In spite of the fact that we tried to cover the evolution of the gamer hero over the last 2.5-3 decades in such a short time, I think we actually covered a lot of ground and touched on a lot of key points. During our discussion of two of the first mainstream movies that featured gamer heroes it had already become apparent that there were always going to be two types of gamer hero:
The Standard Gamer Hero
The Hacker Gamer Hero
The standard gamer hero is fairly self explanatory, covering all gamer heroes that rose to meet a challenge and win through their interaction with actual video games. The hacker type is a variation of the first, seeing as how these hacker types were always some way or another involved in gaming culture as well. The more we followed movies forward along the time line, one of the most significant aspects of these types of movies seemed to be the fact that they were trying out different identities for gamer heroes. The Wizard had a traumatized little boy who was able to prove his worth through gaming and a whole social network of hackers in the movie Hackers. Movies like Tron had stuck the gamer hero's foot in the door of mainstream media and now people were beginning to explore and get a feel for who and what truly represented a gamer, and ultimately a gamer hero.
Throughout this period novels were also written whose protagonists happened to be gamer heroes as well. The gamer hero isn't very prolific in either film or print however people are exploring it more and more. Through this exploration and discovery we find ourselves realizing that the identity of the gamer hero can vary greatly. This, in my opinion is due mainly to the fact that, for example, anyone in a story that's into gaming (or forced into gaming) can become a gamer hero, whether it's a skinny white kid that lives in a trailer park and plays the same arcade every day like Starfighter or if you're a convicted murderer letting someone use you as an avatar for a chance at freedom. This leaves the possibilities wide open for who a hero can be or where they are from. They don't have to be a super spy that works for the government to be included into the gamer hero archetype. In fact, I believe it would be an accurate statement to say that the archetype of the gamer hero is partially characterized by the range of possible candidates that can fill the role. This is hugely beneficial to the archetype as it provides adaptability.
Finally there is the discussion of whether or not the gamer hero is truly an archetype that has been adopted by American culture. In my opinion there is no question, it is a hands down yes. Not only do we have the pop culture legitimizing spoofs contributing to the gamer hero's resume, but stories starring gamer heroes are beginning to be able to be viewed as making fairly significant commentaries on our society. The mere fact that the people are trying to speak through gamer heroes and contribute to our culture and/or comment on our society is all the proof I need to be certain that the gamer hero is here to stay, and hopefully for a very, very long time.
5.06.2010
After A Long Journey, A Warning of Things To Come
The elements which constitute the world a gamer hero belongs to, even the heroes themselves, are sometimes best described as Doctorow aptly qualifies many descriptions of the food Marcus ingests in Little Brother: "better than it sounds". For gamers like myself, or even a dedicated code crunching keyboard jockey, we get what the authors are getting at when they describe something. What might be completely off Jon Doe's radar was picked up by our short wave radios before we even unclipped them from our super sweet yellow utility belts (of course I mean the limited production models with a lead lined pocket for kryptonite, just in case... go ahead and lol, I am) and turned them on. In the past this has worked as a horrible deficit to the acceptance of the gamer hero, especially in mainstream culture. However, what one sees now are completely self sufficient social circles of solely gamers and/or righteously computer literate people. We have come to expect that, for example, the actors that portray us and the heroes based on us and our fantasies do so with a certain degree of accuracy. None of this button mashing, invisible marionette inspired movements that inevitably end up making somebody look like a fool simultaneously resulting in one less plasma TV in stock. The point here is that -- now that the gamer hero has survived the wait for our science fiction to become our science (near) future -- we not only look forward to seeing another take on how awesome it would be to save the world due to teh hotness that is us when it comes to uber gaming pwnage, but we want said pwnage to be executed relatively accurately and feasibly.
Doctorow intelligently, and usually excitedly, utilizes newer gaming methods such as ARGing -- which incidentally is what leads Marcus to the edge of the rabbit hole before the Department of Homeland Defense throws him into it for good -- and role playing staple LARPing in order to enhance his story and further define Marcus as the novel's gamer hero. This was actually a welcome change of pace from the typical shenanigans most gamer heroes get themselves into, much less plan in order to comedically gain a legitimate upper hand over their adversaries like Marcus' VampHunt LARP distraction. Doctorow declares early on that Marcus is into gaming that involves "real" physical action by describing how he transitioned into ARGing from LARPing. Alternate Reality Games are similar to LARPing, however its usually more discrete than a clearing in the middle of a park filled with geekage battling it out with (actually pretty sweet... sometimes) arts and crafts for big kids renditions of armor, clothing, and weaponry. ARGing also seems to be more goal/mission oriented, drawing similarites to the ARG Spooks from the novel Halting State and the augmented reality version of Pac-Man that was played on the streets of Singapore in 2004 and again some time NYC.
"Cory Doctorow is a fast and furious storyteller who gets the details of alternate
reality gaming right, while offering a startling, new vision of how these games
might play out in the high-stakes context of a terrorist attack."
These links won't help you prepare for a terrorist attack, but the will show you how to have some serious fun:
As I've mentioned in blogs past, the hacker is in some ways more of a derivative of the "original formula" for the gamer hero, yet an irreplaceable link in the chain of the gamer hero's overall identity. In addition, while reading Little Brother you don't ever really catch yourself thinking things like, "Even if that laser beam could have somehow transferred Flynn into the Paranoids, a computer or a laser can't generate mass from nothing, considering that once he was transferred on the drive he was electrons," or, "Wow, I didn't know that hackers had a natural reluctance or fear of hitting the shift key." While the latter quote is more of an accuracy issue I have with almost all movies that incorporate any form of computer geek or hacker. It's not a big deal, it's more of a ridiculous pet peeve of mine. The more important issue lies within the previous quote. The uneven 'geekquation' that presented itself in my head when Flynn reappeared at the end of Tron still bothers me. I know I should let it go, but even Honey, I Shrunk The Kids has a more believable crazy laser. Technically all would have had to be able to do was reduce the amount of empty space between atoms based on the fact that if you took out all the empty space a person would be smaller than the head of a pin, but I digress. What I'm getting at is that most gamer hero oriented movies like Gamer, Last Starfighter, Tron or the Wizard either incorporate a futuristic technology that even if developed would not be implemented as depicted, out of this world premise (sometimes literally), seriously flawed hypothetical technology, or simply let Jimmy get 50k on Double Dragon in the time it takes Fred Savage to ask for a cab and sort of get angry. This usually happens regardless of the type of gamer hero present, one obvious reason being that theoretical technology is usually cool, and almost always guarantees sweet special effects, even if they're made out of words and thoughts.
