Literature, Warfare, Omelas, and Rain

A New Literature

J. Hillis Miller: "The end of literature is at hand. Literature's time is almost up. It is about time. It is about, that is, the different epochs of the different media" (On Literature, 1). This is true, for the death of the Author would inevitably lead to the death of literature, an appropriation of the narrative by the audience in the absence of authorial command and content. The phoenix of literature and narrative will break outward, explode, while, because of its age and its culture, implode. Hamlet: "This is the imposthume of much wealth and peace,/That inward breaks, and shows no cause without/Why the man dies..." (Hamlet IV.iv). The deterritorialization of modernity and postmodernity can no longer insist on definitions, no longer conscript meaning within the purview of the hegemony. Narrative qua narrative, literature qua narrative--this is the game, the reterritorialization of the audience as author. The old death of the Author, with reader response and deconstruction, must capitulate to the new death of the Literature as the game moves outward, expanding into and exploring the form of what it means to be.

Theory can predict in loose outlines the path the game must take, but the game itself is powerless to take any form and any path independent from the gamer. Theory can sketch the outward forms, the inward importance, of the game, but the game itself must take the gamer to those signposts. Yet the gamer misappropriates power, assuming that the game exists for the outward expression only. Or the gamer misinterprets the narrative, assuming that the game's story speaks for the inward exploration only. The gamer is always already outside the game--literally and theoretically. The game exists without the gamer, but without the game, there is no gamer. The ideal contingency of what is transcribed within the algorithm has context only based upon the unideal within the gamespace, the reality of the world perceived.

The game points to the Enlightenment more forcefully than other media, as it stands alone in being the unreal responding to the real, a bundle of secondary qualities that can only operate through a medium of something with primary qualities. The oral history (and live performance) is transient and remembered only, incapable of being relived. The novel (and writing) is static and permanent, incapable of adapting to new times (rather, the times must readapt to the novel, for there is too much of worth to abandon the novel, despite the way the world advances). The film (and television) is static and capable of being relived, though what it relies on heavily is the spectacle of itself (much less than the game, yet still in a way that betokens the ambivalence of the medium). Al Gore: "Individuals receive, but they cannot send. They absorb, but they cannot share. They hear, but they do not speak. They see constant motion, but they do not move themselves" (Assault on Reason, 16). Thence comes the game in its ideal (the ideal of an ideal). The game is dynamic and capable of being relived, though its reliance on spectacle and its greatest strength (interaction) also weaken it to a point far from transcendence.

Modern Warfair

War has changed. In the digital, as in the real, there are rules of engagement. Some are unwritten and unsigned (don't camp; headshots get extra points), while others are unflinchingly imposed (Geneva conventions may be ignored in Abu Grahib and Gitmo, but no gamer can usurp the authority of the algorithm). The war outside of the game and the war inside of the game are inversions of each other. For the real soldier, there is no health pack, recharging of shields, or respawn point. For the virtual soldier, there is no politics, past life, or outside considerations. What preoccupies one does not preoccupy the other. The virtual soldier cares about reaching a checkpoint to prevent a loss of progress. The real soldier cares about reaching a safe haven to prevent the loss of life. The terms of the two represent each other only superficially, for the death in the game is immaterial, frustrating the ludonarrative impulse alone. Death on the battlefield is material and ambivalent, for the real soldier who dies does not know it.

Hence there is no playing at war, for war is not fair. The most skilled do not 'level up' or even make it home. Just war theory bears this out, as the premise for conflict is circumscribed by conditions that do not gel inside the new unreality of the game. Games such as Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2, Brothers in Arms, and the Halo franchise do not at all represent war. Even the in-limbo Six Days in Fallujah cannot make a game out of war. The lines are too dissimilar within. Yet the superficiality of the game and the war allow for parallels that bear analysis.

• Example: Those who are denied the right to play and the right to war are given to complaining (with forums, petitions, and creation of new accounts for the unreal, and forums, petitions, and creation of new laws for the real).
  
• Example: There are ethical dilemmas that, upon completion, may warrant awards (positive/negative karmic trees for the unreal, and positive/negative press for the real).
  
