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Exercise 9

Exercise 9: Narrative Architecture

Markku Eskelinen, an independent scholar and self-professed "ludologist", in his response to Jenkins' paper "Game Design as Narrative Architecture", says:
According to the well-known phrase of David Bordwell, narration is "the process whereby the film's sjuzet and style interact in the course of cueing and constraining the spectator's construction of the fabula." In games there are other kinds of dominant cues and constraints: rules, goals, the necessary manipulation of equipment, and the effect of possible other players for starters. This means that information is distributed differently (invested in formal rules, for example), it is to be obtained differently (by manipulating the equipment) and it is to be used differently (in moving towards the goal).
By systematically ignoring and downplaying the importance of these and other formal differences between games and narratives as well as the resulting cognitive differences, Jenkins runs the risk of reducing his comparative media studies into repetitive media studies: seeing, seeking, and finding stories, and nothing but stories, everywhere. Such pannarrativism could hardly serve any useful ludological or narratological purpose.
Do you agree with Eskelinen's dismissal of Jenkins' approach? Why/why not?


I do not really agree with what Eskelinen says of Jenkins – that he is reducing games to narratives. I believe Jenkins is very much aware of the nature and structure of games and narratives and their differences although much discussion of the differences was not made in his paper. It is important to understand Jenkin’s intentions of the paper and that is, not to reduce games to narratives but to show how games and narrative can complement one another to create a different experience for the player.

It could be possible that Eskelinen, being a ludologist, might be too focused on the game-play aspect of games that he overlooks the importance of narratives in games which may set the context, purpose, motivation and create a different experience for players. (But this is really an unjustified claim or accusation) Anyway, in opposition to Eskelinen, Jenkins is, through the understanding of narratives, really exploring the different possibilities of merging or establishing a relationship between game play and narratives. Through this, he is thus exploring other possibilities of creating games and not just reducing them to those with a linear narrative structure. Jenkin’s point of making use of the spatial environment of the game to reveal a certain narrative (something which I believe has been a concern of game-makers or other theorists who claim that games and narratives can not see eye to eye) does highlight possible solutions to finding a point where both games and narratives can converge. Put differently, games and narratives do not have to be seen as separate entities, forcibly put together in different layers via means such as cut scenes. In explaining his point, Jenkins made several references to games that are already in existent and possess characteristics of either of the four categories he mentioned, thus providing some form of evidence of the possibility of games of such nature (with embedded, evocative, emergent or enacting narratives).

On the other hand, Eskelinen’s claims could be a result of Jenkins greater focus and emphasis on the narrative aspect than on the gameplay aspect. Perhaps, Eskelinen’s concern could be on Jenkin’s lack of focus on the extent to which evocative spaces, enacting stories, embedded and emergent narratives may affect the structure and rules of the game (essentially the game play aspect), as well as the user’s experience in terms of control, agency, the tools used to achieve the goal, and the degree to which they affect the outcome of the story.

In conclusion, it is perhaps not entirely right to dismiss Jenkins’s approach. It could however be said that there has been too much of an emphasis on the narrative aspect and is lacking in terms of the discussion of the gameplay aspect (which gave rise to Eskelinen’s stand)

posted by shamanthayan @ 8:34 AM