Doctorow does a fantastic job of employing what I explained to my dad as "implicated generation technology". What I mean by this is that Doctorow doesn't seem to come up with story first and fill in the gaps with easy fixes like the laser in Tron which served as a fix all vehicle for Flynn's trans-planar traveling. That's not to say that Little Brother was full of the types of brilliant conceptual solutions that surface almost regularly in the Ghost In The Shell series, either. Doctorow is well versed in technology related issues, sometimes severely so, which makes the mechanics for progression and development in the story seem almost as if they are maybe not next generation tech, but definitely a possible generation that is implied by the our current technology. Examples would be the iconic paranoia ware Xbox consoles and home brewed arphid cloners. The way he introduces them and the fact that they are home brewed arphid cloners means that there are most likely also manufactured models in the future, but that people have learned how to make their own from parts. The kicker is that the things the cloner is used on. For example, things like the SmarTrip Metro card I have in my pocket right now and devices that are the equivalent to a Maryland E-ZPass for tolls which is on my dad's car's windshield. Not only do current technologies exist in his futuristic landscape, but the future existence of the technology that his characters are familiar with is implied by what exists in our world. The effect is feasibility, and a cast of characters that actually mesh with their environments. The impact on a hacker type gamer hero in such a place is enormously proactive. Foremost, it greatly increases the average readers' understanding and therefore acceptance of the hacker type gamer hero. In addition, it increases overall understanding of whatever it is the hacker is doing and in the case of the hero fueling the social commentary, it narrows the gap between the metaphor and our reality. Narrowing this gap creates more tangible connections, giving the commentary more substance, thus making the commentary much more clear, relevant, and applicable all at the same time.
The struggles of gamer hero are mediated by the interfaces they engage, usually in order to interact with some sort of virtual world or simply digital information and content. This mediation commonly serves as a buffer between the trouble brewing in whatever electronic environment the hero is interacting with and the soon to be consequences for the "real" world depicted in each story. The severity of each buffer (on a story by story basis) can represent story elements such as the relative imminence of the threat posed by the antagonist(s), the degree of obstacles that a hero must overcome, and especially the status quo of technological capability and structure that "currently" exists. Considering my Gamer related argument -- presented in my last post that suggested that the gamer hero can act as a vehicle for commentary on society's relationship with modern and potential technologies -- the buffer of each story could represent warnings or cautions and predictions of real world conflicts that are analagous to its fictional implications.
The two most pertinent possibilites I can deduce are:
1.The amount and variations of freedoms that individuals
have to utilize technology
vs.
The amount and methods of control that organizations
and governing bodies exercise through technology to
create/enforce/maintain/manipulate a desired "order"
in the physical world
2.A suggested time frame within which societally dynamic
events and/or actions could take place and retain their
capacity for potentially affecting possible resolutions of the major
conflict(s) -- regardless of which "side" wins out -- that
challenge the worlds of our gamer heroes and heroines
should these events manifest themselves in our society(ies).
These two Inherent in any social commentary there is usually some sort of warning or caution with varying degrees of severity. The overriding message in Little Brother was personified by Marcus and elaborated on through his internal and social struggles. This message that I took away from reading the novel is this: We all have certain inalienable rights, most important of all our freedom. The government is meant to facilitate our well being and the well being of the country. If they cannot do this without taking away our freedom it is our right and responsibility to "debug" the way we are governed. Although Marcus is the most well developed hacker type gamer hero I have ever come across, considering to his LARPing and ARGin he combines those characteristics with the frontier of what a standard gamer hero, making him somewhat of a hybrid gamer hero, the most evolved type of gamer hero we have discussed so far.
Doctorow intelligently, and usually excitedly, utilizes newer gaming methods such as ARGing -- which incidentally is what leads Marcus to the edge of the rabbit hole before the Department of Homeland Defense throws him into it for good -- and role playing staple LARPing in order to enhance his story and further define Marcus as the novel's gamer hero. This was actually a welcome change of pace from the typical shenanigans most gamer heroes get themselves into, much less plan in order to comedically gain a legitimate upper hand over their adversaries like Marcus' VampHunt LARP distraction. Doctorow declares early on that Marcus is into gaming that involves "real" physical action by describing how he transitioned into ARGing from LARPing. Alternate Reality Games are similar to LARPing, however its usually more discrete than a clearing in the middle of a park filled with geekage battling it out with (actually pretty sweet... sometimes) arts and crafts for big kids renditions of armor, clothing, and weaponry. ARGing also seems to be more goal/mission oriented, drawing similarites to the ARG Spooks from the novel Halting State and the augmented reality version of Pac-Man that was played on the streets of Singapore in 2004 and again some time NYC.
"Cory Doctorow is a fast and furious storyteller who gets the details of alternate
reality gaming right, while offering a startling, new vision of how these games
might play out in the high-stakes context of a terrorist attack."
- Jane McGonical, Designer, I Love Bees
These links won't help you prepare for a terrorist attack, but the will show you how to have some serious fun:
http://gamesalfresco.com/2008/03/03/top-10-augmented-reality-demos-that-will-revolutionize-video-games/
Augmented Reality Pacman!
Smart Phone Mediated Augmented Reality
Augmented Reality Pacman!
Smart Phone Mediated Augmented Reality
Doctorow does a fantastic job of employing what I explained to my dad as "implicated generation technology". What I mean by this is that Doctorow doesn't seem to come up with story first and fill in the gaps with easy fixes like the laser in Tron which served as a fix all vehicle for Flynn's trans-planar traveling. That's not to say that Little Brother was full of the types of brilliant conceptual solutions that surface almost regularly in the Ghost In The Shell series, either. Doctorow is well versed in technology related issues, sometimes severely so, which makes the mechanics for progression and development in the story seem almost as if they are maybe not next generation tech, but definitely a possible generation that is implied by the our current technology. Examples would be the iconic paranoia ware Xbox consoles and home brewed arphid cloners. The way he introduces them and the fact that they are home brewed arphid cloners means that there are most likely also manufactured models in the future, but that people have learned how to make their own from parts. The kicker is that the things the cloner is used on. For example, things like the SmarTrip Metro card I have in my pocket right now and devices that are the equivalent to a Maryland E-ZPass for tolls which is on my dad's car's windshield. Not only do current technologies exist in his futuristic landscape, but the future existence of the technology that his characters are familiar with is implied by what exists in our world. The effect is feasibility, and a cast of characters that actually mesh with their environments. The impact on a hacker type gamer hero in such a place is enormously proactive. Foremost, it greatly increases the average readers' understanding and therefore acceptance of the hacker type gamer hero. In addition, it increases overall understanding of whatever it is the hacker is doing and in the case of the hero fueling the social commentary, it narrows the gap between the metaphor and our reality. Narrowing this gap creates more tangible connections, giving the commentary more substance, thus making the commentary much more clear, relevant, and applicable all at the same time.
The struggles of gamer hero are mediated by the interfaces they engage, usually in order to interact with some sort of virtual world or simply digital information and content. This mediation commonly serves as a buffer between the trouble brewing in whatever electronic environment the hero is interacting with and the soon to be consequences for the "real" world depicted in each story. The severity of each buffer (on a story by story basis) can represent story elements such as the relative imminence of the threat posed by the antagonist(s), the degree of obstacles that a hero must overcome, and especially the status quo of technological capability and structure that "currently" exists. Considering my Gamer related argument -- presented in my last post that suggested that the gamer hero can act as a vehicle for commentary on society's relationship with modern and potential technologies -- the buffer of each story could represent warnings or cautions and predictions of real world conflicts that are analagous to its fictional implications.
The two most pertinent possibilites I can deduce are:
1.The amount and variations of freedoms that individuals
have to utilize technology
vs.
The amount and methods of control that organizations
and governing bodies exercise through technology to
create/enforce/maintain/manipulate a desired "order"
in the physical world
2.A suggested time frame within which societally dynamic
events and/or actions could take place and retain their
capacity for potentially affecting possible resolutions of the major
conflict(s) -- regardless of which "side" wins out -- that
challenge the worlds of our gamer heroes and heroines
should these events manifest themselves in our society(ies).
