It is based on concepts that are

quite different from those used in 2d platformers.

In Warcraft 2, in some campaign missions, different goals

were given to the player along a single mission. The

succession of goals to reach was building up a story within

the gameplay. This game series even introduced special

characters in the form of unique units. Warlords,

commanders, and other important characters — may they

be controllable or not by the player — were participating to

the story-telling just like a movie actor would do.

For instance, one of the key events of the game was the

death of Anduin Lothar. This event was happening during

one of the last missions of the game. The inability of the

player to save this character was organized by the level

design. The character was an NPC, he was in a zone the

player could not reach with his units, and was ambushed by

enemy units.

Even if the games we took as examples, dot not take story-

telling as an intrinsic priority; the succession of different

goals to reach, the scripted actions of game characters and

the overall control over what the player should do, meet the

description of what defines a narrative. A report of

connected events presented in a sequence of signification

modules. In linguistics, those signification modules are

words and sentences. In movies, the modules take the form

of shots, sounds, and sequences. Namely, what are the

modules intrinsic to games?

A game level, for example, has more to do with a difficulty

progression module than with a signification module. In the

previous chapter, we defined three types of game

verbs/actions. The actions performed by the player, actions

of non-playable game objects affecting the player's avatar(s)

and finally actions that are only affecting non-playable

objects. For a simplification purpose, we will call the

actions of the player actum

, the actions affecting the

player tactum

and the actions occurring between non-

playable objects factum

. So we may now affirm that the

littlest signifying modules in video-games are the objects

and the actions. Objects can be categorized as different

types of signs, while actions can be divided into the three

previously mentioned categories.

Also, will we call an association of objects and actions

acting as a semiotic proposition, a ludophrase

. What this

paper defines as a ludophrase is an in-game interaction that

changes the course of the game.

Once again we will use an example situation from Super

Mario Bros., as this game's brilliant simplicity and

popularity make it a wonderful vulgarization device. If

Mario jumps under a question mark block, his jump is

basically an actum. And when the block releases, for

example, a flower bonus; this interaction of two non-

playable objects is a factum. No matter if it is a

consequence of the actum, as Mario can still be moved by

his player during this consequent action. The relation of

causality between the actum and the factum is induced by

temporality. This small interaction sequence is already

definable as a ludophrase.

Some will say that what I just described is simply a game

mechanics. Yes, it is, but only secondarily. As it is a

ludophrase which is, in this peculiar case, reused all along

the game as a game mechanics. All game mechanics are

ludophrases, but all ludophrases are not game mechanics.

Then if Mario decides to touch the flower, the action of

Wikitionary, http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/actus#Latin

Wikitionary, http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/tactus#Latin

Wikitionary, http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/factus#Latin

Neologism from the Latin Ludum which means game and phrasis,

which means diction.

Mario — may he be walking or jumping — is still an actum;

but the transformation of Mario is a tactum. The contact

with the flower affected Mario's appearance, but also his

range of actums.

When Mario touches a flower, he becomes able to throw

fireballs. The activation of this new possibility of action is

also a tactum of the flower. However, the action of throwing

fireballs itself is still an actum.

The entire sequence of Mario touching the flower and

transforming in Fire Mario is a second ludophrase. The

succession of these two ludophrases is constitutive of a

rudimentary in-game narrative. The glue sticking signs and

actions together is a form of game syntax.

The semiotics of time plays an important role in the

Syntactics of games. For instance, we saw that the

immediate consecutiveness of an actum and a factum

implied that the factum was a result of the actum. Also, this

rule of consecutiveness applies to most actions. Except that,

an actum can never be a direct consequence of a factum or

a tactum. The actum is highly depending on the player's

eagerness to act; it can be a reaction but will never be a

consequence. But in video-games, what mainly stands as

syntax is the virtual semiosis itself.

III Theoretical Design perspectives behind

game Semiotics

What if we design games without the purpose of adapting a

storyline to justify the game mechanics? What if the game

mechanics serves the storyline? What if we forget about

mechanics and make a game only out of ludophrases?

