Documentary As Game

Documentary as Game

Joana Malagueira

Mestrado em Multimédia da Universidade do Porto

Orientador: José Alberto Pinto (Professor Auxiliar)

Coorientador: Pedro Cardoso (Professor Auxiliar Convidado)

Setembro de 2020

Documentary as Game

Joana Malagueira

Mestrado em Multimédia da Universidade do Porto

Aprovado em provas públicas pelo Júri:

Presidente: Bruno Sérgio Gonçalves Giesteira (Professor Auxiliar)

Vogal Externo: Ricardo Manuel Coelho de Melo (Professor Adjunto Convidado)

Orientador: José Alberto Pinto (Professor Auxiliar)

Resumo

Esta dissertação providencia possibilidades de como o documentário pode usar os jogos como media para produzir crítica e, particularmente, como a retórica processual pode ser utilizada para alcançar este objectivo. A investigação consiste numa análise de casos de estudo que originaram uma tipologia de retórica processual para produção de crítica; e na criação de um documentário-jogo, Deixa-me Falar!. Os resultados dos testes realizados provam a eficácia comunicacional deste tipo de género documental num contexto de crítica social. Esta investigação pode ser útil a realizadores ou autores de cinema, assim como a designers de jogos que queiram explorar o documentário-jogo enquanto género, ou pretendam utilizar os jogos em ambientes críticos e/ou não ficcionais.

Palavras-chave: documentário-jogo; retórica procedimental; documentário; jogos críticos.

Abstract

This dissertation provides possibilities of how documentaries can use games as media to produce critique, and particularly how procedural rhetoric can be used in order to achieve that goal. The research consisted of an analysis of case studies that originated a procedural rhetoric typology to produce critique; and the creation of a documentary game, Deixa-me Falar!. Its playtesting results proved the communicational effectiveness of this type of documentary genre in a context of social critique. This investigation can be useful for filmmakers and game designers who want to experiment the documentary game genre or how games can be used in critical and/or non-fictional environments.

Keywords: documentary game; procedural rhetoric; documentary; critical games.

Acknowledgements

I want to express my most sincere gratitude to the professors José Alberto Pinto and Pedro Cardoso for their support and for believing in this project from the beginning. I am also grateful to my parents and siblings for being part of this journey, especially my younger sister, Beatriz, who is always the first person to test everything I do and to give her most sincere opinion. To my long lifetime friends Karuline Costa, Luís Rebelo, Kamila Ferreira and Shauna Ashley for being always by my side and available to help me in everything they can. To Miguel Duarte who worked with me on the programming part of the documentary game. Thank you for the long hours of work and patience. In addition to being a great professional, you are an even more incredible person and friend. To Gabriela Ferreira for being an excellent colleague in times of crisis! To the incredible women who were part of this documentary game. Thank you for trusting me and my work: Cristiana Morais, Fabrícia Glória, and Tita Maravilha. And to professor Soraia Ferreira who, in addition to being an excellent teacher in this master’s degree, taught me not to be afraid of experimenting and trying new things.

Joana Malagueira

To the beloved memory of Diana, who left us too soon.

Table of Contents

I. Introduction ...... 1 I.I Context and Motivation ...... 1 I.II Project ...... 2 I.III Problems, Hypothesis, and Objectives of Research ...... 2 I.IV Relevance ...... 3 I.V Dissertation Structure ...... 3 PART 1 – LITERATURE REVIEW ...... 6

1. The Documentary ...... 8 1.1 The Traditional Documentary ...... 8 1.1.1 Contextualizing the Documentary Film ...... 8 1.1.2 Nichols’ Documentary Modes ...... 9 1.2 The Interactive Documentary ...... 14 1.2.1 Understanding Interactive Documentaries...... 14 1.2.2 Gifreu’s Basic Features of Interactive Documentary ...... 16 1.2.3 Gaudenzi’s Interactive Documentary Modes ...... 17 1.3 The Rhetoric of Documentary and a Way of Artivism ...... 20 1.4 Summary ...... 23

2. Games as Communication Tools ...... 24 2.1 How Games Tell Stories ...... 24 2.1.1 The Four Elements of Games ...... 24 2.1.2 Time in Games ...... 28 2.1.3 Game’s Environment ...... 31 2.1.4 Action, Emergent Narratives and Traversal in Games ...... 33 2.2 How Games Make Arguments ...... 36 2.2.1 Rhetoric and Play ...... 36 2.2.2 Procedural Rhetoric ...... 39 2.2.3 The Persuasive and Expressive Power in Games ...... 41 2.2.4 From Newsgames to Artivism ...... 43 2.3 Summary ...... 46 PART 2 – PROJECT ...... 48

3. Case Studies ...... 51 3.1 Context and Methodology ...... 51 3.2 Case Studies Analysis ...... 52 3.3 Procedural Rhetoric Typology for Critique ...... 60 3.3.1 Procedural Rhetoric of Failure ...... 60 3.3.2 Procedural Rhetoric of Success ...... 64 3.3.3 Procedural Rhetoric of Exploration ...... 65 3.3.4 Procedural Rhetoric of Irony ...... 67 3.3.5 Procedural Rhetoric of Experience ...... 70 3.3.6 Procedural Rhetoric of Collaboration ...... 71 3.3.7 Summary ...... 72 3.4 Table of Case Studies ...... 74

4. Creating a Documentary Game ...... 77 4.1 PHASE 1: Research ...... 77 4.1.1 Research of Documentary Films ...... 77 4.1.2 Research of Game Rules and Mechanics ...... 78 4.1.3 Creation of Concepts for Documentary Games ...... 78 4.1.4 Varda’s Documentary ...... 80 4.2 PHASE 2: Planning and Development ...... 81 4.2.1 Objectives, Argument and Procedural Rhetoric ...... 81 4.2.2 Protagonists ...... 82 4.2.3 Documentary Layers ...... 84 4.2.4 Narrative Structure ...... 85 4.2.5 Production Planning ...... 86 4.3 PHASE 3: Execution ...... 87 4.3.1 Shooting ...... 87 4.3.2 Media Research ...... 89 4.3.3 Post-Production ...... 91 4.4 Final Product ...... 95 4.5 Concepts for Different Types of Procedural Rhetoric ...... 96

5. Playtesting and Results ...... 99 5.1 Objectives ...... 99 5.2 Characterization of the Sample ...... 99 5.3 Instruments ...... 100 5.4 Methods and Procedures ...... 101 5.5 Results and Analysis ...... 102 5.6 Considerations ...... 110 PART 3 – CONCLUSIONS...... 112

6. Conclusions ...... 114 6.1 Documentary game: a proposed definition ...... 114 6.2 Summary ...... 114 6.3 Final Considerations and Contributions ...... 115 6.4 Limitations ...... 116 6.5 Future Work ...... 118

Filmography ...... 126

Ludography ...... 127

A. Production Folder ...... 130

B. Game Assets ...... 139

C. Game Guidelines and Script ...... 147

D. Questionnaire Summary ...... 149

List of Figures

Fig. 1.1 Still from Composition in Blue (1935), by Oskar Fischinger. 9 Fig. 1.2 Still from Samsara (2011), by Ron Fricke. 10 Fig. 1.3 Still from Ways of Seeing (1972), by John Berger. 10 Fig. 1.4 Still from Salesman (1969), by Albert Maysles, Charlotte Zwerin, David Maysles. 11 Fig. 1.5 Still from Crumb (1995), by Terry Zwigoff. 12 Fig. 1.6 Still from Stories to Tell (2012), by Sarah Polley. 12 Fig. 1.7 Still from Tongues Untied (1989), by Marlon Riggs. 13 Fig. 1.8 Still from Aspen Movie Map (1978), by Andrew Lippman. 17 Fig. 1.9 Still from Immemory (1997), by Chris Marker. 18 Fig. 1.10 Still from 18 Days in Egypt (2011), by Jigar Mehta and Yasmin Elayat. 19 Fig. 1.11 Photo from 34 North 118 West (2011), by Jeff Knowlton, Naomi Spellman, and Jeremy Hight. 19 Fig. 2.1 Aarseth’s four dimensional model (2012). 27 Fig. 2.2 Still from the “Odessa Steps” scene, from Battleship Potemkin (1925), by Eisenstein. 30 Fig. 2.3 Still from Sleep (1964), by Andy Warhol. 30 Fig. 2.4 Grace and Huang diagram of play (2020, 5) 45 Fig. 3.1 Still from Thank You for Playing (2017), by Andréa Cohen-Boulakia and Dominic Desjardins. 53 Fig. 3.2 Still from Thank You for Playing (2017), by Andréa Cohen-Boulakia and Dominic Desjardins. 53 Fig. 3.3 Still from Thank You for Playing (2017), by Andréa Cohen-Boulakia and Dominic Desjardins. 54 Fig. 3.4 Still from Thank You for Playing (2017), by Andréa Cohen-Boulakia and Dominic Desjardins 54 Fig. 3.5 Still from Thank You for Playing (2017), by Andréa Cohen-Boulakia and Dominic Desjardins. 55

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Fig. 3.6 Still from Thank You for Playing (2017), by Andréa Cohen-Boulakia and Dominic Desjardins. 55 Fig. 3.7 Still from Thank You for Playing (2017), by Andréa Cohen-Boulakia and Dominic Desjardins. 56 Fig. 3.8 Still from Faith Fighter (2008), by Molleindustria. 57 Fig. 3.9 Still from Faith Fighter (2008), by Molleindustria. 57 Fig. 3.10 Still from Faith Fighter (2008), by Molleindustria. 57 Fig. 4.1 Photo of the chinese board game GO. 78 Fig. 4.2 Photo of a memory game. 79 Fig. 4.3 Stills from Varda’s Réponse de Femmes: Notre Corps, Notre Sexe (1975) 80 Fig. 4.4 A photography by Cristiana Morais from the project “Mariazinhas” in collaboration with Maria Imaginário. 82 Fig. 4.5 Still from Trypas-Corassão project by Tita Maravilha and Cigarra. 83 Fig. 4.6 Screnshots of Fabrícia’s projects: Fwentre and Colectivo Mulheres Negras Escurecidas. 83 Fig. 4.7 Representation of the layers of the documentary game. 84 Fig. 4.8 Representation of the three act of the documentary. 85 Fig. 4.9 Stills from Deixa-me Falar! (2020) that show the protagonists’ house. 87 Fig. 4.10 Shot for Fabrícia. 88 Fig. 4.11 Shot for Cristiana. 88 Fig. 4.12 Shot for Tita. 89 Fig. 4.13 Stills from Deixa-me Falar! that show an excerpt of Nazaré (2019-20). 91 Fig. 4.14 Still from Deixa-me Falar! that show the documentar layer. 93 Fig. 4.15 Still from Deixa-me Falar! the show the climax of the documentary. 93 Fig. 4.16 Menu of Deixa-me Falar! and example of how the identity design is applied throughout the film. 94 Fig. 5.1 Results from the question “Did you pass the test the first time? 105 Fig. 5.2 Results from the question: “How many attempts did you have to make to pass the game? 105 Fig. 6.1 Reference for the final menu. 139 Fig. 6.2 Instructions lettering in black with hover in white. 139 Fig. 6.3 Game title as start the game button. 140 Fig. 6.4 About lettering in black with hover in white. 140 Fig. 6.5 Game title with hover. 140 Fig. 6.6 Background. 141 Fig. 6.7 Reference for the final about page. 141 Fig. 6.8 Text for about section. 141 Fig. 6.9 Return lettering button in black with hover in white. 142 Fig. 6.10 Reference for the final game over page. 142

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Fig. 6.11 Try again lettering button in black with hover in white. 142 Fig. 6.12 Exit lettering button in black with hover in white. 143 Fig. 6.13 Game over illustration. 143 Fig. 6.14 Game over text. 143 Fig. 6.15 Reference for the final instructions page. 144 Fig. 6.16 Instructions text. 144 Fig. 6.17 Pause text. 145 Fig. 6.18 Keep watching lettering button in black with hover in white. 145 Fig. 6.19 Return to the menu lettering in black with hover in white. 145 Fig. 6.20 Mouth sprites. 146

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List of Tables

Table 1.1 Gifreu’s linear and interactive documentary processes and behaviors table (2015). 15 Table 1.2 Gifreu’s basic features of interactive documentaries (2011). 16 Table 1.3 Nichol’s documentary types of rhetoric (2001, 68-80). 20 Table 1.4 Nichol’s differences between social issue documentaries and personal portrait documentaries (2001, 166-67). 22 Table 2.1 Aarseth’s typology of worlds in games (2012). 25 Table 2.2 Aarseth’s typology of objects in games (2012). 26 Table 2.3 Aarseth’s typology of agents in games (2012). 26 Table 2.4 Aarseth’s typology of events in games (2012). 26 Table 2.5 Types of traversal in games by Pedro Cardoso (2016). 35 Table 2.6 Brian Sutton-Smith’s seven rhetorics of play (2001). 38 Table 2.7 Bogost, Ferrari and Schweizer typology of newsgames (2010). 44 Table 3.1 Table of Procedural Rhetoric Typology to produce critique. 72 Table 3.2 Case studies analysis overview. 74 Table 4.1 Summary of production plan 86 Table 5.1 Table of Bardin’s (1977) analysis methodology adapted to the project. 101 Table 5.2 Table of the Game Experience Questionnaire’s scoring guidelines for the in- game module. 103 Table 5.3 Table of the Game Experience Questionnaire’s scoring guidelines for the post-game module. 104 Table 5.4 Table of the effectiveness of the message and pertinence of the mechanics of Deixa-me Falar! 106 Table 5.5 Table of advantages and disadvantages of a documentary game according to the participants involved. 108

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I. Introduction

“What gets remixed today is not only content from different media but also their fundamental techniques, working methods, and ways of representation and expression.” (Manovich 2007)

Documentary as Game is an investigation that binds two different fields that at first sight might not have anything in common: documentary and games. In the age of deep remixability where a hybrid territory for media is more than a collage- like aesthetics, possibilities began to generate the birth of new forms of storytelling, expression and representation.