These two Inherent in any social commentary there is usually some sort of warning or caution with varying degrees of severity. The overriding message in Little Brother was personified by Marcus and elaborated on through his internal and social struggles. This message that I took away from reading the novel is this: We all have certain inalienable rights, most important of all our freedom. The government is meant to facilitate our well being and the well being of the country. If they cannot do this without taking away our freedom it is our right and responsibility to "debug" the way we are governed. Although Marcus is the most well developed hacker type gamer hero I have ever come across, considering to his LARPing and ARGin he combines those characteristics with the frontier of what a standard gamer hero, making him somewhat of a hybrid gamer hero, the most evolved type of gamer hero we have discussed so far.
Taking a Joke Builds Character, Character No Longer a Joke
This week Mark and I are focusing on both Gamer(2008) and Grandma's Boy(2006). More specifically, the fact that the gamer hero in Gamer is both a source and a catalyst for a social commentary, and the ways that a spoof like Grandma's Boy actually work towards validating the gamer hero as an archetype.
I want to start off by saying that whatever you might have heard about the movie Gamer, it was a good movie with great action and high caliber acting throughout. If you're able accept that the way things are set up in the movie actually work(I'll explain what these "things" are below) and follow the events within from there, the movie has the potential of a commentary on games and society by virtue of the gamer hero. Society has taken issue with video games and their influences on individuals and culture, positive and negative alike. However it is only recently that gamer culture and a mainstream interest in computer literacy has flowered. Changing times have given new life to the plausibility of a gamer hero to come along and actually make such a statement, especially in a movie as opposed to a novel. Especially considering the relatively limited time to develop both the plausibility of the emergence of gamer heroes with identities similar to Kable and a complex story line that can support commentaries.
Equally as important to the chronicling of the evolution of the gamer hero, insofar as establishing significance, is Grandma's Boy. This comedy is laden with drug references, ridiculous characters, and completely implausible situational funny akin to other spoofs like Austin Powers or Behind the Mask: The Rise of Leslie Vernon(which is epic by the way). The simple fact that Grandma's Boy was even made suggests a strong degree of confirmation of the gamer hero's existence as a recognizable theatrical archetype. Spoofs are made with key archetypes in mind, exaggerating the qualities and quirks of said archetypes throughout the movie. Grandma's Boy exploits the stereotype that "gamers live in their parents' basement" throughout. By the conclusion of the movie Alex's grandma, who he lives with, proves that Alex did in fact create the game "Demonik"; which antagonist and overall uber nerd JP, aka Mr. Roboto, solicits as the new spawn of his genius in lieu of his failure to create a sequel to Eternal Death Slayer. The stereotype is further exaggerated in Alex's friend who calls his parents roommates, wears footie pajamas, and sleeps in a car-bed. Grandma's Boy also introduces a gamer hero that we haven't seen before on this blog, the game creator. However, this is largely overlooked and is mainly used as a premise for a final showdown between Alex the "cool" gamer and "JP" (in quotes because JP isn't really a person -- he's probably giddily giggle-snorting with pride at that statement -- he's the embodiment of every loserly and anti-social stereotype the director could cram into a black pleather trench coat -- initiate robotic ability: wall camouflage).
Before I get back to Gamer, I want to point out one thing: this is an analysis of how the gamer hero in Gamer played an critical role in the development of a possible social commentary based on the concepts of Gamer, not necessarily my opinion, but food for thought nonetheless. This movie is centered around one specific character as the gamer hero, known to the world as Kable(Gerard Butler) in the live action MMOFPS "Slayers". The game was created by the movie's villain as an alternative for death row inmates. If they survive enough rounds then they are granted their freedom, similar to the movie Running Man. Both Arnold's character in Running Man and Kable are wrongly convicted of murder. Coincidentally enough, both crimes were allegedly committed while each was serving in the armed forces, both convictions were part of military related cover ups, and although it is believed that both men are brutal murderers, they are for the most part cheered on by fans of the games they must win in order to expose the truth and live to tell about it. Not only that, but each of them are ultimately forced to break the (same, literally) rules of their respective games ftw and with at least one identical goal: to put an end to the games that made them a gamer hero in the first place. This irony is not lost at all on Gamer. The main difference between Running Man and Gamer is that the players of gamer are literally not in control of their own destinies. Inmates who volunteer for Slayers are controlled by actual gamers via something called a "Nanex", a nanotechnology that functions as cellular copy and paste/replace for the neurons in their brains. Each Nanex has it's own IP address with a metaphorical "read only" property, effectively making each convict a puppet controlled by a paying customer or subscriber for each scheduled conflict. To gauge what this might feel like, imagine having the most vivid dream about being inside your favorite FPS. Only before each match that lucid ability to control yourself in the dream world is handed over to someone you never meet and cannot communicate with, almost as if your subconscious took over forcing you to be a first person witness until you wake up. Oh, and the dream is actually a live fire exercise, your subconscious is some punk kid, and there's no respawning. Ever. Consider the metaphorical implications keeping in mind that what the Nanex does is allow someone else to "play you" via wireless internet connections. Kable doesn't simply zonk out when the game starts, he is completely aware of everything going on around him, maintains his senses, but must execute commands submitted by his player. In an eerie sense, it would follow logically that Kable, mentally speaking, becomes his own subconscious every time the game starts. As uncomfortable as this sensation must be, Kable, like every other playable convict, becomes a victim of ping. The same mechanism was initially utilized in the movie to create a live action social simulator like Second Life, aptly titled "Society", where people are payed to be the avatars of subscribers who have complete control over them, emotes and everything<>.
Although all of this may seem like a mere summary of the technological aspect of the movie, it serves as the premise on which a deep social commentary can be founded. Obviously this would never happen in real life regardless of technological capabilities, it is a metaphor for not only desensitization through gaming but the costs and consequences of gross sacrifices of basic human freedom. Can you even imagine the psychological destruction among the 'actors' of Society caused by griefers or people that treat the sim as something between LARPing and interactive porn? What about the convicts who are forced to watch others less than 30 feet away fall victim to the innumerable horrifying ways to be mutilated beyond recognition and then seeing the result of some irreverent asshole player using the crouch button to follow up his kill by making his convict teabag the fallen "enemy" (this actually takes place in the opening sequences of Gamer). Like I said before, this wouldn't happen in real life to begin with, however the movie exaggerates such things on a relatively consistent scale and makes you think about the nature of the things that we as a gaming society not only accept as executable actions in a game or sim, but in many cases have come to expect. For example, compare the assumed jump in the movie from virtual gaming to using people as avatars to our jump from representational depictions of sexually explicit and/or incredibly violent actions to the demand for photo-realistic depictions of these abilities (would you like some hot coffee with your chainsaw bayonet?). Since when did it become so lame to squish a Goomba dead with the full pasta enhanced body weight of a jovial Italian plumber that we needed to see the infrared spectrum of mist escaping from the exit wound of some Russian commi bastard's cranial soft spot preceded by audio feedback with the uncanny resemblance of splitting a melon with a hammer? (from killing in Mario to killing inSOCOM II)
The fact of the matter is that when you see these atrocities happen to real people, in spite of the knowledge that it's just special effects, you can't help but realize that there entire genres of games whose base mechanics are based around a plethora of ways to brutally make your enemies extinct. And yet, culturally, we sanction the escape into worlds where the unspeakable is possible, for a fee, at the same time that we pass laws that basically mean we prohibit young people from purchasing certain games because we don't think that they are ready to be exposed to the content inside. You might say we do the same with movies, however this is more akin to the sale of alcohol or tobacco due to the fact that games are interactive. The gamer hero's roles in Gamer are to portray the fullest extent to which a gaming avatar can ever evolve and provide a humanistic perspective from those front lines. Without Kable, the movie would have been a killing spree and hardly much more. In the end Kable is victorious and the Nanex network is taken offline similar to the "deletion" of the virtual world in the novel Epic by Conor Kostick, ensuring that this incredibly depraved behavior will not be repeated. It is through Kable's actions and the actions of those that aided him in his goals that the metaphor is preserved and a social commentary is able to take form.
