The purpose of meaning in Hugo

When I heard that Hugo was playing in the theaters in Japan i was overjoyed. I missed the movie during my winter vacation in the states, and I really wanted to see Martin Scorsese’s newest work. My girlfriend lived closest to the theater, so I went to her place and we saw it together. Whenever we watch movies together, we usually like to say comments to each other; a funny observation, story plot discussion, or whatever springs to mind. Unfortunately, the Japanese etiquette for movie watching allows for no talking what so ever. I was following this rule diligently (as a Japanese Studies major in college I felt it was my scholastic duty to follow Japanese customs),  my girlfriend, on the other hand, decided not to follow that rule. In her defence, she was not very loud, and no one complained, but I found myself a little embarrassed. She kept on going about the “notebook” that appears early in the film, but never seems to come back into the plot. I kept on saying “it doesn’t matter!” in order to silence her complaints, but the truth was that I was becoming curious too.

In the beginning of the story, the protagonist, Hugo, has a little notebook that is one of the last possessions he had to remember his father by. Early in the movie the notebook gets stolen from him, and Hugo then has to work off his debt to a toy maker in order to get the notebook back. The problem is that Hugo never gets the notebook back on screen. I thought maybe this was an oversight, or perhaps the audience was supposed to forget about the notebook, but there were several other things that sort of bothered me too, like how all the meanings put into any object Hugo puts into always came up short. Hugo just seems to want everything to be a symbol, something that has a “function,” but everything seems to follow through for him.

Then with all of Hugo’s failure to bring any real meaning to objects around him, the first real antagonist of the film, Georges Méliès, manages to infuse meaning into everything he creates. Though it is that meaning that Méliès grows to despise and makes him unable to create anymore. It is that contrast of meaninglessness trying to form meaning, and the meaningful trying to be forgotten that is the true central theme of Hugo as a movie. Perhaps that is what Scorsese is also trying to say about preserving old movies. People are trying to find meanings in all these new movies and think that they are “fresh,” but in the end they offer nothing that the old movies that people are seemingly trying to forget offer.

Or maybe it is about how I should stop trying to find meanings in all these movies and listen to what my girlfriend has to say, even when we are in the cinema.

Kanye and Heartbreak

Whenever I get some entertainment for myself, may that be music, movies, video games, or whatever, I eventually found myself wondering what the story is behind it. What did the creator have to go through in order to make this thing I am experiencing now? Sometimes I wonder how exactly that form of entertainment is made, and then sometimes I wonder about the personalities and people that made it all possible.

I don’t have to do much wondering when it comes to Kanye West.

Kanye West has made his personal life and thoughts a big part of his music. He is not shy about voicing his opinion in circumstances that would embarrass a normal person (on the contrary, they seem to fuel his fire). Many times I will hear discussions about how a person’s actions and beliefs can cause doubts and make people take another look at the media they have made (such as Micheal Jackson and Orson Scott Card), but Kanye West, on the other hand, uses his personality and behavior as both the context and the content of his music. It is hard to separate the Kanye West from the body of his work.

That is easiest to see in the 2008 album, 808s & Heartbreak. The story is that after both the break-up with his girlfriend and the death of his mother, he decided to throw out the album he was working on. Kanye West decides to do to Hawaii and start a whole new album that mainly uses an 808 drum machine and vocoder enhanced vocals. It was and still is an album that is not very liked by fans and non-fans alike. It is not hard to see why though. 808s & Heartbreak throws away most of the fun and dancibility of Kanye West’s earlier work, and replaces it with more dissonance and loneliness. Mr. West refrains from boasting about his wealth and rapping prowess, and tends more to feel sorry for himself.

