Who Wants to Play Oedipus?

Something is missing. To be honest, I didn't even notice it until recently, but now that I have, its absence has weighed on my thoughts. There is a narrative void in our medium. Games have thus far ignored a particularly revered dramatic template; a template which Western society holds in quite possibly the highest regard. Why has our most venerated of dramatic modes not yet been satisfactorily adapted to our newest medium? Where is our great videogame tragedy?

I've begun to wonder what role tragedy could play in games, if any- and I consider it an important consideration. For why should this most universal human drama not be adequately explored in our medium? Do games and tragedy mix? If not, what would such an insoluble relationship mean for the legitimacy of games as a narrative art-form?

True, I have played games with "unhappy" endings, works which concluded on something of a minor chord; but nothing which compares to the primal dissonance of true tragedy. Some games with multiple endings have the potential for tragic outcomes, an interesting conceit in and of itself, but still not in the tradition of pure tragedy- tragedy is not found just in the conclusion, but also in the inexorable march towards that conclusion. Furthermore, the existence of the so-called "better" endings dilutes the potency and reduces the effectiveness of any tragic ones. By and large, most games work towards that most basic of endings: the indisputable triumph of good over evil, a complete resolution of all conflicts. More often than not, we leave our characters in a child-like state of "happily ever after". Let's face it-most games are fairy tales.

There's nothing wrong with happy endings or fairy tales-but they're somewhat disingenuous. As the incomparable Joseph Campbell puts it, "the happy ending is justly scorned as misrepresentation; for the world, as we know it, as we have seen it, yields but one ending: death, disintegration, dismemberment, and the crucifixion of our heart with the passing of the forms that we have loved." Tragedy holds such power over us because we all lead ultimately tragic lives. We are all made subject to forces greater than ourselves, be they fate, institution, or death itself.

Which is why it is somewhat distressing that games designers have yet to adequately forge something within this narrative mold. We assign tragedy such a high rank, yet our industry has yet to produce a truly "tragic" work. Are our designers simply not up to the challenge-or is a genuinely "tragic" game simply impossible? Perhaps tragedy and gameplay are fundamentally incompatible. In all honesty, who wants to play Oedipus?

One contentious point would be the concept of the tragic flaw. Traditional tragic characters are ultimately undone by their own individual hubris, picked apart by their own actions. When players control these actions, they are not subject to the flaws of the character, except when the character is out of their control. Players would have to be coerced, or ultimately forced, down tragic paths.

Perhaps a particularly adept designer could place her players in situations where they choose the tragic path of their own volition, dilemmas which turn the imperfections of the players themselves into the character's tragic flaw. A tragedy in the truest sense would be a situation in which any decision leads to a catastrophic end. Maybe players could be made to understand a character as existing somewhat outside the player ego; in essence, not simply an avatar the player inhabits, but a shared personality, having their own motivations and flaws.

Perhaps most discordant of all is the fact that by definition, all tragedies have but one outcome-one that most designers would concede as being fundamentally unsatisfying to a player. Gamers unconsciously associate death with "losing" the game, thus a game where a player is in some way doomed to die would be considered "unwinnable", and thus, not fun. Such control of player freedom goes against the very concept of gameplay, while the ability to change the narrative's conclusion goes against the very nature of tragedy. No one wants to play a game they can't win, and no one wants to watch a rendition of The Crucible where everyone lives.

But perhaps as our medium matures, and as we as players mature, our ideas about just what "fun" is will change. Perhaps the concept of a "winning condition" will change, or simply be discarded, in favor of a broader appreciation of entertainment on the whole.

The idea of such deep-seated conceptual changes occurring in our industry is deeply compelling to me. A tragic game would have to completely redraw certain fundamental concepts of gameplay, and such an examination would be healthy for our young medium. Tragedy shares an intimate link with mortality, a condition which games still struggle to depict. Hamlet had but one life to lead, and no savegames to fall back on. For a tragic game to work, designers would have to reexamine the mechanic of death itself- they would have to reconsider what the meaning of death inside a game actually is.

