Two Rail - Shooters - Game Invaders: The Theory and Understanding of Computer Games - page 48

dust and smoke. The sounds that accompany the explosions are actually the sort of
musical sounds that make up trance dance tracks. So the effect of destroying things
is to create music on the side. In support of this, the music in the background while
you play is made up of trance beats supported by a “clap” every time you select
something to destroy. You complete the soundtrack as you play. In Rez the twitchy
activities score a little lower than the non-twitchy ones as can be seen from the pie
chart, and the twitch factor score of 0.8 confi rms what we have been saying.
This is a level-based game that develops with sequences of confrontations fol-
lowed by power-ups, leading to a face-off with the end-of-level boss. The character
also moves through a series of higher levels of existence (gets more powerful) the
more successful you are; and the reverse if you are unsuccessful. You can die and
have to repeat levels but it becomes quite unusual as your skill levels increase. So
the narrative potential does not play a major part in the aesthetic pleasure of playing
the game. There are however the musical and graphical developments which,
although synchronized with the expected narrative build-up of a rail - shooter , also
seem to have an aesthetic life of their own, having as much to do with art and music.
The latter depends on who you are of course. Some players will be far more intent
on the specifi c aesthetic of agency and completing the level than these other aesthetic
references that we fi nd so appealing.
In terms of transformation, we personally do not see this as being of particular
importance. We don't associate ourselves with this character to any degree although
the transformation into higher modes of existence—more colors and powers—is
very satisfying. This is a platform character rather than an RPG one. By that we
mean that it serves as the focus of the agency offered to us but there are no character
traits to get to know, no character development as such, nothing to empathize with.
Co-presence to our minds is even less important in this game than transformation.
In terms of presence the game is highly engaging; at least it was for us. And it
was the additional aesthetic pleasures referencing art and music that did it for us.
These are discussed below. Without them we do not think we would have found
such a game as presence inducing; not nowadays anyway. In the days when Star
Fox fi rst came out that was very different.
In comparing Rez and Star Fox we see that the latter is a typical game of its
genre and highly developed for its day. Agency is actually more varied in Star Fox,
there is more to do and more skill required to accomplish it. This is supported by a
defi nite sense of transformation and active co-presence, neither of which are offered
by Rez. Star Fox is ten years older than Rez, runs on decidedly inferior technology,
and yet seems a fuller game in some respects, at least in terms of our analysis so
far. Yet Rez is a great game and seems revolutionary in its own right. It certainly is
not inferior to Star Fox; it is similar but very different. Very interestingly, Rez relies
on agency and presence. The other aesthetic pleasures are not present. This is no
accident. The visual and auditory beauty of Rez is not weakened by the unnecessary
complications of narrative potential, transformation, and co-presence. Indeed this
could be seen as a marker for the rise of the casual game as a commercial reality
that began in 2008-9 and continues to this day. We go into this in more detail in the
next chapter.