Gaming After Dark I.mueller

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GAMING AFTER DARK

VISUAL PATTERNS AND

THEIR SIGNIFICANCE FOR

ATMOSPHERE AND

EMOTIONAL EXPERIENCE

IN VIDEO GAMES

Ivana Mller

MMA | 2009


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GAMING AFTER DARK

VISUAL PATTERNS AND THEIR SIGNIFICANCE

FOR ATMOSPHERE AND EMOTIONALEXPERIENCE IN VIDEO GAMES

Master Thesis for Obtainment of the Academic Degree

Master of Arts in Arts and Design

Author:

Ivana Mller, BA

MultiMediaArt, Salzburg University of Applied Sciences

Refereed by:

DI Felix Hummel BBakk. (Contentual Consultant 1)

Josef Schinwald, MSc (Contentual Consultant 2)

Salzburg, the 1st of August 2011


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THANKS TO

As this thesis became the center of my thoughts and actions for several weeks, Isincerely want to express my gratitude to following people who supported me all

the way and helped me to finish this extensive work:

First of all, I want to thank my fianc, Stefan Randelshofer, for your endless

support, patience and your help with managing the final sprint. Besides, thank

you for sharing moments of horror with me while play-testing some of the most

creepy games Ive ever seen. I know its not very manly to admit, but I was glad

not being alone in the dark.

I want to express my utmost gratitude to my dear friend Daniel Schwaiger,

without your support and good advice I would have never been able to come

up with such a great topic. Thank you for encouraging me and helping me all

the way. Also, many thanks for being such a great sparring partner; I feel now I

would stand a chance against an attacking horde of zombies at least as long as

it were a small horde.

Many thanks to Daniela Wurhofer from the ICTS, for sharing your knowledge

about patterns with me and encouraging me to realize the importance of this

topic.

I also want to thank my beloved cousin Nina Rozdobudkova for being my

competent proof-reader and for supplying me with a never-ending amount ofsophisticated terms. I also feel honored that my thesis beat its other proof-reading

contestants (a dryer manual and a collection of bank certificates) you had to work

on simultaneously in being an interesting read.

Met by a lucky accident, I want to thank Flurina Doser, for your support with

the psychological part this thesis and her helpful literature hints.


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Many thanks to Felix Hummel and Josef Schinwald, my contentual consultants.

Thank you for your time, your great suggestions and helpful hints and especially

for your interest in this rather unconventional topic.

I am also very grateful to Michael Manf for your patience and advice as well

as providing me with some interesting literature. In order to express my sincere

gratitude I included Jacques Derrida into this thesis. The Hauntology chapter is

dedicated to you.

I especially want to thank Mr. Hans Bacher, who provided me with significant

feedback during the pre-production of my master project and encouraging me tofollow my visual style as he considered it to be on the right track.

Jana and Roland Mller, thank you, mum and dad, for your support from the

almost 350km distance. I guess I should also thank our telecom provider for its

moderate tariff, as our talks where rather extensive.

I want to thank my brother, Robin Mller, who informed me in detail about the

horrors of Amnesias monster design. I was really happy that you were in such

talkative mood for once.

Stefanie Eilenberger thank you for enduring my endless rants. Having to face

that horde of zombies, Id prefer you on my side.

And finally, I want to thank TOSHIYA for your endurance and loyalty. You

didnt let me down, even after almost four years of not having your systemreinstalled at all. Ill fix that next week for sure I promise.


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DECLARATION OF ACADEMIC INTEGRITY

I declare that I, Ivana Mller, born on 10. 06 1987 in Bratislava, have followed

the principles of academic workflow to the best of my knowledge and belief and

that I am the sole author of the present work. No external sources beside those

listed were used for its composition.

I assure that I have not submitted this master thesis, neither nationally nor

internationally, in any form as an examination paper and that this thesis

matches to the copies submitted to the contentual consultants.

Salzburg, the 1st of August 2011

0610429031

Ivana Mller Matriculation Number


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OVERVIEW

Name and Surname: Ivana Mller

Institution: Salzburg University of Applied Sciences

Study Course: MultiMediaArt

Title of the Thesis: Gaming after Dark

Visual Patterns and Their Significance for Atmosphere

and Emotional Experience in Video Games

Contentual Consultant 1: DI Felix Hummel BBakk.

Contentual Consultant 2: Josef Schinwald, MSc

Keywords: 1. Visual Pattern

2. Video Game

3. Atmosphere

4. Experience

5. Fear

6. Survival


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ABSTRACT

The following thesis deals with the issue of style definition that is essential for

atmosphere and immersion in video games. Since the graphics of the games have

evolved drastically in the past years, next gen consoles provide an almost cinematic

experience. And as an emotional experience is doubtless all about the ambiance,

the choice fell on the genre that, as almost no other, has the requirements for

evoking intense feelings the survival horror games. As todays games are known

for creating tension and fear with the help of intriguing aesthetics, the focus lies

on artistic factors of over-arching light-and-dark contrasts, improved with eerily

luminous visual accents introduced in almost realistic but uncanny desaturated

game worlds. After analyzing essential aspects of fear itself and discussing all

relevant components that play a role in succeeding with an emotional experience,

the paper further deals with the principles of patterns. Originally introduced

for solving architectural design problems, patterns soon proved their popularity

among other fields too, becoming useful even for game design. Taking this matter

a step further, this thesis pursues the concept of introducing the novel idea of

visual patterns into the artistic field of expertise. Taking advantage of some

groundbreaking representatives from the survival horror genre, six games are

carefully analyzed from the point of view of their aesthetic features. In the final

iteration, results from theses analyses are evaluated and resumed in an attempt

to create a collection of visual patterns. Such patterns should, in further extent,

present a visual guidance and well inspiration for artistic concepts. This work will

introduce the concept of such visual patterns, adapted to artistic terms, establish

their relevance and illustrate the advantages of putting them in use.


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KURZBESCHREIBUNG

Die vorliegende Arbeit befasst sich mit der Problematik der Stilfindung, die

essenziell fr Atmosphre und Immersion bei Video Spielen ist. Whrend sich in

den letzten Jahren die Qualitt der Grafik um ein Vielfaches gesteigert hat, bieten

Next Gen Konsolen dem/der SpielerIn bereits nahezu kinoreife Erlebnisse. Weil

eine gefhlsnahe Erfahrung auf ein gekonnt inszeniertes Ambiente zurck zu fhren

ist, fiel die Wahl auf ein Genre, das zweifelsohne gute Voraussetzungen besitzt,

intensive Emotionen und ngste hervor zu rufen die Survival Horror Games.

Da die modernen Spiele die Spannung durch faszinierende sthetik untersttzen,

wird der Fokus dieser Arbeit zunchst auf die allgegenwrtigen Kontraste von hell

und dunkel gelegt, hervorgehoben durch die Unbehagen hervorrufenden visuellen

Akzente in einer nahezu realistisch erscheinenden, jedoch zur Gnze entsttigten,

feindseligen Umgebung. Um sich solch einer klassischen Horror-Stimmung

anzunhern, werden zunchst die essenziellen Bestandteile analysiert, die dazu

beitragen, dass der/die SpielerIn in eine homogene und authentische Spielwelt

eintauchen kann. Diese basieren nicht nur auf sthetischen Komponenten, sondern

sind ebenso Ergebnisse gekonnt angewandten Gamedesigns und Storytellings. Da

der Fokus jedoch weitgehend auf der Etablierung Visueller Patterns liegt, befassen

sich die darauf folgenden Analysen zunchst mit einer bersicht des Themas

Patterns im Allgemeinen. In weiterer Folge wird zur Eingrenzung der Thematik

die Anwendung der Patterns im Game Design beschrieben und anschlieend

das Konzept einer innovativen Idee der Visuellen Patterns vorgestellt. Im letzten

Teil der Arbeit werden sechs Spiele, die als reprsentativ fr das Survival Horror

Genre gelten an Hand ihrer sthetischen Merkmale analysiert. In der folgendenIteration werden die Ergebnisse ihrer Analyse ausgewertet, praktisch angewandt

und resultieren in einer Sammlung von Visuellen Patterns. In ihrer ausgereiften

Version sollten solche Patterns visuelle Orientierungshilfe leisten und Inspirationen

fr den kreativen Prozess liefern. Diese Thesis wird nun das Konzept solcher

Visuellen Patterns vorstellen, ihre Relevanz fr den Art Bereich definieren und

die Vorteile hervorheben, die durch ihren gezielten Einsatz entstehen knnen.