I.I Context and Motivation

The confluence of old and new media has been a growing interest in my professional and academic work. I have been studying and working with old media, since my background is in communication sciences and I’ve worked in television before. Yet the field of multimedia, the use of technology and rise of new media such as games and social media began to spark the interest in thinking about new ways of telling stories, different narrative possibilities, and how old media can benefit from the incorporation of these new logics.

I.II Project

The proposed project is a documentary game, which aims to be an example of a possible approach to documentary games, and a way to use games to produce critique. In order to create the final prototype, the investigation and work were divided into four different phases:

Phase 1 – Literature Review Review of relevant concepts, theory and state of art.

Phase 2 – Exploratory Studies Case studies analysis.

Phase 3 – Project Creation and evaluation of the documentary game prototype.

Phase 4 – Review Conclusions of the body of work.

I.III Problems, Hypothesis, and Objectives of Research

In order to guide this investigation, it was crucial to identify problems and hypothesis, and determine objectives of research.

Problem

How can we create a documentary game and not an interactive documentary?

Hypothesis Check

- Can we create a documentary game?

- Can documentary use games as a media to produce critique?

- How can games provide value to the documentary?

- Which subjects can be worked on a documentary game?

- Which types or modes of documentary can be games?

Objectives of Research

• To test how documentary can achieve new ways of portraying reality and structure its narrative using videogames as media;

• To verify how games can be used as communication tools in a non-fictional environment to produce critique;

• To provide an understanding of the unique features of the documentary game.

I.IV Relevance

There’s not a lot of research or information about documentary games, neither a lot of documentary games created. The line between interactive documentaries and documentary games seems to be blurred and undefined, which does not help the emancipation of the documentary game as a genre. The challenge of creating one and discover features and possibilities of its conceptualization and creation is a relevant contribution to the field.

I.V Dissertation Structure

This dissertation is sectioned into three main parts:

PART 1 – Literature Review 1. The Documentary 2. Games as Communication Tools

This first part of the dissertation aims to contextualize the areas of the documentary and games to provide a background with relevant and useful concepts that will help conceptualize and create the project.

PART 2 - Project 3. Case Studies 4. Creating a Documentary 5. Playtesting and results

This second part has two different phases that were previously mentioned: the exploratory studies phase, and the project phase. The former consists of the analysis of relevant case studies that can help recognize patterns and concepts that can be applied to the project. The latter is about the creation process of the documentary game, as well as the playtests of the prototype.

PART 3 - Conclusion 6. Conclusions

The last section is about final considerations, contributions and a retrospect of the body of work provided.

PART 1 – LITERATURE REVIEW

1. The Documentary

1.1 The Traditional Documentary

Contextualizing the Documentary Film

Defining and redefining documentary has been recurrent among authors and throughout time, which is a sign of non-consensual and divergent opinions, but also proof of how diverse documentary can be, and how there are a multitude of ways of making and using documentary. If to Grierson, documentary is “the creative treatment of actuality” (1946), for Penafria (2003) is a document from the historical sciences, where all documentaries are non-fictional, but not all fictional films are documentaries. To Nichols, however, the definition of documentary is fuzzy and “[i]s always relational or comparative. Just as love takes on meaning in contrast to indifference or hate, and culture takes on meaning in contrast to barbarism or chaos, documentary takes on meaning in contrast to fiction film or experimental and avant-garde film” (Nichols 2001). The history of documentary film goes back to the Lumière brothers in the XIX century, but even their work is not consensual among film scholars and critics. What were the intentions behind Workers Leaving the Lumière Factory (1895)? Was it a spectacle of mechanical movement? Was it to document the workers? As Thomas Elsaesser stated, the film itself was scripted, planned and rehearsed several times (in Gaudenzi 2013, 22), which makes the lines between fictional and non- fictional cinema more blurred.

Penafria (2003) argues that the answer to the question “What is a documentary?” is Bazin’s question “What is cinema?”, and how it’s easier to ask where the documentary is, rather than trying to come up with a consensual and universal definition. According to Penafria (ibid.), Lumière’s cinema was far from the documentary as a genre. It was not until Grierson’s Drifters (1929) and the british documentary film movement that documentary began to be discussed as a genre. From that moment in history on, documentary’s diverse approaches, schools and techniques of documenting have been discussed, and Nichols’ (2001) organized these conventions into six different modes of documentary.

Nichols’ Documentary Modes

While admitting that every documentary has its own voice, Nichols argues that there are six conventions and shared approaches to documentary: the poetic mode, the expository mode, the observational mode, the participatory mode, the reflexive mode, and the performative mode. The author explains that “These six modes establish a loose framework of affiliation within which individuals may work; they set up conventions that a given film may adopt; and they provide specific expectations viewers anticipate having fulfilled.” (Nichols 2001, 99)

The Poetic Mode

The poetic mode “sacrifices the conventions of continuity editing and the sense of a very specific location in time and place” (ibid., 102). Instead of using a traditional linear continuity, the poetic documentary filmmaker plays with the sense of rhythm, spatial juxtapositions and even music. It’s a way of exploring the rhetoric of montage and expressing stories and ideas without traditional characters or dialogue. “This mode stresses mood, tone, and affect much more than displays of knowledge or acts of persuasion” (ibid., 103).

Fig. 1.1 Still from Composition in Blue (1935), by Oskar Fischinger.

Fig. 1.2 Still from Samsara (2011), by Ron Fricke.

The Expository Mode

The expository mode “assembles fragments of the historical world into a more rhetorical or argumentative frame than an aesthetic or poetic one” (Nichols 2001, 105). These types of documentaries construct a specific argument, usually using two types of voices: the voice-of-god; or the voice-of-authority commentary. In the first one, the narrator is heard but not seen, and in the latter, the speaker is both heard and seen. The discourse is usually accompanied with images and references to support the argument or counterpoint to what is said.

Fig. 1.3 Still from Ways of Seeing (1972), by John Berger.

The Observational Mode

In response to the previous modes with a subjective and even persuasive approach, the observational mode aims to be a neutral form of seeing and representing the world and puts both the director and viewer as observers. Therefore, the director doesn’t interfere with the subject of filming. Direct Cinema and Cinéma Vérité are forms this mode. “Observational films exhibit particular strength in giving a sense of the duration of actual events. They break with the dramatic pace of mainstream fiction films” (Nichols 2001, 112).

Fig. 1.4 Still from Salesman (1969), by Albert Maysles, Charlotte

Zwerin, David Maysles.

The Participatory Mode

If on the one hand, the observational mode captures the world without interfering with the subject, in the participatory mode, on the other hand, the filmmaker has a participant- observation practice. “Participatory documentary gives us a sense of what it is like for the filmmaker to be in a given situation and how that situation alters as a result” (ibid., 116). In the participatory mode, the filmmaker can take the role of researcher, or have a responsive and reflective approach where his voice emerges. This happens due to his personal and direct involvement with the subject.

Fig. 1.5 Still from Crumb (1995), by Terry Zwigoff.

The Reflexive Mode

While the participatory mode is about the relationship between the filmmaker and the subject, the reflexive mode is about the relationship of the filmmaker with the audience. As Nichols (ibid., 125) states “the processes of negotiation between filmmaker and viewer become the focus of attention for the reflexive mode”. The reflexive mode reminds the audience of the fact that a documentary is a construction and a representation. It shows how the documentary represents the world and subject, and what gets to be represented, instead of omitting the filmmaker and/or the camera.

Fig. 1.6 Still from Stories to Tell (2012), by Sarah Polley.

The Performative Mode

The performative mode is the most personal approach of the modes. Often the filmmakers share their own feelings and experiences and that can drive the action and get an emotional response, “An autobiographical note enters into these films that bears similarity to the diaristic mode of participatory filmmaking. Performative films give added emphasis to the subjective qualities of experience and memory that depart from actual recounting” (ibid., 131). This subjectivity presents the truth as relative, and the relationship between the filmmaker and subject.

Fig. 1.7 Still from Tongues Untied (1989), by Marlon Riggs.

1.2 The Interactive Documentary

Understanding Interactive Documentaries

If trying to define documentary is a challenge, then defining an interactive documentary is an even more blurred attempt. Sandra Gaudenzi and Judith Aston define interactive documentary as far as “Any project that starts with an intention to document the ‘real’ and that uses digital interactive technology to realize this intention can be considered an interactive documentary. This is a deliberately broad definition of i-docs, which is platform agnostic” (Gaudenzi & Aston 2012, 125). Galloway stands for an equally broad definition, arguing that interactive documentaries are “Any documentary that uses interactivity as a core part of its delivery mechanism” (Galloway 2007 in Gaudenzi & Aston 2012, 126). Britain refers to interactive documentaries by comparing it to traditional documentaries, “These experiences are documentary, in the sense that they provide information and knowledge about real-life subjects and individuals. Although, unlike traditional documentaries, these allow users to enjoy a unique experience, as well as offering options and control of the documentary itself” (2009, cit in Gifreu 2011). Despite the possibilities that these authors present, there are others that are very critical about the current state and use of interactive documentaries. Heitor Alvelos and André Almeida in their Interactive Documentary Manifesto (2010) stand that “[t]he sad truth is that so far the current production of interactive documentaries has failed to meet the built expectations and is often no more than a series of multimedia pieces closer to PowerPoint than cinema”.

Both Gaudenzi and Whitelaw argue that new forms of documentary should not replay the conventions of traditional documentary storytelling but come up with their own way of expression and representation (Gaudenzi 2009, 7). However, comparing linear with interactive documentaries can be a helpful exercise to better understand each one’s unique features.

Table 1.1 Gifreu’s linear and interactive documentary processes and behaviors table (2015). Linear Documentary Interactive View/Interpret View/Interpret Relate Play (concepts/ideas) (navigate/interact with the interface) Learn Learn (passively) actively (doing) Share Share (later) (in real time)

Gifreu’s table can provide some basic understanding of the differences between linear and interactive documentaries. The creator of the Korsakow system, Florian Thalhofer, has an interesting perspective about the differences of the Aristotelian narrative form (with a beginning, middle, and end) and interactive narratives. When he was creating Planeta Galata (2011), a linear film, he felt like he was lying to the audience because that narrative form and convention forced him to construct a story that was very different from his actual experience. In this sense, Thalhofer perceives interactive documentaries as an alternative that does not force an authorial point of view to its audience. Documentary passes from representing reality to co-creating it and as Gifreu puts it “Interactive documentaries try both to represent and to interact with reality” (Gifreu 2011). This means that Nichols’ documentary triangle of communication: the filmmaker’s film; the film; and the audience, forms new connections and relationships.

If linear documentary demands a cognitive participation from its viewers (the act of interpretation), the interactive documentary adds the demand of some physical participation (decisions that translate into a physical act such as clicking, moving, speaking, tapping etc…) If linear documentary is video, or film, based, interactive documentary can use any existing media. (…) And if linear documentary depends of the decision of its filmmaker (both while filming and editing), interactive documentary does not necessarily have a clear demarcation between those two roles. (Gaudenzi 2009, 32)

When regarding Blast Theory’s work1, a group of artists that create interactive art, Gaudenzi points out that “The idea that enacted perception – as opposed to an interpretation of a pre-

1 Blast Theory are a group of artists that create interactive art to explore social and political questions, placing the audience at the centre of the work. https://www.blasttheory.co.uk/

authored version of reality – can be at the centre of the documentary experience is one of the aspects which is new and exciting about i-docs” (Gaudenzi & Aston 2012, 132). However, this shift of control and authorship can be both powerful and a failure from the filmmakers’ perspective. The lack of narrative control can mean a lack of voice or a strong point of view, and the lack of meaning behind the structures and media used, can mean a PowerPoint documentary, as Alvelos and Almeida put it.

