This post is a response to: Why the Next-Generation Will Change Games Forever by Adrian Chmielarz

In the above blogpost, former People Can Fly creative director: Adrian Chmielarz, argues that as audio, visuals and story-telling gets better, playability suffers if game mechanics are allowed to rely on current gameplay tropes. He basically argues that there is an uncanny valley effect with regards to gameplay, which becomes more and more prevalent, as more realistic looking games are being made for the next generation. 

The problem, as he puts it, is that increasing levels of realism in presentation, makes it harder for the player to connect mentally when encountering unrealistic gameplay gambits in the game world, like health packs and bonus ammo hidden in ancient temples.

Here are a few quotes from the post:

"Old game metaphors are dying, and we’re in a desperate need of a new dictionary."

"With the next-gen, our games are only going to get better – with better writing, better visuals, better audio – and continue their journey towards being a perfect sim, blurring the line between gameplay and narrative. If our game designs do not follow, our games will suffer."

These are valid sentiments, but they are also flawed, by overly focusing on gaming as a simulation of reality.

I would like to suggest a counterpoint: Instead of trying to embrace realism and develop new tropes in order to fit the increasing real-world-representation potential of modern gaming hardware, how about focusing our efforts on making modern games that are NOT simulations of the real world?

A moment of clarity

I had an epiphany a few years back, when I discovered that I was no longer particularly fond of gaming. This was surprising, as I had loved games ever since the early 80s, and games had traditionally kept getting better as they evolved up to this point. This was early on in the current console generation. I had my big, noisy, first model Playstation 3, the one which was still backwards compatible with older Playstation titles, and found that instead of enjoying new games on it, I primarily used it to watch movies or replay games from previous generations.

I initially figured that this probably meant I was finally getting too old to be a gamer. I had always suspected that the day would come, eventually... Perhaps the only thing that still kept me playing was nostalgia for the old classics?

As it turned out though, I was just playing the wrong games.

I had made the mistake of attributing my disenchantment with contemporary titles to internal factors, instead of the real issue, which was: Most AAA titles from this era just didn't cut it. This was the age of "realistic" first/third person shooters, where realism mostly meant that the world was brown.

Luckily, the indie game scene and titles like: «Braid» and «Geometry Wars», reset my perspective. As a result I became excited about games again, perhaps even more so than I was before. As it turns out, I really like my games to NOT be realistic.

For instance, the critically acclaimed game «Hotline Miami», with its top-down, neon colored, «Miami Vice/Drive»-like visuals, can by no means be described as technologically advanced, or even particularly pretty. It is however, one of the most immersive games I have ever played. The tight, minimalistic, claustrophobic, ultra violent setting brings on a sort of trance state, where kicking the door in the face of a guy before grabbing his weapon to gun down the next target, becomes a ritualistic reflex. It is in fact so immersive, that playing it makes me question my own psyche in ways I am not entirely comfortable with.

My point is: The power of the human imagination to immerse players in a game's world is unparalleled. And as Adrian Chmielarz points out, the capability to tap into this power gets increasingly more elusive as the audiovisual representation of games approaches realism. So the question then becomes: Is realism even worth chasing?

One thing the current generation of games has taught us, is that minimalistic world representations, like the ones in the old classics and some contemporary indie titles, are not only still relevant, but may actually be superior to the "quest-for-more-realism" alternatives.