• Example: Those who participate in the game and the war are of a volunteer ethos, and both have a duty imposed by the exercising of volition (no one is forced to play Ghost Recon 2, and there has been no conscription to the armed services in America since 1973).
  
• Example: The use of violence will resolve the conflict, even if the conflict is, itself, violence.
  

Violence par excellence is promised in both, but the delivery is distinct. The game strips away the inconveniences of the war, creating a condensed experience of fighting, with bloodbaths that pause only long enough for the next level to load. The daily grind, hours of vigilance, endless heat, perpetual stress of being in a war zone comprises the majority of many soldiers' lives. This discrepancy, long leveled at books and movies, now takes aim at the video game--and the charge still stands. The violence of the real battlefield is tangible in all the ways that the digital is not, driving a wedge between expectations and results.

None of this is to say that the games do not lead some to think of war. No reflection of humanity is truly complete without a component of the violent and the dark. The holy books of the three major monotheistic religions of the world all discuss violence as a part of reality, and every derivative and inferior narrative that stems outward from such books must, at the very least, take it as implied that violence exists in the world.

On Omelas

"The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas", a marvelous short story by Ursula K. LeGuin, describes a utopia that may be. People are free, happy, and capable of pursuing destinies of their own choosing. Holidays and work are enjoyed in equal measure, people are not puritanical nor licentious, but instead all live in harmony. In the depths of a closet, however, hidden deep beneath the city, a single child suffers and moans in the privation of its soul, caked in filth and starving its life away. Every person in Omelas knows about this child, and all know that it is because that child lives and suffers that everyone else can enjoy the life they have. Some few people feel that there is something inhumane about this, and choose to walk away, abandoning a life of tranquility bought with the suffering of an innocent for a life that they live independently.

This may very well be a story, not of those rejecting a potential utopia in favor of an unknown world, but instead an allegory for the thinking gamer, one who, rather than reveling in the utopia of the ideal made unreal and accepting it as such, instead turns his back on the pure ludological appeal of the gaming world and wishes to explore outward to additional lands and narratives. The price of playing is not as dramatic, but the effects are similar. Much is sacrificed for the ludic, and it is important to respond to what is being offered outside of the game. Hence the banality, futility, and idiocy of the phrase, "It's just a game." Yes, there is much in the game that is ludological, schediological, or narratological. These are the pillars on which the game itself rests. But there is much outside of the game that provides the context to what is being played. No civilian can play a soldier like a returned veteran can. No child can play a parent like a father or mother can. The context of the real is what allows the unreal its freedom. To those who cannot walk away from the game to see the world beyond--nor see the world beneath, the deeper signs and signifiers of the game--then there is a distinct loss. The context of the real makes the impossibility of the unreal conceivable, believable, and worth desiring.

The fear of how obsessive some people are over video games (above and beyond writing a book of essays about them), the constant, almost desperate attempts to link antisocial, violent, or aberrant behavior to video games, the imposition and regulation of video game sales, and all attendant disinformation about the medium, now comes into sharp focus. Those who look inward at Omelas will see one of two things: a world of bliss and understanding; or a world built on what they cannot accept. Those who only see the former are blinded by the brilliance of what the game can do; those who only see the latter are confident that all within the walls are benighted devils deserving of censure and reproach. Neither attitude serves the reality of what the game can be. And little wonder: there are precious few examples of that in the gaming world.


The Heaviest of Rain

Quantic Dreams has taken the narratalogical and schediological challenge of moving the video game into Hillis' "different media" with their brilliant and horribly undervalued Heavy Rain. The ludological component is somewhat lacking, proof that the industry is not quite capable of fully utilizing the game on its own terms. But there is much that works in the game; so much so that it overcomes its ludological shortcomings beautifully.

Heavy Rain relies on the same thing that thatgamecompany's Flower attempted (successfully) to invoke: emotion.^* The characters of Heavy Rain contain almost every necessary component for well-rounded and fully realized fictional beings: believability, sympathetic flaws, and honesty. Heavy Rain also handles mature issues well, performing the story for the audience, rather than pandering to it. The main purpose of the story is to allow the gamer to get to know its main protagonists. It is this level of detail in the mundane that works strongest for--and against--the game.