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INDEX

Introduction

1. Emotions and Fear in Video Games

1.1 A Short Overview of the Psychology of Emotions

1.1.1 Overview of Emotion Theories

1.1.2 Transfer of Emotions through Media

1.1.3 Sensation-seeking, thrill and suspense

1.2 The Attractions of Gaming After Dark

1.2.1 The Basics of Suspense

1.2.2 The Pleasures of Limitation

1.2.3 Emotions of Horror

1.2.4 Jacques Derridas Hauntology

1.2.5 The Pleasures of Fear

1.2.5.1 Theory of Sensation-seeking

1.2.5.2 Theory of the After-Horror-High

1.2.5.3 Theory of Social Benefits1.3 Mechanics of atmosphere and mood in games with

the focus of the survival horror genre

1.3.1 The Four Basic Elements in Games

1.3.1.1 Aesthetics

1.3.1.2 Mechanics

1.3.1.3 Story

1.3.1.4 Technology

1.3.2 Approaching the Immersive Experience 1.3.2.1 Components of Immersion

1.3.2.2 Asymmetrical Gameplay

1.3.2.3 Flow

1.3.2.4 The Two Factor Theory in Terms

of the Difficulty of Gameplay

1.3.2.5 The Art of Telling a Creepy Story -

You killed Mary again?

1

6

7

8

10

11

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13

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22

2324

25

26

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26

2728

33

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37

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1.3.2.6 Sound Content

1.3.2.7 Visual Content

2. Patterns

2.1 Pattern Language by Christopher Alexander

2.2 Patterns in Game Design

2.2.1 Characteristics of Game Design Patterns

2.2.1.1 Semiformal Descriptions

2.2.1.2 Interrelated Descriptions

2.2.1.3 Hierarchies of Patterns

2.2.1.4 Intentional or Emergent Presence 2.2.2 Analysis and Validation of Game Design Patterns

2.2.2.1 Structural Analysis

2.2.2.2 Play Testing

2.2.3 The Nameless Quality a.k.a.

The Properties of Living Things

2.3 Visual Patterns

2.3.1 Deduction of Visual Patterns by Analyzing Games

2.3.2 Relevance of Visual Patterns

2.3.3 Distinction of Features for Visual Patterns

2.3.3.1 Style

2.3.3.2 Colour-Look and Scene Temperature

2.3.3.3 Light

2.3.3.4 Environment Art and Architectural Geometry

2.3.3.5 Character- and Monsterdesign 2.3.3.6 Visual Contrasts during Encounter

2.3.3.7 Visual Semantics

2.3.4 Visual Pattern Template

3. Applying Visual Patterns

3.1. Analysis of Survival Horror Games based on Visual Features

3.1.1 Dead Space I

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3.1.2 Silent Hill 2

3.1.3 Alan Wake

3.1.4 Amnesia: The Dark Descent 3.1.5 Project Zero

3.1.6 Haunting Ground

3.2 Construction of Visual Patterns

3.2.1 Visual Pattern for Style of the Survival Horror Genre

3.2.2 Visual Pattern for Colour-Look and Scene Temperature

3.2.3 Visual Pattern for Light

3.2.4 Visual Pattern for Environment Art and

Architectural Geometry 3.2.5 Visual Pattern for Monsterdesign

3.2.6 Visual Pattern for Visual Contrasts during Encounter

3.2.7 Visual Pattern for Visual Semantics

4. Conclusion

Bibliography Literature

Bibliography Online

Bibliography Figures

Bibliography - Games

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LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS

BS boredom susceptibility

cf. compare

DIS disinhibition

ES experience seeking

ff. following lines or pages

FMX Conference on Animation, Effects, Games and Interactive Media

ib. ibidem

n/a not available

TAS Thrill and adventure

UDK Unreal Development Kit


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INTRODUCTION


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Introduction 2

Nowadays is an important time for video games, as they slowly mature in

terms of technology, design extent and sophisticated aesthetics. While their

predecessors, consisting of a limited amount of almost countable pixels, had

a hard time invoking the players emotional responses, modern games provide

multiple approaches create already intense, cinematic experiences. Playing video

games is an emotional experience. This should be nothing new to anybody who

spent some time with a gamepad or a joystick in his/her hand. But what are the

reasons that cause emotional responses and how does a visual style influence

what emotions the player is likely to experience? My motivation for dealing with

aspects of atmosphere and experience resulted in the master project that was

developed within the two years of my master studies. It was a game, featuring a

mix of the adventure, 3rd person shooter and survival horror genre.

The game entitled Sidelivesfollowed a very unique visual style, trying to break

norms and conventions of classic games, such as those produced for the massmarket that are under pressure of success and mostly falling back to established

visual language. As it was the final university project, Sidelives provided the

freedom of experiencing with various approaches. The final decision of the art

direction was to pursue a highly illustrative style, based on water colour and ink.

Provided with mood art rather than real concept art, it was a very challenging

time, trying to figure out the appropriate ways of implementation that would

meet the artistic requirements. One of the main goals of the game was to immerse

the player within an atmospheric experience, mainly based on intriguing visuals

and present an eerie environment, deserted and filled with evil presence.

I was mainly responsible for texturing and shading and many times, I found

myself rather clueless and wondering how to translate certain visual aspects into

the shading networks of the engine. Even though we were developing with the

Unreal Engine3, which is with no doubt a powerful tool, one was often limited by

the visual trademarks, automatically suggesting to follow the well-known, specific

UDK-style. It took a big deal of research to figure out how to proceed and it

puzzled me again and again, as I was re-changing textures for the fifth time in

1) Sidelives Team (2011): Sidelives: Synopsis. In: http://www.sidelives.at/game, as of August 1st 2011.

In the utopian futuristic city Taion, where people consider sleep a malfunction

of the body and an unacceptable imperfection, a giant competition, The Sidelives

Tournament is held for 100 civilians, with only one rule to follow: You must not

sleep. During the contest, the city is suddenly hit by a huge tremor, when a dark

mass called Void, which is the source of energy in the urban area, breaks free

from its pipes and tubes and floods huge parts of the city, devouring everything

and everybody touched by it1


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Introduction 3

the same level, trying to follow the art style and preserve the flat and planar style

in a three dimension environment. During the months of experimenting, I often

wished for some artistic guidance that would support certain decisions and suggest

different techniques of approach. This is where the idea of visual patterns was

born. Patterns are very efficient templates for problem-solving issues and present

a handy, reusable model, applicable in various situations within a certain context.

Even though the pattern language was introduced in architectural design first,

soon it became very popular and was adopted in different fields of expertise, such

as software engineering or user experience of human-computer interaction. Lately

they have also become important for video game design, providing many effective

problem-solving approaches. So having programmers and game designers using

patterns, I wondered, why artist were apparently the only ones left without thepossibility of using them. One might argue that art is not something that could be

limited by pre-defined parameters or that using them might decrease creativity and

an individual approach and artists might falling into plain stereotypes, following

all the same principles. But those fears are unsubstantiated as patterns are by no

means something repetitive. They should be mainly considered as hypotheses and

collections of ideas in order to inspire different applications. As certainly every

artist agrees it is much easier being creative if one knows the tools and masters

various methods of expertise. Being familiar with the wide range of possibilities

might only increase creativity, safe plenty of time and occasionally even lead tonovel approaches and styles.

Following these assumptions, there is one central question the whole thesis

revolves around:


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Introduction 4

What are the factors

that contribute to the

creation of atmosphere

and immersiveexperience in video

games and is it

possible to constructvisual patterns which

would support these

factors if introduced

into games, such as the

survival horror genre?


