Interaction in Video Games

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As studies of Juul and Aarseth create different perspectives for the study of video game and its narratology, ludonarrative qualities, audiovisual qualities and media properties, it is a new crucial topic to research in entertainme nt media and narratology. However, in order for this thesis to correlate video games with the real world and emphasis on importance and reliance of both mediums to each others connection, the story elements and narration are fundamentally have not been inc luded in the case studies for the primary reason of irrelevance with architecture and spatial understanding.

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subsequent interaction is sensory intera ction which is fundamentally psychological stimuli and information registered by the player.

The importance of psychological effects video games reflects and interact with the virtual world of the video game is a profound topic. The Interaction in the vide o game Dark Souls series, which is considered Hidetaka Miyazaki’s masterpiece video game title, is given an example in Wildman and Woodward (2018)’s article. Wildman and Woodward express that in Miyazaki’s Dark Souls video games, the interaction with the w orld of Dark Souls is made to perceive as crucial, however fictional because choices, decisions and interaction with the virtual world define how the game will end, and which ending the player s are going to be rewarded with , but separate from any real -worl d connection (2018). Miyazaki’s Dark Souls video games consist of a fictional world with gloomy and dark ambience surroundings and architecture and very dark fictional lore that fills up the connection with the player.

However, Dark Souls is a third -person action game can also be played without reading or listening to the lore of the video game which is provided in -game or understanding the surrounding by just progressing the game without interaction, immersion or narration. The game mechanics work simply b y killing enemies and progressing into the next level after defeating a final boss of that level . However, Miyazaki developed the video games lore and fiction in such a sense, the video game itself could be a complete article studying its lore, narrative, style and interaction. Upon further investigation, it is found that the player is given a free will to choose in the video game Dark Souls , and ability to interact with many fictional aspects of this virtual world creates a depth in the perception of the v ideo game. Players can choose to interact, or neglect NPC’s in this virtual world, some characters are even in the mercy of the player, whether the player chooses to kill or spare those characters are up to the player, and players personal interaction with the virtual world. These decisions and interactions do also have an impact on how the game ends. Wildman and Woodward explain Dark Souls as a work of fiction, a representational work (2018). Wildman and Woodward also explains the interaction element in Dark Souls as;

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“[but]unlike more familiar works of literary fiction, there seems to be something importantly interactive about Dark Souls . In part, this is because there seems to an important sense in which much of the story is, in one way or another, in the hands of the player. For instance, if the player enters the Painted World, they can choose to whether to slay or spare Priscilla, and there seems to a sense in which the player’s choice plays a significant and essential role in shaping the very content of the story itself: players who spare Priscilla seemingly make it fictional that she is spared, those who slay her make it fictional that she is slain”

(Wildman, Woodward, 2018, p. 112).

This explanation by Wildman and Woodward brings out how a video game and a fictional virtual world of a video game can be interactive by the use of story, interaction and the connection of the player to one or another, respectively.

While video games are not like traditional media or visual media, their audiov isual quality and interactivity are much more appealing and satisfying compared to the latter.

Another aspect of the interaction in video games has been explained in previous sections. To reflect previous studies, the practical use of architecture, realistic background landscape or cityscape use, known media use, is a successful way to create an interactive environment with the avatar of the player and hence the virtual world. The architectural interaction and use have been given as an example of in the vi deo game Dishonored by Zonaga and Carter (2019), in which the architectural systems, constructs and spatial spaces could be utilized in stealth playstyle, and remain undetected, in order to achieve the good ending of the video game. Zonaga and Carter’s stu dy of Dishonored video game allowed them to observe both playthroughs to achieve opposite endings to see how architecture and interaction with architecture differed in the video gameplay activity. According to Zonaga and Carter, “ Dishonored’s architecture played a more prominent role when playing stealthily as opposed to confrontationally” (2019, p. 84). The interactivity in a video game virtual world is also tracked back into the earliest 3D video game, Doom that is released in 1993 by id Software, where the developers of the video game had many secrets and hidden doors placed around the labyrinthine design of the video game. In 1993’s Doom, these secret locations could only be found by the players by ‘bumping’ on the walls of the hidden location, that reveals the secret

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entrance which otherwise cannot be found or seen on the map provided in the video game. Upon this new way of easter egg placement — a mention of real -world cultural references or secret locatio ns that could be interacted in virtual worlds of video games — also created another aspect for the video games to be interactive with the player, physically.

While the video games and their virtual spaces are digital productions or recreations of real -world examples and systems, the interaction in the video game is perceived as real. This perception is achieved by mimicking the real -world properties in institutional or conventional audiovisual mediums for video games interactive purpose. Video games gamepl ay activity is achieved by physical actions such as motor skills that represent specific actions of the video games avatar. Therefore any physical input generated in real -world is translated to the virtual world, and also every interaction achieved in the virtual world is translated to the real -world via audiovisual mediums.

Therefore in order to clarify the correlation of the virtual worlds of the video games with the real -world settings and their connections importance on both mediums progression, unders tanding, perception and development, the interaction looked in the case study video games are focused on both the avatars interaction with the spatial surroundings and understanding. This focus is chosen in this case study, to explain the fundamental requi rements of interaction with Virtuality, in order to use Virtuality on design mediums as a collaborative design cycle purposes .