After looking over my research on Reward and Punishment, I felt that it was stepping too far away for the subject of Coherent worlds, so instead I went back to looking at Character and True Character to create a Coherent World.
Why is a Coherent World Important?A coherent world is a world which can be completely fictional yet still clear to understand and believable. It is necessary to create a fictional world that is believable so the viewer or player can be easily immersed into a foreign world that yet still makes sense. Without coherency within gaming worlds, players will find it harder to fully absorb the world before them and lose focus on the main story or character. An example of lack of coherence would be to see a sports car whizzing across the desert of an old western, with a young teenager donned in denim and nylon behind the wheel. These futuristic assets would not make sense in a late 19th century setting because they we’re not invented at this time. The feeling of being immersed in this old cowboys and Indians setting would be lost completely. However, if we add a mad professor and explain that the car is actually a time machine, suddenly the world becomes believable again and thus coherent. This is a good example to show that fictional worlds can be strange and impossible, as long as there is evidence to support its reason for being there, and these things that are out of place explained, the world will keep its coherency.
There are many different elements that aid in making a coherent world, not only must the physical world make sense, but so must the narrative, and characterisations. Characterisation is an important element in creating a coherent world because without a believable main character, the immersion is lost. Ultimately, the main character is what links the player to the gaming world, and through which they experience it. The main character needs to make sense to the player so they can connect to them and fully take on the role. Just like an actor understanding his or her role in a play, the player must understand what role they are playing to be fully immersed. A bad example would be to take a character like Professor Layton, intellectual, gentlemanly and calm and place him into first person shooter, like call of duty. These characteristics would not suit a battle torn soldier and instead confuse the player. However, if our hero was put into a pressurising situation that showed his true character to be a cold blooded killer in the heat of battle, the player would then accept this.
What is a True Character?
Robert McKee argues that a characters characterisations are a false personality of someone they would like to be, and that their "True Character" is only shown when they are forced to react under pressure. An example of this can be seen in the character of Sam in Lord of the Rings, through out most of the saga, he is the nervous side kick hidden in the shadows of Frodo’s heroics, dreaming of nothing more than a quite life in The Shire. Yet when Sam is put under pressure, or his friends life is in danger, his true character of a brave and fiercely loyal hero shines through. This loyalty shown when we see his true character makes his actions believable and understandable, its clear he would not leave his quiet, safe life for no one other than Frodo. If Sam did not show this brave loyalty, the audience would be confused as to why he would embark on such a dangerous journey and therefore the story world would not be coherent.
How does a True Character establish a coherent world?
A true character is necessary to establish a coherent world because it helps reinforce the players belief in the narrative world. A character with depth, shown through the “true character” draws us into the character as well as the gaming world, whereas a flat character can be hard to connect to and therefore disconnect us from the surrounding world, because as I mentioned before, the character is the link between the gaming world and the immersion of the player. An example of this can be seen in the character of Tidus’ from Final Fantasy X, his character is that of a cocky, carefree, sports star focused solely on himself and his career, yet as the game proceeds, his true character shines through as a compassionate and caring hero . The players role as Tidus is to aid the saviour Yuna as part of a group of guardians in her quest to rid the world of Sin and bring eternal calm. Without seeing this “true character” of compassion from Tidus, his aiding of these other characters would not be coherent because his characterisations would not match his actions. His compassion and care for not only Yuna but the other guardians as well is what the player holds onto when we see him make the final sacrifice at the end of the game. In conclusion, characters can be mixed and diverse, as long as their true character reflects their actions and placement in the world.
Player input onto character
How I have used this.In my own project, “Fred”, I have had to think hard about how to present my main characters characterisation as well as her “true character”. The story is based around Fred losing her memory, part of which will be her characterisations. The player will learn of Fred’s character as the game progress’ yet will start out with a basic naive and confused character, adding more characteristics as the game progress’ as well as hints of true character shining through at important scenarios of the game. It is important that Fred’s character is coherent with the rest of the world, yet not be too obvious to give away too much of the mystery too soon. For example, if the game gives away Freds true character of a protective daughter who is in fact much cleverer than she pretends, then this will take away a lot of the mystery of “who is Fred?” and make little sense to some of the earlier actions. At the beginning of the game, Fred is naive and needs a lot of help from another character, if her true character was shown here, it would not make sense that she could not work things out on her own.
ConclusionIn conclusion to this presentation, I have established that character and “true character” are two separate entities used to create a character that belongs in a coherent world. The character provides a shell for us to play through and the true character gives reason for every thought action and speech the main character makes. Therefore creating a coherent world.
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