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Introduction 5

As exploring this topic in terms of atmosphere as such would definitely break

the mould of this thesis, I decided to focus on the genre of survival horror games

for three reasons. First, they provide a significant and distinguishable palette of

visual characteristics, second this genre played an important role in the content of

Sidelives and its aesthetic appearance and finally, survival horror games contribute

much to the players experience, succeeding to evoke emotions to an extent, as

no other genre does.

Within the three main chapters, this work tries to find answers and present

various solutions and approaches for this issue. The first part EMOTIONSANDFEARS

INVIDEOGAMES deals with numerous aspects concerning emotional experiences

during play. Starting with a short psychological overview of the key-features

about emotions and fear, it continues with social aspects in regard of attractionsand pleasures provided by experiencing horror in media. The final part analyzes

atmosphere in games and the factors that are crucial for succeeding in creating

an emotional experience.

The second chapter PATTERNS comments on patterns in their basic field of

expertise, as they were introduced to architectural design in the first place. In

order to narrow the context, the further part deals with pattern, as used in game

design, showing their modified approach in a novel field. Taking this idea up,

the following chapter introduces the concept of visual patterns, adapting them to

artistic terms and also trying to establish their relevance and properly illustratingtheir advantages. Finally, a template for visual patterns is constructed and put

in use in the third chapter APPLYINGVISUALPATTERNS. This section consists of

two parts. First of all, the famous and trend-setting survival horror games Dead

Space I, Silent Hill 2, Alan Wake, Amnesia: The Dark Descent, Project Zero

andHaunted Ground are going to be analyzed in regards of their visual means,

responsible for contributing to atmosphere and emotional experience. Afterwards,

the results of the analysis will be evaluated and implemented to the template

and resulting in the creation of several visual patterns. The final pages of the

conclusion will provide a critic discussion about creating emotional experiences

in games, the possible success or fail of such visual patterns in terms of artistic

approach and further suggestions of additional use as well as future prospects.

Finally, it is important to note that this thesis does not raise a claim to create

a completeness of new patterns, as that would go beyond the scope of a master

thesis, rather this work tries to introduce the basic idea of applying patterns in

graphical fields of expertise as well. Visual patterns, conducted by the analysis of

this paper are meant to be seen as the main outline of this idea.


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1

EMOTIONSAND FEARIN VIDEOGAMES


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Emotions and Fear in Video Games 7

1.1 SHORT OVERVIEW ABOUT THE PSYCHOLOGY OF EMOTIONS

This first chapter will provide a short and basic overview of the main components of

emotions and moods based on psychological foundations. As a detailed description

of this topic would certainly go beyond the scope of this media-oriented thesis,

this part will only list aspects that are relevant for further understanding of the

subject.

As human beings, people have an innate understanding about the principles of

emotions. One important thought deals with the question on how are emotions

produced and why one has them. By attempting to simulate natural systems, the

very first thing to resolve is the nature of a certain system and its purpose andreason for being, because very few, if any systems at all in the natural world seem

to exist for no reason. Emotions are an integral part of our decision-making

systems. Emotions tune our decisions according to our personalities, moods, and

momentary emotions to give us unique responses to situations presented by our

environment.2 According to psychologists Meyer, Reisenzein and Schtzwohl,

there is a difference between the terms emotionand mood. Emotionsare temporally

limited, unique and specific occurrences like happiness, fear or rage. They are

current, object-oriented mental conditions of a certain quality, intensity and

duration, consisting of three aspects: the aspect of experience, the psychologicalaspect and the aspect of behaviour. Mood on the contrary, is characterized

by lesser but longer lasting level of arousal, significant for the absence of the

object-oriented feature. This means that the causes for moods are often not

directly obvious. These definitions are based on the assumption that emotions

are triggered by specific events and can be distinguished in terms of their quality

(as happiness is experienced on a completely different emotional level than rage

or fear). The three aspects of emotions mentioned above are also foundations

for various emotional theories. Some of those theories focus on daily experiences

and look for so-called basic emotions. Rudimentary approaches to evolutionary

biology are also part of these theories, as they assume that elemental emotions can

be also found within the animal world. Exponents of such evolutionary biological-

based theories assume that emotions are inherited, adaptive forms of behaviour

that evolved in order to support the individual to survive and to adapt a variety

of different, situational behaviour-structures.3

2) Cook, Daniel (2007): Constructing Artificial Emotions: A Design Experiment. http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/1992/constructing_

artificial_emotions_.php?page=2, as of July 17th 2011.

3) cf. Batinic, Bernad / Appel, Markus (2008): Medienpsychologie. Heidelberg: Springer Medizin Verlag. p.150 ff.


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1.1.1 Overview of Emotion Theories

The reason why there is need for unique responses to situations instead of

uniform ones lies beyond the individual at humanity as a group of society.

Basically, personality has evolved as a problem-solving mechanism, to enable

human beings to achieve a highly effective potential of dealing with various

situations. Furthemore, emotion could be regarded as an emergent system in

terms of its ability to interact with the society rather than acting in isolation. 4

According to Izard, there are ten fundamental emotions that define the main

motivational system of human beings:

Interest Excitement

Pleasure Happiness Astonishment Shock

Grief Pain

Anger Rage

Disgust Revulsion

Disdain Contempt

Fear Horror

Timidity Humiliation

Feelings of guilt Regret5

Izard assumes that each of those fundamental emotions has a unique feature. He

claims that emotions interact with each other, intensifying some and weakening

others. They also have impact on various procedures of homeostatic, drive,

perception, cognitive and motoric actions. According to Plutchik, emotions

are based on cooperation between cognitive situational impressions, subjective

feelings, psychological arousal and behavioral impulses. Emotions merge with

other constructs such as personality characteristics and can be classified as primary

or secondary emotions. Plutchiks theory also deals with the intensity of emotions

and their resemblance.

The second line of theories about emotions is known as dimensional emotion

theories. It states that emotion is a result of one or multiple characteristics of

various dimensions. Currently there are still some discords about the issues of

those dimensions, as Wundt suggests that they are among the three foundations of

tension solution, passion aversion and excitement calming. But according

to Schlosberg, they are represented trough two dimensions of pleasantness

unpleasantness and orientation avoidance. This theory is based on various

4) Cook, Daniel (2007) ib. as of July 17th 2011.

5) cf. Batinic, Bernad / Appel, Markus (2008) ib. p.151.


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experiments using photographs showing different scenarios and the resulting

mimic responses of the test objects.

Other approaches can be found among cognitive-evaluation theories with

a strong focus on various appraisal-theories. The fundamental appraisal theory

was introduced by Scherer in 1990 and describes the occurrence of emotions as

cortical and sub-cortical processing mechanisms of intern and extern stimulation,

neurophysiologic patterns, motoric expression, motivations and feelings. According

to Scherer, emotions are conditions of different organismic sub-systems. He claims

that not every mood-change might be described as emotion, as emotions occur

only if correlating changes of positing sub-systems emerge, which means that the

result is a subjective change of a stable baseline condition. This theory suggests

that emotions are always a sign of a balanced organism even if they are positive,such as strong happiness they automatically mobilize all vital resources to a

synchronized action. Summed up the references, the procedure of experiencing

emotions starts with information processing on a cortical or sub-cortical level and

leads to changes of the balanced state of all five sub-systems. Such changes are

responsible for complex correlations and synchronizations of system-states. The

whole processing capacity is focused on the trigger. The emotional experience

ends as soon as the synchronization and the interaction of the sub-systems relieve

and they take over their usual specific tasks again. The intensity of an emotional

experience depends on the novelty of an irritant, the intrinsic pleasantness, thegoal significance, the coping potential and the compatibility standards.

The final approach is the so-called three-factor theory by Zillman, introduced in

2004 and describes three essential parts of emotion as a dispositional component,

an arousing component and the experience component. This theory differs

from the others based on its assumption about automatic emotional reactivity.

