Kowloon Walled City

Narrative and the Shooting Game

I was sitting back and pondering after eating two Gregg's pizzas about 20 minutes ago when I started to think about the concept of story telling in the arcade shooting game. Of course, one of the most compelling features of a shooting game is it's simplicity. No matter how hard a game may be (Mushihimesama Futari occasionally pushes the 500 bullets on screen at one point boundary) or how convoluted it's scoring mechanics may be (the meat of any good shooting game is the practice of obtaining a 'high score'), the sole point of a game of this type is to shoot things while dodging bullets. In this sense, the genre is inherently high concept, it's purpose can be summed up in a single sentence. Much like Die Hard is a film about Bruce Willis in a vest in a skyscraper, a shooting game is about dodging and shooting. The ratio and importance between these qualifying actions may be shifted depending on the particular game or the sub-genre, but this is what it always essentially boils down to. However, there is also generally a necessity in STGs, as in all arcade games, to include a narrative, no matter how scant. There are the occasional examples that escape this need, for example Triangle Service's Shmups Shooting Test, but generally at least a vestige of plot has to be crammed in somehow.

Of course, narrative is a highly subjective concept, and can be dealt with in a number of ways. Hormony Korine's 1997 film Gummo at first glance appears to be free from the conventional trappings of narrative continuity, yet it manages to weave it's story through unconventional means. Cinematographic framing emphasises certain images that are used time and time again to link initially disparate characters, and there is a thematic continuity (for example through the images of animal torture) that further links the film. Arcade games, of course, cannot expect the same degree of cine-literacy that the average Korine viewer possibly wields, and nor do they need to. They are, of course, explicitly commercial entities, designed to goad the onlooker into parting with their money, and the most succinct manner in achieving this is through the attract screen.

The attract screen is the primary device used to get the onlooker to pump money into an arcade machine. Like it's name suggests, it is wholly there to 'attract' a potential customer. It functions much like a loop of film; when it reaches the end, it goes back to the beginning. Generally this loop will contain gameplay footage, a title screen, production credits, high scores and often garbled chunks of story, all the while interjected by a legend prompting the arcade visitor to "INSERT COIN". As soon as the requisite amount of money is inserted into the cabinet, the legend fades, and the machine leaves 'attract mode' to allow the player to play the game as long as they fulfil certain criteria (for example, retaining an initial allocation of 'lives'), or until they complete the game, whereupon the screen will often display screens displaying a narrative resolution. In both situations, the generic prompt 'GAMEOVER' will often be displayed, followed by a return to attract mode.

As was briefly mentioned before, attract mode often establishes a semblance of narrative, presumably to contextualise the action that occurs once it has fulfilled it's purpose and money has been inserted into the machine. For scholars of narrative, the concept of an attract mode that elaborates narrative before the narrative has officially begun proves problematic. If we are to adhere to Todorov's conventions of narrative, the attract mode can be seen as establishing a narrative equilibrium, one that is often disrupted before the loop is completed and repeated. For example, the 1992 Toaplan shooter Truxton II (Tatsujin Oh)'s attract mode merely shows a crater erupting into the game's title. In this instance, there is no semblance of equilibrium, merely the disruption of on equilibrium we never witness. The explosion is invective enough, in the eyes of the programmers to warrant the ensuing shooting action. Additionally, in this instance Todorov's theorised partial restoration of the equilibrium is impossible to realise; the game continues infinitely, ending only when the player finally looses all their lives or chances to play the game.

What nihilism is evident here! Truxton II is devoid of any conceivable state of equilibrium, only violent disequilibrium. It is also impossible to ever see a restoration of the un-detailed equilibrium. In a cruel twist for narrative analysts everywhere, only the extra-textual notion of achieving a 'high score', a feat that would take amazing skill and well over sixteen straight hours to accomplish will ever bring any semblance of conclusion to the act of commencing a game. There are games that do offer more meaty narrative reasons for participating in the simulated mass murder inherent to the shooting game, though the equilibrium, if even depicted, is characteristically brief.

Take, for example, the attract mode of Raizing's CPS2 shooter Dimahoo. The initial image of blue skies and inferred pastoral bliss are immediately destroyed by a shadowed assailant, giving us the narrative thrust to truly goad the onlooker into proving that he or she is indeed 'great' enough to accept the challenge. These direct modes of address are hardly rare in the world of attract modes. The English version of Data East's Dragonninja famously drawled the line "ARE YOU A BAD ENOUGH DUDE TO RESCUE THE PRESIDENT?". Dimahoo really takes the cake when it comes to the inherent absurdity of attempt to compress an entire exposition into a loop of images that are trying to catch your eye only long enough to get you to pay money to play it. "THE EARTH WAS REALLY HOLLOW!" chides an intertitle, relishing the absurdity of the situation. The protagonists? "THE TOUGH BOUNTY HUNTERS!". On cue, a selection of colourful generic character archetypes swarm the screen, inferring the variety that will be on offer if you'll only stop watching and actually play the thing. In a hilariously blunt finishing blow, the loop concludes with the legend "THIS IS DIMAHOO", of course leaving us in no doubt as to what we are expected to do. Equilibrium, disruption of the equilibrium, exposition of the antagonist, enigma codes, exposition of the protagonists, inferred character development through inherent schematic association's with character archetypes, a postmodern call to arms and a self assured distillation of these aspects into a punchy title. Dimahoo achieves more in 54 seconds than most films manage to establish in their entire first act.