Not only do these reconsiderations excite me, but according to Aristotle, tragedy fulfills an important societal need- an emotional purgation, a cleansing, called catharsis. This is the "emptying out" one experiences during a tragic work, followed by a kind of euphoria, an ecstasy at having lived a life not quite so terrible as the characters' they've just seen. Through catharsis, the tragic play would ideally increase the audiences' appreciation for life.

Imagine, then, the kind of catharsis a game could inspire. A tragic game could achieve a kind of hyper-catharsis, a super-purgation involving a suspension of ego and the temporary assumption of another person's character and flaws. Players could theoretically finish a tragic game with a heightened sense of cathartic bliss, having actually played out a character's tragic path instead of merely watching it.

Most tragedy is so inextricably dependent upon the power of the Fates, the Will of the Gods. In the traditional single player videogame, the player is a God-if only by virtue of their capacity for conscious thought. But to some degree, games are intrinsically tragic systems in and of themselves. There is a will to which players must bend built within every game- the will of the designer. Players are already subject to forces beyond their control, they've simply thus far been devoted to the edification of the player rather than their destruction. It would seem as though the medium itself is prepared its first great tragic work.

If there is such a thing as an immutable, undeniable truth to the human condition, it is that we all eventually learn that life is not a fairy tale. There is no happily ever after. There is, however, toil, and dilemma, compromise and regret, discontentment, disappointment and despair; the tragedy of old age, of madness, weakness, sickness, decrepitude; and at the end of it all, death. No second chance, no extra lives, merely unfulfilled potential and an infinite list of sins to contemplate. We are all inherently tragic creatures.

Perhaps we don't play games to be reminded of this. Perhaps that is simply not their function. Or perhaps, like any other art-form, games can be crafted in such a way that in their reminding us of our own nature, they fulfill that inscrutable magic, that arcane purgation, and despite our own myriad tragedies we are filled with the ecstasy of living.

Comments

A thought provoking piece Mal.

I think you answer a lot of your own questions: tragedy is largely absent from modern culture. The tragic movie is a very rare thing, and even few books are tragic in a classical sense. Honestly, the last truly tragic movie I can recall was Baz Luhrman's Romeo+Juliet and that seems like cheating. In games, I suppose one can consider God of War tragic in some ways, certainly in tone.

I think this is inextricably tied to the age-old argument here about "are games art?" To the extent they are then tragedy can and will form a part of the emerging canon. To the extent games are just bubble-gum escapism, it will be as absent as it is in most hollywood blockbusters.

But where I would sidestep is in your comment that "we all learn that life is not a fairy tale". I think games are actually quite good at this. Sure there are plenty of King's Quest style happy endings, but I can think of many games where victory is bittersweet--characters die, companions fall, the good are revealed to be evil, etc...

Last but not least (laugh if you must) - the entire Star Wars saga, when viewed from 1-6, form one of the most detailed stories of tragedy since the invention of cinema. Ultimately, it's not a story about rebellion and jedi and whatever, it's the truly tragic story of Anakin from birth to death. But this has never really made the transition into the myriad games based on that tragic arc.

Great food for though Mal.

Another reason might be a general distaste that the general public (or perhaps just the american public) has for sad or tragic stories. It might simply be a matter of commercial support. At the very least, I think it would be a hard sell to the executives or the marketing deperatment of any game developer / publisher.

Great post and great comments from those who beat me to it. I agree that it would be nice for a change to play a game that moved in this way. And although it's not quite what you're saying, I do feel that "Indigo Prophecy" (aka Fahrenheit) had a tragic feel to it throughout its duration. The entire time I was playing the game I constantly had the feeling that "this isn't going to end well". And you know what? I don't beat many games when playing recreationally (as opposed to for work) but I beat Indigo Prophecy and I think a part of that was the uniqueness of the game. And while we at first pointed to the game design as the unique feature, the more I think about it, I think the game's tone was what was really unique. And arguably more engaging.

Thanks for bringing this up, it's definitely something I'm going to think about more.

