Gaming and Ego
Over the past couple of nights, I have been witness to the delicate interplay of ego and gaming. Now, it's not something new to me, and it's definately not a surprise, but it sickens me none the less.
What is it with gamers? Why do people identify so closely with their characters that they feel that if their character looses, they are losing as well? Not only is this frustrating for the player who believes this, since the very nature of LARP makes it difficult if not outright impossible for anyone to 'win', but it makes it near impossible for other players to interact with them. How do you create an interesting animosity between two characters without having it spill over to the players involved, when those said players equate their character with themselves?
Worse yet, this mentality sets up a situation in which the emphasis of the game is no longer on creating interesting and compelling stories for the characters, but on gaining the upper hand and maintaining it through the oppression and persecution of other characters, with no thought given to how this might impact the enjoyment of others. It should be easy to see how this effect cascades when the players involved are all of the same mentality. I'm sure that anyone who has gamed for any length of time has seen how ugly things get when so-and-so's character has screwed with whatshisface, and now the two players won't talk to one another.
I have always been very careful about keeping a strong distinction between my character and myself, and a firm believer that if someone is incapable of doing so, they should not be playing these games. One is welcome to screw with my character. One is not welcome to screw with me. Don't get the two confused.
What is it with gamers? Why do people identify so closely with their characters that they feel that if their character looses, they are losing as well? Not only is this frustrating for the player who believes this, since the very nature of LARP makes it difficult if not outright impossible for anyone to 'win', but it makes it near impossible for other players to interact with them. How do you create an interesting animosity between two characters without having it spill over to the players involved, when those said players equate their character with themselves?
Worse yet, this mentality sets up a situation in which the emphasis of the game is no longer on creating interesting and compelling stories for the characters, but on gaining the upper hand and maintaining it through the oppression and persecution of other characters, with no thought given to how this might impact the enjoyment of others. It should be easy to see how this effect cascades when the players involved are all of the same mentality. I'm sure that anyone who has gamed for any length of time has seen how ugly things get when so-and-so's character has screwed with whatshisface, and now the two players won't talk to one another.
I have always been very careful about keeping a strong distinction between my character and myself, and a firm believer that if someone is incapable of doing so, they should not be playing these games. One is welcome to screw with my character. One is not welcome to screw with me. Don't get the two confused.
posted by Alina at
11:33 AM
10 Comments:
Hello, I just noticed this and found it interesting.
Whilst it may be good that you make conscious and concerted efforts to maintain distinctions between your on-screen persona and your real and physical self, I feel this is your own personal way of dealing with situations that revolve around various other external factors.
Games are by their very nature 'competitive' (SpaceWar! the first videogame is testament to that notion), though trends in recent years have been altered relative to the increase in the power of games machines in their depiction of more realistic visuals and more convincing world habitats.
Games nowadays are able to convey realistic and aesthetically convincing representations of our real world (what is termed 'photorealism') that are used by developers to actually increase the bond between a player and their on-screen protagonist.
But of course various other factors occur here in regard to how 'gaming and ego' is played out; the player's natural propensity to act aggressively and the causal effect of competitive play, the genre of the game (puzzle, fighting game, co-operative first-person-shooter game etc), the player's rationality - whether they are tired and are therefore more inclined to become more aggressive.
I am merely pulling at strings here but there is a raft of such external factors that can play on any one given situation that may not have occured at any other time.
During the 'Golden Age' of arcades, players would freely challenge other players to games with no bitterness or anger involved. A challenge was seen as the challenger acknowledging their opponent's skill, and it was therefore encouraged. Sadly this does not occur very often nowadays.
Whilst the contemporary gaming scene has indeed promoted co-operation between players I sometimes feel that when it does come to competitive play, today's players are not as well rehearsed in how to deal with it - something players in the 'Golden Age' were used to handling.
MMORPGS (Massively Multi Player Role Playing Games) whilst being all the rage nowadays and while still encouraging players to play in union, nevertheless don't allow the player to 'see' the other player in a real social setting. While I may be going off tangent here, I feel it also contributes and compounds the player's inexperience of competitive play.
Going back to what you said earlier about 'being careful of keeping distinctions between your character and yourself', doesn't this in fact detract from your overall enjoyment? Making such conscious decisions means that you are not fully engrossed in the game and thus cannot fully enjoy the experience or what the character perceives in-game.
Forgive me if I am wrong but the first impression that came to mind whilst reading that particular paragraph was the idea that you were protecting yourself as a means of admitting falliblity.