I know that a whole album of sadness and loneliness may not be everyone’s cup of tea, but it is that loneliness that I find to be compelling. Having Kanye West go over in his songs about what went wrong in his relationship and his life is so much more interesting than what most mainstream rap is about (which, as far as I can tell, is mostly about boasting). Granted, Kanye West may be doing what more independent rappers are already doing, but what makes it more interesting to me is the character of Kanye West himself. With songs that are about feeling some sort of catharsis or empathy, usually they try to paint the protagonist as either sympathetic or reprehensible. With 808s & Heartbreak, every time Kanye West tries to be reprehensible (“I’m a problem that’ll never be solved/and no matter what you’ll never take that from me”), he comes off as sympathetic, and whenever he attempts to be sympathetic (“You’re like the girl from Misery/She said, she ain’t take it to this degree/Well, let’s agree to disagree”) he comes off as a jerk. He is like a stranger you meet at a bar, telling you his whole life story; every so often you want to try and interrupt to get clarification or offer some advice, but in the end, you don’t really know him well enough to get what you want to say out. Maybe that stranger in the bar just needs someone to listen to his sad story.

It is that saddness that is why I also think that the 808 drum beats and the vocoder vocals work. I can almost imagine Kanye West, alone in that studio at 4AM in the morning, programming the beats into the 808, and then singing by himself while playing the synthesizer for the vocoder. The sort of artificial tonal effect the vocoder gives to Kanye West just makes him sound close audio-wise, but emotionally cut off from all outside interference. It is almost as if Kanye West is trying to make an album as inaccessible as possible. If there isn’t anything less relate-able than boasting about your new car, it might be about singing about how your new car might be ruining your life. But I think that is why I like this album. It is not trying to get anyone to like or hate Kanye West, it is just about a man trying to state his case and tell his story but is realizing that he is lacking something crucial, something deep in his heart that he has lost some time ago. The album may not be the most articulate or clever of Mr. West’s catalogue, but it makes it up with fantastic emotional moments. Like the part in “Robocop” where Kanye West talks about how his ex-girlfriend must be joking (“your first good one in a while”), the whole song of Street Lights (my favorite song on the album), when Kanye West declares “I WON’T EVER LOVE AGAIN” in Coldest Winter, and Pinocchio Story, a “freestyle” that sounds more at home on Pink Floyd’s “The Wall” than any rap album.

Maybe Kanye West is a big jerk that goes out of his way to ruin things, but even if that is true, that doesn’t mean he can’t make good music. In fact, I think the character Kanye West shows on TV is the same person that sings about his girlfriend cheating on him and the depression that brings (even though he admits that he isn’t completely innocent either: “I did some things but that’s the old me”). I find this sort of outspoken guy more emotionally compelling than most mainstream musical artists who try to get emotionally intimate with their songs and end up sounding fake and corny. Kanye West isn’t a role model, but as a person going through a break-up, he is still someone I can relate to. It is his willingness to see his imperfections and sing about them that make him all the more compelling. There is also something about someone who claims to be the best ever, to be unable to be topped, but then having insight into those moments of doubt, giving voice to those little voices in people’s heads that can cast doubt on a whole person’s life. For someone like Kanye West, who seems so focused on image and how people look at him, 808s & Heartbreak is a bold move that I believe everyone should at least try. It may not make Kanye West your favorite artist, but it might make you realize that he is just a human being like the rest of us.

Musings on Star Wars

When I was thinking of writing about Star Wars, my first draft involved childhood memories of first hearing about the “clone wars,” and trying to get into how fantasy worlds are created, but I found myself falling into the same trap that I was trying to write about in the first place. The biggest problem I have with Star Wars is that no one (including George Lucas, apparently) want to judge original triology of Star Wars for what they were really were.

To illustrate this point, I am going to look at the famous/infamous scene were the smuggler Han Solo meets bounty hunter Greedo. In the original version, it looks like Han Solo shoots first and kills Greedo, but in newer version of the movie, it looks like Greedo shoots first. This little change has fans of Star Wars in a tizzy, because it changes the arc of the Han Solo character. The idea is that Han Solo starts as a unlikable rogue, but at the end of the movie (and the at the end of trilogy) he redeems himself. George Lucas says that he always intended for Greedo to shoot first because he didn’t want Han Solo to be a killer. Both points of view seem to ignore that it actually makes more sense that Han Solo just shoots slow; not because of whether or not Han Solo is a killer who may or may not need to be redeemed, but because Han Solo is a doufus. Han Solo is a slow shot because he is both at bad at shooting, and a lot of other things.