Since the appearance of video-games, what seemed like the

most natural way to create content was to stick to the formal

definition of games: A form of competitive activity or sport

played according to rules.

The notion of interactivity

implied the notion of competition indirectly. Not all video-

games are about competition. But in truth, most games

provide the player with challenges. Games are about having

the player doing something. It is then difficult not making

it look like a challenge. But challenges are not necessarily

about competition.

If we take the example of a game like Will Wright's (1989)

Sim City

; the game does not ask the player to compete

with anyone or anything except himself.

In Sim City, the player is given the challenge of building

his own city and making it prosper. It is a challenge because

the settlement of the city is not made easy. For example, the

player will have to balance a budget, to build industrial

zones while taking into account the effects of pollution or

to control the criminality rate in his city. This game is a

simulation, and in a simulation, the player is given a lot of

parameters he can influence. The game will consist in

observing and understanding how one's own changes in

these parameters affect the simulation. And actually, it is a

pretty fun experience.

To make it look more like a “game”, the designers also

included a game mode with timed missions; in another

word: scenarios.

Those scenarios were placing a context in order to give a

goal to the player: it could be about reducing the criminality

rate in Detroit, or rebuilding the city of San Francisco after

a major earthquake. The game could be, or a never-ending

simulation, or a timed scripted simulation. But in every case,

the game happened to be entertaining, mainly as an

Oxford Dictionary,

http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/game#game

(Accessed on November 11, 2014)

Will Wright, “Sim City”, Maxis, Pc version, 1989

experience that involved a form of interactivity challenging

the player’s mind.

A video-game does not need rules or competition to deserve

to be called so. What defines the essence of a video-game

is its ability to convey an entertaining and interactive virtual

experience. This experience may be a challenge, a

competition, or even a story. Goals are essential to invite

players to interact, and challenges enhance the player's

experience. But if the player's experience could be

enhanced by something else than challenge — without

abandoning interactivity — would it still be as entertaining?

It is not a challenge to enjoy a good story, but it is still

entertaining.

Along a hundred and twenty years of history, movies

managed to adapt literary stylistic devices and even to

create devices of their own. It would be interesting to see if

video-games could do the same. Who knows what form

could take a metaphor in a game's virtual semiosis? For

instance, the repetitive process of game mechanics could be

stylistically assimilated to an anaphora. A game mechanics

is a repetition of ludophrases that helps the designer to

emphasize the inner workings of her game. Game

mechanics are a peculiar form of Anaphora, yet anaphoras

could arguably take other forms in video-games.

Let us imagine a game which is aimed simply at providing

a moving experience. Why would such a game choose just

one camera system, or just one set of game mechanics? For

example, camera systems are generally chosen for their

particular ergonomic contribution to a specific type of game.

Thus, third person shooters will use a camera attached

behind the avatar's shoulder, because it is the best way to

see the avatar while keeping the ability to aim and shoot.

For instance, it follows from the evolution of the gameplay

of the horror game series Resident Evil, that workings of

the game camera do influence the feelings of the player.

Shinji Mikami's (1996) Resident Evil

, was the Japanese

take on the survival horror genre introduced in France by

Frederic Raynal (1992) with Alone in the Dark

. Resident

Evil will later become a very prolific series, and its

gameplay will change a lot. At this time, the survival horror

genre was defined by a specific camera system. Indeed, in

the first Resident Evil — maybe partly for technical

optimization purpose — the camera was always standing

still. Technically, this system permitted the use of pre-

rendered background graphics.

As it was pre-rendered, the background could bear more

details; and more processing power could be used to render

the 3d characters in real-time. Yet this technical decision

was used to participate in the semiosis of fear the game was

aiming to convey. The still camera as a semiotic device was

limiting on purpose the virtual semiosis.

