Snes is the Best: Imagination in the Super Nintendo

Not too long ago Chrono Trigger was released on the Nintendo DS under the auspices of exposing the classic Snes game to a new generation of gamers. Upon its announced release, game composer Yasunori Mitsuda declared “Finally!...It's still a very deep, very high-quality game even when you play it today. I'm very interested in seeing what kids today think about it when they play it." Its interesting to me that the marketed focus is on providing this classic gaming experience to a new generation of youth. I remember growing up on Chrono Trigger and pretty much spending an entire summer replaying it, trying to get my characters to level 99. I know I’m not the only one. Until this Nintendo DS rerelease, Chrono Trigger was quite rare to find on cartridge, sometimes selling for $200 on eBay, and I retain the notion that console games just aren’t the same when played on an emulator on the computer (you need the couch, tv, controller, and save limitations that only the console offers for maximum chill/fun factor.) However, the DS Chrono Trigger is not the Chrono Trigger of our fathers. Its portable, on (two) small screen(s), the menus are altered, there are added dungeons, new features – oh, yeah – and a new “more accurate” English translation of the original Japanese text.

Recently I have somewhat jokingly discussed with several people as to why the Super Nintendo is the best system of all time. The discussions rarely encountered any empirical evidence to back this up, but maybe there’s something to the claim. Its possible that I’m just displaying symptoms of nostalgia, since the SNES played an integral role in my childhood – however, I think that is too easy of an explanation. I think the “more accurate” translation of Chrono Trigger indicates to a gap that separates today’s systems (I’m looking at you PS3) and the consoles of our youth.



To expand on this, I’m going to draw on my all-time favourite game, Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past. Released on the Snes in 1992, A Link to the Past has since been adapted to the Game Boy Advance in similar fashion to Chrono Trigger. The game features new dungeons, new features, and a “more accurate” English translation. I noticed this myself as I played the GBA version of the game, as certain text sequences in the game made a hell of a lot more sense than they did when I was a child. Specifically, there is a point when a towns-person refers to the town elder as “Oh, that old guy?” instead of “Oh, the grandpa?”

So maybe this retranslation is a narrative restoration, but why is it that so many English-speaking kids loved that game when many of its plot points barely made any sense? I remember playing many games as a kid, getting confused by the incomplete back-story and thinking I was playing a sequel to a game I had never heard of. I still loved the games though. Even now I’m replaying Illusion of Gaia for the first time since Corey and I beat it in my basement in grade 5, and it barely makes narrative sense.

And this is kind of why I think the Snes is the best. Its limitations as a system force the gamer to employ a great deal of imagination to fully engage with the games. With the insane hardware capabilities today, very little is left to imagination. Solid Snake looks like Solid Snake. Super Mario looks like…a comatose pedophile?



This concept is best illustrated by comparing (or rather contrasting) official game artwork with character sprites from the game. Seeing the variance between what the characters are supposed to look like and what they are represented as indicates to the degree of imagination employed when playing the game. Same goes with bad translations. When games are translated badly, young players may cope with impossibly ambiguous plots with imagination and makeshift narrative connections.

Games today seem to indicate clearly to the gamer exactly what they are capable within the virtual realm. Most games contain some kind of go-to character who is constantly on-hand to provide hints and advice, and to teach gamers exactly what they can and cannot do. When I got stuck in a game back in the day I would spend hours punching walls, slicing pots, and talking to every villager, because I wasn’t quite sure what my character was capable of, and what the game world had to offer. You read the game manual and pretty much thrown into the fray left to your own devices. Now Navi just tells you the answer to the puzzle before you even have a chance to figure it out yourself.

Now one may argue: If limitation is what makes the Snes so good, then what about more limited systems like the Nes?

I think its simply that the Snes has a perfect balance between limitation and capability that is enough to spur the imaginations of the gamer but not fully satisfy the mimesis of the virtual world. That might be a cheap answer…but I pretty much stopped paying attention to this essay as soon as I turned my Snes on.