I want to start off by saying that whatever you might have heard about the movie Gamer, it was a good movie with great action and high caliber acting throughout. If you're able accept that the way things are set up in the movie actually work(I'll explain what these "things" are below) and follow the events within from there, the movie has the potential of a commentary on games and society by virtue of the gamer hero. Society has taken issue with video games and their influences on individuals and culture, positive and negative alike. However it is only recently that gamer culture and a mainstream interest in computer literacy has flowered. Changing times have given new life to the plausibility of a gamer hero to come along and actually make such a statement, especially in a movie as opposed to a novel. Especially considering the relatively limited time to develop both the plausibility of the emergence of gamer heroes with identities similar to Kable and a complex story line that can support commentaries.
Equally as important to the chronicling of the evolution of the gamer hero, insofar as establishing significance, is Grandma's Boy. This comedy is laden with drug references, ridiculous characters, and completely implausible situational funny akin to other spoofs like Austin Powers or Behind the Mask: The Rise of Leslie Vernon(which is epic by the way). The simple fact that Grandma's Boy was even made suggests a strong degree of confirmation of the gamer hero's existence as a recognizable theatrical archetype. Spoofs are made with key archetypes in mind, exaggerating the qualities and quirks of said archetypes throughout the movie. Grandma's Boy exploits the stereotype that "gamers live in their parents' basement" throughout. By the conclusion of the movie Alex's grandma, who he lives with, proves that Alex did in fact create the game "Demonik"; which antagonist and overall uber nerd JP, aka Mr. Roboto, solicits as the new spawn of his genius in lieu of his failure to create a sequel to Eternal Death Slayer. The stereotype is further exaggerated in Alex's friend who calls his parents roommates, wears footie pajamas, and sleeps in a car-bed. Grandma's Boy also introduces a gamer hero that we haven't seen before on this blog, the game creator. However, this is largely overlooked and is mainly used as a premise for a final showdown between Alex the "cool" gamer and "JP" (in quotes because JP isn't really a person -- he's probably giddily giggle-snorting with pride at that statement -- he's the embodiment of every loserly and anti-social stereotype the director could cram into a black pleather trench coat -- initiate robotic ability: wall camouflage).
Before I get back to Gamer, I want to point out one thing: this is an analysis of how the gamer hero in Gamer played an critical role in the development of a possible social commentary based on the concepts of Gamer, not necessarily my opinion, but food for thought nonetheless. This movie is centered around one specific character as the gamer hero, known to the world as Kable(Gerard Butler) in the live action MMOFPS "Slayers". The game was created by the movie's villain as an alternative for death row inmates. If they survive enough rounds then they are granted their freedom, similar to the movie Running Man. Both Arnold's character in Running Man and Kable are wrongly convicted of murder. Coincidentally enough, both crimes were allegedly committed while each was serving in the armed forces, both convictions were part of military related cover ups, and although it is believed that both men are brutal murderers, they are for the most part cheered on by fans of the games they must win in order to expose the truth and live to tell about it. Not only that, but each of them are ultimately forced to break the (same, literally) rules of their respective games ftw and with at least one identical goal: to put an end to the games that made them a gamer hero in the first place. This irony is not lost at all on Gamer. The main difference between Running Man and Gamer is that the players of gamer are literally not in control of their own destinies. Inmates who volunteer for Slayers are controlled by actual gamers via something called a "Nanex", a nanotechnology that functions as cellular copy and paste/replace for the neurons in their brains. Each Nanex has it's own IP address with a metaphorical "read only" property, effectively making each convict a puppet controlled by a paying customer or subscriber for each scheduled conflict. To gauge what this might feel like, imagine having the most vivid dream about being inside your favorite FPS. Only before each match that lucid ability to control yourself in the dream world is handed over to someone you never meet and cannot communicate with, almost as if your subconscious took over forcing you to be a first person witness until you wake up. Oh, and the dream is actually a live fire exercise, your subconscious is some punk kid, and there's no respawning. Ever. Consider the metaphorical implications keeping in mind that what the Nanex does is allow someone else to "play you" via wireless internet connections. Kable doesn't simply zonk out when the game starts, he is completely aware of everything going on around him, maintains his senses, but must execute commands submitted by his player. In an eerie sense, it would follow logically that Kable, mentally speaking, becomes his own subconscious every time the game starts. As uncomfortable as this sensation must be, Kable, like every other playable convict, becomes a victim of ping. The same mechanism was initially utilized in the movie to create a live action social simulator like Second Life, aptly titled "Society", where people are payed to be the avatars of subscribers who have complete control over them, emotes and everything<
Although all of this may seem like a mere summary of the technological aspect of the movie, it serves as the premise on which a deep social commentary can be founded. Obviously this would never happen in real life regardless of technological capabilities, it is a metaphor for not only desensitization through gaming but the costs and consequences of gross sacrifices of basic human freedom. Can you even imagine the psychological destruction among the 'actors' of Society caused by griefers or people that treat the sim as something between LARPing and interactive porn? What about the convicts who are forced to watch others less than 30 feet away fall victim to the innumerable horrifying ways to be mutilated beyond recognition and then seeing the result of some irreverent asshole player using the crouch button to follow up his kill by making his convict teabag the fallen "enemy" (this actually takes place in the opening sequences of Gamer). Like I said before, this wouldn't happen in real life to begin with, however the movie exaggerates such things on a relatively consistent scale and makes you think about the nature of the things that we as a gaming society not only accept as executable actions in a game or sim, but in many cases have come to expect. For example, compare the assumed jump in the movie from virtual gaming to using people as avatars to our jump from representational depictions of sexually explicit and/or incredibly violent actions to the demand for photo-realistic depictions of these abilities (would you like some hot coffee with your chainsaw bayonet?). Since when did it become so lame to squish a Goomba dead with the full pasta enhanced body weight of a jovial Italian plumber that we needed to see the infrared spectrum of mist escaping from the exit wound of some Russian commi bastard's cranial soft spot preceded by audio feedback with the uncanny resemblance of splitting a melon with a hammer? (from killing in Mario to killing inSOCOM II)
The fact of the matter is that when you see these atrocities happen to real people, in spite of the knowledge that it's just special effects, you can't help but realize that there entire genres of games whose base mechanics are based around a plethora of ways to brutally make your enemies extinct. And yet, culturally, we sanction the escape into worlds where the unspeakable is possible, for a fee, at the same time that we pass laws that basically mean we prohibit young people from purchasing certain games because we don't think that they are ready to be exposed to the content inside. You might say we do the same with movies, however this is more akin to the sale of alcohol or tobacco due to the fact that games are interactive. The gamer hero's roles in Gamer are to portray the fullest extent to which a gaming avatar can ever evolve and provide a humanistic perspective from those front lines. Without Kable, the movie would have been a killing spree and hardly much more. In the end Kable is victorious and the Nanex network is taken offline similar to the "deletion" of the virtual world in the novel Epic by Conor Kostick, ensuring that this incredibly depraved behavior will not be repeated. It is through Kable's actions and the actions of those that aided him in his goals that the metaphor is preserved and a social commentary is able to take form.
