For this blogpost, I decided to revisit one of my favorite games of the past decade – Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic (KotOR). KotOR was always interesting to me not only because of its turn-based combat system, but also because of its focus on dialog and personal narrative. This time, though, I also focused on the game's treatment of gender, of spaces, and of cultures, hoping to find some redeeming qualities in this game I love that will prevent it from being dismissed as your standard violent action game targeted at pasty white boys with a violence fetish. While I won't claim the KotOR is the paragon of gender-neutrality and progress in the gaming industry, the game is certainly moving in the right direction.
KotOR is interesting in that it both conforms to and somehow also avoids being characterized entirely by the "Hegemony of Play" (Fron et al, 2007), particularly in its treatment of combat. Indeed, the marketing and merchandising strategies of the Star Wars franchise are the epitome of the "[taking] lunch money away from 14-year-old boys" attitude described by Fron et al (2007), and that any game springing forth from that culture would solely target the "hardcore gamers" and their love of RTS and FPS gameplay (p.7). However, KotORs combat system (which comprises only about 50-60% of the actual gameplay) is turn-based with the illusion of real-time action, and allows the player to pause the game during a fight, look at the situation, and issue orders, then resume the action. Also, the game is available for both consoles and PCs. These two factors (combat system and PC availability) directly break down two of the barriers to female gamers – non-female-friendly controller design and the necessity of strong spatial rotation skills (Fron et al, p.4) – and makes even the traditionally male-oriented combat aspect of gameplay more gender neutral. It isn't simple, cutesy, or "girly", but it isn't "hardcore" either.
Another interesting fact arises from KotOR's roots in the Star Wars universe. The existence of the larger Star Wars story world presents a space to create, as Jenkins (2004) put it, "an immersive environment [the player] can wander through and interact with" (p.678). KotOr makes use of this space wonderfully, and tries to maintain a healthy balance between the "dark and monochromatic" dungeons Fullerton et al (2007) describes (p.3) with vast, populated cityscapes with open skies and scenic views. Even in the dungeon-like areas, the palettes are brighter and more inviting than one would expect, creating environments that will appeal to females as well as males (Fullerton et al,p.3). KotOR also makes good use of its narrative space, creating many, many instances of Jenkins' (2004) concept of "micronarratives" (p.679) in the form of small dialog interactions between the player and the non-player characters in the world. Much of the game's content comes from the exploration of the various stories of the characters through these dialog events. Fullerton et al (2007) mentions the importance of "navigable narratives" in appealing to female gamers (p.6). Each of the narratives for the characters in the game creates a new narrative space for players to "discover, uncover, and reveal the plot elements," (Fullerton et al,2007,p.6) and many of these narratives can be resolved without violence (and sometimes the player is rewarded for avoiding violent confrontations).
Oddly enough, the vast merchandising nature of the Star Wars universe contributes to the narrative in another way as well – transmedia. The transmedial culture described by Laurel (2001) is very, very present for the Star Wars franchise. There is a core "foundational narrative" which many people (not just the 14-year-old boys) are familiar with that has been around for over 30 years, and the "story world" is spread across movies, television shows, comic books, novels, video games, and more (Laurel,2001,p.85). I am not going to claim that the literature of the Star Wars universe is of the highest caliber, but it definitely creates a wide range of possible media (not just video games) for users to interact with. In addition, Laurel (2001) also describes the importance of relationships in storytelling, and how it is distinctly different from just a story (p.59). The micronarrative, character-driven subplots of KotOR epitomize this idea. At any point during the main story, the player is free to choose to stay on board their ship and talk with each and every member of their crew, exploring and building (or destroying) their relationship with each character in the game.
Finally, KotOR is actually one of the few games I've played that avoids the use of "kombat" lingerie (Fullerton et al,2007,p.3). The female versions of all the armor or clothing in the game are only modified in such as way as to make it possible for someone with female anatomy to actually wear them. While I won't say the beauty or femininity of the female models is totally realistic, the female form is not objectified for the purposes of being a male fantasy. Rather, the differences present seem only to allow the player to distinguish between the two genders. The male models are not overly strong or huge either – almost every character in the game seems just barely above-average in their body image. I won't claim the game has the best representation of the sexes in the gaming world, but for a mainstream game based on a massive marketing franchise, the generic nature of the character models when compared to most other games is surprising.
All in all, KotOR is a game that simply manages to avoid many of the design pitfalls that plague many "hardcore" games without specifically trying to fix them, but it's a good first step in the right direction. After all, the more developers that haven't yet fallen into the pit, the more there are to help fill it in.
Works Cited
Jenkins, H. (2004). Game design as narrative architecture. The Game Design Reader, 670-686.
Laurel, B. (2001). Utopian Entrepreneur. Cambridge, Massachusetts: The MIT Press.
Fron, J., Fullerton, T., Morie, J. & Pearce, C. (2007). The Hegemony of Play. In Situated Play: Proceedings of Digital Games Research Association 2007 Conference. Tokyo, Japan. 1-10.
Fullerton, T., Morie, J. & Pearce, C. (2007). A Game Of Ones Own: Towards a New Gendered Poetics of Game Space. In Proceedings, Digital Arts & Culture 2007, Perth, Australia. 1-11.
Comments