Gifreu’s Basic Features of Interactive Documentary

When designing and creating an interactive documentary it’s crucial to understand its basic features and how their combination can have different consequences, meanings and results.

Table 1.2 Gifreu’s basic features of interactive documentaries (2011).

A) From the Author’s Point of View (sender) 1.A) Loss of control by the director and system 2.A) Author’s role as assistant B) From discourse or narrative (text) point of view 1.B) Varied 2.B) Documentary 3.B) Format 4.B) Documentation of a specific reality terminology to and informative type linked 4.1B) 4.2B) Nodal 4.3B) Non-linear refer to similar interactive to non- Hypertext, outline and narrative projects multimedia fictional nodes and branches of applications genres links narrative discourse C) From the interactor’s point of view (receiver) 1.C) Online or 2.C) Interaction 3.C) New 4.C) Generative and open 5.C) The rules are offline reception based on the receivers system: active system that changed by the decision making becoming a adapts to the environment spectator: an in order to new active user- progress. audience interactor- type participant- contributor

Following the same logic as Nichol’s documentary triangle of communication, Gifreu divides interactive documentaries in three different perspectives: the author (A); the text (B); and the interactor (C). The first (A) concerns the relationship between the author and the reader, and how the former intends to communicate the message. The second (B) is about how that message is communicated, that is which structures, media and/or platform were used. And the third (C) is

related to the role of the interactor and how his actions can affect the text, determining his degree of involvement with it.

Gaudenzi’s Interactive Documentary Modes

Similarly to Nichols, Gaudenzi defines a taxonomy of four interactive documentary modes.

The Conversational Mode

The conversational mode “positions the user as if ‘in conversation’ with the computer” (Gaudenzi &Aston 2012, 126). Instead of having two human beings interacting with each other, the conversational mode in interactive narratives places the user in a conversation with the system. “Computational theorist Michael Murtaugh sees ‘liveless’ as a recurrent theme in computational interactivity ‘interactivity always involves simultaneity, as computations occur iteratively through feedback to a shared and changing environment” (Gaudenzi 2013, 41). With three screens and videodisc technology, the Aspen Movie Map (1978) enabled the user to take a virtual tour around the city of Aspen, Colorado. Still from Aspen Movie Map (1978), by Andrew Lippman.

Fig. 1.8 Still from Aspen Movie Map (1978), by Andrew Lippman.

The Hypertext Mode

The hypertext mode “links assets within a closed video archive and gives the user an exploratory role, normally enacted by clicking on pre-existing options” (ibid., 127). It structures the user experience through a series of branching choices. This mode is used for “choose your own adventure” type of films, enabling the user to make choices and feel in control on the course of the story.

Fig. 1.9 Still from Immemory (1997), by Chris Marker.

The Participative Mode

The participative mode “counts on the participation of the user to create an open and evolving database” (ibid.). It’s a two-way conversation between author and users where the latter contributes to the content of the documentary. For instance, 18 Days in Egypt (2011) is a crowdsourced documentary that uses videos that the audience submitted about the Egyptian revolution of 2011. As one of the creators states “The storytellers are the people that actually lived these experiences” (Mehta 2011).

Fig. 1.10 Still from 18 Days in Egypt (2011), by Jigar Mehta and Yasmin Elayat.

The Experiential Mode

The experiential mode “brings users into physical space, and creates an experience that challenges their senses and their enacted perception of the world” (ibid., 128). 34 North 118 West (2011) used digital media, computation and internet resources to create an experience that allows the users to explore a real space and trigger moments, sounds, and voices in time, as he walks.

Fig. 1.11 Photo from 34 North 118 West (2011), by Jeff Knowlton, Naomi Spellman, and Jeremy Hight.

1.3 The Rhetoric of Documentary and a Way of Artivism

The voice of documentary “can make a case or present an argument as well as convey a point of view” (Nichols 2001, 43), and to elaborate that argument and persuade the viewer, filmmakers have different types of representation and rhetoric to choose from. Nichols (2001, 2-4) argues that documentary has three forms of representation:

1. Documentaries offer us a likeness or depiction of the world that bears a recognizable familiarity; 2. Documentaries also stand for or represent the interests of others; 3. Documentaries may represent the world in the same way a lawyer may represent a client’s interests: they put the case for a particular view or interpretation of evidence before us.

These forms of representation are created under three main types of rhetoric, which are used as strategies to persuade the audience to a particular argument or perspective.

Table 1.3 Nichol’s documentary types of rhetoric (2001, 68-80).

Rhetoric Description Examples Legislative or About political and social issues such as It’s Elementary: Gay Issues in deliberative war, welfare, abortion, or LGBTQI+ rights. It School (1996) by Debra affects people on their course of public action. Chasnoff and Helen S. Cohen Judicial or The domain of evaluating previous Far from Poland (1984), by historical actions. It concerns subjects like public issues, Jill Godmilow morality, or historical events. By accusing, defending, justifying or criticizing, it puts certain issues to trial for the viewer to judge. Ceremonial or Domain of praising or blaming others, and Nanook of the North (1925), by panegyric of evoking qualities and establishing attitudes Robert J. Flaherty toward people and their accomplishments.

Another element that documentaries make use of to strategically convey a message is the use of metaphor representations. Metaphors “draw on basic forms of personal experience like physical orientation (up, down, above, below) to assign values to social concepts. Success, for example, may be represented as rising to a higher station in life” (ibid., 74). Michel Meyer (2007) breaks discourse at 5 different levels and Arcanjo (2017) adapts it to the documentary practice:

• Invention is the first level of discourse organization, that is, the arguments that the filmmaker intends to communicate; • Disposition concerns the montage of the documentary and how the information is organized; • Elocution is the expression domain of documentaries, which regards the types of shot, material used, angles, movements, or photography; • Action is about the filmmaker’s voice and subjectivity, that is the process of film enunciation process; • And Memory, which holds the logos, ethos and pathos of the documentary. It’s an external representation of what it was represented, and how the viewer uses what they’ve seen to interpret what they are watching in the documentary.

Nichols states that “Documentary not only activates our aesthetic awareness (unlike a strictly informal or training film), it also activates our social consciousness” (Nichols 2001, 69). Therefore, documentaries can be used as rhetorical tools and as a means to social change, in other words, as artivism2, the combination of art with activism.

2 An artivist (artist + activist) is someone who uses creative and artistic expression to contribute to social change.

Table 1.4 Nichol’s differences between social issue documentaries and personal portrait documentaries (2001, 166-67).

Social Issue Documentary Personal Portrait Documentary • About public issues; • About private matters and • Voice of the filmmaker or moments; witnesses as authority and experts • Voice of actors who speak for – may rely heavily on rhetoric; themselves – amy rely heavily on • Discourse of sobriety. Style is style; second to content; • Poetic or subjective discourse. • Individuals are represented as Style counts as much as content; typical or representative, and as a • Individuals are represented as victim; unique and mythic; • Common problems and solutions • Familiar dramatic form to specific recur: poverty, welfare, sexism, problemas recurs: crisis, intense violence, injustice. experience, maturation, chatarsis, insight. Ex: Ways of Seeing (1972), by John Berger; Nanook of the North (1925), by Robert J. The Man with the Movie Camera (1929), Flaherty; Portrait of Jason (1967), by by Dziga Vertov Shirley Clarke

Csikszentmihalyi’s model of creativity situates documentary in a specific cultural and social context, where documentaries are mediums for social and cultural conventions. And that power of persuasion and social change that documentaries hold bring discussion about its ethical boundaries. Slavoj Žižek argues that “there is an inherent trap or deadlock in documentary in that its attempts at getting intimately close to its subjects often becomes troubling, appearing as exploitation or ‘pornographic obscenity.’ (Žižek 2006, 31, cit in Kara & Reestorff 2015). Kara and Reestorff in Unruly Documentary Artivism (2015) criticize how some filmmakers misrepresent their subjects and how documentary as a practice lacks rules and ethical guidelines to avoid and control this issue “It is easy to simply dismiss unruly forms of artivism – engaging in practices like bullying, culture jamming and hooliganism – as unethical, disruptive or narcissistic and accuse them of merely reproducing inequality rather than producing collaborative utopian spaces” (Kara & Reestorff 2015). There was, however, an ethical turn in documentary filmmaking since the writings on ethics in documentary by Rosenthal.

The ethics of documentary has been going through different phases. The phase of collaboration, where the political views of the filmmaker were the same as the subject matter, therefore a high risk of manipulation and subjectivity; but also the phase in which the subject was treated as a victim. Eventually “The compassion fatigue has resulted in a ‘move from an ethics of pity to an ethics of irony’ and from an ‘other-oriented morality to a self-oriented morality’ (Chouliaraki 2013, 3). However, within the context of media and its logic, unruly documentaries are still being created aiming to appeal to a broader audience and media sphere – a mediatized artivism (Hjarvard 2008 in Selmin Kara & Camilla Møhring Reestorff 2015).

1.4 Summary

From the narrative structure to the questions and shots that the filmmaker chooses to do of the subject, every choice made by him has consequences and holds social responsibility to both the subject and the audience. Being aware of how these choices can affect the message, the text and the receiver makes communication more effective and strategic.

2. Games as Communication Tools

2.1 How Games Tell Stories

There was debate and controversy in the world of games regarding games and narrative: Do games tell stories? Can we talk about narrative when referring to games? Or is it something else – ludology? Instead of diving into the debate itself and discussing terminology or the ontological status of games, we analyse these authors’ arguments and take some key-characteristics of games, which end up distinguishing it from other types of media, such as movies or books. Furthermore, this exercise made us understand how we can use games as a storytelling medium, taking their unique characteristics into account.

The Four Elements of Games

Janet Murray (2005) questions the game's existentialist perspective where there’s a tendency to study games independently from other types of media or cultural context. Murray discusses games as part of a larger spectrum of cultural expression and connects bridges between games, books and movies. In this sense, we ask: what do games, books and movies have in common?

When trying to define narrative, Ryan (2001) says:

Narrative representation consists of a world (setting) situated in time, populated by individuals (characters), who participate in actions and happenings (events, plot) and undergo change.

And accordingly, Aarseth in Narrative Theory of Games (2012) mentions how games and stories share four common elements: a world; objects; agents; and events. But despite games and films having this common ground, each one configures this abstract structure differently, adapting it to their own media specificities and expressive resources (Ryan 2011).

Marvel’s Spider Man character lives in comics, films, series and games, but despite being the same character, Spider Man undergoes changes and adaptations for each media. These differences can vary from the spider man’s costume design to plot changes.

Some changes in the plot and character’s personality can be motivated by a will of wanting to update these characters to a younger audience, or merely as an aesthetic choice. However, the time and pace in these comics and films are not the same. Therefore, the story and characters must suffer modifications without hurting the essence of the story. What Peter Parker’s traits are highlighted in the comics that are not in the games and why?

Put in simpler words: there are plot types and character types that are best for the novel, others are best for oral storytelling, and yet others are best for the stage or the cinema. The question, then, is to decide which types of stories are suitable for digital media. (Ryan 2001)

Not only they can be constructed separately for each media like Ryan points out, that is, different characters for different media, but also the same character can suffer different adaptations for each media.

To understand how characters and stories have their own specific features in a ludo-narrative context, we need to take a step back and look at games as abstract structures. Aarseth dissects the four elements mentioned above explaining how worlds, objects, agents and events exist and can be created in games.

Table 2.1 Aarseth’s typology of worlds in games (2012).

Worlds Linear Like Half-Life (1998), the world game consists of a linear corridor, where the player goes from one room to the next without the possibility of choosing a different path. Multicursal Such as Star Wars: Knights of The Old Republic (2003), and or hub- Far Cry 2 (2008), the world game is semi-open and allows shaped the player to have some choice. labyrinth Open In The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion (2006), and World of Warcraft (2004) the world game is open and allows the player to explore.

Games can combine these structures and create their own variations. As Aarseth exemplifies, we can have a “game with a linear beginning, opening up to an open quest world in the middle, and then closing in at the end to another linear corridor”. The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion (2006) and Fallout 3 (2008) are examples of this more complex structure.

Table 2.2 Aarseth’s typology of objects in games (2012).

Objects Linear Static objects are objects that can’t be modified by the player. They can be non-interactable or usable, but not changed. Dynamic Dynamic objects can be changed or destroyed by the player, like a building or a weapon. User Created These objects can be created or invented by the player.

Similarly to worlds, games often have more than one type of objects, and “they determine the degree of player agency in the game” (Aarseth 2012), therefore if an object can’t be modified by the player that means more narrative control for the game designers, and on the opposite side, when a player can interact and make modifications, that results in a higher degree of player freedom.

Table 2.3 Aarseth’s typology of agents in games (2012).

Agents Deep Characters These characters have a rich personality, they are round characters who change and develop as the story game progresses. Flat Characters Flat characters can have names and individual appearances but little personality, and they stay the same througout the game. Bots They have no individual identity.