I don't mean to sound antagonistic but if one were to make such a desicion then are you admitting you are hiding something for why else would you make such a choice of distancing yourself otherwise?
As an aside of course you 'imply' another interesting though controversial topic area here: while there are people who take an active role in allowing themselves to become engrossed by their on-screen character, they should not therefore be allowed to play such games.
The implication here relates to 'videogame violence' and under those circumstances whether the videogame or the actual person's natural tendancy to act violently would be to blame if the player were to commit an act of crime after having played. That's a very interesting point you give in all frankness.
In all I totally understand where you are coming from, but I think identifying closely with characters nowadays is a prerequisite for total immersion in a videogaming scene that strives for a greater degree of realism.
My replies may be quite irrelevant and off tangent as I only happened to be glancing and haven't really spent enough time in thought, but it was a nice topic to think about anyway.
Regards.
tooptroop.blogspot.com
By
Toops, at 1:37 PM
Hmm, someone giving you grief? Want me to break their nose? :D
By
Thunderquake, at 4:43 PM
Hey, thanks for the comment, toops. It was a very interesting read, and a well thought out discussion.
However, I am talking about this in the context of Live Action Role Playing (LARP) games, and not video games. Sorry for the confusion.
I'm sure that examining the relationship between people's on-screen character and their IRL selves would be fascinating, but it simply something that I don't have enough experience with MMORPGs to relate to wholly.
By
Alina, at 4:56 PM
Oh, kim? Heh. Thanks for the offer, but it's all good. :) I dealt with it this afternoon.
By
Alina, at 5:00 PM
Aww thanks for that nice reply. I dont know why but I was expecting you to bite my head clean off lol!
Anyway it was fun to get thinking (even if it wasn't about games per se) but you now have a new reader to your blog :P
Best wishes!
By
Toops, at 4:52 AM
I don't want to trivialize what you are feeling at all and if what I say does then I'm sorry I don't mean it too.
I am somewhat amused (not really in a good way) by the actions of all the people involved. I have the advantage of being able to see a bit more of what is going on and I get a chance to hear what all the groups are saying.
Both groups involved feel like they are being forced to play their character in a way that doesn't make sense to them. Both groups feel that the character deaths leading up to this point were not necessary and were done more for out of character reasons. Unfortunately I also feel that both groups are doing the I'm the good roleplayer thing and the other group should go along with me.
I personally think all the groups that are involved are fine roleplayers and that the problems can be solved. I know that W. as the storyteller would like all the characters to keep being played and for all the players to remain in the game. They are all valuable to the game.
Like I said I hope I haven't trivialized what you are feeling. Perhaps the best way for this all to be solved would be a session where W. gets all those together and everyone just argues out what they are feeling and then a story is written that everyone accepts. I believe that everyone involved needs to show some give on how their character is played.
By
Anonymous, at 12:10 PM
Not to stick my nose into this, since I wasn't really invoved, but as I understand it, WL DID stick everyone in a room... and one of the parties involved refused to play along with ANY story (ie, no compromise). I think that's what she's complaining about, in fact.
In any case, I believe WL now has the situation well in hand, so hopefully all's well that ends well.
By
xenophile, at 9:14 PM
"WL DID stick everyone in a room... and one of the parties involved refused to play along with ANY story (ie, no compromise)."
I'll just point out that such is technically and rather obviously incorrect. Folks may have resisted a particular take on things for a variety of reasons, but I think it /is/ important to realize that in the end, things moved forward.
Although there may be other problems, on this specific point I think it's important to differentiate between fighting hard for a position and refusing to compromise. All the players involved /did/ compromise, otherwise things wouldn't have happened the way they did, right?
The fact that things may have been more painful and less civil than they could have been is certainly an issue, but I do think it important to acknowledge that, eventually, everyone compromised.
--W
By
Anonymous, at 5:13 PM
I wasn't suggesting that no resolution was come to... obviously, I wouldn't have said "WL has the situation in hand" otherwise. I was just trying to rebut John's "this is how I see it" post, because there was (as I understand it) more going on than he was aware of.
Anyway, I'll shut up now and let Alina post her own responses, if she chooses to do so.
By
xenophile, at 1:25 AM
Forums, letters and blogs are all notoriously inaccurate methods of getting one's point across clearly. If anyone wants my further thoughts on what occurred, drop me an email and we'll talk in person.
By
Alina, at 4:54 PM
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