作者：Alois Wittwer

两周以前，我与Warren Spector一起参加了在墨尔本的动态影像中心的座谈会。Spector和Paul Callaghan（墨尔本Freeplay节的主办人）之间的谈话让我看到了游戏界元老的创意过程，真的很有意义。

因为Spector有非常多的工作都与玩家代理有关，所以谈话最终不可避免地落在电子游戏的选择和结果上。Spector提到当玩家第一次玩《杀出重围》时的挣扎，以及当玩家保存并重新载入剧情的关键时刻想看看游戏要告诉玩家的一切。他提到有些玩家，从小就受早期电子游戏那种更直接体验的影响，他们“被游戏中的选择麻痹”了。他对此颇为不解。

杀出重围(from deusex.wikia.com)

两周以后，Richard Cobbett在《Saturday Soapbox: Guilt by Association》一文中流露了类似的焦虑情绪。虽然内容上并不同，但Cobbett和Spector二人都认为，当玩家可以影响事件的结果时，玩家在游戏中会更有身临其境之感。Cobbett特别强调了游戏有可能破坏我们伸张正义的渴望。《Spec Ops: The Line》中不存在“正确”的决定，玩家要在游戏中面临一连串可怕的事件，Cobbett认为应该给予玩家退出执行任务的选择，无论这种选择也许多么无意义。否则，玩家本该因自己的选择而产生的负罪感就会消失殆尽，因为那并不是他的选择。

我反对这个论点，因为游戏的叙述元素选择不会影响我，而且很可能永远都不会。我希望游戏指引我的感觉，否则我就会很机械地处理叙述选择，就像在电子游戏中的所有其他选择一样。

我之所以这么想，部分是因为我对电子游戏的理解。电子游戏是一种体验性的媒体，鼓励玩家在某时刻进行思考，非常像现实生活。我确实没有意识到我所作的大部分决定。我的决定更多地是根据我希望怎么处理事情。我怎么写这个？我怎么申请大学？我在这些决定中看不到什么意义，我只知道那些是必须要完成的事。现实生活已经很像电子游戏了，因为生活中有太多时候都是关于我要怎么做某事。

玩家代理太熟悉现实生活了。Cobbett希望我对游戏中发生的一切都有全知全能的感觉。我不行。如果我处于战争地带，除了逃出这个是非之地，我很怀疑我还会考虑其他什么事。当我玩游戏时，我想的就是怎么把事情处理妥当，怎么用道具爬树，怎么进入下一道关卡。我太关心这些卑微的事了，以致于没有办法关注真正有意义的事，除非这些事主动影响我。

这就是为什么《Spec Ops: The Line》中的一个例子在Cobbett的形容下让我觉得那么有趣。剥夺我的决定权，迫使我适应虚构游戏世界，然后我就会以正确的心态处理罪恶感的了。我甚至能从中学到一些可以运用于现实生活的东西。

如果游戏想让我感受到什么像罪恶感和责任感一样沉重的东西，就必须打开我的心扉。选择会让我分心。我只会把选择当作一连串杂活，就像我在现实生活中那样处理事情。

这就是为什么《最终幻想4》的游戏开场让人觉得那么强大。一开始，画面上出现了一批叫作“Red Wings ”的精英战士，他们正在攻击一座名为Mysidia的和平城市，目的是偷取水晶。在这个事件中，玩家没有选择权，即使那分明是件不正义的事。当主人公Cecil见到王，质问王发动攻击的动机时，他立即被降级并派去执行另一项任务——将一包裹送到邻近的村庄。然而，这个包裹居然是一种屠杀全村的武器。劫后余波，玩家很不幸地看到孤零零的孩子失去了她的母亲。这个孩子却加入了玩家一方。

选择的缺失让我认识到Cecil就是从我自己当中分离出来的人。我是一个助纣为虐者。这太悲剧了。我没有摧毁自己的生活，但我把别人的生活搞得一团糟。

最终幻想（from nightmaremode)