Aarseth classifies agents in terms of their depth, malleability and player control, and comes to these three different types which similarly to objects, its level of malleability has direct impact on the authorial affordance of the game.

Table 2.4 Aarseth’s typology of events in games (2012).

Events Fully Plotted When events are pure story and the player has no control over them.

Dynamic Playable story where the player can take different actions Satellites (satellites) to the same path (kernel). Dynamic Multipath / quest games where the players have different Kernels paths on their disposal. No Kernels There’s no story, it’s pure game.

Events help to understand how the gameplay and storyline intertwines with each other. A game can have multiple events and these can appear in the game in different moments. When a game has a cutscene it is a fully plotted moment where the player has no control, that is a hardcoded narrative, but when the cut scene ends and the player comes across with a decision where he has to take a path, he is dealing with a dynamic kernel event, and consequently emergent narratives.

These elements originate a four-dimensional model:

Fig. 2.1 Aarseth’s four dimensional model (2012).

With these dimensions and sets of possibilities, the author distinguishes four different types of games:

• The linear game: has fixed kernels and flexible satellites, like the game Half-Life (1998); • The hypertext-like game: has choice between kernels and fixed satellites, like Myst (1993) or Dragon’s Lair (1983); • The “creamy middle” quest game: has choice between kernels and flexible satellites, like Star Wars: Knights of The Old Republic (2003) or The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion (2006); • Non-narrative game: has no kernels and flexible satellites, like chess or The Sims (2000).

Aarseth’s typology provides some perspective of what types of games and structures can be configured using these four elements, but we still need to understand how games can develop narrative.

Time in Games

In Games telling Stories? A brief note on games and narrative (2001), Jesper Juul mentions how time is different in games:

By pressing the CTRL key, we fire the current weapon, which influences the game world. In this way, the game constructs the story time as synchronous with narrative time and reading/viewing time: the story time is now. Now, not just in the sense that the viewer witnesses events now, but in the sense that the events are happening now, and that what comes next is not yet determined. (Juul 2001)

This way, and according to Juul, “[y]ou cannot have interactivity and narration at the same time”, which sets some limits regarding present and past tense in games, but also implies that narrative only happens retrospectively. Conversely, Ryan (2006) responds to Juul’s assumptions, arguing that narrative also takes place in the present, and games can represent events from the past. According to Ryan, games aren’t always chronological and, like films, they can also use flashbacks. Nonetheless, in cinema and literature, the spectator/reader can realise the events took place in the past (for example, in New York in the 1920s), but as the film continues, and the pages are turned, the spectator/reader will experience the events as if they are taking place in the present. Henry Jenkins (2005) reinforces Ryan’s response and alerts to the confusion between story and plot. In simple words, the former corresponds to the viewer’s mental construction of events, while the latter, is a structured set of causal events.

Games are no more locked into an eternal present than films are always linear. Many games contain moments of revelation or artifacts that shed light on past actions. (Jenkins 2005)

Another interesting perspective on time in games is provided by Ian Bogost (2010):

Indeed, editing has become an ever more important tool in filmmaking. (...) But generally, video games don’t have cinematic editing. They can’t, because continuity of action is essential to interactive media. In fact, that continuity is so important that most games (3D games, anyway) give the player direct control over the camera, allowing total manipulation of what is seen and from what vantage point. (Bogost 2010)

According to Bogost (2010), “In modern cinema, edits move action forward” and “Films are short compared to games”. The author argues that “If “edit” is the verb that makes cinema what it is, then perhaps videogames ought to focus on the opposite: extension, addition, prolonging”. In this sense, films have the ability to shorten time and direct viewer’s attention, whilst games have continuity of action and give some control to the player, often lengthening the narrative – which according to the author, is the opposite of cinema. The power of editing in cinema that Bogost argues about is highly associated with cutting things out of the narrative, omitting or implying actions like brushing teeth or walking from home to work. Cinema does have that power, however we should keep in mind that this perspective of cinema “shortening time” is a one-sided generalized idea and attempt of understanding time in cinema. Bogost here doesn’t contemplate how cinema has the power to extend, expand and amplify time. If we think about Eisenstein’s Battleship Potemkin (1925) and the famous “Odessa Steps” scene (fig. 2.2), we can clearly understand the power of montage and how cinema can do the opposite of shortening time. What in reality would take seconds, in the Eisenstein’s sequence, takes several minutes. Furthermore, we can think about common techniques used in film editing that amplify time, such as slow motion. And regarding actions that are considered mundane or secondary such as brushing teeth, films like Andy Warhol’s Sleep (1964), which consists of a man sleeping for 4 hours and 20 minutes (fig. 2.3), or Lee Chang-Dong’s Burning (2018) prove that these types of actions also have place in cinema.

Fig. 2.2 Still from the “Odessa Steps” scene, from Battleship Potemkin (1925), by Eisenstein.

Fig. 2.3 Still from Sleep (1964), by Andy Warhol.

What cinema indeed does not provide is the control of time that games can provide to the player. So, the difference here is not measured by the length of time, but by the ability of controlling it. Eskelinen (2001), on the other hand, points out an interesting distinction between cinema and games: films are interpretative, but games are configurative. While in cinema, the spectator has to

watch and spend 90 minutes to understand and experience the film fully, and in books, the reader has to read all the pages; in games, time can be more variable and flexible.

To generalize: in art we might have to configure in order to be able to interpret whereas in games we have to interpret in order to be able to configure, and proceed from the beginning to the winning or some other situation. In literature, theatre and film everything matters or is conventionally supposed to matter equally - if you've seen 90% of the presentation that's not enough, you have to see or read it all (or everything you can). This is characteristic of dominantly interpretative practices in general. In contrast, in computer games you either can't or don't have to encounter every possible combinatory event and existent the game contains, as these differ in their ergodic importance. (Eskelinen 2001)

In conclusion, what inherently differentiates the time in games from the time in literature or in cinema, is the degree of action and control over that time provided to the player. This affects the pacing of the game and the perspective of time, while also having a direct effect on the player’s interpretation of the narrative.

Game’s Environment

The environment plays an important part when creating a narrative in games, because of its contribution to the player’s immersion. When defining immersion, Janet Murray states:

Immersion is a metaphorical term derived from the physical experience of being submerged in water. We seek the same feeling from a psychologically immersive experience that we do from a plunge in the ocean or swimming pool: the sensation of being surrounded by a completely other reality, as different as water is from air, that takes over all of our attention, our whole perceptual apparatus. (Murray 1997, 99)

According to Murray, immersion is more than the suspension of disbelief. The latter presupposes the idea of passivity, rather than an active behavior and will. “When we enter a fictional world, we do not merely “suspend” a critical faculty; we also exercise faculty. We do not suspend disbelief so much as we actively create belief” (Murray 1997, 107). In this sense, the user actively wants to contribute and reinforce the idea of the world.

A big part of the environment of the game is the space. Linear media can portray and describe space through images and words, “but only digital environments can portray space that we can move through (Murray 1997, 79). When referring to games, Aarseth (2012) distinguishes two types of space in opposition to a fictional world that lives in the imagination: the ludic and extra ludic space.

A game can contain two types of space, the ludic and the extra-ludic; the arena of gameplay, and the surrounding non-playable space. In certain games most of the space is extra-ludic, and the ludic space consists of narrow trajectories or corridors surrounded by static scenery. In other games, such as chess, the ludic space takes up the entire world. In others yet again, the players expand the ludic space by constructing more of it as part of the gameplay. (Aarseth 2012)

Thinking about space in games makes us think about the semiotic potential they can have, and consequently how these spaces can also tell stories and contribute to the overall world the player is immersed in. For instance, we can take the game Bioshock (2007) as an example, where every detail in its world contributes to the story of the game and hints the player about what happened in that world. They work like pieces of a puzzle that the player, as she traverses the game, puts together and interprets the game world and its narrative. Jenkins (2005) states that “Game designers don’t simply tell stories; they design worlds and sculpt spaces”, reinforcing the importance of space in digital environments.

Environmental storytelling creates the preconditions for an immersive narrative experience in at least one of four ways: spatial stories can evoke pre-existing narrative associations; they can provide a staging ground where narrative events are enacted; they may embed narrative information within their mise-en-scene; or they provide resources for emergent narratives. (Jenkins 2005)

Juul (2001) argues that “Star Wars the game can not be said to contain a narrative that can be recognised from Star Wars the movie”, since the game does not have all the characters and events. Jenkins (2005) approaches this issue with a transmedia perspective, where medias are not trying to adapt or copy the stories of one another, but complementing or expanding their storytelling universe. This way, the Star Wars game (1983) “exists in dialogue with films, conveying new narrative experiences through its creative manipulation of environmental details” (Jenkins 2005).

In this sense and through space, games have the ability to provide a different shape to a movie’s storyworld, “creating an immersive environment we can wander through and interact with” (Jenkins 2005).

This environmental immersion is not only about visual and spatial details. Sound plays a crucial part in establishing the world’s material nature and immersion, while also contributing to an immediate feedback, if the player shoots an enemy, the former can hear the shot and then the sound of it hitting the enemy’s body. Bryan Alexander (2011) when referring to Plants vs Zombies (2009) reinforces the importance of sound in spatial immersion:

Ominous theme music plays. When zombies attack, their various moans and shambling footsteps build and echo. Your defensive plants emit equally present sounds (popping, squishing, crunching). Their physical presence persists: once planted, they remain and fulfill their various functions. This sense of spatial immersion may be one of the most powerful contributions gaming offers to digital storytelling. (Alexander 2011, 94)

Action, Emergent Narratives and Traversal in Games

Gonzalo Frasca and Brenda Laurel argue that action is the central characteristic of games.

For an external observer, an adventure videogame session will look like a group of narrative sequences. Actually, it is perfectly possible to videotape an adventure videogame session and show it to a public as a work of narrative (probably the result will not win any Oscar award, but it will still be narrative). However, the player is not an external observer. Observers are passive, the player is active. If the player does not act, there will be no game, and therefore no session at all. It is a completely different activity to watch a game and to play the game. (Frasca 1999)

Laurel reinforces the primacy of action “Action is indeed the primary component of human- computer activity - not environments, interfaces, or objects.” (Laurel 1991, 135). Her approach focuses on one main characteristic that drama provides and traditional narrative lacks: user performance. As a consequence, when thinking about narrative in games we need to take in consideration how the player acts and traverses the game through time and space, and how that will make narrative emerge. Jenkins (2005), for instance, argues that narratives in games can have enacting stories, embedded narratives, and emergent narratives.

According to Jenkins (2005): Enacting stories are micronarratives that shape the player’s emotional experience. They set a staging ground where narrative events are enacted.

Micronarratives may be cut scenes, but they don't have to be. One can imagine a simple sequence of preprogrammed actions through which an opposing player responds to your successful touchdown in a football game as a micronarrative. (Jenkins 2005)

Embedded narratives are “stories within stories” that pre-generate narrative that exists prior to the player’s interaction with the game. They involve information within their mise-en-scene.

[O]ne can imagine the game designer as developing two kinds of narratives - one relatively unstructured and controlled by the player as they explore the game space and unlock its secrets; the other pre-structured but embedded within the mise-en-scene awaiting discovery. (Jenkins 2005)

Emergent narratives are “not pre-structured or preprogrammed, taking shape through the game, yet they are not as unstructured, chaotic, and frustrating as life itself” (Jenkins 2005). These narratives emerge from the player’s interaction with the game world, and therefore vary from play session to play session. When mentioning emergent gameplay, Jesse Schell (2008) explains:

Trying to create “emergent gameplay”, that is, interesting resultant actions, has been likened to tending a garden, since what emerges has a life of its own, but at the same time, it is fragile and easily destroyed. (Schell 2008)

In this sense, emergent narratives are rather “fluid, dynamic, devoid of previously defined structure, strange and even abstract sometimes” (Cardoso 2016, 264), opposed to a structured, hardcoded and fixed narrative.

Yet, despite their divergences, they are bound to work together, and the ratio between hardcoded and emergent narratives in a video game is what determines how much of the game is static, predetermined, and bound to scripted events, and how much of it is volatile and run by procedural occurrences. It is this that determines when it is necessary for the player to follow a specific narrative path and when she is free to go astray. (Cardoso 2016, 264)

The relationship between the player and the game system, not only makes us wonder what types of narratives can emerge, but also which types of journey the player can go through in a game, which directly affects the narrative itself, since it affects the way the player perceives it. Pedro Cardoso (2016) proposes six different types of traversal in games:

Table 2.5 Types of traversal in games by Pedro Cardoso (2016).

1. Branching The player has to choose between mutually exclusive paths. 2. Bending The player accesses to non-mutually exclusive paths that are optional, either to explore parallel narratives or learn about the world. 3. Modulating The player forms relationships with the characters that are part of the game world, which can regulate or modulate the constitutive traits and behavior of the latter. 4. Profiling The system profiles the player, tracing patterns of behavior, choices and data that affect the course of action. 5. Exploiting The player explores the system in order to find glitches, bugs or problems with the system itself. 6. Reprising The player traverses the game by repeating moments and passages.