5.05.2010
Gamer
Gamer is a futuristic depiction of virtual interaction taken to extreme measures. The game Slayers gives death row inmates the chance of earning freedom by successfully completing 30 matches. Kable(played by Gerard Butler) is an inmate on the verge of earning his freedom in the game Slayers, he is controlled by Simon a 17 year old who is extremely good at beating the odds. Ken Castle(played by Michael C. Hall(Dexter) is the inventor of self replicating nan-nites which allow these virtual worlds to exist, Castle is the villain in this film. Castle hatches a plan to separate Kable from Simon during in-game combat rendering him a inoperable head shot target. The Humanz leader played by Luda contacts Simon before it's to late. Luda uses his elite hacking skills aparently and enables Simon to communicate with Kable. Kable asks Simon to set him free which Simon does, this eventually leads to Castle's Downfall and the reuniting of Kable with his family.
There are two hero's in this film Kable and Simon. Kable plays the role of your typical bad ass in the style of Rambo or Terminator films. Simon's character is somewhat of a new breed of gamer hero, armed with his space age internet gaming displays he defies all odds in the virtual gaming world allowing Kable to survive. Kable is only set free near the end of the movie. Kable probably would have never seen his family again if some noob controlled him (he would have ended up like the blonde chick with cornrows, as soon as I saw those cornrows I knew she was dead). Simon was optimal in the survival of Kable in the virtual gaming world. New gamer hero'swill emerge that keep close great knowledge of technology, people today that hold these significant tech skills are viewed as elite and posses heroic like qualities(although there are some exceptions like that fat guy eating waffles in the film).
There are two hero's in this film Kable and Simon. Kable plays the role of your typical bad ass in the style of Rambo or Terminator films. Simon's character is somewhat of a new breed of gamer hero, armed with his space age internet gaming displays he defies all odds in the virtual gaming world allowing Kable to survive. Kable is only set free near the end of the movie. Kable probably would have never seen his family again if some noob controlled him (he would have ended up like the blonde chick with cornrows, as soon as I saw those cornrows I knew she was dead). Simon was optimal in the survival of Kable in the virtual gaming world. New gamer hero'swill emerge that keep close great knowledge of technology, people today that hold these significant tech skills are viewed as elite and posses heroic like qualities(although there are some exceptions like that fat guy eating waffles in the film).
Gamer & Grandma's Boy
Grandma's Boy is one of my favorite current day gamer hero depictions. The hero in this film is Alex played by Allan Covert. At the start of the film Alex is forced to move out of his apartment because his friend josh spends all the rent money on Filipino hookers. Alex is forced to move in with his friend Jeff who still lives with his parents. An embarrassing encounter occurs between Alex and Jeff's Mom (he ejaculates on her as she opens the bathroom door), Alex is forced to move in with his grandmother. Alex's job as a game tester is pushed to the limits as he struggles to do all of his grandmother's various chores, and try to pull his grandmother and friends away from Antique's Roadshow. Alex's arch rival J.P. is classified as a "mega nerd" he is the prime example of all that could go wrong within a gamer. Alex is pitted against J.P. in competition for Samantha (an object of desire among all those at the office). The movie ends with Alex getting the girl, Alex's grandmother defeating J.P. in Eternal Death Slayer.
The hero in this movie is a more down to earth depiction of gamer hero. The movie frequently exploits his weakness's unlike the other movies viewed. In this movie the hero is not fighting some epic battle in the stars, he is fighting the battle of actual problems that could occur in real life. In the scene where Alex burns both hands on the cookie sheet it lets the viewer know that he is not some super being, this adds to a more realistic premise and allows the viewer to relate to the hero. But overall the reason why Alex is the hero in the movie is because he is cool, funny, extremely good at video games, and he is liked by all (except Jeff's Mom). I guess the main reason why this movie depiction of the gamer hero is so good because it shows you don't have to be from the Matrix to be a hero, and if you are from the Matrix everyone will laugh at you! ("you would if you had robot ears"-J.P.)
The hero in this movie is a more down to earth depiction of gamer hero. The movie frequently exploits his weakness's unlike the other movies viewed. In this movie the hero is not fighting some epic battle in the stars, he is fighting the battle of actual problems that could occur in real life. In the scene where Alex burns both hands on the cookie sheet it lets the viewer know that he is not some super being, this adds to a more realistic premise and allows the viewer to relate to the hero. But overall the reason why Alex is the hero in the movie is because he is cool, funny, extremely good at video games, and he is liked by all (except Jeff's Mom). I guess the main reason why this movie depiction of the gamer hero is so good because it shows you don't have to be from the Matrix to be a hero, and if you are from the Matrix everyone will laugh at you! ("you would if you had robot ears"-J.P.)
4.28.2010
Hackers & The Wizard
As the iconic portrayal of the gamer hero emerges throughout the decades new characteristics are being applied that pertain to newer technological advances. In the film Hackers the hero can be described as trustworthy, intelligent, owning expert video game and hacking abilities, and as always irresistible to the female protagonist. At the start of the film a Seattle youth named Dade "Zero Cool" Murphy is arrested and charged, at the age of 11, with crashing 1,507 systems in one day and causing a single-day 7-point drop in the Stock Market. As a result he is banned from owning or operating computers or touch-tone telephones until his 18th birthday. As Dade enters high school he is introduced to a woman named Kate who seems to strike his interest most sexually. As Dade slowly unravels the puzzle of a mysterious hacker named Acid Burn he soon finds out it is actually Kate and the two team up along with friends( including Shaggy from Scooby Doo, who apperently plays the 90's version of Shaggy in this film, Scooby is played by Angelina Jolie she is definetly no Laura Croft in this film). As the team unravels the plan of the evil foe called "The Plaugue" (which is the lead security official of an oil corporation). Dade's friends are in danger of The Plauge and it is up to him to save the day. After pulling off some impressive hacking tricks Dade is able to expose The Plauge of his evil plan and justify his surpremacy as an apha hacker. The hero in this movie does not beat anyone up or kill anyone, it is his up to date exquiste technological skills that seperate him fro the norm of the average computer nerd/hacker. This hero's characteristics have evolved with the new wave of technology that was the e-hype of the 90's. The internet was relativly new then and someone possesing superior abilities in hacking were veiwed as "godlike".