Zillman argues that some strong emotions, e.g. shock are hard-wired. While other

emotions are results of complex biological procedures, some other do not need

planning or thinking and are beyond conscious control. Aspects of automatic

emotional reactivity are also supported by various recent studies. This theory also

states that even though such reactions are subconscious, a cognitive validation

still takes place afterwards, which leads to an instant change of reactions related

to the trigger event. This leads to an affective disposition to look for or avoid

such triggers in future.6

There is also one last interesting theory that was introduced at the beginning

of the 20th century, claiming that emotions are psychological malfunctions and

should not occur at all. The foundation of this theory was the idea that emotions

6) cf. Batinic, Bernad / Appel, Markus (2008) ib. p.151 ff.


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just reflect situations that the human being cannot cope with. E.g. fear emerges

only if one is not able to run, anger exists only if one is not able to defeat his/her

opponent. The supporters of this theory claimed that emotions are unnecessary

and even harmful for a healthy personality as they weaken the attention and

reasoning and are responsible for actions that people regret afterwards. This bold

theory was soon disproved through two essential aspects. First of all, happiness

does not result from unsolved problems and second, emotions have adaptive

functions and are vital for survival of the individual: the fearful person runs,

the aggressive person fights back. Charles Darwin briefly states that the role of

emotions is surviving.7

1.1.2 Transfer of Emotions through Media

As human beings are not only exposed passively to emotions, there are also

possibilities of creating emotions artificially. A rather easy way is the construction

with the help of media. Two main theories are going to be described in this

section, trying to explain, why it is possible to experience emotions without the

trigger that is usually essential. One attempt deals with the construct of presence

in order to compare virtually mediated reality to the experienced reality and the

second one describes neuronal representations of specific triggers that are able toevoke emotional responses.

The first concept of presence is also called tele-presence and defines the

psychological predominance of virtual experiences over immediate, real ones.

Basically, tele-presence is simply the condition that appears during a reception

of contents processed by the media. The interesting point is that the media itself

fades into the background while the subjective experience becomes the primary

thing, people are focused on, even if they are physically somewhere else. This

means, if one watches the protagonist crying in pain, s/he emotionally gets

attached to the character and experiences empathy, even though one is not at the

same place as the protagonist and strictly speaking even does not have anything

to do with that situation. According to Lombard and Ditton, there are at least six

correlating conceptions of such constructs of presence:

- Social comprehensiveness of information

- Perceptual and fictive contact with reality

- Tele-presence that conveys the feeling of sharing

the same space with virtual protagonists

7) cf. Zimbardo, Phillip G. (19957): Psychologie. Berlin: Springer-Verlag. p.442.


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- Construct that supports immersion

- Construct that refers on social interaction with the medium

- Social reaction towards the medium itself8

Those aspects refer to the phenomenon of emotional changes that get triggered

by media reception and affect the level of reality one experiences even with

completely fictional content. This connection can also be reversed by intentionally

seeking distance to the medium which occurs mostly during too horrific events

that one is not willing to experience to such extent any longer.

Another approach is based on the three-factor theory by Zillmann and refers

to the importance of emotional memory that is essential for experience and one

of the main reasons why fictional triggers work that well. Even iconic or symbolicrepresentations of triggers can evoke the same emotional reactions, and such

reactions can be reinforced through considerations about arguments with the

trigger-media as well. This means that an image or a clip of a snake can trigger

the same emotional responses of threat as a real snake might evoke. Such reactions

can even arise when one has never really experienced a threat by a snake in real

life before. As emotions need a certain time to release, it is possible to strengthen

upcoming emotions as they do not occur onneutral ground,but already on a

triggered post-emotion. Many emotions triggered shortly after each other leads

to a more intense experience and is called excitation transfer. The media haveevolved this trend skillful as they introduced more emotionally touching and

evoking topics, combined with short cuts, shock effects, close-ups on the actors

in full emotion and odd cinematography to assure a constantly high level of

excitation.

1.1.3 Sensation Seeking, Thrill and Suspense

It is obvious that some people seem to prefer experiencing fear and horror rather

than others. Psychologists think that is has mainly to do with emotional specific

application motives and personal characteristics. The term suspense describes

the emotional condition that builds up slowly with a certain involvement within

the received process. It is tightly linked to the feature of sensation seeking. It is

assumed that people, suffering from the sensation seeking drive are constantly

under-stimulated and therefore look for an appropriate level of excitement.

Zuckermann does not hesitate to profile such people in a rather controversial way:

8) cf. Batinic, Bernad / Appel, Markus (2008) ib. p.155 ff.


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They love risks and exciting situations, prefer dangerous sports, look for sexual

adventures, have a low inhibition threshold towards psychoactive substances and

attract attention through their risky behaviour in road traffic. This personality

trait is also portrayed with the feature of curiosity that is known to be important

for infants in the first place. In terms of evolutionary biology, sensation seeking

characteristics might even be regarded as a positive trait. Beauducell and Brocke

introduced the sensation seeking scale in 2003 that deals with the different

elements of this characteristic.

- thrill and adventure seeking

(TAS the search for unusual irritants trough physical actions,

such as adventures)

- experience seeking(ES search for sensorial experience through cognitive stimulation)

- disinhibition

(DIS search for stimulation through social encounter)

- boredom susceptibility

(BS intolerance against boredom)9

The feature of thrill and sensation seeking is a common characteristic of fans

of the horror genre, as presented by the media. This feeling is based on the

awareness of an immediate danger and the resulting hope of the individual thats/he will survive the situation and fear, resulting from a certain horrific event. It

is the trust that afterwards, one can return home unharmed, to a safe location.

This context is essential for media and the reason why people with sensation

seeking traits tend to regard fearful and horrific experiences as pleasurable within

the setting of a movie or a game, etc. Zillmann pointed out the slight obvious that

the content of a medium has direct connections to the degree of arousal for the

recipient, as watching nature documentaries cannot compare to the excitement

experienced while watching action or horror movies.

9) cf. Batinic, Bernad / Appel, Markus (2008) ib. p.160.


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1.2 THE ATTRACTIONS OF GAMING AFTER DARK

In this upcoming chapter, various approaches to the success of survival games

and their techniques will be discussed, as well as some philosophical aspects

that outline the appeal of the so-called Hauntology, and finally the ambivalent

pleasure that emerges from voluntarily empathizing with the horror.

Almost the very beginning, video games became an established entertainment, they

seized on the idea of the horror genre. Starting with plain, text-based adventures,

people had the chance to experience fear in a rather interactive way through a

medium for the first time. Stumbling around dark caves, hiding from ambiguous

creatures and running for their lives it was a new type of horror, one that didnot only involve watching another person try to survive, or eventually die, but to

experience it oneself, as the player of the game. Any chance of redemption, failure

or possible success would require facing death, again and again in order to gain

victory in the end. Since the straightforward games based on textual interaction

such as Zork (Mark Blank and Dave Lebing, 1980), the genre has evolved in

many ways. From the first graphical adventures like Mystery House (Roberta

and Ken Williams, 1980) to a more finely crafted horror in The Lurking Horror

(Dave Lebing, 1987), the genre finally achieved the level of suspense with games

that remain important representatives to this day, such as Resident Evil(ShinjiMikami, 1996), Silent Hill (Keiichiro Toyama, 1999), The Suffering (Richard

Rouse, 2004), F.E.A.R.: First Encounter Assault Recon (Craig Hubbard, 2005)

and Dead Space(Brett Robbins, 2008).10

1.2.1 The Basics of Suspense

Taking a step back in order to analyze another immensely successful medium

films such suspense-horror-driven themes have mainly focused on life-and-

death struggles within an insane world, and protagonists who have to face pure,

inhuman evil. One quick look at some famous examples like Nosferatu (F.W.

Murnau, 1922), Night of the Living Dead (George A. Romero, 1968), Alien

(Ridley Scott, 1951) or Ringu(Hideo Nakata, 1998) shows one common trait that

apparently ensures a high quality horror experience: The evil portrayed in those

films is far from explained extensively, if at all. That the antagonist is deadly

dangerous and possesses inhuman powers is much more shown through his/

10) cf. Rouse, Richard (2009): Horror Video Games: Essays on the Fusion of Fear and Play. North Carolina: McFarland & Company, Inc.,

Publishers. p. 15.