The tiniest minutiae--brushing teeth, shaving, playing with one's children, trying to work as an architect--push the gamer more and more heavily into the character's shoes. When it works, it is phenomenal. The empathy and care that is generated in the gamer can only be felt via this constant presence and control. It is here, however, where the ludic fails, as many gamers, so attuned to the spectacle of gaming and the type of response that they demand and are accustomed to the controls, cannot engage in the story to the correct degree. It is, as it were, too steep of a learning curve. The QTEs that play a predominant role in the control of the game are not tiresome, difficult, or poorly done; they are simply a more overt showing of what the controller normally does. It is a complex piece that must be sight-read as it is played, rather than a memorized ditty that can be rattled off like a thirty-lives code. This complexity offends the gamer who is more attuned to playing by rote than by improvisation.

Still, despite this minor setback (and it is minor), Heavy Rain stands far above other narratological media. It is, within the boundaries of the story, two-way. It gives possibilities, closes doors, opens windows, unlocks treasures, and refuses to let the ineptitude of the gamer halt the progress of the story. Rarely will a game allow such freedom with the choices in an almost genuine way. Unlike sandbox games that provide the greatest, most hollow promises of freedom, Heavy Rain allows the gamer to manipulate not the world around the character (an impossibility in the real world that is actually matched in the game world), but instead the story itself. The possibility of the death of the avatar is real, but the idea of not finishing the game is impossible. This allows the story to be told according to the whims of the game and the gamer, a symbiosis that is as beautiful as it is difficult to articulate.

Heavy Rain is not a game that should be precisely emulated. It must be expanded upon. The idea of sitting down with this game to 'play for a few minutes' is absurd. It is not that kind of game. It does not need (the laughably ubiquitous) multiplayer option. It needs a greater control option (perhaps it will be achieved with Move) and greater appreciation from gamers. It needs to be used as a model of what is possible, and an inspiration to push games toward what should be.

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*While Quantic Dream's masterpiece pushes emotions of fear, anger, stress, and empathy, Flower instead focused on emotions of tranquility and calm

Metal Gearl Solid I Act III: Shadow Moses

Backup Crew
The other characters of Metal Gear Solid round out the cast, provide additional context and content, and reside on a continuum of pertinence to the gamer, though their relevance to the narrative remain untouched by the gamer's machinations.^¤ In a sense, Master Miller, Mei Ling, and Nastasha are vestiges of the game's narrative in a formal, primal way--the game operates independently of their participation, though the attempt by MGS to incorporate them is noticeable. 

This isn't to disparage these tertiary characters. The gamer can succeed without interaction with Nastasha and Master Miller--success can also be accomplished without listening to Mei Ling's sagacious dispensations of aphorism, though each is thoughtfully added to the game to help enhance the gamer's perceptions of just what Snake is having to accomplish. Still, their importance is always narratological; Mei Ling proves her value in how effortlessly she is replaced by Otacon in MGS2. The similar role, played by Para-Medic in MGS3, does little to redeem Mei Ling's essentially empty presence in the original game. Despite these characters existing only for the narrative, they are there to heighten the attachment of Snake to his mission, to provide the occasional ludo- or schedieological purpose, and overall enhance the accomplishments of Snake.

Secondary Characters and Secondary Stories

Hal Emmerich (Otacon), Meryl Silverburgh, Colonel Roy Campbell, Naomi Hunter, and Revolver Ocelot are characters whose stories move beyond the tragedy at Shadow Moses. The remainder (Vulcan Raven, Decoy Octopus, Sniper Wolf, Psycho Mantis, Genome Soldiers, et al.) are mostly corpses, left to frozen tombs or savagery by the indigenous wildlife. Even Ocelot's arm is left behind. This is the life of Snake--the death of others. But each secondary character has a purpose that is beyond just the narrative's need for supporting cast.

Otacon

Narrative: Otacon provides the necessary lightning rod of the MGS's science fiction, grounding it with a tenuously-plausible genius who created the doomsday machine. He is the gentleman in distress, the intellectual foil to Snake's rugged machismo and masculinity. As a counterbalance to the incredibly violent Snake, Otacon is a pacifist by default--not having the skills to be a fighter--and, at the end chooses to become more of a generator of his own actions, rather than merely a reactionary.