4.27.2010
Osmosis, mitosis, and stuff
As we enter the gamer hero's sophomore decade there seems to be something analogous to mitosis taking place with the gamer hero's key identifiers and identity as a whole. The first movie we watched this week, Hackers (1995), is a prime example of both offshoots of the split while The Wizard (1989), our second film, more aptly addresses the latter change in the hero. The split I'm referring to is best explained as one part the creation of the gamer hero's hacker sub type, and the other part being the portrayals of differing gamer hero identities; which may have helped lead to the current overall acceptance of gamer heroes in mainstream media.
Hackers put forth a lot of new ideas as far as who a gamer hero could be. One of the most important aspects covered in the movie was the fact that there wasn't a single character in the movie that could have saved the day. Each character had multiple accomplishments under their belts by the end of the movie, not to mention the two weird Asian guys that helped at the very end. There was Dade, or Zero Cool, who is the most likely of all of them to be considered the hero, Kate AKA Acid Burn played by Jolie who is both love interest and super hacker somewhat on par with Dade, and then there is a cast of about 4 or 5 other hackers, all with their own style, personality, and back story. I read an interesting article the other day on Kotaku about avatars in reference to how the gaming community is beginning to demand that they be more and more customizable, creating a more authentic in game identity for the player. The other important thing to consider is the most obvious thing that happened to the gamer hero in the movie Hackers was that the gamer hero began to expand his/her prowess into other fields besides just gaming. The gamer hero thus begins to include those who use the hardware and software related to playing video games or simply those enveloped by the culture. This phenomenon has become apparent in the literary world as well. The novel Epic contains a "real" world where the virtual world is used to govern (sometimes indirectly) in the stead of true heads of state or governments. This inspires rebels and appointed officials alike to hack the system to do anything from gain access to the virtual world to creating an "invincible" player character. Hacking takes many forms in the gaming world and is therefore understandable that hackers would eventually claim their own piece of game hero pie. Now you hardly see any heist, science fiction, or gadget heavy super hero movies without the presence of some sort of hacker. Even Mission: Impossible incorporated the hacker with an outlandish history (apparently still one of the most inventive ways people have come up with for developing the gamer and/or hacker hero...) of gaining access to top secret government information but is also willing to risk his entire future for the team, not to mention that by then hackers were so prominent in movies that none other than Michael Clarke Duncan takes the mantle for a spin (but only after the initial scrawny white boy hacker met a fairly gruesome end).
On to The Wizard, which now that I really think about it is re-telling Rain Main(1988) except in this the Tom Cruise parallel is benevolent from the beginning. The movie also acts as the first unveiling of in game footage in a feature film as a way of advertisement. In addition to the plethora of games that are actually depicted/mentioned in the movie, Super Mario 3 gameplay is revealed at the end of the movie in the form of the final challenge in Jimmy's adventure, the type of thing that you see everywhere at E3 these days. In spite of all this, The Wizard still manages to create a new type of gamer hero in a few ways. The hero, Jimmy, is a disturbed little boy that has all but gone catatonic after the death of his sister and is about to be placed in a home by social services due to custody issues when Corey, Fred Savage, runs away with Jimmy. They set out on a journey to California to enter a nationwide gaming competition after Corey realizes at a rest stop that Jimmy is a beast at video games, earning 500,000 points in the Double Dragon arcade in the span of about 3 minutes (for more on how ridiculous certain game related scenes in the movie are check out the Angry Nintendo Nerd video at the end of the post). Anyways, the whole point of Jimmy succeeding in the contest is to prove that he's not as useless as he seems, winning the contest would be a source of validation for the poor little guy. Winning would prove (I assume) that his brain works just fine and he doesn't need to be placed in a home. When looking at the big picture of this movie, its gamer hero is a child protagonist with huge mental blocks that literally bases his success in the real world on his success with video games which actually kind of makes sense by the end of the movie. Jimmy is no abstracted form of gamer though, his relationship with video games is directly responsible for how his story unfolds, much like Alex Rogan from The Last Starfighter or the kid who controlled Gerard Butler's character in the movie Gamer(2008). Gaming acts as a looking glass through which who the gamer hero is in each of these movies can be seen. While Hackers added a sub type to the gamer hero ranks, The Wizard stayed true to the most literal definition while simultaneously experimenting with using the idea of a gamer hero to appeal to much younger audiences than movies that came before it.
In the end, the gamer hero seems to have always been either the abstracted form, represented most often by hackers the way it is in Tron and Hackers, or the most literal form that we see in movies like The Last Starfighter, The Wizard, and Gamer --which is on the docket for this coming week. The most interesting thing going on by the time Hackers came out is obviously the search for the ideal archetypal identity of the gamer hero, or even just an honest portrayal of what gamers are like. The latter being something I have been constantly dismayed with, especially when the actors on Big Bang Theory are button mashing when playing Halo(not what happens/how it's played), can no one do the gamer justice?
p.s.: check out this article about Cory Doctorow's latest novel, the comments made by the reviewer are surprisingly relevant to this specific discussion of the gamer hero.
Video: Angry Nintendo Nerd review of Mario3 and The Wizard -- movie review round half way through
Hackers put forth a lot of new ideas as far as who a gamer hero could be. One of the most important aspects covered in the movie was the fact that there wasn't a single character in the movie that could have saved the day. Each character had multiple accomplishments under their belts by the end of the movie, not to mention the two weird Asian guys that helped at the very end. There was Dade, or Zero Cool, who is the most likely of all of them to be considered the hero, Kate AKA Acid Burn played by Jolie who is both love interest and super hacker somewhat on par with Dade, and then there is a cast of about 4 or 5 other hackers, all with their own style, personality, and back story. I read an interesting article the other day on Kotaku about avatars in reference to how the gaming community is beginning to demand that they be more and more customizable, creating a more authentic in game identity for the player. The other important thing to consider is the most obvious thing that happened to the gamer hero in the movie Hackers was that the gamer hero began to expand his/her prowess into other fields besides just gaming. The gamer hero thus begins to include those who use the hardware and software related to playing video games or simply those enveloped by the culture. This phenomenon has become apparent in the literary world as well. The novel Epic contains a "real" world where the virtual world is used to govern (sometimes indirectly) in the stead of true heads of state or governments. This inspires rebels and appointed officials alike to hack the system to do anything from gain access to the virtual world to creating an "invincible" player character. Hacking takes many forms in the gaming world and is therefore understandable that hackers would eventually claim their own piece of game hero pie. Now you hardly see any heist, science fiction, or gadget heavy super hero movies without the presence of some sort of hacker. Even Mission: Impossible incorporated the hacker with an outlandish history (apparently still one of the most inventive ways people have come up with for developing the gamer and/or hacker hero...) of gaining access to top secret government information but is also willing to risk his entire future for the team, not to mention that by then hackers were so prominent in movies that none other than Michael Clarke Duncan takes the mantle for a spin (but only after the initial scrawny white boy hacker met a fairly gruesome end).
