BA3a Research Report - 1000 Word Draft

How does my workflow differentiate from realistic and hand painted asset creation?

Chapter 1: Mimicking Reality

With technological advancements being a staple in modern society as well as video games, even the most infamous titles such as the original ‘Tomb Raider’, ‘Space Invaders’ and ‘The Legend of Zelda’ are starting to show their age in terms of graphical comparisons with newer ‘AAA’ titles such as ‘The Last of Us’, ‘Assassin’s Creed Syndicate’, ‘Uncharted’ and ‘Fallout 4’. Steven Poole, a professor who wrote ‘Trigger Happy – Videogames and the Entertainment Revolution’ suggests that ‘a casual observer would certainly note the vast improvements in graphic style and detail every year and conclude that videogames are increasingly realistic. Those cars look pretty real; those trees at the side of the racetrack, waving gently in the wind, look satisfyingly real’ (Poole, S). It has become very apparent that games are starting to mimic the real world and what we see around us, not only with more detailed and realistic textures but increasingly fluid animation with dynamically rendered lighting. But why? Poole also states that ‘There is a direct link between convincing videogame dynamics and gameplay pleasure. A game that is more physically realistic is thereby, Topping says, “more aesthetically pleasing”, because the properly modelled game enables us pleasurably to exercise our physical intuition.” (Poole, S). As humans it is natural for us to find what resembles us to be relatable, especially something that we can personally connect with. Not only is it characters which can trigger emotional responses to the player, but also the world around them – even if it may be an imaginary and fictional world. Kendall L. Walton, the writer of ‘Mimesis as Make-believe: On the Foundations of the Representational Arts’ suggests that ‘engaging in make-believe provides practice in roles one might someday assume in real life, that it helps one to understand and sympathise with others, that it enables one to come to grips with one’s own feelings, that it broadens one’s perspectives.’ (L. Walton, K). This suggests that game designers are developing these very realistically based worlds to evoke emotion and possibly realisation to players, that the characters they play are a personal learning curve for the future. In addition to this, L. Walton describes what the role of a ‘prompter’ can be, which in the case for videogames would be the assets a player would see and possibly interact with. She suggests that, ‘One might carve a stump into an unmistakable bear “likeness” in order to make sure that it will prompt people to imagine a bear.”. Whether it be symbols, or something as literal as a stump carved to look like a bear, these are all to add depth to the reality of a scene as well as for the player to think about the origins of a certain asset and if there could be a story to it.

However, even though games are becoming more innovative in ways to provoke emotional responses in players due to mimicking the real world…can it become almost TOO realistic? In the paper, ‘Androids as an Experimental Apparatus’, Karl F. MacDorman describes the work of Masahiro Mori, a roboticist by writing ‘Mori predicted that, as robots appear more human, they seem more familiar until a point is reached at which subtle imperfections create a sensation of strangeness.’ (F. MacDorman, K.) Mori described this strangeness as being called ‘uncanny’ (Mori, M), which is most commonly known today as the ‘uncanny valley’. F. MacDorman also suggests that in terms of creating an artificial human that is uncanny, it is the ‘mechanisms involved in evaluations of human likeness…Machines that appeared too lifelike would be unsettling or even frightening inasmuch as they resemble figures from nightmares or films about the living dead.’ (F. MacDorman, K.). This can also be linked to a 1906 paper written by a German doctor named Ernst Anton Jentsch called “Über die Psychologie des Unheimlichen’ (On the Psychology of the Uncanny)’. Tom Geller summarised his findings in his paper, ‘Overcoming the Uncanny Valley’ by specifying that ‘Jentsch discussed the fear engendered by “automata” (which act as though alive) and wax figures (which appear as though alive). He asserted that the essence of this unease comes from uncertainty: is the object alive or not?’

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