当游戏中没有改变的余地时，颠覆我们伸张正义的渴望也更加有效了。在《Nier》（游戏邦注：这是一款由Square Enix公司发行的ARPG）中，当你意识到自己犯下了灭绝种族的大罪时，拯救自己女儿的行为就变得毫无意义了。只有在所有破坏都完成后，玩家的扭曲感才最终被纠正。 新游戏被重新制作后，变得更加恐怖，因为玩家的影响远比yes/no的选择更加有效。玩家可以选择继续玩游戏和屠杀万民，或者放下游戏控制器并离开。

这似乎是Cobbett和Spector都忽略掉的选择。玩家可以拒绝沉浸到任何游戏中。玩家可以通过完全回避某些情况来减轻罪恶感。但是，有些游戏能如此有效地让我们产生罪恶感（或其他情绪），我们从这些游戏中学到了什么，以至于我们不能再玩这款游戏？那是一种在艺术上令人永生难忘的东西，但对于一般玩家来说却没什么吸引力。你得到的是反感。

另外，有些游戏根据我们的选择可以将罪恶感完全转换成其他情绪，我们从这些游戏中又学到了什么？当我们可以选择许多不同的心态时，游戏告诉我们什么了？游戏有告诉我们什么吗？

生化奇兵(from geekosystem.com)

最后，Cobbett认为《生化奇兵》在向玩家灌输罪恶感方面有一点儿让人不快，我同意。但在我看来，这个问题更体现了有些人不知道说什么，而不是游戏不能在所有情境中都产生合理的结果。如果《生化奇兵》移除了“拯救Little Sisters ”的选项，只给玩家提供“收获/忽略”的选项，那么我们就会有一个非常不一样的游戏了，也许会更连贯吧。

尽管Cobbett是对的。电子游戏确实能相当轻易地让我们摆脱困境。但游戏不必如此。游戏更擅长挖掘“更难的”情绪如罪恶感、悲伤和甚至爱。注意：那些不是愉悦的情绪，而且我们会努力摆脱它们。不要认为这很容易。游戏应让我们关注某些不能忽视的事，并可能让我们在这个过程中学到一些事。因为我们在游戏中已经有太多自由了，远比我们自己想像的多。所以限制一些选项是完全合理的。（本文为游戏邦/gamerboom.com编译，拒绝任何不保留版权的转载，如需转载请联系：游戏邦）

Feedback Loop: Why video games should drag us kicking and screaming

by Alois Wittwer

Two weeks ago I went to a panel with Warren Spector at the Australian Centre for the Moving Image in Melbourne. The conversation between Spector and Paul Callaghan, director of Melbourne’s Freeplay festival, was a fascinating look into the creative process of one of gaming’s oldest luminaries. It was my first encounter with someone entrenched in the medium and I loved it. I was over the moon.

With so much of Spector’s work concerned with player agency, it was inevitable the talk would eventually settle on choice and consequence in video games. Spector touched on the struggles some players had when they first experienced Deus Ex and of his frustration when people would save and reload at pivotal moments of the story to see everything the game had to offer. He mentioned that some players, raised on the more directed experiences of early video games, couldn’t even comprehend the freedom they had. They were “paralyzed by choice”.

Spector was talking to me that night. He just didn’t know it.

Richard Cobbett’s Saturday Soapbox: Guilt by Association sparked a similar feeling of anxiety two weeks later. While dissimilar in content, both Cobbett and Spector advocate that the player is more personally invested in a game when they can affect the outcome of events. Cobbett specifically highlights the opportunities games have in subverting our desire to do the right thing. When faced with a particularly gruesome sequence in Spec Ops: The Line where no “right” decision exists, Cobbett argues that the game needed a choice to weasel out of doing your duty, however empty that choice may be. Any guilt he could have felt about his decision was lost because it never was his decision.