In Film as Art Rudolf Arnheim essentially argues that cinema's status as an artform depends on its properties that distance it from the real world. I think this notion is pertinent to the Snes. The artistry of the Snes lies in its distance from realistic representation. While the Nes, Atari and other previous systems may seem by this logic more artistic, I somehow think they are less engaging than the Snes.

Meta-Fiction in the Controls of Metal Gear Solid 2

With the semester’s essays completed, I spent a good part of the past week playing through Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty (I’ve heard good things of the series in general and wanted to see for myself). I’ll have to admit that it took me a long time to become even remotely comfortable with games controls (I’ve never been a fan of the PS controller) and even now I’m not entirely sold on them. At points I found that one of the main challenges presented to me were navigating with these controls. In reflection of my previous blog entry, I tried to figure out why I found these controls so difficult and frustrating.



Last time I wrote about how the first-person shooter genre succeeds in putting the player within the subjective perceptual realm of the in-game character. MGS2 is primarily in third-person, however it offers the option of assuming a subjective first-person mode for investigating environments, and shooting from a vantage point behind the character’s gun.

What struck me instantly was the distinction between these two modes. The third-person view distances the player from the character, while the first-person view provides a very subjective look into the character’s experience providing extra ambient effects such as wind, breath and heart-beat noises. Several segments of the game offer the use of an in-game directional microphone that is used in the first-person mode. When using the directional microphone, the player can only hear what the microphone is pointing at, and if the player isn’t careful, they can miss out on important plot points if they do not point the microphone at specific events.

The third-person mode is seen from a fixed or preset camera position. This is unlike many Nintendo brand games that I’m used to (with the free-roving retro-posited, or player- controlled camera). An example of my preference can be seen here in Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess. This game uses a system in which the camera is easily situated behind the character, at the player’s control. The game also has an optional first-person mode for environmental investigation and arrow-shooting. Since the camera is usually situated behind the character Link, the player shares directional continuity with the character. In the same sense as the first-person shooter, the player becomes more immersed in the character’s physical functions.
MGS2 offers no control over camera angles. The camera has fixed positions and movements that are only affected by character movement. Because of this, the player never becomes immersed in the character, instead assuming the position of an omniscient puppet-master. In Zelda, control directions are always relative to the camera position, so you press up to move Link up, and press down to move Link down. In MGS2, you have no control over the camera but the control directions always stay the same, so you may have to press up on the control stick if you want to move Snake or Raiden down. I immediately saw this as negative, however I did not understand the complete implications of this control scheme until I beat the game. I would argue that the control scheme in MGS2 is a means of meta-fiction which meshes well with many of its narrative elements.



While MGS2 is by no means the first video game meta-fiction (most games address the player when teaching game rules and control functions), it effectively utilizes the video game control functions as a means of further expressing certain plot themes. From this point on I will be spoiling crucial plot surprises from the game.

Metal Gear Solid 2 develops a theme in which the main character Raiden must face questions surrounding the basic truths of his existence (offering a parallel between “real world” military training and “VR” training). Throughout the course of the game, Raiden learns that the woman he loves is a spy gathering information on him, that his commanding officer (whom he corresponded with only over transceiver) was only an AI digital representation, and that his entire life was manipulated by an international organization in an attempt in forming him into a perfect soldier. Raiden’s body is also filled with nano-machines that come to betray his sensory perception. In short, Raiden’s entire life has always been under the control of forces outside of his own. It is my belief that the game’s control scheme purposefully distances the player from the in-game character as a means of indicating the player as a controller of Raiden’s life-actions. Several sequences in the game help to back up this theory. For example, Raiden’s commanding officer Colonel Campbell radio’s Raiden shouting "Raiden, turn the game console off rightnow! ... Don't worry, it's a game! It's a game just like usual. You'll ruinyour eyes playing so close to the TV." This reference to the construct of the game suggests the canon’s willingness to include the player as a recognized controller of the in-game character’s events.



So while I found the game’s controls disruptive, I think more immersive controls would have minimized the distance between the player and the character, thus eliminating this meta-fictitious element of the game’s narrative.