Arcades and Parlour Games- Research

10:58 BA2a , Research 0 Comments

Arcades were incredibly popular during the 90s, but have since become obselete with the power of home gaming consoles allowing player access to hundreds of games, right at home. It was a disarmingly cheap (until you were on machines for hours!) and fun place to be, put in a few coins and play a game, forever wanting to improve or beat and progress in a game, these gaming machines were compelling and had ways of making you part with your change. Much of the following information comes from Jordan Zolan's article on "The Decline of the Arcade" on denofgeek.us.

Games like Space Invaders, Donkey Kong and Pacman were present but other machines during the 90s held Mortal Kombat and Street Fighter, games that weren't available at home, so you'd practice and play in these environments with other kids and teenagers to get better, to play against each other, to cheer each other on and feel a sense of camaraderie, united in real life by a love of games. "Arcades offered even the shyest kid to become King of the Castle" when having skill at a certain game, there'd often be "some unbeatable kid" you'd want to try and beat. This sense of union has now been facilitated through online play and voice chat from home consoles and PCs, you can play games with anyone in the world for as long as you like with one payment and not have to leave the house. Echoing Kazuki Takahashi's opinion on the lack of human connection, enforced by online play, this sense of union has been arguably filtered. I myself recall great joy as a kid going to an asian Arcade every so often, that had many machines only found in Japan. I remember putting all my pocket money in this card based beetle game "Mushiking", collecting cards from this machine to scan them in and power up my growing collection of beetles, swapping them with my friends and wanting that guy who poured all his money into the game who had the rarest cards- I still remember the glee of finally getting the butterfly special! It was this space, this world, this community with tickets and food and smells that was so wonderful, which has somewhat been lost in the takeover of todays home consoles an online-play as standard.

Fighting games and watching everyone else play, jousting with the other and when including eSports, its easily comparable to the idea of Greek Arenas. Who will beat the other? A fictional world where there may be bloodshed, but no harm will come to the player, as is the joy of video games. Arcades still seem to be in great use in Japan however, the game series Blazblue for example release console disks and arcade machines in tandem, the latter coming out before so players can already begin sharpening their skills. At tournaments, its not uncommon for these players to use joysticks and buttons, akin to those used on the machines.

Hubs in games, like the theme-park-centric Nintendo Land or even the home screen of the Wii U itself, try to create a digital community, the "miiverse" an online place to share tips and talk about games, trying to add a social element to the game you may be playing alone, making friends from a love of a series, as kids may have once done in arcades.

Arcade game mechanics have easily transitioned into gaming of today, games like Super Meat Boy and The Binding of Issac are designed to be difficult, but have a "one last try" appeal and a rapid reload time so you can get straight back into the action after you've failed. From Edmund McMillen's Gamasutra article, the "penalty for dying in video games started in the arcades where the major penalty was adding a quarter". As games appeared in homes and quarters were no longer necessary, the goal in games shifted from high scores to completion. Super Meat Boy's levels can be seen in entirety by the player, they know the ending is in sight, like the later mentioned Wario Ware, these bite size levels come in rapid succession so there is enough variety for players and they don't have time to get frustrated, they want to try the new challenge. "Video games are exercises in learning and growing", when a player completes a level, they can see a replay of all the times they died and the one time they did it faultlessly, congratulating the player for achieving something difficult.

Various iterations of classical arcade games have also made appearance on consoles, the DS game Pac-Pix heavily features the gimmick of drawing Pacman and other symbols, when the console and idea of touch screen controls were new. Another DS game in Space Invaders Extreme tried to reinvent the game for a contemporary audience, introducing flashy neon retro visuals and new powerup mechanics like a large vertical laser and bombs, to add some spice to the archaic game. Players nowadays can have their own digital library of games, be it digital or disk- games that focus on mini games, like Warioware, have an arcade feel in gaining extra credits and seeing how long you can play, before the game gets too difficult. Many video games feature arcade-like mini games, such as a playable games console within a game like No More Heroes, where the geeky protagonist plays a "bullet-hell" based on a fictional anime, to attain high scores, which serves as little more than a virtual...virtual distraction. Games within games.

The Parlour game in comparison unites people in a similarly social way. A largely Victorian pass time popular with the middle and upper classes, it was "the golden age of the parlour game" as stated by Patrick Beaver in his book on the topic, these noble men and women having a lot of free time. Mass Media such as radio and television and now games dwindled the play of parlour games, however they are sometimes still played today, often at Christmas or parties. Many have evolved into bourd games. Many of them make use of theatrical skill such a s charades, physical activity and word play. Games include word association, wink murder, Mafia, The Minister's Cat and snapdragon- a game that must have been played by the bourgeois as it was about snatching raisins from a bowl of flaming brandy in a darkened at the risk of being burnt- the idea was to see each other as demons, lunging for fruit over flames.

Many party games could count as modern day parlour games, and make use of peripherals to enhance the experience. The popular Guitar Hero has players competing against friends, to "play" a song better than the other, bringing people together in a physical way for a digital medium, Singstar and other karaoke games could also fit this bracket. The game Keep Talking and Nobody Explodes can only be played with two people, one with a screen and a virtual bomb to diffuse, and the other with a physical 27 page manual that must be printed out to play. The bomb diffuser has wires and puzzles to solve, consulting the other player who has the manual but cannot see the bomb and vice-versa for the other, this leads to a challenge of explaining and talking the other through tasks to diffuse this bomb within a time limit. A brilliant game is Jack's Box, which makes use of the player's digital devices such as smart phones and tablets, to enter online rooms and use these devices as controllers, to play drawing and word based games, interacting with everyone in the room in a digital manner, comparable to the deeply social and physical Victorian parlour games.

This idea of games asking more of the player than just use of a controller, of being tactile, is interesting. Games like Metal Gear that continuously break the fourth wall, a famous boss fight not telling the player they had to swap controller ports, was a way of engaging the player outside the screen, engaging them more with the world within as its directly interacting with them. Games like No More Heroes and Fragile Dreams make use of the Wii Remote's speaker, phone calls in No More Heroes, prepping you before each boss fight, have you hold the remote to your ear as you wander an intentionally large, empty virtual space at a slower pace, to absorb this information in a physically engaging way, traversing virtually to support this "phonecall". AR in the driving force in Fatal Frame Spirit Camera, that comes with a physical book filled with markers and a lady who sits in your room, talking to you through AR, having the player physically walk to find her. Comparable to the upcoming Pokemon Go, players physically wandering to find Pokemon. Games breaking the 4th wall and having the player interact physically I find massively compelling, it could be a good strand to really explore!