On to The Wizard, which now that I really think about it is re-telling Rain Main(1988) except in this the Tom Cruise parallel is benevolent from the beginning. The movie also acts as the first unveiling of in game footage in a feature film as a way of advertisement. In addition to the plethora of games that are actually depicted/mentioned in the movie, Super Mario 3 gameplay is revealed at the end of the movie in the form of the final challenge in Jimmy's adventure, the type of thing that you see everywhere at E3 these days. In spite of all this, The Wizard still manages to create a new type of gamer hero in a few ways. The hero, Jimmy, is a disturbed little boy that has all but gone catatonic after the death of his sister and is about to be placed in a home by social services due to custody issues when Corey, Fred Savage, runs away with Jimmy. They set out on a journey to California to enter a nationwide gaming competition after Corey realizes at a rest stop that Jimmy is a beast at video games, earning 500,000 points in the Double Dragon arcade in the span of about 3 minutes (for more on how ridiculous certain game related scenes in the movie are check out the Angry Nintendo Nerd video at the end of the post). Anyways, the whole point of Jimmy succeeding in the contest is to prove that he's not as useless as he seems, winning the contest would be a source of validation for the poor little guy. Winning would prove (I assume) that his brain works just fine and he doesn't need to be placed in a home. When looking at the big picture of this movie, its gamer hero is a child protagonist with huge mental blocks that literally bases his success in the real world on his success with video games which actually kind of makes sense by the end of the movie. Jimmy is no abstracted form of gamer though, his relationship with video games is directly responsible for how his story unfolds, much like Alex Rogan from The Last Starfighter or the kid who controlled Gerard Butler's character in the movie Gamer(2008). Gaming acts as a looking glass through which who the gamer hero is in each of these movies can be seen. While Hackers added a sub type to the gamer hero ranks, The Wizard stayed true to the most literal definition while simultaneously experimenting with using the idea of a gamer hero to appeal to much younger audiences than movies that came before it.
In the end, the gamer hero seems to have always been either the abstracted form, represented most often by hackers the way it is in Tron and Hackers, or the most literal form that we see in movies like The Last Starfighter, The Wizard, and Gamer --which is on the docket for this coming week. The most interesting thing going on by the time Hackers came out is obviously the search for the ideal archetypal identity of the gamer hero, or even just an honest portrayal of what gamers are like. The latter being something I have been constantly dismayed with, especially when the actors on Big Bang Theory are button mashing when playing Halo(not what happens/how it's played), can no one do the gamer justice?
p.s.: check out this article about Cory Doctorow's latest novel, the comments made by the reviewer are surprisingly relevant to this specific discussion of the gamer hero.
Video: Angry Nintendo Nerd review of Mario3 and The Wizard -- movie review round half way through
4.26.2010
We Have A Winner: round one
Ok so we have a winner for the first week's three way match-up between Flynn, Tron, and Alex Rogan. These heroes put their lives/existences on the line to show that nerds rule and bad guys still drool. So, in the spirit of brevity, here is your winner:
FLYNN, Jeff Bridges in the movie Tron 1984.
ROUND TWO: This new round is a match up between the hackers from the movie Hackers (1995), for reasons that I(de gnomer) will discuss in my post later tonight, or Alex (Allen Covert) from Grandma's Boy(2006).
p.s.: if you can put yourself through a story told via a series of montages then give Hackers a look, plus it has Angelina Jolie in her third movie since her third feature film, Cyborg2 (1993), you know, before she went all Tomb Raider and "I-really-wish-there-were-more-obscure-movies-for-me-to-get-half-naked-in-so-the-movie-actually-does-well-at-the-box-office-and-its-super-deep-meaning-is-heard-by-everyone-who-thinks-I'm-brooding-and-righteous".
p.p.s: if you didn't catch the literal implication of "series of montages" until just now then we probably don't agree on a lot of things.
FLYNN, Jeff Bridges in the movie Tron 1984.
ROUND TWO: This new round is a match up between the hackers from the movie Hackers (1995), for reasons that I(de gnomer) will discuss in my post later tonight, or Alex (Allen Covert) from Grandma's Boy(2006).
p.s.: if you can put yourself through a story told via a series of montages then give Hackers a look, plus it has Angelina Jolie in her third movie since her third feature film, Cyborg2 (1993), you know, before she went all Tomb Raider and "I-really-wish-there-were-more-obscure-movies-for-me-to-get-half-naked-in-so-the-movie-actually-does-well-at-the-box-office-and-its-super-deep-meaning-is-heard-by-everyone-who-thinks-I'm-brooding-and-righteous".
p.p.s: if you didn't catch the literal implication of "series of montages" until just now then we probably don't agree on a lot of things.
4.19.2010
Finding "The One"
I know, I know, it's been done. But I wanted to know, "If the world is going to end, which author or Hollywood hero would I have to stalk down and offer up everything I own (including my Boba Fett frosted beer mug) for them to save us all?"
I'm pretty smart, but I figured I'd ask for your guys' help on this. Every week I'm going to have a match up for you to vote on and by the end of this experiment I'll know who I'm gonna call. This week will be a match up between Jeff Bridges (Kevin Flynn from Tron), Bruce Boxleitner (Tron and Alan Bradley from Tron) and Lance Guest (Alex Rogan from The Last Starfighter). I know a lot of you are saying "who the hell is this Lance joker?". Well, if you don't know I'm begging you to do whatever you need to do to watch The Last Starfighter and find out, for the laughs if nothing else. Plus, who wouldn't want to see some dude get recruited to save the universe because he's the local arcade junkie? So anyway, please vote, I'd hate to see the last vote tallied tell me that Neo was the best.
I'm pretty smart, but I figured I'd ask for your guys' help on this. Every week I'm going to have a match up for you to vote on and by the end of this experiment I'll know who I'm gonna call. This week will be a match up between Jeff Bridges (Kevin Flynn from Tron), Bruce Boxleitner (Tron and Alan Bradley from Tron) and Lance Guest (Alex Rogan from The Last Starfighter). I know a lot of you are saying "who the hell is this Lance joker?". Well, if you don't know I'm begging you to do whatever you need to do to watch The Last Starfighter and find out, for the laughs if nothing else. Plus, who wouldn't want to see some dude get recruited to save the universe because he's the local arcade junkie? So anyway, please vote, I'd hate to see the last vote tallied tell me that Neo was the best.
4.18.2010
The cake isn't a lie, and it tastes good
So we just sat through both The Last Starfighter(1984) and Tron(1982), in that order. In each movie I think there were two focuses:
1. The methods of identifying and the transfer of our hero to another fantastic place, or plane of existence, whichever the case may be.
2.The consequent social situations. Including how the situation was handled in each movie and what that handling said about the heroes.
Considering the time period, I'd say they chose right. The first was needed to provide a plot and story that it was plausible for a gamer hero to emerge and succeed in. The second adds another dimension to the gamer hero and ironically makes the hero more human, a motif that still persists today.
1. The gamer hero was a relatively new concept for mainstream culture and it was necessary for the story to be interesting yet maintain incredibly abstract situations' "acceptability" in pivotal moments. The introduction in Tron of the laser that turned objects into code and spat them back out again as real made the entire story possible. Without it, Flynn(Jeff Bridges) would've never been able to explore the crazy, logical, and digital world of programs and data, much less had a chance to drop some major pwnage on the MCP. Without the sweet arcade game Starfighter(that was apparently free since Rogan needed a loan for school yet played it all the time) in the middle of nowhere from The Last Starfighter, Alex Rogan(Lance Guest) would have never been able to prove himself worthy to some seemingly benevolent opportunist named Centauri who apparently only wants to obtain the reward for finding "the one" as it were. The madness needed a method and those that were utilized made the madness imaginable, grabbing a tangible spot in our conscience.