As an example, when the player was in a narrow corridor,

and a zombie was walking hidden behind a corner, the fixed

camera was a way to limit the information the player could

get. The semiosis of this ludophrase was composed of the

visible environment and the sound effects. Visually, the

player could see the iconic representation of the corridor.

He could also maybe see indexes, like blood spills on the

floor, indicating that someone — or something — was

bleeding here before.

From an audio perspective, effects could indicate the

presence of a zombie in the corridor. The player could hear

audio indexes of its steps and of its growls. But as the player

Shinji Mikami, “Resident Evil”, Capcom, Playstation version, 1996

Frédérick Raynal, Didier Chanfray, “Alone in the Dark”,

Infogrames, Pc version, 1992

do not control the position of the camera, he must cross the

corridor with fear of what he may find behind the corner.

This feeling of fear is almost impossible to convey through

a virtual semiosis that makes the player potentially

omniscient.

The notions of ergonomics and comfort of play did not

always affect game's emotional potential in a very good

manner. From the 4th episode of Resident Evil

, it was

decided to change the camera system. In this episode, the

game mechanics radically changed. The game adopted the

third person shooter camera. This camera permitted to have

wider environments and less scripted ludophrases. This

gain in freedom had to be paid with a loss of emotional

potential. Indeed, as the camera allows the player to be

virtually omniscient, it becomes more difficult to create a

feeling of anxiety when the player knows he holds all the

cards necessary to face any danger.

In the end, the game will feature more gory scenes and

overwhelm the player with a lot of enemies to compensate

this absence of fear in the game-play. The gory scenes will

convey a feeling of disgust; the overwhelming assault of

enemies will convey stress. But only an equation with

unknown factors can provoke fear and trigger courage.

Where Resident Evil 4 overwhelms the player with dozens

of intelligent and organized enemies to cause a vague

feeling of stress; Resident Evil was succeeding in

discomforting and scaring the hell out of players with just

one zombie walking very slowly in a creepy hallway. It was

brilliant.

Nowadays, games are focusing on simplicity and comfort

of play. And some types of features are depreciated because

Shinji Mikami, “Resident Evil 4”, Capcom, Gamecube version,

2005

they don't meet the ergonomic standards of our time.

However, despite its bad ergonomics, the still camera is a

good semiotic device. If a designer aims at creating a

discomforting experience, it should still be considered as a

weapon of choice.

If a game rather aims at providing a narrative experience to

its player, maybe should it not choose a particular game

system as a sports game would do.

Maybe should it prefer ludophrases that are matching the

mood the game aims to convey? A game does not

necessarily have to bear only one set of mechanics from the

beginning to the end.

For instance — for ergonomic purpose — in The Legend of

Zelda: Ocarina of Time, the game was featuring several sets

of game mechanics. When the player had to fight enemies,

for example, the camera system was changing.

In normal conditions — like simple exploration — the

camera is interactive and follows the main character. The

player can choose the point of view that suits him the most

by refocusing the camera behind him with the Z-button.

But when the player encounters an enemy, the Z-button will

focus the camera on the enemy. In this way, the player can

focus on the enemy and think of his actions to react

accordingly. As the game's combat system was based on the

observation of enemies' attack patterns, it was an efficient

way to have the player focusing on indexes of the future

attacks of the enemies.

For example, the Stalfos — a kind of skeleton warrior from

the universe of Zelda — had a very interesting attack

pattern. If the player does not choose the right moment to

strike him, he will jump and avoid the attack or use his

shield. The Stalfos can make a lot of quick attacks from

which only the use of the shield can protect Link. But at one

specific moment, the Stalfos will prepare a strong attack,

for this purpose he will lower his guard and raise his arm.

This is the index of a weakness; the player has to interpret

this indication to win the fight. Without a camera targeting

the enemy, it would have been difficult to observe those

patterns.