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her actions, so the audience would never blame the hero for killing it in an act

of obvious self-defense. This very approach in games can be traced back even to

the Space Invaders, where the player is thrown into a pretty blank environment,

exposed to enemies and forced to overcome the dangerous situation with a clear

kill-or-survivemotivation11: The evil forces are numerous and all deserve to

die.12

In the genre of survival games, this device works in a similar manner, even

though a bit more subtly. Combined with a rather fair plot that is easily to

understand, at least in its basics, the nuances of the horror are mainly worked into

the environment and the characters. And since suspense works the better the less

is explained, the more things are left to the players imagination, the more it mapsto the storytelling and ensures a successfully frightening experience. In horror,

the way the audience fills in the blanks will be far more disturbing than anything

a writer could possibly come up with.13Horror is a convenient genre for video

games as it creates a fairly familiar world, but then offers the possibility to add

disturbing twists to change it into something special and fantastic. Following this

rule, most of the horror stories are placed in highly recognizable environments

the player can easily identify with, in order to make slight and unusual changes

likely to be noticed. Once facing the danger that invaded such familiar locations,

the player does not question the different rules and unique game play elements,as it appears to be clear that they are a result of an altered reality.

1.2.2 The Pleasures of Limitation

Survival horror games unfold in static game spaces. They do not so much create

an environment for experimentation as present a world where the single solution

to individual puzzles must be discovered. Survival horror is closer to ludus than

paidia, characterized by closed systems, limited participation, dichotomized worlds

divided between good and evil, a sense of centralized authorship, and moral

certainties.14

The term ludic might be best explained by the simple rule: you have to do X

in order to achieve Y and become the winner. The gaming principles of survival

games strongly contrast with simulation-oriented games, as they are binary rather

than dynamic systems and work with information instead of rules. The player

of a survival horror video game is internal-exploratory, rather than external-

11) cf. Rouse, Richard (2009) ib. p. 16.

12) Rouse, Richard (2009) ib. p. 16.

13) Rouse, Richard (2009) ib. p. 17.

14) Kirkland, Ewan (2009): Horror Video Games: Essays on the Fusion of Fear and Play. North Carolina: McFarland & Company, Inc.,

Publishers. p. 63 ff.


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ontological.15His/her main task is to guide a rather helpless, fragile character

through the game world, inhabited by much more powerful foes that usually

attempt on the protagonists life. As opposed to this setting, in other genres

the player is given a strong character and more importantly the chance to craft

his/her powers to surpass the enemies in the long run. While the player in

these genres is also privileged to influence the game world around him or her,

there is no such possibility within the survival game. Those games contain only

prefabricated scriptons that occur from the combination of player and game

and can be characterized by static interpretation, not only manipulation, and are

mainly ready-made relations not to be tampered with.16This means there is no

possibility of modding the game in this genre, as maybe the extremely limited

possibility of changing the outfit of the protagonist from times to times. There isneither re-decorating, nor redesigning of the location and certainly no leveling up

the skills of the protagonist. And this is actually the masochistic appeal survival

horror games provide to the player: The feeling of helplessness, entrapment and

pre-determination, caused by the tight limitations of the game freedom.

Players move around the game space, but their actions cannot change the shape

of the game-world history, past or future, or impact in any significant way upon

their surroundings.17

Despite such limitations, it is an undeniable fact that survival horror games

provide their players with pleasure, even, just as stated above, a masochistic oneand in exchange of focusing on any interactive possibilities along a defined route,

the game guarantees one single pathway, filled with excitement, thrill and a

shaking experience in varying pleasurable and un-pleasurable measures.

All induce the vertiginous sensation of not really being in control, no matter

how expertly one might manipulate the controller. The ultimate horror of survival

horror is the suggestion that, despite our strongest feelings to the contrary, we are

not the masters of our own fate.18

1.2.3 Emotions of Horror

Playing video games is an emotional experience. The following section considers

how games engage the emotional system. Still, it is important to keep in mind

that the presence of game structures of representational qualities for causing

emotions is no certain guarantee that the player will experience just those exact

emotions the game designers wanted to achieve. The whole process is also based

15) Kirkland, Ewan (2009): ib. p. 64.





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on individual attitudes of the player, as well as his or her experiences, skills or

memories.

Various scholars already tried to explain the emotionality of gameplay. According

to Perron (2005), gameplay emotions are caused by the evaluations of the player

made during the game. Based on this theory, Lankoski (2007) and Ravaja (2006)

suggest that emotions are directly linked to the structural content of the game.

According to their thesis, the common evaluative context of emotions in games

is the relation between the player and his or her goal set. That means that

during the play, no decision is made in isolation from the game background

or its content. Just as movies evolve around their plots, games also can be seen

as a string of events, one following the other. Such sequences of actions enable

deeper emotional boundaries to the game. According to Bura (2008), each minutespent on playing a game deepens the emotional attraction of the player and

all combined sequential actions help to build more complex feelings, such as

commitment, care or loss.19While playing a horror-themed game or watching a

horror-movie, a certain part of the emotions are just plain reactions to this virtual

experience. Still, it affects a wide range of emotional experiences and in further

consequence, such emotional experiences might even fully change the evaluations

at higher levels of processing. In fact, overly strong emotions can even override

all logical reasoning. Such behaviour can be found among people who suffer from

phobias. Even knowing rationally that a mere picture of a huge spider cannotharm them, they can not possibly stop feeling frightened or disgusted by it.20So

generally, every single perceived element of a game arouses emotions as well.

The player is constantly moved emotionally, even though most of this feeling

takes place on subtle or unconscious levels. Nevertheless, one never stops to

automatically evaluate the encountered events.

However, most if the time, we will be too busy focusing on a very small subset

of events to notice the vast number of other events that influence how we feel at

a given moment.21Usually, in terms of representations and visual primacy, the

player pays attention to the visual part and the sound the most. Such evaluations

can be seen as a result of the cognitive process, caused by different low-level

responses to the environment. There are also emotional responses that are

triggered by the story elements of the game and rely on representation enhancing

narrative comprehension.22In order to understand the emotional design of games,

there are two remarkable elements that influence the representations.

In terms of representation, key videoludic elements are game characters on

the one hand (both, the player character and non-player characters), and the

19) Ekman, Inger / Lankoski, Petri (2009): Horror Video Games: Essays on the Fusion of Fear and Play. North Carolina: McFarland & Company,

Inc., Publishers. p. 185.

20) cf. Ekman, Inger / Lankoski, Petri (2009) ib. p 187.




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environment on the other.23The hostilely portrayed environment punishes every

failure of the player with the death of the character. In order to guide his or her

character out safely, the player is in constant state of worry to keep the character

alive and in good health. The player has to emphasize and to evolve feelings of

care for the character in order to succeed in the game.

The best way of creating such emotional effects is by maintaining the feeling of

vulnerability of the player. This is best achieved through imbalance and inequality

of distributed resources. The player has to feel strongly underpowered and left

alone with limited supplies. This definition is kind of obvious as the name of

the genre survival horroralready suggest such measures and describes the goal

(survival) and the emotional state (horror) the player has to deal with. One

significant feature is the impossibility of victory, as the term survivaldoes notstand for any victorious outcomes of events. Therefore, the primary activity the

player executes during the game is self-defense, as s/he is never powerful enough

to act offensive and attack the enemies on his or her own. Instead, the player is

thrown into a dark and obscure environment, mostly alone, trying to figure out

how to survive with very limited supplies and blunt weapons, if given at any.