It is not hard to find evidence of to support the “doufous-ness” of Han Solo all the first three Star Wars movies. Han Solo starts as someone who messed up smuggling some cargo (which is his profession), all the times he bumbles through the Death Star (running gun first into a hallway, and then having to run the other way because he is outmatched), being captured in Empire Strikes Back, having to be saved by the teddy bear-esque Ewoks in Return of the Jedi, and many other times that make me wonder how in the world Han Solo not only survives, but is considered such a “badass” by Star Wars fans. If he isn’t foolishly going headfirst into something he shouldn’t be, he is probably then escaping from something he bumbled going into.

Though, it is this “bumbling” that actually makes Han Solo a fun character to watch, and in turn, makes the first three Star Wars movies fun to watch. It is about Han Solo and his crew of underdogs managing to save the universe. It is a fun adventure, as the audience is just as clueless as the protagonists are. Contrast that to the prequel movies, which are about people who are supposed to be the smartest people in the universe, end up being nitwits and ruining everything. Han Solo ends up being a metaphor of why the the original Star Wars still is fun to watch today. Star Wars may not be the epitome of badassery that fans want it to be, neither is it a legendary tale of morality that Lucas seems to want, but Star Wars is the bumbling underdog that stumbles into universal success.

That is why no matter how many times Geoge Lucas “messes” with his past movies with CGs, editing, or whatever, I am okay with it, because it just fits the theme of Star Wars just fine. Maybe one day Star Wars will tumble, fall down, and mess up in a way that I find endlessly entertaining again one day.

Extra Note: My favorite thing about Han Solo being a doufus is how that also reflects on the bounty hunter Boba Fett. Fans love Boba Fett because of his cool outfit and his mysteriousness. As far as I can remember, the audience never actually sees Boba Fett actually do anything. With Han Solo being a bumbler, this turns the tables on Boba Fett completely, and maybe he isn’t a cool assassin after all. Maybe he is as much as a doufus as Han Solo is. That could explain why, when Boba Fett has to defend his life in Return of the Jedi, he ends up falling in a man eating hole monster, despite that Mr. Fett has a jet pack. It would also explain why Jabba the Hut imprisoned Han Solo in carbonite. If Han Solo was really a threat wouldn’t Jabba the Hut just kill him? Not only that, but if Han Solo was a real threat, wouldn’t Jabba the Hut at least not imprison him in a carbonite apparatus that can be disabled? Man, I have already spent too much time thinking about this.

A Review of Hope

I was almost afraid to review Hope: A Tragedy: A Novel by Shalom Auslander. The book seems to be viewed as “controversial” and honestly, I think a lot of the point of views in the book many people would maybe not appreciate. Looking at the book, I found myself reflecting upon the protagonist of the book, Solomon Kugel, and seeing more of myself in him than I am comfortable to admit. That is when it hit me; despite my background being nothing like Kugel’s, I found his plight to be sympathetic and relatable. It was then I decided I needed to write something about this book.

Hope takes place when Kugel and his family (wife, child, and grandmother) move to the country and live in a farmhouse in Stockton, New York. It is in this farmhouse where the attic has an unexpected guest who claims to be Anne Frank. The book then revolves around what Kugel is going to do with the guest, finding out if the guest is really Anne Frank, and trying to deal how this will affect his already dysfunctional family. The book does not play around or tries to be coy about the implications of Anne Frank still being alive; instead it uses it as an opportunity to discuss the effects of the Holocaust on both the people that went through it and the people who did not. The book doesn’t just focus on the Holocaust; it bounces from moral issue to moral issue as the forever anxious Kugel worries about each issue individually and throughout the book.