This special change in the camera system succeeds in

creating a feel of duel. However, there is still some criticism

that can be made of this system. First of all, it has the player

totally forgetting about the environment. And secondly, this

system does not match group fights. Indeed, it is very

difficult to fight several enemies when the camera forces

you to target one in particular. The game featured a change

target system but it was quite unhandy to use. But despite

a few induced weaknesses, the game managed to articulate

different kinds of ludophrases successfully through a set of

different game mechanics. This game is the living example

of the possible cohabitation of several sets of mechanics.

It confirms that it is possible to convey a meaning through

a gameplay that changes and evolves along the game

experience.

Let us clarify this with a made-up example. If we imagine

a game in which there is a shooting mechanics; in this kind

of games, the player's ability to shoot will depend mainly

on one parameter: having his rifle loaded or not. If the

character is no longer able to shoot because his magazine is

empty, the simple click noise of the trigger will be sufficient

as an index of the inability to shoot.

What if this ability to shoot depend on other parameters?

Could it not also depend on ethic parameters? Parameters

that would tell something about the personality of the

character?

So, if for example, the player tries to shoot a woman and

the avatar he controls refuses to shoot.

Even if it could be upsetting for the player, it would

nonetheless enrich the background of his character. It

would give him a personal moral code. This refusal of the

character would become an index of the existence of a

personality of his own. It indicates the differentiation

between this character and the player. It would have a

significance in the game's story. And if therefore women

characters are able to shoot the player’s avatar, it would also

give the game a peculiar strategic significance. It this case,

the controlled character would not have to be the player's

avatar, he would be a character with his own values. And

whether he shares those values or not, the player would

have to deal with it. This process is the opposite of the

identification process used in the Legend of Zelda series

(p.27). It prevents the player from identifying to his avatar.

However, it gives a supplement of humanity to the character.

Even if the player doesn't identify to his avatar, he can have

empathy for him. It is arguably the reason why most

character-centric games feature third-person camera

systems.

Recently I had a dream from which bloomed a game-design

idea. In this dream I saw a young girl, wearing a long white

silk dress, and walking in an old French colonial style house.

This house was lost in the middle of a lake. But the

reflection of the house on the surface of the water seemed

different. Inside the house, when the girl was passing in

front of a mirror, her reflection was different. Her dress and

her hair were floating, just as if she was walking underwater.

When I woke up from this dream, I immediately took a pen

to write a game idea. My idea was to adapt the literary genre

of fantastic into a game experience. Fantastic is a literary

genre in which the reader will end up questioning the reality

of the facts presented to him. For instance, in Guy de

Maupassant's (1887) fantastic novel The Horla; the main

character feels like he is attacked every night by an invisible

man who suddenly appeared in his life.

The story is told

from the character's perspective. So while reading the novel,

the reader is invited to wonder: Is the character becoming

crazy? Or is this really happening?

I imagined a game in which the player controls the ghost of

a drowned girl. This character is stuck in this lonely home

and tries to find an exit. She discovers that she can cross

some reflective surfaces as if they were portals; may it be

mirrors or the surface of the water. She would just have to

touch a mirror, and the camera would pass on the other side.

This other side would look like a totally different world

from the moment the character would walk into the blind

spot zone of the mirror. With the notion of boundary

underlying in this idea, I thought it could be interesting to

play with the notions of safety and trust in the ludophrases

I would choose to use. I tried to figure out what would

happen if you present something as a mechanics and then

suddenly change the rules. Imagine this character,

discovering her power to cross the mirrors. When taking the

control of her reflected self, the player would discover that

the topography of the house is totally different in this other

world. He would also understand that he can return to the

real world simply by touching the same mirror again.

For example, our character could be stuck by a closed door

in the real world. In this room, there would be two mirrors.

A normal one, in which she sees her true reflection, and in

which she could notice that there is a key on the floor. A

key which is not here in the real world.

But as this mirror is a plain one — she does not see the

underwater version of herself in the reflection — she cannot

Guy de Maupassant, “The Horla”, trans. Charlotte Mandell, Melville

House Publishing, 1887

cross it.