That is why even the process of self-defense is sometimes limited and the only

chance to escape death is to run or to hid. Such features of the genre underscore

the limited powers of the player and force him or her to carefully evaluate every

single of the strongly limited resources. In combination with game resourcesand cognitive challenges, this sense of vulnerability adds a great deal to the

psychological effect of survival horror games. Basically, fear is the main emotion

players of this genre are looking for, but even fear can be analyzed and broken

down to various nuances of its essential core-emotion. The Gothic novelist Anna

Radcliffe even tried to distinguish between the feelings of terror and horror:

Terror and horror are so far opposite, that the first expands the soul, and

awakens the faculties to a higher degree of life; the other contracts, freezes and

nearly annihilates them and where lies the great difference between horror and

terror, but in uncertainty and obscurity.24

Perhaps it is obscurity that enhances the sense of vulnerability even better, as

it projects the thrilling tension of an unclear and uncertain situation that could

eventually arise into terror. Now, if obscurity has so much affect on fiction, what

must it have in real life, when to ascertain the object of our terror, is frequently

in acquire the means of escaping it?25

23) Ekman, Inger / Lankoski, Petri (2009) ib. p 189.

24) Niedenthal, Simon (2009): Horror Video Games: Essays on the Fusion of Fear and Play. North Carolina: McFarland & Company, Inc.,

Publishers. p. 171.

25) Niedenthal, Simon (2009) ib. p 171.


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Indeed, emotion can be seen as the main component in apprehension of horrific

events. But the physical reaction might be still different in experiencing the

feeling of fear. On the one hand, being scared drives people away from the

source of their fear; on the other hand, one can be so much in shock that moving

further seems to be impossible and completely seizes both the body and mind.

In Radcliffes theory, the active part of escaping might be seen as a result of

experiencing terror, the passive part of shock as a consequence of horror. Both

emotional states are anticipated and strongly associated with the survival horror

genre.

1.2.4 Jacques Derridas Hauntology

The survival horror is one of those genres with the ability to overwhelm its

audience, to increase the heartbeat and to make them break out in sweat.

Disbelief is not so much suspended as bound up tightly; the navigation of

both, physical and intellectual registers have to dovetail, one folding over the

other, in order to affect us fully. We want to feel fear in its absolute, and yet

posses everything we need to conquer it.26

The primary fascination of the survival horror genre and its formal propertiesthrough which the game is shifting and changing layers of other media can

be described as the process of Hauntology. This process focuses on the traces

between various media and the figures that the player faces in survival horror

games, interpreting them as central embodiments of both, our player experience,

and the experience of the machines we play with.27According to this theory,

such virtual creatures have a completely different impact on the person when

encountered inside a game than if merely watched as parts of a movie, as it is the

certain medium of a game that changes the perception.

Many scholars already dealt with the topics of survival horror games and human

senses in regard of this continual paradox. Pursuing Noel Carrolls concept of

audience-victim synchronicity, Bernard Perron wrote about the survival horror

genres mechanics of forewarning and examined the relationship between the

player and the victim. He claimed that while emotional responses run parallel

to those of the characters, their way of feeling fear is different.28 Despite these

variations in experiencing fear, there is still the fascinating problem: the ability

of the player and the inability of the protagonists cross over and manifest at the

worst (and best) possible moments.

29

26) Nitsche, Michael (2009): Horror Video Games: Essays on the Fusion of Fear and Play. North Carolina: McFarland & Company, Inc.,

Publishers. p. 220.

27)McCrea, Christian (2009): Horror Video Games: Essays on the Fusion of Fear and Play. North Carolina: McFarland & Company, Inc.,

Publishers. p. 221.

28) McCrea, Christian (2009) ib. p 221.



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Hauntology is also directly connected to the Apparatus Theory introduced by Jean-

Louis Baudry. Friedrich Kittler took this subject further in his work Gramophone,

Film, Typewriter in 1999, stating that there is no concept of the dead without

one of the trappings of memory. The dead themselves are mostly the apparatus

of the memory:

Once memories and dreams, the dead and ghosts become technically reproducible,

readers and writers are no longer in need of the powers of hallucination. Our

realm of the dead has withdrawn from books, in which it resided for so long. As

Diodor of Sicily once wrote, it is no longer only through writing that the dead

remain in the memory of the living.30

Kittler states that with each technological step forward such as the introductionof the telegraph, the camera and finally the animated image appears a new

fascinating possibility of representing the dead. Because they are, after all,

disconnected by our time and distance, and because those two great barriers were

finally brought down by the wire, the broadcast and the filmstrip. And the more

the media machinery makes sensible what we already know to be real, the more

the opposite, as a doubtful and ever-present danger of the risen corpse or spirit,

becomes provable. In Kittlers opinion the more we advance into modernitys

apparatuses of capture and display, the more fascinated we are with the dead and

their imprints.31This is the phenomenon described as hauntology by Jacques Derrida. An

insistence more than a neologism, hauntology encapsulated the paradoxical

state of the specter, which is neither being nor non-being.32 This describes

hauntologysability of changes in a form that might occur in one-off echoes and

nuances, mutant evolutions and further also in anachronistic reflections. It is a

possibility to come to grips with the muddying of traditions, a ways for figures

to permeate across virtual boundaries and finally the impact of the audio-visual

archives of memory and oblivion.33Derrida describes hauntologyas historical,

to be sure but it is not dated, it is never docilely given a date in the chain of

presents, day after day, according to the instituted order of the calendar.34

Hauntology interpreted for the gaming genre is describing the technologies of

representation finding themselves arrayed to fight the dead, or to maneuver

around them. In this case, hauntology is not necessarily limited to the un-dead,

but rather to the images of the past, more generally, the medias own ghosts.

So, that the gaming hauntological is most visible along genre borders speaks

to the centrality of horror to game culture and design, rather than to a literal







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connection between the specters of media and the specters of the dead. This

natural, deep media historicity and the multiple ways in which it seeks to represent

the dead are, above all, traces.35

1.2.5 The Pleasures of Fear

One certainly interesting topic deals with the question why people have such

strong appeal with horror media, as it is a bedrock assumption in theories that

human behaviour is based on a motivation to pursue pleasure and avoid pain.

Therefore it seems rather counterintuitive that people willingly immerse themselves

in fictional events of terror, fear and disgust, as such experiences definitely elicitnegative feelings and noxious emotions of fear. Dr. Andrew Weaver, an assistant

professor at Indiana University whose research focuses on media consumption

and the effects of media violence, claims that being horrified to such extent

is nothing people generally want to experience and the aftereffects of viewing

particularly frightening media are definitely not something that anyone wants.36

Even though most of the studies that extensively dealt with the issue of attraction

to horror, focused on the film medium, it is not that problematic to apply these

theories to games as well, even though it is necessary to extend them to the

degree of interactivity that is a game-exclusive trait.Of course, every single person has his or her own private phobias beyond the

obvious fears of death and injury. But there are also other proven sources of fear

that expand beyond the boundaries of society. The fear of extreme abnormality

and disfigurement is a strong factor that affects various interpretations of horror.

On the one hand it includes graphic disfigurement which results in the deepest

fears of weird physical appearances and movements and is the basic for body-

horror, as found in various monsters. And on the second hand, it is the panic

that arises when confronted with the destruction of familiar forms. This feelings

of fear tend to be even more intense if the distorted or supernatural form is

being recognized for what it used to be in the first place. Many survival-horror-

themed games and movies emphasize this idea in showing horribly mutilated and

disfigured creatures, still recognizable as former human beings. It also underlines

the abnormal movements, not only of evident monsters, but also of naturally

appearing beings at least at first sight, such as the jerky, scuttling movements

of the little girl Alma in the F.E.A.R.series. Fear of darkness can be also seen

as one of the primal fears, as biologically the human being is a visual oriented


36) cf. Madigan, Jamie (2011): The Psychology of Horror Games. http://www.gamepro.com/article/features/217945/the-psychology-of-

horror-games/, as of July 12th 2011.


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creature and this kind of fear is a result of natural selection. As the audible senses

are developed below the visual, it reduces the feeling of security if the received

information is taken in limited. The darkness hides various forms of potential

danger and decreases the human capability of adequate reaction.37

While consuming horrific content from media, the excitation transfer shows

that ambient noises and creepy soundtracks improve the feelings of excitement

and anticipation. Another relevant aspect is the similarity of shown scenes on

screen in regard to the experiences in real life. One is hardly going to get excited

watching one single pixel slaughtering another single pixel. But especially in

video games, graphics have rapidly improved and the shown visuals are rather

accepted as appearing real to the player. The more identifiable the content, the

more realistic and frightening the game seems to be. But the question remains,why people find attraction in horror in the first place and why are they willing

to endure unpleasant experiences voluntarily. Generally there are three current

theories that try to explain this phenomenon.

