After playing Plotkin’s Shade and reading Jeremy Douglass’ “Enlightening Interactive Fiction: Andrew Plotkin’s Shade, I was plainly frustrated, but also reminded of this quiz the Washington Post published online by the extent to which it utilizes extended notions of light to craft a narrative. While this is fundamentally different from Shade, there are some interesting takeaways.
First, my initial engagement with Shade was so frustrating I had to quit. Immediately, I began a new document for this post to write down all of the aspects of the structure I found unhelpful or particularly crucial to the experience of playing. These notes included the exploration of a language barrier questioning the existence of a learning curve in regard to knowing the correct “command” language necessary to move the game forward. Douglass describes the sensation perfectly when he states that “no matter how many times you turn off the lamp, the requested interaction is politely refused” (3). Essentially, Douglass calls the frustrating inability to articulate the correct command the “hiding method” that necessitates a ransacking hunt which “produces a moderate amount frustration” – an understatement (6). Therefore, in realizing the scholarly legitimacy of this play induced rage, I am left questioning then whether or not the learning curve is from learning a new process of reading (that is, electronically) or rather learning how to play a new game in order to facilitate reading?
The concept that “darkness kills,” or at least generates fear, Douglass raises interested me for literal and metaphorical reasons (4). Literally speaking, I thought initially of more current interactive games that use darkness as a scare tactic that enlivens the second person nature of the game, most notably among them Slender Man which was discontinued due to a violent act that occurred when two girls took the simulation too far wanting to allegedly be proxies for the video game murderer. Second-person immersion can have serious real-world consequences, but that is another digression.
On a lighter and more metaphorical note, I found the idea of light important in Shade, as Douglass notes, such that “as a narrative, it tells a story of enlightenment” (4). The Washington Post quiz, “Which of these 2020 Democrats agrees with you most?” informs the idea of enlightenment as a narrative strategy. The quiz implies an understood “you” when answering policy questions granting the reader, or player, the agency to choose which narrative they want to craft to better embody their ideal political candidate. Conversely, readers may fashion their answers to craft their own political narrative. The quiz has interactive elements including the readers identification with a character and their construction of a story via online web-based media outlets – an affordance only provided through the Washington Post’s online presence. Thus, the idea of being enlightened through the construction of a story rings true even within the fabrication of our political identities. Moreover, most of what politicians say anyways is a fabricated story, so the media adopting IF as a means of news makes complete sense. Did I just make a case for news as interactive fiction?