But there is a second mirror in this room. On the other side

of the room. This mirror is a portal. Her own reflection is

different in this one. So, when she touches the mirror, the

camera crosses the wall to the other side and the player

takes control of her reflection. This is a first ludophrase that

the player will interpret as a game mechanics. They will

understand that she can only cross mirrors when her

reflection is different.

On the other side, the scale of the room may be very

different. From the entrance, the player might see the key

on the floor of the room. But maybe the other side of the

room could be a hundred meters away. And maybe the way

to reach it could be full of holes in the floor. Behind her, she

can see her true form reflecting in the mirror she crossed.

The player crosses the room to get that key. Once he gets

the key, the player would notice that this version of the

room, features no door. He would then understand he will

have to cross a mirror again to open the door. The mirror

from which he saw the key is for its part still there. But

when the character walks in front of it, the version of the

character in the mirror is the ghostly version of this fake

world. When she touches this mirror, nothing happens. So

she will have to cross the room back to the first mirror.

In this first mirror, her real self is reflecting. When she

touches this one, she will return to the real world. From this

semiosis, the player will deduce the workings of the

mirror's mechanics. Only mirrors reflecting the character of

the other world can be crossed, and these mirrors can be

crossed from both sides. On the other hand, plain mirrors

cannot be crossed, from whichever version of the world.

These mechanics could be confirmed through a few other

analog game sequences.

However, suddenly, the player could experience a new case.

Once the player is used to this game-mechanics, we could

put him in a confusing situation.

For example, he could cross a mirror, to discover that on

the other side it becomes a plain mirror. A mirror from

which he cannot return in the real world. In this room, there

would be no other mirrors to exit. He would find himself

stuck in the other world. But while searching for another

mirror in the other world, he would find a door. A plain

wooden door.

When opening this door, and crossing to the other room, the

player would have the surprise to be back in the real world.

He would be back in a room he visited before and the

character would have her normal appearance again. But by

breaking the game mechanics which seemed to stand as a

rule in this world, we can have the player questioning the

supposed reality of the world he previously considered as

the real one. What was presented to the player as a game

mechanics was simply a ludophrase.

This ludophrase was so recurrent that the player interpreted

it as a rule. A quasi-scientific rule. These mechanics became

a normality in this fantastic world. But isn't it when the rules

of reality are broken that we truly dive into the fantastic

genre?

Players are used to magic and fantasy in video-games. And

those elements are often deeply rooted in the mechanics of

the game; in such way that players accept them as a

normality. When we play, we enter a world and we accept

its rules. So with the example of the mirrors, the mirror-

crossing mechanics is easily acceptable by the player as a

rule of the world he entered. This mechanic induced that the

world that seemed closer to our real world, was also the real

one in our virtual semiosis. After all, it is the place where

we start to play, and the character does not look like she is

floating in mid-water in this version of the virtual world.

But at the moment the player gets stuck in the other world

and cannot exit in the right way; as players understood that

the only path between those two worlds are mirrors.

Suddenly, a mere door serves as an exit from the mirror

world. The player will necessarily wonder how he came

back, as he did not respect the rules of this world.

Consequently, he will question the reality of the world in

which his character came back. Did he really came back, or

is he still in the mirror world? Is the mirror world less true

than the real world?

With this short example, just with ludophrases, we

highlighted a potential to approach the depth of fantastic

literature or cinematography in games. And it is likely that

the same thing could be achieved with other genres.

If we start to consider video-games primarily as an

interactive experience, built out of signs and ludophrases;

and if we make the game rules optional in this experience;

maybe we will be able to reach new perspectives in game

making. And slowly, as the semiotic of games will be better

understood, video-games will take their legitimacy as a

cultural media.

Conclusion

Whichever tool or media might they choose, artists will try to

convey emotions and stories through the mastery of a chosen

technique. This short essay is a form of manifesto. It is desirable to

reach a mastery of semiotics to give video games a wider

storytelling potential. This article was aimed at designers, as it is

their vision of our art that can change the way it is perceived as a

cultural object. Video-game is a media that goes far beyond the

standard definition of games. They are mainly an interactive

experience, and the notion of rule is in the end very optional. Despite

its propensity to borrow from other arts, video-game has its own

language. And this language has a strong potential to communicate

meaningful contents. Games are art, undoubtedly.