Those arguing that its inherently appealing to be in the clutches of the horror

genre, those that frame the experience as leading to worthwhile payoffs, and those

that say society makes us want to do it.38

1.2.5.1 Theory of Sensation-seeking

Many researchers tend to think that certain people possess a sensation-seeking

personality and because of being in search for a constant emotional high, they are

attracted to the horror genre and appreciate getting scared. While such personal

traits might be satisfied from sky diving or shark-punching, horror movies and

games are a similar catalyst for such needs. Other forms of this kind of personalities

are even drawn to situations showing disruptions of social norms in extreme

ways that might not be found in real life as such. Linked to this theory, there is

the approach of mastering the fear, which is an important matter, especially for

young adults. They turn to scary media as an ultimately safe possibility to act

out their emotional chops and deal with scary experiences of real-life situations.

Weaver explains this need as a search for control in difficult situations:

Watching a horror film gives us back some control. We can experience an

adverse event through film, and we know that it will end. Well survive it. Well

go on with our lives.39

The significant point about this theory of co-opting with horror lies in the fact that

the viewers know that what they see is fake. According to a famous experiment,

37) cf. Madigan, Jamie (2011) ib. as of July 12th 2011.

38) Madigan, Jamie (2011) ib. as of July 12th 2011.



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researchers asked subjects to watch a movie featuring authentic scenes of animals

having their brains scooped out and children who got their facial skin peeled of

as a preparation for a surgery. Despite the fact that many splatter and horror

media offers much more disturbing visual imaginary, the vast majority of the

studys participants refused to finish watching the movies. Hence, it seems to be

important for people to know that something scary and disturbing is simply fake

in order to be able to enjoy what they are seeing.40

1.2.5.2 Theory of the After-Horror-High

The second theory deals with the idea that people dislike scary situations and

the horror as such, but enjoy the relief that comes with the end of the fearful

moment. They even endure highly disturbing scenes in order to experience a kindof a thank-god-its-finally-over high.

People become physiologically aroused due to the fear they experience during

the media event and then when the media event ends, that arousal transfers

to the experience of relief and intensifies it. They dont so much enjoy the

experience of being afraid rather, they enjoy the intense positive emotion that

may directly follows.41

A new study by Eduardo Andrade from the University of California and Joel B.

Cohen from the University of Florida, appearing in the issue of the Journal ofConsumer Research, argues that the real kick does not come from enduring the

unpleasant experience and feeling the joy afterward, but they assume that people

have the ability of experiencing positive and negative affects at the same time.

This theory implies that the audience literally enjoys being unhappy so as

happiness and unhappiness can be experienced simultaneously, it may not only

be the relief of theultimate threat removal that causes the pleasure of horror, but

also the sensation of being scared during the uncanny moments. Therefore, the

idea that the most pleasant moments can not simultaneously be the most fearful

ones is not a general principle.42Apart from that, there is the theory of the so-

called dispositional alignment43. It is very satisfying for the audience to see

villains getting what they deserve in the end, even if it means one has to endure

hours of stirring imaginary in the first place, but all that makes the payoff worth

it. In video games, the player can even execute the punishment of the villain him/

herself, which is even more enhancing.



42) cf. ScienceDaily (2007): Why Do People Love Horror Movie? They Enjoy Being Scared.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/07/070725152040.htm, as of July, 18th 2011.



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1.2.5.3 Theory of Social Benefits

The third theory describes the social benefits of enduring terrific situations.

According to this theory, it is an important act of self-affirmation, especially

for males, as it proves they are cunning and manly enough to handle fear. To a

certain extent, this theory even goes so far as saying that media filled with horror

give people the chance to demonstrate their adherence to ancient social norms

about maleprotectorsand femaleprotectees. Despite some approaches that might

appear rather sexist nowadays, the famous study widely known as the snuggle-

theory of horror44supports this point of view. In this study, male audience was

paired with female audience in order to watch the horror movie Friday the 13th,

part III. Men who were paired with women acting rather scared claimed to have

enjoyed the movie much more than those whose female partners acted tough,displaying mastery of their fear. Likewise, the female audience said they preferred

a male partner that acted cool rather than afraid. Surely, individual results may

vary from the experiences the person has had in real life as well as the need to

conform to social norms to a certain extend.

These theories, when applied to the medium of video games, help to understand

the effect of scary topics and strongly relate to the issues of control. While movies

are a completely passive form of entertainment, games add the principles of

interactivity to the genre and create an effective illusion of choice while stumblingthrough the horrific events. Therefore the common audiences Dont open that

door!-scream gets a completely new meaning within the interactive entertainment,

where it is oneself who is opening the door and springing the trap. Those more

immediate and intense feelings get even tightened up, because besides control,

the player experiences empathy for the character, especially if the protagonist is

chosen by the player who can to a certain extent identify with him or her.

Compared to the amount of hours players spend in front of their screens to

play games, the short experiences of movies are not a match. And if the players

develop the feeling of empathy for their character, it is likely they re-experience

his or her emotions of fear when the character is afraid in the first place.45




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1.3 MECHANICS OF ATMOSPHERE AND MOOD IN GAMES WITH THE

FOCUS ON THE SURVIVAL HORROR GENRE

Long before the introduction of the gothic novel, the playful evocation of fear

and dread in the audience had been a central component in a great variety of

legends and folklores. Succubus, incubus, imps, and harpies populate medieval

imaginary; an impressive bestiary permeates literature, the visual arts, and

reality to a large extent. As reason theoretically superseded those dark ages, the

Enlightenment saw the rise of the phantasmagoria show, delighting audiences

with a variety of effects (building on magic lantern expertise) that sought to

represent otherworldly apparitions. Cultural facts associated with horror fiction,from the gothic masterpieces of Shelley and Stoker, the stories of Maupassant, to

the contemporary slasher movie series, have received a lot if academic attention.

Still lacking from these accounts, however, it is the contribution of a medium

that, like the horror genre itself, has been seen mostly as popular fare: video

games.46

Different moods and atmospheres can be translated throughout a video game as

this medium grew really powerful during the last decade. It developed in many

ways, not only the visual style thanks to faster and better graphic cards, APIs andprocessors but also in regard of gameplay, the use of sound and music and of

course new technologies, so the game takes its players another step further in the

experience. While this thesis focuses basically on aesthetic aspects of a game as it

tries to create patterns for artists, it will also deal with the issues of the survival

horror genre and its look and feel. Although patterns could be created for any

other genre as well, this one is especially significant as it provides the artists with

a sophisticated palette of expressive tools and methods to achieve the thrilling

atmosphere that is required to the vision of a successful gaming experience.

The reason and importance is not far to seek - playing video games in general

is about the experience, about fun and entertainment. Of course those factors

include a huge amount of other the players personal motivations, like achieving,

exploring, socializing or interacting, etc., but the main appeal they provide is the

experience of interaction and the possibility of immersion during the time they

are in use, and some even afterwards. That is why they create such a different way

of entertainment compared with other mediums - interaction is the key.

46) Therrien, Carl (2009): Horror Video Games: Essays on the Fusion of Fear and Play. North Carolina: McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers.

p. 26.


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The only reality we know is the reality of experience. And we know that what

we experience is not really reality, We filter reality through our senses, and

through our minds, and the consciousness we actually experience is a kind of

illusion - not really reality at all. But this illusion is all that can ever be real for

us, because it is us. This is a headache for philosophers, but a wonderful thing for

game designers, because it means that the designed experiences that are created

through our games have a chance of feeling as real and as meaningful (and

sometimes more so) that our everyday experiences.47

The focus of this thesis is to establish patterns for atmosphere-creation in games

and despite its artistic approach, the most important elements that are pertinent

for the game mood are going to be listed and discussed in the first place to ensurea proper overview of essential issues.