I struggle with this line of reasoning because narrative choice in games doesn’t affect me. It most likely never will. I want games to tell me how to feel otherwise I’ll approach narrative choice like I do all other choices in video games: a mechanical to-do list.

Part of this comes from how I understand video games. They’re an experiential medium that encourage you to think in the moment, much like life. And, much like life, I’m not really cognisant of the majority of decisions I make. My decisions come about more from how I want to do things. How do I write this? How do I apply for a university? I don’t see a story in these decisions, I just see things that need to be done. Life already feels like a video game because so much of it is concerned with how I’m going to do things.

Player agency feels too familiar to real life. Cobbett wants me to think that I have some omniscient understanding of the shit that’s happening in games. I don’t. If I was placed in a war zone, I doubt I’d even consider anything but how to get out of there and make sure I’m okay. What I’m thinking about when I play games is how to make everything fall into the right place, how to use this item to clamber up that tree, and how to get to the next bit of the level to see the next big thing. I’m too concerned with the menial to focus on the meaningful unless it yells at me.

It’s why that one instance in Spec Ops: The Line as described by Cobbett sounds so interesting to me. Remove that decision from me, force me to adjust to the fabrication of the world, and then I’ll be in the right mind set to process guilt. I could even learn something from it to apply to my own life.

I need games to punch me in the gut if they want me to feel something as heavy as guilt and responsibility. Choice will distract me. I’ll only turn choice into a series of chores like everything else I do in life. I need to be separated from myself otherwise I’ll turn into an adult, quickly.

It’s why Final Fantasy 4′s opening remains so powerful. The game opens with an elite group of soldiers called the Red Wings attacking the peaceful city of Mysidia to steal a Crystal. You have no choice in the matter and it’s clearly depicted as the wrong thing to do. When the protagonist Cecil confronts the King and questions his motives, he’s quickly demoted and sent out on another mission to deliver a parcel to a nearby village. The parcel turns out to be weapon that decimates the entire village and you unlucky bastard get to see the lone child who lost her mother in the aftermath. She even joins your party.

The absence of choice lets me recognise Cecil as someone separate from myself. I’m an enabler. This is devastating. I’m not fucking up my life here, I’m fucking up someone else’s.

Even subverting our desire to do good is more effective when presented with little leeway. Nier rendered all your actions to save your daughter completely meaningless when you realised you committed mass genocide. The twist came right at the end only after all the damage had been done. New Game + was reworked into a terrifying game of player implication far more effectively than a binary yes/no choice. You either continued to play the game and slaughtered hundreds, or put the controller down and walked away.

That’s a choice both Cobbett and Spector seem to ignore. You can refuse to engage in any game. You can assuage your guilt by avoiding the situation entirely. But what do we learn from games that are so effective at rendering guilt (or any emotion, really) that we can no longer play them? It’s the sort of thing that’s impressive in an artistic sense but grossly unappealing to the average player. You learn by repulsion.

On the other hand, what do we learn from a game that can transform feelings of guilt into something else entirely depending on our choices? What is a game telling us when we can select many different emotional mindsets? Is it telling us anything?

At the end of his piece, Cobbett touches on Bioshock as a game that went a bit off the rails when it came to instilling guilt in players, and I agree. But the issues I see are more indicative of someone who didn’t know what to say rather than a game that failed to offer reasonable outcomes for every situation. If Bioshock removed the option to Save Little Sisters and only offered the Harvest/ignore option, we would have had a very different game at the end of it all, something more coherent.

Cobbett’s right, though. Video games do let us off the hook pretty easily. It doesn’t have to be like this. Games are more than capable of tapping into the “harder” emotions like guilt, sadness, and even love. Be warned: they’re not pleasant feelings and we’ll try and worm away from them. Don’t think it’ll be easy. Force us into something that can’t be ignored and maybe we’ll learn something along the way. Because we already have a lot of freedom in games, much more than we realize. It’s alright to restrict our options.

Maybe then I’ll be able to play your games, Spector.(source:nihtmaremode)