The thing that makes Hope a compelling novel and not just an essay on controversial topics, is that all these points of view are filtered through the main character. It isn’t just about raising controversial points of view, but how Kugel’s various opinions informs his character. The book isn’t really about death, the Holocaust, and how optimism can only ruin lives, and the lives of millions of people, but how all those topics swirl around and create a character that can’t quite escape from his past, and whose anxiety prevents him from living in the present. Hope, like the title suggests, is a tragedy. Which doesn’t mean that it is sad (in fact, if I had to assign a genre to this book, it would be Comedy/Satire), but a tragedy in the classic Greek sense; the characters’ woes and fates are determined by his their own flaws and imperfections, not necessary just because of the world around them.

The tragedy in Hope is what makes it a great book to me. It is how through every absurd situation Kugel goes through, it makes him seem much closer to truth and more sympathetic. Even if the situation is improbable, the weirder and more painful it gets for Kugel, the more I found myself getting uncomfortable about how closely it relates to me. The genius is that Kugel’s situation is nothing like mine, but I still was cringing about some of the same type of mistakes, assumptions, and thoughts Kugel creates for himself.

Hope: A Tragedy: A Novel, may not be the easiest read in the world, but through humor, insight, and insanity (that almost makes too much sense at times), it is a novel very much worth reading.

On Stories in Video Games

A few weeks ago the internet was a buzz about David Jaffe and his opinion on narrative in games. If you haven’t read the piece (which you can find here) it basically boils down to “why make stories for a medium where it doesn’t fit?” While Mr. Jaffe is all for narratives derived from choices the player chooses, the idea of cutscenes, dialog, or anything the player does not have any real interaction with is something he thinks video games as a medium are not meant to do. While this point of view is not necessarily unique, David Jaffe is a rather credible game developer (whose credits include the Twisted Metal series and the first God of War) who has made games with storylines and cutscenes, so his point of view carries a bit more weight than the average anonymous internet user. The problem I have with Mr. Jaffe’s point of view is that is seems to be based on the incorrect assumption that the only reason there are games with narratives is because the developers of these games want to tell stories and have picked the wrong medium to tell it in. Developers don’t always put stories in their games because they have a story they want to tell, often times  there is stories in games because that is what some players expect and want.

To explain that point it is important to explain the origins of stories in games in the first place. Stories in games started back in the 1970’s when the visual element of games was primitive when compared to today’s standards. In the graphics in the very first video games, a person could count the pixels on screen, and the shapes the pixels made did not necessarily make any sense. The “story” of the game became something like “imagine these pixels are playing tennis” or “imagine that pixel is a spaceship.” This explanations were not just created because the game creator wanted to tell that story, but to give context to the player in order for them to figure out what they are even trying to accomplish. Around the same time, other games relied completely on text for their interactions, and the game world existed pretty much in the players head. Games like the Zork series put the player in the game world by text, and how the player could interact would rely on what commands they would type (for example: “You are in a cave surrounded by goblins, what will you do?” and depending if the player typed in a command the game could understand, then that action and another story beat would commence and lead to another text prompt). These games are called text adventures, and their entire existence relies on games having a narrative. So at the beginning of games, narrative was an integral part.

As graphics, UI, and other elements of games emerged, the need to take the player aside and explain to them what is exactly happening and how the player can react became less and less necessary. Story in games became much more about providing specific contexts and marketing. If a game about airplanes doesn’t sell, why not take the same gameplay and make the game about spaceships? The problem became that a lot of these “clones” were paper thin and players could intuitively figure out whether not a game was exactly the same or offering a similar experience, even if players could not express that vocally. It was near this time that games based on the popular tabletop game Dungeons and Dragons began to take off. Dungeons and Dragons was a game based on a “dungeon master” creating a scenario and then the other participants had to rely on statistics, luck, and wit in order to go through the scenario that was put in front of them. This “dungeon master/participant” was extremely similar to how game creators and game players interacted with each other (especially text adventures) and game developers began to take advantage of the similarities and put the already established system of statistics and wit into their games. This started a wave of games called “RPGs” (role playing games) that began to take PCs by storm. The idea of being able to have the dungeon master integrated into a visually represented dungeon is something that appealed due to its complexity, but also appealed because it took much of the busywork of calculating the math necessary to play Dungeons and Dragons and let the computer handle it.