1.3.1 The Four Basic Elements in Games

A really useful figure for the main categories of a game is the so-called elemental

tetradthat shows a good way to break down and classify the core elements. The

tetrads most important feature is the equality of all four parts - none of the

elements below is more important than the others.The tetrad is arranged here in a diamond shape not to show any relative

importance, but only to help illustrate the visibility gradient; that is, the fact that

technological elements tend to be the least visible to the players, aesthetics are

the most visible, and mechanics and story are somewhere in between. (...) None

is more important than the others, and each one powerfully influences each of

the others.48

47) Shell, Jesse (2009): The Art of Game Design: A Book of Lenses. Burlington: Elsevier, Ltd. p. 21 ff.

48) Shell, Jesse (2009) ib. p. 43.

Fig. 1: Elemental Tetrad


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1.3.1.1 Aesthetics

Aesthetics are directly connected to the visual experience of the player, therefore

they must be considered as an extremely important part of the game design. They

define the look, style, sound and feeling of the game and directly let the player

be immersed in the environment. In order to amplify and reinforce the power

of aesthetics at its full range, it is necessary to choose the right technology for

the desired look and feel that will allow the aesthetics to come through properly.

Much the same way, the game design itself has to be persuasive enough to give

the player the feeling of really fitting into the visually defined environment. The

story with a set of events on top of all that provides the aesthetics with the right

pace and most remarkable impact in order to create a truly memorable gaming

experience.49

1.3.1.2 Mechanics

The best way to describe mechanics is to see them as rules and procedures

of the game. They define the goals, achievements, the ways and possibilities

to succeed or fail, etc. Compared to other mediums that also provide their

audience with remarkable experiences, while they all consist of aesthetics, story

and technology, none of them but games have the element of mechanics included,

for it is the mechanics that make a game a game. To ensure a properly working

set of mechanics that appeals and supports the gaming experience and moreimportantly make sense to the player, aspects of technology, aesthetics and story

are crucial as well.50

1.3.1.3 Story

A story could be described as a sequence of events unfolding in the game.

Depending on various factors like genre, gameplay, etc. it may be pre-scripted or

linear, but also branching and emergent.51The story and the way it is translated

within the game has a big impact on the experience, as it is the key to the gamers

freedom of choice. Whether it wants to let the player live through a huge epic

myth full of thrilling events and twists or just create a basic setting and let the

player evolve on his own it always needs support from appropriate visual- and

sound-based elements, as well as a suitable technology and useful mechanics.

1.3.1.4 Technology

Basically, it can be said that technology is what enables one to do certain things

and prohibits others. Even though it is likable to talk about engines within

49) cf. Shell, Jesse (2009) ib. p. 42.




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the context of video games, technology as such doesnt exclusively refer to just

high technology.52It is essentially the medium in which mechanics will occur,

aesthetics are placed and through which a story can be told.

The most challenging part is to keep in mind the equality of the four elements

and simultaneously feel the experience of your game while understanding which

elements and elemental interactions are causing that experience and why.53Those

ambivalent parts could be described as skin and skeleton54. Focusing on the skin

only enables a vivid experience, but its the experience only, without understanding

how the process works, of what it consists and how it is improvable. On the

other hand, skeletononly will assure a precise game structure with perfect theory,

but potentially pain in the practice. The challenge is to combine and balanceboth, stay focused on skinand skeletonat the right time. This required skill that

provides the ability to observe ones own experience while thinking about the

underlying causes of that experience is called holographic design55and deals with

questions about detracting a game from its experience in order to analyze and

then improve it.

1.3.2 Approaching the Immersive Experience

As discussed before, those four elements are the core basics of video game creation.

In the following chapter, the main factors for successful atmospheric issues will

be described. Before turning to the visual patterns, it is important to know other

significant elements that have to be regarded as crucial for establishing a proper

mood in games. Introduced in general first and touched briefly with the subject

of the survival horror genre, the factors of a successful gaming immersion will

be listed and described below, as immersion is the main factor for experiencing

atmosphere. Even though technical aspects as listed in the previous chapter are

important for any game to make it work in general, immersion appears to be

based on elements of aesthetics and mechanics sound and vision combined with

a challenging gameplay and a thrilling story. And those components are going to

be analyzed in the first place, before focusing on visual patterns in atmosphere

creation only.

52) cf. Shell, Jesse (2009) ib. p. 42 ff.

53) Shell, Jesse (2009) ib. p. 45.




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1.3.2.1 Components of Immersion

The best way to create a profound understanding for atmosphere and mood in

games might be a basic overview about the principles of immersion, the link

between psychology and play. First of all, one has to realize that immersion is

a psychological effect of specific senses that trigger specific effects in the brain.

When the reds, greens, and blues of television images careen in through your

retinas, and then bang back and forth between your amygdale and your prefrontal

cortex, youre having a certain type of experience. When sounds, smells, or even

tastes hit varied sensory receptors, youre having other types of experience.56

It is essential for game developers to understand the wide range of factors howpeople sense and perceive such input, and further make use of both virtual and

traditional methods for creating such media experiences, because the nature

of such input, as well as how its processed, has an effect on the final product.

() What follows, then, is a mega-abbreviated exploration of how the game

experience slaps together a patchwork of elements, in the senses and in the

mind, thereby forging something desirable. Something that the brain takes as a

convincing-enough pastiche. Something thats still a medium, but which, while in

its clutches, the mind might be forgiven for mistaking as real.57 The main feature

of visual media is its duality it has to be both immediate and convincing atthe same time. Anne Marie Barry, Ph. D. of Communication at Boston College,

described the visual learning as prewired by evolution to detect and respond

danger. Even though the wiring itself has remained the same for millions of years,

the visual media has changed.

For the brains perceptual system, visual experience in the form of the fine arts,

mass media, virtual reality, or even video games is merely a new stimulus we

have inherited as part of our brain potential and is processed in the same way. 58

The truly interesting fact is that those areas of the brain do not have the physical

ability to distinguish plain daily experiences from fictional ones, as consumed

from e.g. the TV screen. Regarding those facts, it may be obvious that visual

media are not just some kind of event.

A kid playing violent games, let alone an adult, wont have some Mysterious

Black Switch of Menace flipped in their brains. Rather, the brains visual system

files it as one apparently real experience among the many that we might have as

we learn and grow.59

56) Clark, Neils (2010): The Sensible Side of Immersion. http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/4265/the_sensible_side_of_immersion.

php?page=1n, as of June 25th 2011.

57) Clark, Neils (2010) ib. as of June 25th 2011.




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And yet, visual media might have a different kind of switch that gets flipped when

in use. Usually that switch suggests that such convincing visuals coming from

a TV screen or intriguing gaming experiences still are to be classified as being

simply a visual matter. Even before one is able to think about sight, s/he feels and

responds in the apparently appropriate way. In the amygdale, optical impulses

are quickly matched against low-resolution images from the emotional center.

Immediately afterwards, an already full image is sent down the cortical pathway,

to achieve a response as the first sign of a conscious awareness. Therefore such

visual experience can keep players truly engaged without requiring their full mental

awareness.60On the other hand, the physical awareness of the real environment

is lowered by such distractions while gaming. Gaming also provides a wide range

of different experience-designs: mating/social games have to be regarded from adifferent angle than e.g. survival horror games, as they provide a wholly different

experience. As the gamer finds the most interesting part in the stimuli within

the virtual world, provided by the game, s/he may even completely block out the

outside stimuli, such as the real environment or, more often, the amount of time

spent during a game.

The human brain has no inborn mechanism separating photorealistic visuals

on a screen from the visuals in reality. Sound and vision hold human attention

within that frame of experience. In neither case has our fundamental processing

changed simply because weve sat down for a little gaming. Physiologically, ourStone Age brains seem helpless but to fall into worlds.61

What gamers consider Immersion, is widely known as Spatial Presenceamong the

researchers and is often defined as existing

Gaming After Dark I.mueller

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