And it is now the designers' duty to expand the range of topics they

dare to address in video-games.

Ludography

Shigeru Miyamoto, “Super Mario Bros”, Nintendo,

Nintendo Entertainment System, 1985

Will Wright, “Sim City”, Maxis, Pc version, 1989

Shigeru Miyamoto, “The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the

Past”, Nintendo, Super Famicom, 1991

Joseph Bostic, Aaron E. Powell, Brett Sperry, “Dune: The

Battle for Arrakis”, Westwood Studios, Virgin Interactive,

1992

Frédérick Raynal, Didier Chanfray, “Alone in the Dark”,

Infogrames, Pc version, 1992

Ron Millar, Chris Metzen, “Warcraft II: Tides of

Darkness”, Blizzard entertainment, PC version, 1995

Shinji Mikami, “Resident Evil”, Capcom, Playstation

version, 1996

Shigeru Miyamoto, “The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of

Time”, Nintendo, Nintendo 64, 1998

Shinji Mikami, “Resident Evil 4”, Capcom, Gamecube

version, 2005

Neil Druckmann, Bruce Straley, “The Last of us”,

Naughty Dog, Sony Computer Entertainment, Playstation

3 version, 2013

Bibliography

Guy de Maupassant, “The Horla”, trans. Charlotte

Mandell, Melville House Publishing, 1887

Charles Sanders Peirce, “Philosophical Writings of

Peirce”, Dover Publications, 1955 (Kindle edition)

Roger Caillois, “Men, Play and Games”, trans. Meyer

Barash, University of Illinois Press, 1961

Gonzalo Frasca, “Simulation versus narrative:

Introduction to Ludology”, The Video Game Theory

Reader, Issue n° 1, September 18, 2003

Jesse Schell, “The Art of Game Design: A book of lenses”,

Taylor and Francis, 2008 (Kindle Edition)

Dylan Holmes, “A mind forever voyaging: a History of

story-telling in video-games”, CreateSpace, 2012

Miguel Sicart, “Defining Game Mechanics” in “The

International Journal of Computer Game Research”,

Volume 8 issue 2, Game Studies,

http://gamestudies.org/0802/articles/sicart , December

2008 (accessed on October 30, 2014)

Miguel Sicart, “Beyond Choices: The Design of Ethical

Gameplay”, MIT Press, 2013 (Kindle Edition)

Ludonarrativas y narrativa visual para videojuegos: caso Inka Madness

Research

Full-text available

Aug 2022

Resumen El presente artículo estudia uno de los elementos fundamentales en el diseño de videojuegos: la estructura narrativa que logre la inmersión del usuario en la construcción del mundo propuesto. Para ello se toma como ejemplo al juego Inka Madness, desarrollado en Perú con temática del imperio inca para el lanzamiento de Windows Phone. El caso presenta un manejo amplio de las estructuras narrativas con proyección al desarrollo de diversos productos transmedia, como obras de narrativa de ficción, animación o cómics. Palabras clave: Narrativa visual, estructura narrativa, ludonarrativa, gamificación, videojuegos. Abstract This article studies one of the fundamental elements in video game design: a narrative structure that achieves the user's immersion in the proposed world-building. For this, the game Inka Madness is taken as an example, developed in Peru with the theme of the Inca empire for the launch of Windows Phone. The case presents a broad management of narrative structures with a projection to the development of various transmedia products, such as narrative works of fiction, animation or comics.