His tropes are familiar--genius scientist whose well-meaning inventions threaten humanity--yet as his character is explored throughout additional games, he becomes more and more rounded. His back story is pure narrative--one never plays as Otacon (which many would consider a boon)--yet his foibles become recognizable. His foray into the world of creating Metal Gear is not his first mistake. MGS2 gives additional detail about Otacon's pre-Shadow Moses life, and it is quickly understood that the man easily falls into temptations. His perpetual resolve to never mess up again provides a sidelined tragedy that is played out in every game. His statement on the snowmobile is enlightening and tragic: "I'm just tired of always being a spectator in life. I'm ready to live. I'm gonna stand on my own two feet. I'm not gonna hide anymore." Despite such brave words, by the time he is seen again in MGS2, he is once again hiding in the digital world (a digital character in a digital world--a simulacrum of the simulacrum). His mistakes with his stepmother are perverse and strangely humanizing from a narrative point of view. His seduction by Naomi in MGS4 is, by now, expected. His constant heartache and heartbreak (he cries in every game) comes from wanting to be so much more than he is. The tears are not just of sadness but frustration at his perpetual humanity: He wishes he could be the ideal that Snake embodies, but he is--unlike Snake--all too human.

Meryl

Like Otacon, Meryl's back story is provided elliptically, and the gamer never has the chance of controlling her directly.^¤¤ Her desires are forged out of a childhood that she doesn't appreciate, and while the truth about her parentage isn't given until MGS4, her vulnerabilities because of her sex come through powerfully. Snake stands as an ideal man in that he doesn't judge Meryl based upon her gender (though he does think her butt is cute), but rather her abilities on the battlefield. Meryl, at first, stands as an ideal woman in that she is capable of overcoming the stereotype of a woman whose capacities are diminished because of her sex. This is not a permanent standing, as Meryl often has to be saved by Snake. However, each act of salvation feels less of a trope and more of a natural motive between two characters whose identities mingle, goals overlap, and mutual appreciation is apparent. 
 
The expected sexual tension between Snake and Meryl is subtle, and most likely reflects the gamer's desire for some sort of romantic consummation to exist in the lives of the characters on the screen. This tension is explicitly exploited by Psycho Mantis when he takes over Meryl's mind. After demanding of Snake to know if he likes her, she moans, "Hurry...hurry! Make love to me!! Snake, I want you!" The declaration may or may not be what Meryl felt for Snake at the time (though, by the end of the game, one gets the feeling that she has fallen for the rugged hero of Shadow Moses), but it taps into the necessary emotional responses that helps the illusion of control within the game. Once an overt overture of attraction is given, the desire to save Meryl when she's trapped by sniper fire later stems not from the schedieological, but from the emotional.

Because of the emotional connection that the two characters should have, the schism of the two separate endings of the game becomes more pointed. To save Otacon, the gamer must succumb to Ocelot's torture techniques, a move that is irrevocable within the game--short of reloading a prior save, Snake must live with the choice of having abandoned Meryl to rape and death while saving his new-found friend. This betrayal of Meryl is rarely something that the gamer has to reconcile with the rest of the narrative--according to the canon of the series, surviving the torture and getting the 'Meryl ending' indicates that Otacon survives the ordeal as well--as she is never heard from again. Even Campbell, her 'uncle', takes the news with little time devoted to grieving.

And yet, here the narrative breaks down because of the ludology: The gamer can choose Otacon because a second play-through will be 1) easier (on account of the stealth camo item that Otacon will give to Snake); and 2) one ending of two possible solutions. Unlike a novel, play, film, or any other narrative, the game--and the game alone--can allow such a multiplicity of potential endings. The illusion of control here is emancipating, but the damage done to the narrative is profound. No longer can authorial intention and expected emotional connections be sufficient to give the story its due. Instead, the story is manipulated because of ulterior motives--the gamer always picks up the controller with an ulterior motive to that of the characters.