How about Shadow of the Collosus? That's pretty darn tragic.

Or Max Payne 2 (at least if you ignore the "happy" ending you get if you beat the game on all difficultly levels). They don't call it The Fall of Max Payne for nothin'.

Yeah "Max Payne 2" was the first one that came to mind for me. I remember just staring at the screen, mouth agape and feeling melancholy as all hell as the credits rolled. It took me some time to get my emotional bearings back after that game finished.

Actually, "Mafia" was quite tragic as well, though not quite so poignant (in my view) as MP2.

But where I would sidestep is in your comment that "we all learn that life is not a fairy tale". I think games are actually quite good at this. Sure there are plenty of King's Quest style happy endings, but I can think of many games where victory is bittersweet--characters die, companions fall, the good are revealed to be evil, etc...

True, there are quite a few games with bittersweet conclusions-but I'd say these tend to follow a tradition of kairosis rather than catharsis. They are more along the lines of an epic "fulfillment in time" than the "emptying out" associated with a tragedy. This is how I view Max Payne 2, more comprable to the Aenied than Macbeth; although I do admit that it sprung to mind as I was writing this. Certainly one of the closest approximations to a videogame tragedy we have so far.

I definitely think that in the current market a tragic game is something there would be little commercial support for. Perhaps that's the difficulty involved with a medium that is so dependant upon commercial support to exist. Games are not yet easy enough to make that someone would set out to create one solely to expand the art-form.

Would you consider MP2 to be tragedy if the plot were unchanged but Max died in the end?

Well, that would be one way to do it. But see, who would want to play a game where you're forced to die at the end? To a gamer, death=failure.

But I don't think tragedy is neccesarily predicated on the death of the protagonist, as much as it is a catastrophic outcome brought about by the characters' actions and/or forces beyond their control. In this regard, perhaps MP 2 with the "bad" endings does constitute a tragedy-but the fact that there is a "good" ending kind of invalidates this. But then, perhaps that's the compromise of an interactive medium.

I'm not sure that a tragedy could be done with a game, simply because of the narrative structure. Lee Jacobus writes, in Literature: An Introduction to Critical Reading

"Tragedy tells of the fall of a worthwhile, usually noble, character. Greek and Elizabethan tragedies relied on a protagonist [...] who was of high station, but modern tragedies also use protagonists of low or middle station as a means of exploring their worthiness. Traditionally, tragic heroes or heroines faced an unexpected fate. Fate, or destiny, dominates tragedy, and the plot reveals the protagonist resisting fate before finally yielding to it. Fate in classical tragedy was determined by the will of the gods; in modern tragedy it is sometimes determined by inherent characteristics of the heroes, by the force of the environment, or by both. Tragic heroes and heroines face their fate with determination, courage and bravery. Thus, they are worthy of our respect. [...] Tragedy is, above all, serious in tone and importance. It focuses on a hero or heroine whose potential is great but whose efforts to realize that potential are thwarted by fate: circumstances beyond his or her control"

So, maybe if it were a god game, where the player was Fate to the AI's character, but I'm not sure many players would enjoy being the tragic hero.

Malacola, you and I truly are as gemini. Excellent piece.

duckideva wrote:

. . . but I'm not sure many players would enjoy being the tragic hero.

Count me as one of them. That's a bit masochistic of me, I realize, but there's an element of masochism present in the mere act of watching a tragedy, too.

In my experience, the only game that really got this right is Planescape: Torment, although a very few others have made great strides.

I believe it's possible, just that it's an area that hasn't been explored enough, or has even begun to be effectively explored.

One way would to simply put the player in story that's tragic to start with, and the player's only choice would be to "fight the good fight" as it were, even if in the context of the overall story the situation is hopeless. Have the player make some tough decisions that have an impact on the game world. For example, one of the few characters you trust must stay behind to hold off the enemy. Staying behind would mean certain death. You, the player (as the leader of the group) must make the call, and depending on who you pick will determin how successful you are at leading the rest to (temporary) safety. Maybe not the best example, but it's one of the few ideas that are coming to mind for now.