These types of traversal can coexist in the same game, therefore, are not mutually exclusive. It is interesting to note how all these authors try to understand games and its unique characteristics, always comparing them to cinema. It is even more interesting to find how movies take inspiration from games and vice versa, and how narrative, according to Ryan (2006, 98), needs to expand itself:

In contrast to Aarseth, I regard narratology as an unfinished project, and if classical narratology fails the test of interactive textuality, this does not necessarily mean that interactive textuality fails the test of narrativity. It rather means that narratology must expand beyond its original territory. (Ryan 2006, 98)

Thus, the mentioned unique features of games help us to expand the narrative in games, not only by understanding how games tell stories, but most importantly, how games can tell stories.

2.2 How Games Make Arguments

Rhetoric and Play

Rhetoric precedes a negative connotation throughout its 2,500 years of history. When Plato in Gorgias attempts to define rhetoric and distinguishes it from philosophical discourse, the former is associated with the winning of an argument and persuasion of others, which in other words can be an empty discourse, lacking true meaning where the main concern lies in appearance, whereas the latter is associated with wisdom and a path to knowledge. As Bogost states “Rhetoric is often equated with a type of smoke screen; it is language used to occlude, confuse, or manipulate the listener” (Bogost 2008, 123). However, the concept of rhetoric and persuasion expanded to new modes other than oratory. Artists use it to express and communicate their ideas and views of the world, creating a space for interpretation and not necessarily of imposition or empty discourse. In fact, Kenneth Burke’s New Rhetoric focuses on the relation between authors, audience and text, rather than only on the argumentation and persuasion aspect of rhetoric. Film, television, photography, advertising, design and games enlarged the spectrum of communication and brought a new interest and need to understand how rhetoric works in these contexts and ways of expression (visual rhetoric and digital rhetoric). Similarly to rhetoric, play also has a misleading connotation. Play is frequently associated with children’s activities, entertainment, and fun, and not as something serious or a critique. Although some game’s main purpose is indeed entertainment, that does not represent all games nor all its possibilities. When we think about cinema, we can roughly think of two different categories: entertainment and art. And we understand art when the main purpose is the creative expression, cultural and social values or critique. This is a very rudimentary and simplistic way of thinking about art and cinema, however it helps us to comprehend that cinema has a spectrum of films, genres, purposes and intentions. In spite of some critics not acknowledging entertainment as cinema (because in their views cinema is art, and art is not entertainment), cinema as a medium can be used to create different products with sundry purposes, and those can even overlap. In this regard, it’s easier to understand that games can also be used as a medium to express different things and have different purposes. Some “[g]ames use procedurality to make claims about the cultural, social, or material aspects of human experience” (Bogost 2008, 123). These claims can be intentional, deliberate and conscious, or done inadvertently. In fact, Katie Salen and Eric Zimmerman (2003) talk about cultural rhetoric, as they understand that games are created in a

specific time and place, so they are not isolated from a cultural and social context, but rather reflect the ideas of that culture.

In fact, Salen and Zimmerman built a conceptual framework of three primary schemas: rules, play and culture.

• RULES is a formal primary schema, and focuses on the intrinsic mathematical structures of games. • PLAY is an experiential primary schema, and emphasizes the player's interaction with the game and other players. • CULTURE is a contextual primary schema, and highlights the cultural contexts into which any game is embedded. (Salen & Zimmerman 2003, 113)

In this sense, rules are directly related to the system; Play is related to the experience between the player and the system; and Culture is about the context where the game happens. Animal Crossing (2001) is a game about debt, buying and selling goods, and that reflects the capitalist and consumer society which we live in. Monopoly (1935) shares the same ideological beliefs, but Super Mario (1985) doesn’t have such an obvious correlation, nevertheless the cultural rhetoric is still present. Why isn’t the hero saving a prince instead of a princess? That is a reflection of a heteronormative society and ideology. If game designers are aware of the rhetoric of games, they can use it strategically to create arguments and meaningful play. Salen and Zimmerman point out how games do not merely play a passive role, but also “help to instill or fortify a culture’s value system” (Salen & Zimmerman 2003, 504). Games reflect ideas and ideologies, yet they also have the power to transform society contributing with new perspectives and arguments. Brian Sutton-Smith (2001) unpacks seven rhetorics of play. Although games are complex objects that can contain multiple arguments, layers and interpretations, these seven categories help game players identify those arguments and ideological presumptions, while also helping game designers to understand the rhetoric possibilities they can create and use to express ideas. In other words, these seven rhetorics of play show us the reasons why people play and the cultural function of play.

Table 2.6 Brian Sutton-Smith’s seven rhetorics of play (2001).

1. Play as Progress Play is a way of developing skills, behaviors, cognitive capacities and a way of educating children so they can become adults. With play, children can progress, grow and learn. 2. Play as Fate Humans don’t control play, because play is defined by luck, gods, destiny, neurons or atoms. 3. Play as Power Play is a form of power, conflict and/or status for those who control it. 4. Play as Identity Play is a means of confirming, maintaining, or advancing the identity of a community of players. 5. Play as Imaginary The essence of play is imagination, flexibility and creativity. Play is synonymous with innovation. 6. Play as Rhetoric of Play exists to evolve the self, by providing intrinsic Self experiences of pleasure, relaxation and escape. Either through play itself or through the aesthetic satisfaction of play performances. 7. Play as Frivolity Play is oppositional, parodic and sometimes revolutionary; this rhetoric is opposed to a “work ethic” view of play as a useless activity.

Although Sutton-Smith’s work focuses on the rhetorics of play in broad cultural contexts, Frasca’s model of play rhetoric consists of three categories: playworld, mechanics and playformance.

Playworld The playworld refers to “the space, time and physical objects involved in a game or play activity” (Frasca 2007, 93). These elements work on a semiotic level since the player can interpret them similarly to a book’s reader or a film’s spectator. Examples of these elements are the color and materials used in a board game, cutscenes, illustrations in a deck of cards, or the sounds that the game makes when the player selects an object.

Mechanics Mechanics is about play and game regulations and rules. The mechanics deal with “the procedures through which something is done or manipulated” (Frasca 2007, 116). Frasca distinguishes four different categories of rules: model rules; grade rules; goal rules; and metarules.

• Model rules “state how the playworld works”, delimiting what can be done and the boundaries of that activity. It is about the game’s time and space limitations. In a chess game the player has to play within the space of the board, use one square at a time (the rules don’t allow the player to place two pieces on the same square) and make one movement per turn.

• Grade rules “deal with any characteristic of a game or play activity that is measured within its system” (Frasca 2007, 118). Scores, number of lives, objects available or energy levels are examples of grade rules. These types of rules deal with winning and losing conditions that the game system inflicts (if the player gets shot, he loses one life).

• Goal rules are a particular set of grade rules that lead the player to the closure of the game, defining “the states that lead to victory and defeat”.

• Metarules define the level of player agency that interacts with the system by modifying, customizing, creating or changing rules or elements of the game. Metarules define “what the player could do not within, but with the game itself” (Frasca 2007, 119).

Playformance Playformance deals with the player’s actions and behaviors within the game or play activity that make him interpret and construct meaning. Interpretation doesn’t solely deal with the passive act of seeing, but is defined by the action of the player, that is what Frasca calls “interpretation by doing”.

Procedural Rhetoric

In Hamlet on the Holodeck, Janet Murray defines four essential properties of digital environments: they are procedural, participatory, spatial, and encyclopedic (Murray 1997, 72). The first two are related to interactivity, and the other two to immersion. The author refers to the computer’s procedurality as an “ability to execute a series of rules”, an engine that creates rule-generated behavior through algorithms. Those algorithms generate representation, rather than authoring the representation itself. However, as Bogost states “Computation is representation, and procedurality in the computational sense is a means to produce

that expression” (Bogost 2007, 5), which emphasizes the rhetorical power of those algorithms and processes. For Bogost, procedural rhetoric is “the practice of using processes persuasively”:

Procedural rhetoric is a general name for the practice of authoring arguments through processes. Following the classical model, procedural rhetoric entails persuasion—to change opinion or action. Following the contemporary model, procedural rhetoric entails expression—to convey ideas effectively. (Bogost 2007, 28-29)

In this sense, procedural rhetoric is a subdomain of procedural authorship, “its arguments are made not through the construction of words or images, but through the authorship of rules of behavior, the construction of dynamic models” (ibid.). Wardrip-Fruin uses the term “expressive processing” when referring both to this authorial expression of processes, and what these processes express through their designs. In his perspective, this new kind of authorship takes into account the scripting of dynamic and interactive processes. Although Wardrip-Fruin focuses his work on the processes themselves, Bogost’s work lies more on human interaction and reaction to the media, hence the main focus on rhetorics. When studying rhetoric and analysing procedural rhetoric in video games, Bogost highlights the aristotelian concept of enthymeme and argues how this type of syllogism is a basic quality of procedural rhetoric. A syllogism handles two modes of human reason: induction and deduction, and both the proposition and conclusion are given explicitly. Yet, in an enthymeme one of the propositions is omitted, as we can see in the following example given by Bogost (2007, 18):

Politicians are not trustworthy (omitted premise) This man is a politician. Therefore, we cannot trust this man.

According to Bogost, “enthymemes advance the claim that a certain proposition is true in light of another’s truth value” (Bogost 2007,18). Consequently, this procedural model raises a simulation gap, a gap “between the rule-based representation of a source system and a user’s subjectivity” (ibid.). The player completes the syllogism and rhetorical loop but that’s subordinated to the digital literacy and subjectivity of the player. Dogness (2018) is an example of how the procedural rhetoric can be created. Dogness is a game where the goal is to create the perfect dog breed and most homogeneous dog park. The dogs have four different traits: size, build, height and color, and its combinations result in a percentage of

perfection. An average of 70% or higher percentage is considered a good score. The dog breeding has no sexual discrimination, however when dogs mate with close relatives, the percentages are low and a glitchy inbred puppies are created. The game is divided into 6 minute sections where the average is revealed and consequently the players finds out if he was successful. Because the average is what makes the game successful or not, the player ends up wanting to control the population of dogs, expelling those with lowest percentages and keeping the ones with higher scores to preserve and achieve the desired traits. The game was part of the #resistJam, “an online game jam about creating games that resist oppressive authoritarianism in all its forms”. Paolo Pedercini, the creator of the game, states that the game is a “direct response to the resurgence and normalization of white supremacy in the Trump era”. He admits the difficulty of achieving a 100% score, and classifies it as “a pointless exercise that involves an arbitrary abuse of power and likely to produce a good amount of stunted inbred dogs”. Dogness mounts a procedural rhetoric about the impossibility, costs and dangers of wanting to create a pure breed or, in parallel, a homogeneous human race with eugenics ideals. In order to succeed, the player has to eliminate dogs that don’t fit with the ideal, which makes claims about racism, immigration and white supremacy, as mentioned by the creator himself. Despite the intentions of Pedercini, these arguments and claims are always dependent on the player’s subjectivity, as we understood with the enthymeme and simulation gap, therefore for some players, Dogness can be just a game about dogs. Procedural rhetoric is not only a “promising claim about how things work” (Bogost 2008, 125) but also how things don’t work, which is the case of Dogness. As Bogost advocates, “procedurality is a symbolic medium rather than a material one” which can make arguments about conceptual systems and show how social, cultural and political processes work. (Bogost 2008, 126)

The Persuasive and Expressive Power in Games

According to Bogost, persuasive games are “video games that mount procedural rhetorics effectively” (Bogost 2007, 46). With this simple definition we can further distinguish persuasive games, procedural rhetoric and the rhetoric of play. Sutton-Smith’s rhetoric of play focuses on the cultural manifestations of play, a macroscopic approach that helps us contextualize the procedural rhetoric of a game. Salen and Zimmerman analyze Monopoly (1935) and the Landlord’s Game (1904) under Sutton-Smith’s rhetoric but realize the importance of the rules of games in creating an argument. And then Bogost discusses the processes of games and how it can be used expressively in the tradition of representation rather than

the tradition of play. Both Salen and Zimmerman and Bogost focus on the persuasive and expressive power of the game's rhetoric. On a surface level, we can distinguish two different purposes of games: games for entertainment and serious games. However, this is a simplistic and trivial way of considering games. Serious games are seen as the opposite of entertainment, but they can actually be both entertaining and serious. Educational games can be an example of this reality, where the main purpose is to develop knowledge and skills while entertaining the player. Bogost dives into different interpretations and approaches of what “serious” in games and play means, yet he explains that serious games are serious because they serve the interests of governments, corporations, healthcare systems, religious beliefs, cultural communities, and so forth (Bogost 2007, 57) . In other words, serious games can use procedural rhetoric and be persuasive, but persuasive games are not necessarily serious games, because they can serve purposes of critique, contestation and denouncement. Therefore, persuasive games can make claims “that speak past or against the fixed worldview of institutions like governments or corporations” (Bogost 2007, 57). Persuasive games, then, can be used not just to explain how things work, but how they could or should work, challenging the way we perceive the world. They can be used in different contexts and serve a variety of purposes such as entertainment, education and activism. Bogost analyses the persuasive and expressive power of games in three different contexts: politics, advertisement, and learning. The domain of politics concerns how ideology works in videogames; the domain of advertisement is about how games are being part of marketing strategies articulating products and services with procedural rhetorics; and in the learning domain explores how games can be used as a means to learn social, moral or academic knowledge. Frasca argues that the rhetoric of games works at four different levels to convey meaning. The first level is a material level that contains texts, graphics or characters; The second level are the rules that limit the player’s actions which manipulates the experience; The third level are the rules that condition the player to win the game; And the fourth level are the metarules that allow the player to modify the rules of the game (Frasca 2007, 86-87), this typology applies to simulation games but also games in general. Regarding simulation rhetoric, Frasca states that “to simulate is to model a (source) system through a different system which maintains to somebody some of the behaviors of the original system” (Frasca 2003) emphasizing “behavior” as the key term for a simulation, “simulation does not simply retain the – generally audiovisual – characteristics of the object but it also includes a model of its behaviors.” (ibid.).