Colonel Campbell

Campbell is also featured in prior games, not the least of which is MGS: Portable Ops, when he first meets Naked Snake--Solid Snake's father--in South America. Aside from his obvious role as a commander, Campbell moves beyond the avuncular to a demigod status. His orders are absolute, even if his original ideas require fine tuning by additional recommendations of his staff. His powers are limited--even his body is invisible. (He gains something resembling corporeality in MGS2, but that isn't even the real Campbell; it isn't until MGS:PO and MGS4 that Campbell is shown to be a real person.) It is perfectly fitting that Campbell become the voice of the Patriots in MGS2, as he is the one responsible for the generation of Snake's motives. As a fairly empty character, Snake needs the direction for his motivations (namely, to kill). Snake's rapid acceptance of Campbell's orders indicates a type of reliance on a greater authority, a type of validation for why he does what he is doing. Hence the import of Snake operating solo at the beginning of MGS2, and the significant change in Snake's character as he listens to the lengthy mission briefings of MGS4.

While Campbell may be the god of Snake's world, dictating where he should go and whom he should kill, he is a flawed god--one whose personal foibles makes for a more natural and realistic character. After all, his motivations for sending Snake in aren't originally expressed in the mission briefing before Snake is launched into Shadow Moses. His care for his daughter (though, in MGS, Meryl is called his niece) impels him to lie, deceive, and make unreasonable demands on his field agent. Not very professional, but definitely natural.^¤¤¤

Shadow Moses

The location of the game is its own character, too. Much like the Mississippi River is another crucial character to Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Shadow Moses becomes not just a backdrop to the espionage, but a pertinent and powerful part of the overall narrative. The snow encrusted buildings, the endless flurries, the darkness of the rarely-glimpsed sky--it all adds the necessary presence. While the Big Shell in MGS2 is also its own character, it is the inverse of this in every conceivable way (bird-poop encrusted boxes, endless visibility, almost to the distant shoreline, the brightness of the blue sky), and as a character it fails to be as ominous or as memorable. The severity of the circumstances within Shadow Moses adds a dimension of isolation and desperation. Like Snake, it is utterly remote--socially for the former, geographically for the latter--and that sense of the alone compounds not only the exceptional prowess of Snake, but the scope of the potential success when Liquid is finally defeated.

Additionally, Shadow Moses' name itself conjures a dual significance: The Fox Archipelago (located on the spur of islands off of Alaska's southwestern tip) is itself frequently in shadow due to heavy fogs that plague the islands; religiously, Moses of the Old Testament and Torah, was similarly tasked with a massive undertaking of salvation of a people (Israelites in place of America, though both are sometimes viewed as beneficiaries of a Promised Land--a heaven outside of the world and her problems). He, too, operated essentially alone, only having his brother, Aaron, as an assistant. While Snake is not a religious figure, he operates on the same tropes as Moses, including through the reception of commandments through voices that he alone can hear.

Windswept, hostile, and inhospitable, Shadow Moses acts as the tough-love character, the one that is unforgiving in its punishment of Snake for his audacity to try to conquer it. Of all the enemies Snake must face, Shadow Moses is the most omnipresent. Of all the allies that Snake must leave behind, Shadow Moses is the most haunting. While Gray Fox is later remembered in MGS4, it is Shadow Moses where the most of the Flashback Events take place, where Snake must reconcile what he was and what he has become. Otacon even says, upon opening the door into the access chamber to where REX's bones rest, "Welcome home." Shadow Moses has defined Snake in the minds of gamers and in his own mind in such a way that it is only while in Shadow Moses can Snake ever have identity. 

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¤Like any traditional narrative, games contain the typical character hierarchies (primary, secondary, tertiary, etc.), thus giving a formal acceptance to pure narratological expressions. In MGS, however, many of the tertiary and lower characters are the endless reams of victims for the violence. The spear-carriers are often literally that in video games, and MGS is no different, save that the gamer--the audience--is directly responsible for the principle actor's response to all of the characters.

¤¤There is a notable exception to this: When Snake squares off against Psycho Mantis, the gamer has to 'control' her--a vicious, vicarious type of control that is one step away from domestic abuse. She appreciates what Snake has to do (it saves her life, after all), but there is a residue of guilt over this type of control. Instead of being cathartic and exploratory, as much of the digital violence ends up being, it is twisted and Machiavellian--a perfect type of Psycho Mantis.

¤¤¤Naomi and Ocelot will get character analyses in the essays on Metal Gear Solid 4.