Lobo wrote:

In my experience, the only game that really got this right is Planescape: Torment, although a very few others have made great strides.

Oh geez, how could I forget Torment! I'll leave my gamer badge on the desk on my way out.

LupusUmbrus wrote:

I believe it's possible, just that it's an area that hasn't been explored enough, or has even begun to be effectively explored.

One way would to simply put the player in story that's tragic to start with, and the player's only choice would be to "fight the good fight" as it were, even if in the context of the overall story the situation is hopeless. Have the player make some tough decisions that have an impact on the game world. For example, one of the few characters you trust must stay behind to hold off the enemy. Staying behind would mean certain death. You, the player (as the leader of the group) must make the call, and depending on who you pick will determin how successful you are at leading the rest to (temporary) safety. Maybe not the best example, but it's one of the few ideas that are coming to mind for now.

I was thinking the same thing, although with a different track. Take a RE style game, with several protagonists, where you play each character's path in sequence. Each character has their own flavor and style, hopeful or pessimistic, which ends suddenly in either a horror movie type environmental kill or some sort of boss fight. The last character you play, if you pay attention, you'll notice you cross over into the plotlines of the other characters, but you're fighting these strange monstrous creatures. Once you get to the end, after defeating the final boss, the madness is lifted and you see the bodies of your dead friends, and realize it wasn't monsters you were fighting at all. There could be a final cutscene where your character kills themself, and then fin.

I expect a cut if this game is ever released.

Good lord, Lobo. It's like you're thinking every thought I have a year before I do. Are you from the future? Before I start anything else I'm going to have to read every article you've written to make sure it's not something you've already covered. I mean, we both used the word "myriad", for God's sake! You pretty much wrote this exact article a year before I did, and with twice as much poise and elegance. Damn.

I almost wonder if this is another example of where videogames, just havent escaped from the 'game' in their 'name.' When the majority of folks think of the word game, they think of fun and youth etc.. its a hard association to escape. Even older 'gamers' are folks who grew up on atari 2600's or nintendos.

People who play a lot of video games have graduated from the stereotypes of what a videogame is and are open to the broad range of target age groups different kinds of games can appeal to. They think of their games as a modern form of electronic entertainment and we want it to be art, only to see its freedom as a medium held back by the fact that the whole industry model has developed out of games... pc games, videogames whatever. We see the same idea in the censorship of their edginess or the inability of politicians to see they have moved beyond 2d sidescrollers for the kiddies to a medium with a lot more emotional and storytelling potential.

I'm all for edgier and more moving games... the reality may be that the market just isnt there for it to be as profitable as a simple, pick up and click game. Sanitarium was one of my favorites that I thought really pushed the medium of gaming hard.

I don't buy the death = failure notion. I mean, sure, during gameplay yes indeed death = failure. But if the character dies during the actual end of the game, perhaps against an impossible action sequence or against some undefeatable force, even as a cinematic, then I'm fine with it. And I don't think many would believe they've failed. They would believe they "completed" the game.

What I would like to see is a game that moves this climactic moment to the middle of the game and then spends the latter half or third of the game allowing the player to explore the consequences of that characters failure. Perhaps dealing with the grieving relatives or the spread of tyranny and oppression.

This would be the ultimate set-up for a sequel. For example...

1) Noble Knight asked by a King to defend the empire against foreign/magical foes.
2) Fighting, exploration, leveling ensue all under the cloud of self-doubt and feelings of a suicide mission.
3) Player is made to completely understand the seemingly insurmountable odds they're against and to feel the gravity of the situation. Fairwells to loved ones are teary-eyed scenes. The HERO instead of being pumped up with rock music and a "kick some a$$" attitude is somber and fearful.
4) Player character loses after a valiant effort.
5) Latter portion of the game spent exploring the new ruling force as a a friend or child of the fallen hero.
6) Grief is everywhere, nothing is happy, everything is in a shambles...