Ludonarrativas y narrativa visual para videojuegos: el caso Inka Madness

Article

Dec 2023

El presente artículo estudia uno de los elementos fundamentales en el diseño de videojuegos: la estructura narrativa que logra la inmersión del usuario en la construcción del mundo propuesto. Para ello se toma como ejemplo al juego Inka Madness, desarrollado en Perú con temática del Imperio inca para el lanzamiento de Windows Phone. El caso presenta un manejo amplio de las estructuras narrativas con proyección al desarrollo de diversos productos transmedia, como obras de narrativa de ficción, animación o cómics.

The Ludic Framework: A Theory of Meaningful Gameplay

Conference Paper

Full-text available

Mar 2017

Frederic Seraphine

Using concepts from semiotics, aesthetics, and ludology, this paper is shaping a framework opening new perspectives on meaning and emotion evocation in videogames. While building upon the MDA Framework, it poses the problem of meaning production in game design when the traditional building block, the game mechanics, is a complex rule-based semiotic compound belonging to the Peircean thirdness. It proposes an alternative building block called the ludic at a higher level of abstraction, allowing for wider combinatory possibilities and deeper meaning production through the gameplay itself. It introduces an interpretation layer opening new possibilities for both narrative and emergent gameplay.

Playing or Being Played? Choice and Agency in Videogames: Reflecting on The Witcher III: Wild Hunt (2016)

Conference Paper

Jan 2022

Danielle Kleinerman

This paper interrogates how the videogame medium produces an engrossing and complex spectatorial experience, consistently challenging the user’s dimension of engagement. A reflexive analysis of the Witcher III: Wild Hunt (2016) encompasses a principal methodology; considering how play, spectatorship, and engagement merge into one. This paper homes in on how narrative directions and choices manipulate the will of the player, facilitated by preconceived and ongoing spectatorial influences. Semiotics, narratology, cinematography, ludology, and focalization theories fortify a conclusion that deconstructs the inherent fallacy present in narrative-based ludic choices, uncovering that their presence is a more an upholding of an inherent hegemonic structure and its boundaries.

A Strong Independent (Video Game) Woman? Examining Red from Transistor (2014)

Article

Full-text available

Apr 2019

Najma Litany Adhyaksana

In the 21 st century, gender representation in video games has improved as a response to growing criticisms of stereotyped, denigrating portrayals of women. Despite this progress, some of these depictions persist in female characters who appear in the medium, even within the independent (indie) video game scene. Examining Red as the protagonist of the independent role-playing game Transistor (Supergiant Games, 2014) through a semiotic lens, this paper investigates whether her character is in accordance with the prevailing trend of gender representation, especially as it pertains to sexualization and objectification. This paper argues that rather than sexualizing Red, the narrative and visual aspects of Transistor characterize her as a complex, powerful heroine. Moreover, she initially expresses a high level of autonomy in the game, subverting the damsel-in-distress trope. However, she ultimately loses her agency and succumbs to her dependency towards her male lover. As such, Red embodies contradictory concepts of empowerment and helplessness. This indicates that despite originating from an independent studio, the portrayal of Transistor ’s protagonist is still in line with the broader paradigm of gender representation in video games. Specifically, it challenges certain harmful stereotypes of women while reaffirming some of them.

Ludonarrative Dissonance: Is Storytelling About Reaching Harmony?

Article

Full-text available

Sep 2016

Frederic Seraphine

This paper is a literature review focusing on the term " Ludonarrative Dissonance " which was coined by the game designer and scriptwriter Clint Hocking in a blog post from 2007. Through diverse blog posts and academic papers that reused the term, this essay is attempting to identify a definition of the concept that factors the different ways it can be perceived. It identifies a dichotomy of concepts that participate in creating the dissonance: the opposition between incentives and directives and how it is handled both in the narrative and ludic structures. Relevance to design practice – This paper will help game designers and writers to understand what is at stake behind this concept of ludonarrative dissonance. It is identifying ways to avoid dissonance to happen, but also opens the possibility of a purposeful use of dissonance for designing deeper ludonarrative interactions.