2. The other thing I noticed was that there were two different social situations that evolved around each protagonist. In the Last Starfighter, Centauri used a Beta Unit to clone Rogan and take his place at home so that no one would know whats going on. They even used this fact for comic relief with Rogan's brother and girlfriend. It was comically ironic with his whole community in the dark yet the maintained presence of his family and friends also served to create more suspense by the time the resolution third of the story arc came around. With Tron, however, there were two gamer heroes: Flynn as himself and Tron who was seen as a hero vicariously through his user, Alan. In addition, the two heroes were as physically and figuratively dissimilar as can be, yet they were foils for each other til the end as they worked together. This not only depicts the gamer hero as a possible future mainstay, but simultaneously suggests two ways that a gamer hero can originate from and assume their role as such. It should be interesting to see in December if(and I expect how) Tron: Legacy will continue to mark milestones in the evolution of the gamer hero.
p.s.: What do you think is the meaning of the "messenger" or guide that aids in the transfer in the protagonists' reality? There was Centauri the benevolent mad hatter of military recruitment in Starfighter and there was the MCP doing the transfer and RAM doing the guiding in Tron, but I'm asking in general, not just them.
1. The methods of identifying and the transfer of our hero to another fantastic place, or plane of existence, whichever the case may be.
2.The consequent social situations. Including how the situation was handled in each movie and what that handling said about the heroes.
Considering the time period, I'd say they chose right. The first was needed to provide a plot and story that it was plausible for a gamer hero to emerge and succeed in. The second adds another dimension to the gamer hero and ironically makes the hero more human, a motif that still persists today.
1. The gamer hero was a relatively new concept for mainstream culture and it was necessary for the story to be interesting yet maintain incredibly abstract situations' "acceptability" in pivotal moments. The introduction in Tron of the laser that turned objects into code and spat them back out again as real made the entire story possible. Without it, Flynn(Jeff Bridges) would've never been able to explore the crazy, logical, and digital world of programs and data, much less had a chance to drop some major pwnage on the MCP. Without the sweet arcade game Starfighter(that was apparently free since Rogan needed a loan for school yet played it all the time) in the middle of nowhere from The Last Starfighter, Alex Rogan(Lance Guest) would have never been able to prove himself worthy to some seemingly benevolent opportunist named Centauri who apparently only wants to obtain the reward for finding "the one" as it were. The madness needed a method and those that were utilized made the madness imaginable, grabbing a tangible spot in our conscience.
2. The other thing I noticed was that there were two different social situations that evolved around each protagonist. In the Last Starfighter, Centauri used a Beta Unit to clone Rogan and take his place at home so that no one would know whats going on. They even used this fact for comic relief with Rogan's brother and girlfriend. It was comically ironic with his whole community in the dark yet the maintained presence of his family and friends also served to create more suspense by the time the resolution third of the story arc came around. With Tron, however, there were two gamer heroes: Flynn as himself and Tron who was seen as a hero vicariously through his user, Alan. In addition, the two heroes were as physically and figuratively dissimilar as can be, yet they were foils for each other til the end as they worked together. This not only depicts the gamer hero as a possible future mainstay, but simultaneously suggests two ways that a gamer hero can originate from and assume their role as such. It should be interesting to see in December if(and I expect how) Tron: Legacy will continue to mark milestones in the evolution of the gamer hero.
p.s.: What do you think is the meaning of the "messenger" or guide that aids in the transfer in the protagonists' reality? There was Centauri the benevolent mad hatter of military recruitment in Starfighter and there was the MCP doing the transfer and RAM doing the guiding in Tron, but I'm asking in general, not just them.
The Last Star Fighter & Tron
Tron and the Last Star Fighter have two very different depictions of the gamer hero. In The Last Star Fighter the gamer hero is Alex Rogan a poor lower class individual living in a remote trailer park in California. This particular type of gamer hero can be labeled as underdog hero. This type of hero "underdog" can be traced back to many ancient tales such as Aladdin, and Robin Hood. This type of gamer hero is always overlooked and under appreciated, but in the end it the underdog hero always ends up saving the day and getting the girl( which is exactly what happens at the end of The Last Star Fighter only with more cornyness). Throughout the movie Alex is faced with many obstacles in his path that leave him questioning his abilities to be a Starfighter. When Alex is taken to the starfleet base by Centari a clone replaces his role back home this is a new concept to the gamer genre, it is like Super man having a clone of Clark Kent around all the time to further ensure thet no one finds out the truth about his identity. I found that this movie appeals to a more childized version of the gamer hero not found in Tron but in game movies like The Wizard.
In Tron there are two different gamer heros. One hero by the name of Flynn who owns his own arcade and is an avid hacker, and one hero by the name of Tron(who is actually the character Alan who works for major corporaton run by the MCP). Tron and Flynn are two entirely different catagories of the gamer hero. Flynn is different because he is actually a user transported into the system via some super lazer that de-materializes things, Tron is not an actual person but a program designed by Alan to take down the MCP and establish a non-governed free system to all users. This movie appeals to a more broader audience than The Last Star Fighter because programmers and tech related people can relate to everything thats going on in the movie. Tron is much more of a tech-based movie adding to a newer generation of gamer heros such as hackers, but they still remain relevant in the classic example of a hero rising up against authority.
In Tron there are two different gamer heros. One hero by the name of Flynn who owns his own arcade and is an avid hacker, and one hero by the name of Tron(who is actually the character Alan who works for major corporaton run by the MCP). Tron and Flynn are two entirely different catagories of the gamer hero. Flynn is different because he is actually a user transported into the system via some super lazer that de-materializes things, Tron is not an actual person but a program designed by Alan to take down the MCP and establish a non-governed free system to all users. This movie appeals to a more broader audience than The Last Star Fighter because programmers and tech related people can relate to everything thats going on in the movie. Tron is much more of a tech-based movie adding to a newer generation of gamer heros such as hackers, but they still remain relevant in the classic example of a hero rising up against authority.
4.14.2010
The End of The Beginning
Over the last few years it has become very apparent that what a "gamer hero" is has changed in many ways, sometimes fundamentally, just as it became obvious with the death of Superman that comics and the like had forever changed. This is the end of the beginning of the gamer hero's initiation into theatrical and literary canon. Society has acknowledged(finally) and welcomed the addition of this brand of hero to our culture's contemporary archetypes. The posts that will follow this are the discussion and analysis of the history and characteristics of gamer heroes and this decades long induction.
Both Mark Homayouni and myself will be posting weekly, reading and responding to comments and questions from anyone, and hopefully slaying some trolls while we're at it. We'll be covering as much as possible from movies like Tron and Gamer to novels like Snowcrash. We want you to respond, especially if you disagree with what we say(mostly because we like a good laugh), but we really just want to keep the discussion going, so speak your mind and remember: Superman is dead.
Both Mark Homayouni and myself will be posting weekly, reading and responding to comments and questions from anyone, and hopefully slaying some trolls while we're at it. We'll be covering as much as possible from movies like Tron and Gamer to novels like Snowcrash. We want you to respond, especially if you disagree with what we say(mostly because we like a good laugh), but we really just want to keep the discussion going, so speak your mind and remember: Superman is dead.
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