Then the sequel, the son grows up and fills out his dad's armor and voila! Sequel baby.

I've never played MP2, which combined with my resurgent starcraft addiction, may be why my initial thoughts on the tragic in gaming go in another direction. I'm thinking of endless horde/tower defense style scums maps, although I know the same dynamic is used in little flash games and probably many other places. Games that don't have a 'WIN' criteria. If you manage to beat level X, you're going on to play level X+1, where the enemies will probably be stronger, faster, and more numerous than any encounter so far.

It lacks the emotional attachment to the character that it sounds like you get in Max Payne, but there can be a powerful engagement when frantically trying to plug those gaps and hold the line in the face of countless opponents, when you KNOW that you're going to fall some time but dammit that time isn't going to be now.

I feel like that conveys some sense of the tragic, the act of delaying an inexorable fate, and I believe there is room for someone more talented than I to expand that into a full fledged, tragic game that people could enjoy.

Or maybe they already have, my gaming budget is pretty meager

Great article! I'll step up for the other side here: I HATE depressing endings and have no wish to see them make their way into more games. I tend to get emotionally invested in the characters in a given movie/book/game. Unless they've done something to merit their failure/death/etc., why would I wish that on them? Since movies that feature sad endings have a tendency to bomb massively, I don't think I'm in the minority on this one.

As the incomparable Joseph Campbell puts it, "the happy ending is justly scorned as misrepresentation; for the world, as we know it, as we have seen it, yields but one ending: death, disintegration, dismemberment, and the crucifixion of our heart with the passing of the forms that we have loved."

Incomparable is... one way to put it. Hilariously overwrought is another.

don't buy the death = failure notion.

While I think there are many people out there who would appreciate a tragic ending there are plenty of people who don't react well to it, in the context of a game they are playing to 'win' or beat, anyway.

*** Big Dreamfall spoilers ahead, for those who don't want to know how it ends ***

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The reaction to Dreamfall's ending was pretty split... I personally loved it but there are a lot of people out there who feel disappointed or ripped off that after everything Zoe (the lead character) goes through in the game she ends up dead and the bad guys more or less win.

I was pretty suprised by the reaction on Dreamfall and TLJ boards. I thought the game was so well done, it did that thing that so very few games can do: provoke a deep emotional response, I thought the whole last chapter of the game was very moving. But people still felt let down (not that the ending was the only thing in the game people had to gripe about, but it was a big thing).

*** End of Spoilers ***

Anyway, good article.

Remember in the "Death and Return of Superman" when you beat Doomsday's ass all over Metropolis? Remember when, despite your 100% health, control of Superman was torn away from you and you had to watch as Superman and Doomsday slug each other? Remember how you felt when you were forced to watch your full health drop to zero and die? I do.

Despite the inner rage that I apparently still carry within me completely unaware of until now, I'm not against the death of a game's main character. I just can't fathom a method of accomplishing this without having a controller or mouse thrown across the room. If the game stops for a cinematic then I'd protest that if I'd still been in control I'd still be walking and Bruce Lee would have lived through the end of "The Chinese Connection." Or if the game hits you with an unblockable attack that is an instant kill I'd decry it as being cheap, etc.

Uberstein wrote:

Actually, "Mafia" was quite tragic as well, though not quite so poignant (in my view) as MP2.

I didn't mind the ending for this game since it didn't happen during the game and took place years afterwards. While the distance didn't ignite a flame inside me it also didn't bring forth the appropriate reaction.

I gag at the thought of you naysayers expecting video games to emerge as a fully formed artistic medium, pining Shakespeare and shooting 1,000 yard headshots straight from the womb. Perhaps such dramatic emotion does not appear often because, as David Jaffe said, plot in a game is like scraping a picture on a stone wall with a trumpet (there's a euphemism I hope never goes away). The biggest advances in narrative game-grammar in the last 6 or so years have been cut scenes and scripted sequences, both of which are no more gameplay than overtures and intermissions are theater. While video games can embrace other artistic traditions, their strengthes are unique to themselves and perhaps still undiscovered.