It was the process of simplification that lead to games like Wizardry and due to the slower pace of RPGs in general (nothing usually would happen until the player made a choice first), it allowed for the developer to insert more story for context and a more expansive game world. This simplification process began to accelerate in Japan where these Dungeon & Dragons PC RPGs were simplified for the Japanese market and made accessible for a wider audience. Dragon Quest and Final Fantasy were made out of the simplification process, and their legacy is still alive and well today. As the popularity of RPGs began to rise, the elements that were contained within them (slower pace, statistics based action, gaining experience in order get stronger) began to permeate through all the genres of video games. Slower story based games were also prominent in the adventure game genre, which was descended pretty directly from text adventure games. Because of their slower pace, adventure games and RPGs could integrate more presentation elements such as better graphics and voice acting in order to appeal more to a wider audience. Action games then began to compete with games like Doom that had both action and presentation, but were still seeped in context (though with the faster pace, the stories were not nearly as integral to the experience as it was with RPGs and Aventure games).

As games continue to simplify and are paced faster and faster, David Jaffe’s criticism of game narratives seems to become more and more valid, why should games have any stories at all? I think the major reason is because the context of the game is still integral to the video game experience. In the metaphorical match between player and game developer “dungeon master,” there forms a contract that the player trusts that the developer will deliver a fair and fulfilling experience in the end. Story and context go a long way in communicating what the player should expect and how they can react to things. Without at least context, the player is signing on to a game where they don’t really know what is going on, and unless the developer makes their game extremely transparent or just simple, the contract between game and game creator is unbalanced. This unbalance leads to players saying something is “unfair” and quickly moving on to something else. Context is important for giving the players more control over their environments and giving their decisions they make in the game have more weight and make more sense. The more ambitious that context, the more risk the game creator’s takes on as the money, time, and energy required to create those contexts can be exponentially larger than a game with no context, but as Bethesda has proven with games like Skyrim, it is an investment that can pay off handsomely.

The final question then is if cutscenes and non-interactive parts in games are necessary. In the end, I think it just depends on the game. In a game that the game creators want to be slower paced and contemplative experience, then cutscenes are a valuable tool in creating that sort of experience. The assertion that using cutscenes in games is “lazy” is something that I just think is a mistake. It might be true for some games, but games that use them correctly make a game experience that is more fulfilling in my opinion. As a general rule of thumb, the key for good cutscenes in games is two-fold, one, providing some sort of context for the game and the world, and two, making sure that those cutscenes have a valid reason for not being interactive. For example, if the game is an action game, and all the mechanics are action based, then cutscenes that are primarily dialog with no real sort of fast movement is perfectly acceptable. Also, if the game is very dialog and exploration mechanics driven, then cutscenes that involve action that the game creators have no mechanics for is also fine. The problematic cutscenes for me are the one that could have been interactive considering the mechanics of the game, but are not for whatever reason. Only then do I even begin to consider whether they are “lazy” or not.

I think David Jaffe has valid points, and his openness with his opinions is refreshing in an industry that seems bent on controlling every single word that comes out of game creators mouths. If it is he does not want to create games that focus on narrative that is his prerogative. For me and others that enjoy narratives in games, the stories that games can tell is both fun and exciting to see what game creators can cook up for the future. Games as narrative is still a relatively new idea (especially considering books, music, etc.) but storytelling in games comes from a valid place in the human experience and I would hate to think that sort of creativity is snuffed out just because people have the notion that it can’t be done.　Stories in games are a way to both communicate and contextualize mechanics in games, but also a way that games can transcend those mechanics into something a person brings into their own lives.  I look forward to what stories people can tell via game and hope one day we can look back and laugh at the notion that games were once considered a medium that has no story-telling ability.