From Newsgames to Artivism

To Sicart, newsgames are “serious computer games designed to illustrate a specific and concrete aspect of news by means of their procedural rhetoric, with the goal of participating in the public debate” (Sicart 2008). Therefore, according to the author games that produce political commentary or aguments, such as September 12th (Frasca 2001) are not considered newsgames. They can be political but “they do not necessarily convey a political message, but the implications of a piece of news” (Sicart 2008), which means that, to Sicart political commentary is not the main goal in these type of games.

Newsgames have a political agenda and an editorial line, but those are presented as an open space for discussion. Political and persuasive games appeal to the partisan, newsgames appeal to the citizen. But newsgames are not, and should not be ideologically neutral. Like any other form of discourse addressed to the public, these games have an agenda, which is presented not as truth, but as arguments. Newsgames are computer games that engage in a public discussion, articulating discourses using procedural rhetoric. (Sicart 2008).

Sicart (2008) defines four essential principles of newsgames:

• Newsgames should be easy and universally distributed Required downloads are to be avoided when distributing newsgames because it conditions the accessibility to the newsgame. Browser based games are the preferred vehicle.

• Newsgames do not have political interests This means that newsgames can have an editorial line but should not persuade but rather illustrate and open those ideas to debate.

• Newsgames participate in the public debate Newsgames illustrate news that can generate public debate, however they do not influence and lead the discussion.

• Newsgames refer to a specific period of time Just like news, newsgames are ephemeral and belong to a specific time and context in history.

Bogost, Ferrari and Schweizer, on the other hand, provide a much broader conception of newsgames by defining them as “a broad body of work produced at the intersection of videogames and journalism” (Bogost et al. 2010, 6), and create a typology of four types of newsgames: event games, infographic games, documentary games, and puzzle games.

Table 2.7 Bogost, Ferrari and Schweizer typology of newsgames (2010).

Type of Sub-types of Description Examples Newsgames Newsgames Event Games Editorial Editorial games are current games with an September 12th (2001), by argument, they express opinions, commentary Gonzalo Frasca and are persuasive. Layoff! (2009), by Mary Flanagan Tabloid “Playable versions of soft news -particularly Hothead Zidane (2006), by celebrity, sports, or political gossip” (Bogost et Alberto Zanot. al. 2010, 16) Reportage Games that are in between the editorial and Food Import Folly (2007), by tabloid types. Instead of wanting to persuade Persuasive Games. the players like editorial games, reportage Points of Entry (2007), by games want to educate and inform. Persuasive Games. Infographic Games Explanatory Depict data in a relatively static form. It’s about Boeing 787 Dreamliner the results rather than the process. (2009), by Boeing. Exploratory Allow players to manipulate data by arranging, Presidential Primary filter or zoom data, and drawing their own Delegate Tracker (2008), by conclusion. USA Today. Directed It guides the player through dynamic data. Challenger (1986), by USA Today. Documentary Spatial Reality Environments of events are navigable to the The Berlin Wall (2008), by Games player. Extends the cinematic mise-en-scène. Garrymods. Operational Re-recreates tbe events themselves. JFK Reloaded (2004), by Reality Traffic Games. Procedural Reality Explores the reality of a situation’s behavior PeaceMaker (2006) by rather than spaces or actions of an event. ImpactGames Puzzle Games Crossword Newspuzzles digital games that arise from the Scoop (2007), by Red Mercury. crossword legacy. Crickler (2004), by Michael and Barbara Crick News Quiz Uses questions and quizzes for personal Cosmo Quiz, by Cosmopolitan Magazine. exploration instead of educational or The Political Compass informative purposes. (2001) Hybrid Uses questions and quizzes for personal Take Intern Juli’s Advanced exploration instead of educational or Emanuel Brothers informative purposes. Personality Test from Hell (2008), by Wonkette.

The typology created by Bogost et al. provides a sense of the spectrum that comes from the intersection between games and news, and it is a reminder of how games have been part of newspapers for almost a century. However, this typology also raises questions related to the characteristics that make these newsgames actual games, and not just interactive artifacts. Lindsay Grace and Katy Huang (2020) created a diagram that provides some understanding on this issue.

Fig. 2.4 Grace and Huang diagram of play (2020, 5)

From interactives to games, newsgames artifacts can vary according to the level of involvement provided to the player. Besides being compromised to an editorial line, games can rise to an independent and critical approach of expression and as a way of artivism. Flanagan defines activist games by “their emphasis on social issues, education, and, occasionally, intervention” (Flanagan 2009, 13) and reinforces the importance that games have in the cultural context of the twenty first centure, and how they are building this century’s imagination.

Games for Change is a non-profit company that creates and curates games that aim to impact the real world by exploring civic and social issues. At-Risk (2017) for instance, is a game that creates awareness about mental illness and combat the stigma associated to it.

2.3 Summary

Games can be powerful tools of expression, representation and critique. Understanding their unique features such as how games can tell stories; how worlds are created; how games can be designed; which type of performance is allowed to the player; which type of rhetoric can be mounted; and how games can be used in different contexts, provides an important scope of understanding on how games can be used as communication tools and as means to embed values and arguments.

PART 2 – PROJECT

3. Case Studies

3.1 Context and Methodology

In order to conceptualize how documentaries can use games as a media to produce social critique, it was relevant to analyse games that used procedural rhetoric and identify how that use relates to the critique or argument of the game. This exercise was a crucial step before the creation of a documentary game prototype. Thus, a selection of games was made. Some of the games were found during the literature review process, others from further research and investigation. The criteria was to find games that used procedural rhetoric as a means to create an argument and/or produce critique.

To understand how this relationship was implemented, some key concepts from the literature review were highlighted as parameters and objectives of the analysis:

• Identify the procedural rhetoric that was used, which was discussed on the third part of the literature review, mainly by Ian Bogost; • Understand the critique or argument behind the game, which relates to the section on critical games and games as artivism; • Identify which game mechanics were being used, which relates to the section about how games tell stories.

With this analysis, some patterns were recognized and discovered, which led to a creation of a procedural rhetoric typology for social critique, that is, a typology that concerns the different uses of procedural rhetoric in order to produce social critique. This typology provided a great insight and understanding of how, not only documentary games, but games in general, could use procedural rhetoric or create new possibilities of it.

3.2 Case Studies Analysis

Due to the main goal of the case studies analysis being the creation of concepts and ideas for the final prototype, this section has emphasis on the cases that most influenced the final product. The next section (3.3) concerns the case studies categorized under the procedural rhetoric typology. The cases that were most relevant to the design, structure and conceptualization of the documentary game were: Thank You for Playing (2017), Faith Fighter (2008), and September 12th (2003).

Thank You for Playing

Thank You for Playing (2017) is a documentary game created by Andréa Cohen-Boulakia and Dominic Desjardins and produced by The National Film Board of Canada. The documentary focuses on the dark side of gambling and how these games of chance perpetuate and develop addictive behaviors to the players. The documentary begins with a game section (fig.3.1) where the player is immediately asked to pay attention and find the heart hidden and sorted among three chip coins. After guessing correctly the position of the heart at least two times, the narrator says “Now, you think you’re in control. But the game is programmed to let you win just often enough to condition your behavior. What is happening is called positive reinforcement.”. This premise proves right away an interesting approach: instead of telling the player what the subject of the documentary is about by using an expository approach, it makes the player experience it first, and then, by talking directly to the player add an additional explanation that contextualizes him and moves to the next topic, which is about how the mechanics of slot machines work. The narrative proceeds with a branching structure, allowing the player to choose from 3 different characters and stories (fig 3.2). The player hears their stories (fig 3.3) but the game starts popping up on the top right corner of the documentary (fig. 3.4) while the characters are still talking. This makes the player decide whether to engage with the game, or just pay attention to what the characters have to say. Gradually, the game’s complexity and difficulty are increased by the inclusion of new elements such as a points counter, a bet indicator (fig 3.5), and a lucky roulette (fig 3.6). The critical moment happens when the player hears what the characters are saying, but doesn’t see them anymore. The game takes the protagonism of the characters (fig 3.7) and the player can keep playing or hit the “Get Help” button in order to finish the documentary.

Fig. 3.1 Still from Thank You for Playing (2017), by Andréa Cohen-Boulakia and Dominic Desjardins.

Fig. 3.2 Still from Thank You for Playing (2017), by Andréa Cohen-Boulakia and Dominic Desjardins.

Fig. 3.3 Still from Thank You for Playing (2017), by Andréa Cohen-Boulakia and

Dominic Desjardins.

Fig. 3.4 Still from Thank You for Playing (2017), by Andréa Cohen-Boulakia and Dominic Desjardins

Fig. 3.5 Still from Thank You for Playing (2017), by Andréa Cohen-Boulakia and Dominic Desjardins.

Fig. 3.6 Still from Thank You for Playing (2017), by Andréa Cohen-Boulakia and Dominic Desjardins.

Fig. 3.7 Still from Thank You for Playing (2017), by Andréa Cohen-Boulakia and Dominic Desjardins.

Faith Fighter

Faith Fighter (2008) is a game developed by Molleinsdustria that generated a lot of controversy, criticism and even censorship. In the game, players must fight religious figures such as Jesus and Buddha (figs. 3.9-10) and because of that, it was accused of inciting religious hate and violence, especially islamophobia. Molleindustria responded to the critics “Faith Fighter was meant to be a game against intolerance which used over-the-top irony and a cartoonish style to express the instrumental use of religions” (Molleindustria 2009). The creators uploaded a censored version (figs. 3.8-9) without showing Muhammad’s face and created another game as a response - Faith Fighter 2 (2009). Criticizing violence by perpetuating the idea of violence and making it a victory condition to win the game (figs. 3.11-12) makes the procedural rhetoric ironic. It is a controversial but undenyingly impactful way to make an argument.

Fig. 3.8 Still from Faith Fighter (2008), by Molleindustria.

Fig. 3.9 Still from Faith Fighter (2008), by Molleindustria.

Fig. 3.10 Still from Faith Fighter (2008), by Molleindustria.

Fig. 3.11 Still from Faith Fighter (2008), by Molleindustria.

Fig. 3.12 Still from Faith Fighter (2008), by Molleindustria.

Fig. 3.13 Still from Faith Fighter (2008), by Molleindustria.

September 12th

September 12th (2003) is a game created by Gonzalo Frasca as a response to the 2001 September 11th attacks in the United States of America. The game starts by saying that it’s not a game and by informing the player that he can’t win or lose it (fig. 3.14). The only way of winning the game is by not playing it, which expresses a strong argument against violence. The only option available to the player when playing the game is to attack (fig. 3.15) which consequently generates more terrorists and destruction. The possibility of creating a game that is intentionally impossible or nearly impossible to win, that is, the use of the procedural rhetoric of failure, opens interesting doors to documentary, which usually has a beginning, middle and end (resolution).

Fig. 3.14 Still from September 12th (2003), by Gonzalo Frasca.

Fig. 3.15 Still from September 12th (2003), by Gonzalo Frasca.

3.3 Procedural Rhetoric Typology for Critique

As mentioned in 3.1, the case studies analysis led to a creation of a typology based on the recognition of different uses of procedural rhetoric in order to produce critique. Six types of procedural rhetoric were identified: procedural rhetoric of failure (Bogost 2010, 12); procedural rhetoric of success; procedural rhetoric of exploration; procedural rhetoric of irony; procedural rhetoric of experience; procedural rhetoric of collaboration.