Ludophrase: Ludics before Mechanics

Research

Full-text available

Aug 2016

Frederic Seraphine

A blog post about videogame semiotics which is an attempt at explaining the concept of Ludophrase. Ludophrase is a proposition for a semiotic building block that would possibly precede the game mechanics in the MDA framework. http://www.fredericseraphine.com/index.php/2016/08/19/ludophrases/

The Ludic Framework A Theory of Meaningf (2)

Data

Full-text available

Mar 2017

Frederic Seraphine

Beyond Choices: The Design of Ethical Gameplay

Book

Sep 2013

Miguel Sicart

How computer games can be designed to create ethically relevant experiences for players. Today's blockbuster video games—and their never-ending sequels, sagas, and reboots—provide plenty of excitement in high-resolution but for the most part fail to engage a player's moral imagination. In Beyond Choices, Miguel Sicart calls for a new generation of video and computer games that are ethically relevant by design. In the 1970s, mainstream films—including The Godfather, Apocalypse Now, Raging Bull, and Taxi Driver—filled theaters but also treated their audiences as thinking beings. Why can't mainstream video games have the same moral and aesthetic impact? Sicart argues that it is time for games to claim their place in the cultural landscape as vehicles for ethical reflection. Sicart looks at games in many manifestations: toys, analog games, computer and video games, interactive fictions, commercial entertainments, and independent releases. Drawing on philosophy, design theory, literary studies, aesthetics, and interviews with game developers, Sicart provides a systematic account of how games can be designed to challenge and enrich our moral lives. After discussing such topics as definition of ethical gameplay and the structure of the game as a designed object, Sicart offers a theory of the design of ethical game play. He also analyzes the ethical aspects of game play in a number of current games, including Spec Ops: The Line, Beautiful Escape: Dungeoneer, Fallout New Vegas, and Anna Anthropy's Dys4Ia. Games are designed to evoke specific emotions; games that engage players ethically, Sicart argues, enable us to explore and express our values through play.

Philosophical Writings of Peirce

Article

Jan 1955

Charles Sanders Peirce

Sim City

Book

Jan 1989

Defining Game Mechanics

Article

Dec 2008

Miguel Sicart

This article defins game mechanics in relation to rules and challenges. Game mechanics are methods invoked by agents for interacting with the game world. I apply this definition to a comparative analysis of the games Rez, Every Extend Extra and Shadow of the Colossus that will show the relevance of a formal definition of game mechanics.

Simulation Versus Narrative: Introduction to Ludology

Chapter

Jan 2003

Gonzalo Frasca

The Art of Game Design: A book of lenses

Book

Aug 2008

Jesse Schell

Anyone can master the fundamentals of game design - no technological expertise is necessary. The Art of Game Design: A Book of Lenses shows that the same basic principles of psychology that work for board games, card games and athletic games also are the keys to making top-quality videogames. Good game design happens when you view your game from many different perspectives, or lenses. While touring through the unusual territory that is game design, this book gives the reader one hundred of these lenses - one hundred sets of insightful questions to ask yourself that will help make your game better. These lenses are gathered from fields as diverse as psychology, architecture, music, visual design, film, software engineering, theme park design, mathematics, writing, puzzle design, and anthropology. Anyone who reads this book will be inspired to become a better game designer - and will understand how to do it.

Horla

Article

Vyd. 3

Men, Play and Games " , trans

Jan 1961

Roger Caillois

Roger Caillois, " Men, Play and Games ", trans. Meyer Barash, University of Illinois Press, 1961

Dune: The Battle for Arrakis

Jan 1992

Joseph Bostic
Aaron E Powell
Brett Sperry

Joseph Bostic, Aaron E. Powell, Brett Sperry, "Dune: The Battle for Arrakis", Westwood Studios, Virgin Interactive, 1992

Warcraft II: Tides of Darkness

Jan 1995

Ron Millar
Chris Metzen

Ron Millar, Chris Metzen, "Warcraft II: Tides of Darkness", Blizzard entertainment, PC version, 1995

The Intrinsic Semiotics of Video-Games

Abstract

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