I offer this thought only for pointed discussion. Critically I loved the piece, Malacola. Yours, too, Lobo. It seems great minds think alike.

Malacola wrote:

Good lord, Lobo. It's like you're thinking every thought I have a year before I do. Are you from the future? Before I start anything else I'm going to have to read every article you've written to make sure it's not something you've already covered.

Freakin' tell me about it bro. Working the same room as this guy is like warming up for freakin' mozart. freakin'.

But. Planescape: Torment. Yeah, check my badge in at the door too. Now you've got me all thinking and stuff.

Bastards.

I can think of one big reason:

No sequels

You'd be forced to do prequels and we all know how well those turn out =P

Hopped Up On Koolaid wrote:

I feel like that conveys some sense of the tragic, the act of delaying an inexorable fate, and I believe there is room for someone more talented than I to expand that into a full fledged, tragic game that people could enjoy.

I think one of the problems in introducing the Tragedy to games is that I think most of them would instead end up Kafkaesque, or would feel that way to the player.

Reference how angry McChuck got when control was removed in his game, and thus the player had no method by which to effect the outcome...rendering the player both frustrated and powerless.

I'm just not sure that most escapists, (who are the target demographic of pixel-based games), are prepared to be existentialists at the same time.

I understand completely how he feels. I may be even more petty--I get pissed every time I take up a defensive position in a game because i know i'm going to get rushed, and after a cutscene I'm magically transported into the middle of the room to get wailed on. I probably would have thrown a controller during that Superman game.

I think that tragic elements can make up a fun game though. Is it possible to actually beat Geometry Wars? I honestly don't know, but I've never heard of someone doing it. I'm not sure that something without a plot can truly be called tragic. At the deepest level though, the gameplay can be described as "survive as long as possible, then die".

What about Quake 4? I think there are a few others like it where you had to "fail" to progress/succeed.

Perhaps such dramatic emotion does not appear often because, as David Jaffe said, plot in a game is like scraping a picture on a stone wall with a trumpet (there's a euphemism I hope never goes away).
I'm just not sure that most escapists, (who are the target demographic of pixel-based games), are prepared to be existentialists at the same time.

I think these two points are what it will come down to in time. Are games narrative art or performance art, and will we ever see a significant portion of gamers start playing games for something other than escapism? If games really are an evolution of the narrative form, I think we'll see more games in the tragic vein eventually. But if they are something completely different, something in which narrative is just an unneccesary splint, then I guess all us whiners will have to go back to reading books and watching movies.

Malacola wrote:

Are games narrative art or performance art, and will we ever see a significant portion of gamers start playing games for something other than escapism? If games really are an evolution of the narrative form, I think we'll see more games in the tragic vein eventually. But if they are something completely different, something in which narrative is just an unneccesary splint, then I guess all us whiners will have to go back to reading books and watching movies.

Sorry, I was a little strong in my words, I do that sometimes. Your expose is highly relevant to gaming today, which pushes further and further towards story, towards emotion and personality. What I feel whenever I read pieces like yours or Lobo's is a strong longing for the greatest achievements in human art, and the desire for games to reach that level, NOW.

Yet I am also aware of a disturbing trend where our biggest games become increasingly formulaic. An developer might fit your ideas to a boring generic RPG with tedious combat and uninteresting design. We might then find that we have not elevated gaming but dragged it down slightly.

So when I think of this subject, of the basic emotions and situations that classic theater taps into, and I wonder if they are feasable in a game. Perhaps the tragic hero scenario would collapse like a house of cards as soon as we introduce the key element of choice. One thing I feel in a tragic film or story is an utter sense of helplessness to affect the freefall I am experiencing.

And for your 2nd quote, we just need to create an escapist existentialism game. I Heart Sims.

And for your 2nd quote, we just need to create an escapist existentialism game.

Zentris?

I came home after a long weekend out of town to find this terrific article and the equally terrific discussion that follows. This right here is why I love GWJ so much. I'm recommending you all for extra firm butt-patts.