Procedural Rhetoric of Failure

According to Bogost, the procedural rhetoric of failure is “[A] design that comments upon a political situation by denying players a victory condition” (Bogost 2010, 12). After the backlash of Faith Fighter (2008), the creators developed Faith Fighter 2 (2009) as a response. The second game, instead of using the procedural rhetoric of irony, uses the procedural rhetoric of failure, and rather than violence being the subject and critique of the game, Faith Fighter 2 is about tolerance (fig.3.16). With Muhammad’s face still censored, the goal of the game is not to fight, but to give love and respect to every religion. The player has to click on the characters as a symbolic gesture of love (represented by hearts), otherwise they become invisible and the game is over (figs. 3.17-18). It is, however, impossible to win the game and avoid someone from turning invisible, which expresses the difficulty in being tolerant and the hypocrisy often associated with it.

Fig. 3.16 Still from Faith Fighter 2 (2009), by Molleindustria.

Fig. 3.17 Still from Faith Fighter 2 (2009), by Molleindustria.

Fig. 3.18 Still from Faith Fighter 2 (2009), by Molleindustria.

Frasca’s Madrid (2004) has the same game mechanics and symbolism. The player must keep all candles burning, otherwise she loses the game (fig.3.19). Madrid was created in the context of the attacks that took place in Spain back in 2004.

Fig. 3.19 Still from Madrid (2004), by Gonzalo Frasca.

Pedercini’s Dogness (2018) mentioned and analyzed back in the section 3.2.2 is also part of this type of rhetoric (figs. 3.20-22). The author states that he doesn’t know if it’s possible to win the game (a 100% score), however if not impossible it’s nearly impossible to win, which can be a variation of this type of rhetoric.

Fig. 3.20 Still from Dogness (2018), by Paolo Pedercini.

Fig. 3.21 Still from Dogness (2018), by Paolo Pedercini.

Fig. 3.22 Still from Dogness (2018), by Paolo Pedercini.

Procedural Rhetoric of Success

The procedural rhetoric of success is the direct opposition of the procedural rhetoric of failure. If failure can make an argument and produce critique, so does success. Oil God (2006) is a strategic game where the player wears the shoes of an oil god. The goal is to double the consumer price of gasoline in five years. The player can fail the goal and lose the game, however, she quickly realizes that the vast majority of strategic decisions available will benefit her. That includes alien invasions, political and financial instability, wars and storms (fig.3.23).

Fig. 3.23 Still from Oil God (2006), by Ian Bogost.

Although it is possible to lose in Oil God, the procedural rhetoric of success works as a critique and could be applied to the victory condition of the game. Imagine a critical game with the intention of criticizing the impunity of some powerful and influential people in the world. The player could be the owner of an international chain, or a politician who independently of the actions available and/or chosen in the game, would always win it and never take responsibility. The actions could be limited to crimes and ethical dubious options. Another game that could be made under this type of procedural rhetoric could be a game about racial, sexual and gender privilege. A game where the player could pick between different

characters, and that choice would determine the course of the remaining choices. A white cis and heterosexual male would always win the game, despite of his actions, this way signifying the position on the social hierarchy and power that he holds in society; while on the other hand, a black trans woman would always suffer consequences, regardless of doing something wrong or not.

Procedural Rhetoric of Exploration

Games that use the procedural rhetoric of exploration are games that expose the critique and its depth gradually as the player explores and traverses the game. Molleindustria’s McDonald’s Video Game (2006) could be a common management game in which the player has to manage time, clients, and resources at a McDonald’s restaurant (fig. 3.24). However, as the player fulfils requests and traverses the game, she gradually becomes aware of the consequences of its actions, and of what it actually requires to keep the business going profitable. Being an anti-advergame, McDonald’s Video Game exposes the obscure side behind big corporations such as McDonald’s, therefore the player soon realizes that she has to corrupt health officers or a politician, kill a bunch of cows, destroy nature. It is a critique that unfolds with the player’s actions. Similarly to McDonald’s Video Game, Pedercini’s Phone Story (2011) exposes the ugly side of smartphone production (fig. 3.25). And Wired’s Cutthroat Capitalism: The Game (2009) Somali’s pirate coast, in which the player is a pirate commander that has to attack, capture ships and negotiate a randsom (fig.3.26). To summarize, it is a procedural rhetoric that uses exploration as a technique of exposing the process behind something the author intends to critique and create awareness of.

Fig. 3.24 Still from McDonald’s Video Game (2006), by Molleindustria.

Fig. 3.25 Still from Phone Story (2011), by Paolo Pedercini.

Fig. 3.26 Still from Cutthroat Capitalism: The Game (2009), by The Wired.

Procedural Rhetoric of Irony

When using the procedural rhetoric of irony, the subject that is intended to be criticized is actually perpetuated and/or encouraged. Faith Fighter (2008) previously analysed in the 4.2 section, falls into this type of procedural rhetoric, since it criticized violence by making the player fight in order to win. Due to the use of irony, games that use this rhetoric can generate controversy, backlash, censorship and be generally misinterpreted. In Guilty Smells (2019) by Paolo Pedercini, is a smell-enhanced game in which the player is a police dog that has to sniff non american food that became illegal to consume and possess in the United States of America. The dog approaches the suspects (fig.3.27), sniffs them (fig. 3.28) and barks when detects a foreign food smell (fig. 3.29). Although for some people, the game might be just about American food and about being a police dog, Guilty Smells can be a metaphor for the right-wing politics against immigration, especially for Trump’s discourses and political views, and xenophobia. The position that the game puts the player in, where in order to win and be rewarded with a dog biscuit, she has to arrest people who are from other cultures (as in, other than american) or are consuming other culture’s food it’s perpetuating the argument that it’s intended to be condemned. Rewarding such actions in this context is ironic, however it could be interpreted as an actual reinforcement of these political views. In this case, the name of the game helps to unriddle the intentions of the author. Layoff (2009) is a newsgame created by Mary Flanagan that comments on the 2008/2009 financial crisis by making the player fire honest workers and keep the bankers in the game, the

more jobs the player cuts, the more money he saves to the company. The game was controversial and some people even argued that it was not a subject to make a game about3. Tiltfactor, the game company, had to explain that making the players feel unsettled was part of the intention.

Fig. 3.27 Still from Guilty Smells (2019), by Paolo Pedercini.

Fig. 3.28 Still from Guilty Smells (2019), by Paolo Pedercini.

3 Layoff Game in the News: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bGqNN9xTGOQ

Fig. 3.29 Still from Guilty Smells (2019), by Paolo Pedercini.

Fig. 3.30 Still from Layoff (2009), by Mary Flanagan.

Procedural Rhetoric of Experience

With this type of procedural rhetoric, the player experiences the critic or the subject in the first person, not as a fiction or a simulation, but as a real experience. The previously mentioned Thank You for Playing (2017) exemplifies this type of rhetoric by having gambling and its consequent addiction as the subject of the documentary, and then making the player experience gambling and addiction by playing it. The player plays, bets and accumulates points throughout the film (fig.3.31), making her switch his attention between the story and the gameplay (fig.3.32). The use of procedural rhetoric of experience as a means to experience non-fictional subjects can open interesting possibilities to documentary. The use of systems that profile players can be a viable option to create these sorts of experience, as well as the use of simulation systems.

Fig. 3.31 Still from Thank You for Playing (2017), by Andréa Cohen-Boulakia and Dominic Desjardins

Fig. 3.32 Still from Thank You for Playing (2017), by Andréa Cohen-Boulakia and Dominic Desjardins

Procedural Rhetoric of Collaboration

This type of procedural rhetoric puts the player on the side of the argument or critique that the game intends to produce. In order to win, the player has to collaborate with what the game is arguing about and position it stands for, which can be a way of calling for action, involvement and effort of the player. The procedural rhetoric of collaboration was not found on any of the games that were analysed, however it came up as an idea and concept to develop in the final documentary game as a way of making the player collaborate, fight the problem, and become an ally to the cause.

Summary

Table 3.1 Table of Procedural Rhetoric Typology to produce critique.

Type of Description Examples Procedural Rhetoric Procedural Rhetoric of The player has a very difficult, nearly September 12th (2003), by Gonzalo Failure impossible or impossible task to win Frasca; the game. Dogness (2018), by Paolo Pedercini; Madrid (2004), by Gonzalo Frasca; Faith Fighter 2 (2009), by Molleindustria. Procedural Rhetoric of The player always wins despite her Oil God (2006), by Ian Bogost. Success choices and actions within the game. Procedural Rhetoric of The player gradually explores the McDonalds Videogame (2006), by Exploration critic and its depth as he traverses the Molleindustria; game. Phone Story (2011), by Michael Pineschi and Paolo Pedercini; Cutthroat Capitalism: The Game (2009) by The Wired. Procedural Rhetoric of The argument that is intended to be Faith Fighter (2008), by Irony criticized is actually perpetuated and Molleindustria; encouraged. Guilty Smells (2019), by Paolo Pedercini. Layoff (2009), by Mary Flanagan. Procedural Rhetoric of The player experiences the critic or Thank You for Playing (2017), by Experience the subject in the first person, not as Andréa Cohen-Boulakia and Dominic fiction or a simulation, but as a real Desjardins. experience. Procedural Rhetoric of In order to win, the player has to be on Deixa-me Falar! (2020) by Joana Collaboration the side of the critic and collaborate Malagueira. with it.

The analysis can be summarized in a table such as 3.1, although it is important to remind that games can use more than one type of procedural rhetoric. For instance, a game can have a rhetoric of failure that affects the end of the game but the path until that point can use a rhetoric of exploration where the player is gradually unfolding the critique. A game that uses the procedural rhetoric of experience can simultaneously use the procedural rhetoric of collaboration

as a condition to progress in the game and/or win it. The rhetoric of irony can use the rhetoric of success in order to increase the level of irony. In this sense, the combination of types of procedural rhetoric can produce a more complex critique and express multiple meanings throughout the traversing of the game, or even dilute the experience.

3.4 Table of Case Studies

Table 3.2 Case studies analysis overview.

Game Author (year) Type of Game Game’s Critique Procedural Game Mechanics Objectives

(Reflective Play) Rhetoric (Recursive Play)

1 Cutthroat The Wired Newsgane Capitalism as a system. Exploration The player has to choose Educate and inform the

Capitalism: The (2009) strategies and negotiate to player about the economic

Game accomplish goals. system of piracy off the

coast of Somalia.

2 Dogness Paolo Pedercini Critical Game Eugenics, racism, and Failure The player can mate dogs Make the player question

(2018) xenofobia. or expel them. behaviors that marginalize

people and cultures, and

make the player guilty

about it.

3 Faith Fighter Molleindustria Critical Game Violence, intolerance, Irony The player has to fight. Make the player question

(2008) and religious hate. He has different attacks to about religion, intolerance,

choose from. violence and hypocrisy

4 Faith Fighter 2 Molleindustria Critical Game Intolerance and the Failure The player has to click on Make the player reflect on

(2009) inability to please the characters in order to hypocrisy, religious hate

everyone. keep them visible and intolerance.

5 Guilty Smells Paolo Pedercini Critical Game Xenophobia, racism, Irony Uses digital (video game) Make the player question

(2019) segregation and politics and analog mechanics about immigration politics

against immigration. (smell). The player has to and segregation.

smell people and bark at

them to report them.

6 Layoff Mary Flanagan Newsgame Capitalism and how Irony The player has to fire Comment on the financial

(2009) companies profit from honest workers and keep crisis of 2008-2009 by

financial crisis. the bankers, the more criticizing the position of

employees the player cuts, company’s owners and

more profit it gets. bankers who do not get

affected by the crisis, but

even can profit from it.

7 Madrid Gonzalo Frasca Newsgame Terrorism. Failure The player has to click on Make the player

(2004) candles in order to understand that Madrid is

maintain them burning. not the only city that

suffered from terrorism,

and how it is a global

problem and that memory

is an active effort.

8 McDonalds Molleindustria Anti- The power and Exploration The player has to manage Educate the player about

Videogame (2006) Advergame corruption that goes time, resources and corruption, power and

behind big companies negotiate strategies in manipulation that goes

such as McDonalds. order to keep the business behind big corporations.

profitable.

9 Oil God Ian Bogost Newsgame The power that big Success The player can choose Educate the player about

(2006) players have in the which strategies to use in economic and political

world, especially in the order to accomplish the systems.

economy. goal.

10 Phone Story Michael Educational Exploration of the dark Exploration The player has to play Educate the player about

Pineschi and Game side of the phone mini games along the what goes behind the smart

Paolo Pedercini industry, such as child game, such as make phone industry.

(2011) labour. children work and prevent

suicides.

11 September 12th Gonzalo Frasca Critical Game Violence, terrorism and Failure The player has to attack Make the player aware of

(2003) war. by throwing bombs. the cost of war, terrorism

There’s no other option to and violence.

choose from.

12 Thank You for Andréa Cohen- Documentary Game and gambling Experience Uses gambling and chance Educate the player about

Playing Boulakia and Game addiction. sorts of mechanics to gambling addiction.

Dominic addict the player.

Desjardins

(2017)

The table 3.2 summarizes all the games that were analysed which is a helpful overview for the next phase of creating a documentary game, and a way of consulting how concepts, procedural rhetoric and critique are used and combined. We can also conclude that all the examples have a strong political view and use games to produce not only critique, but social critique.

4. Creating a Documentary Game

Constructing concepts and thinking of procedural rhetoric possibilities to produce critique is one thing, yet trying to put these concepts into practice is a different learning experience. The process of creating a documentary game requires a lot of decisions to make, a trial and error process, frustrations, limitations, and a lot of it can’t be anticipated nor expected. To create Deixa-me Falar! / Let Me Speak! (2020), three phases were required: 1- Research; 2 – Planning and Development; and 3 - Execution.

4.1 PHASE 1: Research

Research of Documentary Films

In order to find a subject, inspiration and ideas for the final documentary game, a selection of four different documentaries was made: • Koyaanisqatsi (1982), by Godfrey Reggio, because it’s a film with no dialogue, so it relies on the use of visual rhetoric, music and montage to tell a story; • Walden: Diaries, Notes and Sketches (1968), by Jonas Mekas, for the way it compiles narration and video footage to express feelings and stories; • Réponse de Femmes: Notre Corps, Notre Sexe (1975), by Agnès Varda, for being a feminist short documentary about what it means to be a woman; • The Society of Spectacle (1973), by Guy Debord, due to its criticism of the spectator’s passivity.

The first film could inspire an abstract and poetic way (Nichol’s poetic mode) of approaching documentary by playing with rhythm, sound and visual stimuli. The second could work on the power of words and narration, so the rhetoric of sound and voice would be something to further explore. The third film could explore how interview type documentaries can be games, while simultaneously being a way of updating the documentary in content and form. And the last one could be an interesting opportunity to answer the documentary’s critique by giving action to the spectator.

Research of Game Rules and Mechanics

The second step was to search for game rules and mechanics that could be interesting to use and experiment with. The research was specifically focused on card games and board games such as Mahjong (1850), Go (-2200), Rummy (1887), Memory (1959), Dominoes (1500), Yahtzee (1956), Spoons (1982), and Jenga (1983). The exercise aimed to understand how these game rules worked: Do they use luck? Strategy? Are they multiplayer? What actions are the player allowed to make? And then try to attribute them different meanings: Can Jenga be about technological apparatus? Can Memory be about the human attention span in the digital age? Can Go be about colonialism?

Creation of Concepts for Documentary Games

With the previous two steps taken, we could now try to combine the documentaries and game mechanics together to start creating preliminary concepts of what a documentary game could be. The main goal at this point was to find possibilities, so for each film a set of game rules was associated.

Fig. 4.1 Photo of the chinese board game GO.

At this stage, for instance, Varda’s documentary was combined with the chinese board game GO (-2200). GO is an abstract strategy and competitive game for two players that play against each other. The aim is to surround more territory than the opponent. This was interesting because the main objective of the game is to create borders, limit the other player’s freedom until he’s completely

surrounded and loses his power, which can be a metaphor for the oppression of women, and the lack of space, power and freedom that comes with it.

Koyaanisqatsi’s combination, on the other hand, had a completely different subject, intention and style.

Fig. 4.2 Photo of a memory game.

Inspired by the visual rhetoric that the original documentary uses, the idea of rhythm and visual stimuli, the memory game was one of the possibilities for challenging the player’s attention and visual memory. The film’s critique of the unbalanced rhythm of life and excess of stimulus could inspire a gradually frenetic turn of images that the player had to memorize to the point where it would be impossible to win the game. In this scenario, the critique would be about the excess of information, fast paced lifestyle, and the technological apparatus.

Varda’s Documentary

Fig. 4.3 Stills from Varda’s Réponse de Femmes: Notre Corps, Notre Sexe (1975)

Varda’s documentary was the chosen one to further explore. Réponse de Femmes: Notre Corps, Notre Sexe (1975) tries to define women, their role, their value in society, as well as their power of decision and independence, contesting misogynistic and patriarchal behaviors that oppress women and treat them as objects that sell.

Some key characteristics of the documentary:

• It is a scripted documentary; • It lacks representation: it only represents white cisgender and heterossexual women, all with the same body type (thin/fit); • It perpetuates a biological cisgender perspective towards women and emphasizes the importance of the women’s body; • The documentary is mostly shot in a studio.

The social construction of what a woman is and represents 45 years ago is not the same as today, therefore the idea of representing women who were not represented in this documentary arose. A documentary game in 2020 about the same subject as Varda’s 1975 short film would update the discussion around what it means to be a women today, that is, the content; but also the form of communication and expression, for being a documentary game.

4.2 PHASE 2: Planning and Development

Objectives, Argument and Procedural Rhetoric

Similarly and according to the dissertation’s objectives, the main goal of the documentary game is to produce critique. In this case, the criticism is about the lack of representation of women in the media, especially black, trans and women that don’t fit in society’s beauty standards. Deixa-me Falar! (2020) is a 23 minute long documentary game that features interviews with three women, video excerpts from portuguese media, and problematic discourses represented by talking mouths, which makes it an expository mode type documentary. The game part of the documentary consists on fighting racist, transphobic, fatphobic and misogynistic discourses that gradually pop on screen and prevent the player from hearing the women’s voices. The choice of procedural rhetoric of collaboration forces the player to win the game by being on the side of the critique that it’s intended to be made. That means that if the player fails to defeat those discourses represented by speaking mouths, he can’t complete the documentary game nor win it. Moreover, the fact that he has to collaborate can make the player feel more involved in the subject matter, and inspired to take action in real life. The player is part of the problem and can be part of the solution. This way, Deixa-me Falar! can be a frustrating experience, but that frustration is an expression and metaphor of the consequences that these discourses have in real life. The game layer is supposed to be difficult but possible with effort, this way it tries to communicate that it’s not, in fact, easy to fight these discourses, but possible with effort and persistence. Furthermore, the documentary game isn’t supposed to explore the character’s emotions, but rather present facts, denunciate the problem and make the players feel it in his skin.

Protagonists

To represent and speak up for the lack of representation and voice of black, trans and women that don’t fit in society’s beauty standards, three women were chosen. Additionally, all these women fight this lack of representation and voice in creative ways that can help inspire the player to do the same. Cristiana with photography, Fabrícia with social media activism, and Tita with performance and music.

Cristiana Morais is a fashion photographer based in Lisbon. Her personal work challenges the standards of beauty by representing women with diverse body types. The way she portrays women and her own self portraits express a message that contrasts with what it’s seen and communicated in traditional media.

Fabrícia Glória is a nursing student that in her spare time is part of an anti-racist and feminist collective called “Mulheres Negras Escurecidas”4. She also has an individual project called “Fwentre” that focuses on what it means to be a woman today.

Tita Maravilha is an artist that works mainly with performance and music. In her work she expresses the struggles of being a trans woman and stands for how diverse women are. Her single Typo de Mulher5 (2020) screams “I am a woman” repeatedly.

Fig. 4.4 A photography by Cristiana Morais from the project “Mariazinhas” in collaboration with Maria Imaginário.

4 Translation: Dark Skinned Black Women 5 Translation: “Type of Woman”

Fig. 4.6 Screnshots of Fabrícia’s projects: Fwentre and Colectivo Mulheres Negras Escurecidas.

Fig. 4.5 Still from Trypas-Corassão project by Tita Maravilha and Cigarra.

Documentary Layers

Fig. 4.7 Representation of the layers of the documentary game.

Deixa-me Falar! (2020) has a logic of three layers: (1) the women’s voice; (2) the noise; (3) the game. The first layer corresponds to the interview with the characters, it’s literally and metaphorically the women’s voice. The second layer is the noise represented by misogynistic, racist, transphobic and fatphobic discourses taken from portuguese media, especially tv and radio. This layer overlaps the first one, it’s louder and it makes it impossible to hear what the characters are saying. The third layer is the game where the player has to take action and fight against the second layer in order to be able to hear the first one.

Narrative Structure

Fig. 4.8 Representation of the three act of the documentary.

The documentary game follows a linear three-act structure. The first act introduces the subject, characters and problem; the second act brings the conflict and climax of the documentary by adding the game layer; and the third act presents the resolution of the problem previously introduced and only accessible if the player won the fight. Therefore, act one intends to construct the critique, act two aims to make the player get involved and fight for the cause, and act three answers the question “What are they doing to solve this?”, and “What can we do?”.

Production Planning

A production folder was created (A) in order to plan the shooting, interviews, budget, schedules, script, equipment and locations.

Table 4.1 Summary of production plan

List of locations List of shots List of equipment Marquês de Pombal, Interview shot; Camera; Lisboa Close up shots for the introduction; Microphone; Campo de Ourique, Close up shots of the protagonists’ Tripod; Lisboa mouths while talking; Memory card; Lumiar, Lisboa Shots of each protagonist’s Camera battery; home. Computer.

4.3 PHASE 3: Execution

Shooting

The documentary game was shot in Lisbon in each character’s house, except for Fabrícia who could not give permission to film at her place. The goal was to shoot in a space that was personal to the characters so that could say something about them. Instead of the characters presenting themselves, the shots of their houses could say who they are, while also giving hints about what the documentary game is about.

Fig. 4.9 Stills from Deixa-me Falar! (2020) that show the protagonists’ house.

As stated in the objectives of the documentary game, it isn’t supposed to explore the character’s emotions, therefore a deliberate decision was made to shoot them in a more distant shot. The proximity that the player can feel to the characters is achieved by how informal they talk to the camera and how comfortable they are, and not by the closeness of the camera. The shooting was made in 3 different days but at the same time of the day, so the light could be similar in every shot.

Fig. 4.11 Shot for Cristiana.

Fig. 4.10 Shot for Fabrícia.

Fig. 4.12 Shot for Tita.

Media Research

An important part of the critique was to include portuguese media excerpts, this way it’s about “here and now”, that is, “In Portugal and in 2020”. In this sense, it was imperative that the examples used were recent and familiar to the player. Showing a racist excerpt of an american film wouldn’t have the same impact as showing a telenovela. As Nichols argues, “Expository documentary facilitates generalization and large-scale argumentation. The images can support the basic claims of a general argument” (Nichols 1991, 107), therefore the chosen examples served as a claim for a general argument, which in this case denunciates the portuguese media in general. There were two types of media to research: visual and audio. The excerpt of the telenovela Nazaré (2019-20), for instance, shows how a fat character is represented on tv: her position in the shot, her pose and the fact that she’s eating cookies while talking can say a lot more than the actual conversation that she’s having with the main character (that fits the beauty standards). The audio excerpts were important to the game part of the documentary game. They were categorised by subject and associated with each character to contrast what the characters say and represent with the discourses that speak against them. 24 audios were used: 5 racist discourses; 5 fatphobic discourses; 5 transphobic discourses; and 4 misogynistic discourses that are traversal to all women. 23 video excerpts were used to create the visual references.

These references were mainly taken from TV channels such as SIC, TVI, RTP, CMTV and CANAL Q, and from radio, like RFM, Cidade FM and Antena 1.

Fig. 4.13 Stills from Deixa-me Falar! that show an excerpt of Nazaré (2019-20).

Post-Production

4.3.3.1 Video Editing

The main editing technique was to let the protagonist speak first about the issues, and then illustrate with an example taken from portuguese media that is proof of what they are saying. This technique is called evidentiary editing, and as Nichols (1991) argues, aims to “[m]aintain the continuity of the spoken argument or perspective” (Nichols 1991, 107) . One of the most important things to consider while editing the video was the rhythm and connection to the game, especially in the second act. For instance, the shots with the close ups of the protagonists’ mouths were intended to add tension to the climax of the documentary game, hence the fast paced rhythm to create stress. The audio of the interviews were also purposely lowered in the moments where the talking mouths take place.

4.3.3.2 Game

The game segment consists of discourses that are associated with talking mouths that appear on screen interrupting what the characters are saying. These mouths randomly generate letters that the player has to click in order to defeat them. The game starts slow and easy and progressively gets faster and harder. It has four different levels, although those levels are not perceived directly by the player:

• Level 1: Fabrícia – 9 mouths to defeat; • Level 2: Cristiana – 14 mouths to defeat; • Level 3: Tita – 12 mouths to defeat + beginning of level 4; • Level 4: All women – 12 mouths to defeat + mouths automatically generated each 1.1 seconds.

On the levels 1, 2 and 3, the player has to hear the audio until the end in order to generate the letter and consequently be able to defeat the mouth. Whilst on level 4, the mouths that are automatically generated immediately generate letters, so the pace of the game can be fast.

The following rules were created as a guide to Miguel Duarte, the programmer of the documentary game:

• The letter to defeat the mouths appears after the audio played until the end; • After the audio’s playing completely, both mouths and audios fall into a loop until the player defeats it; • On the loop, the generated letter continues to be visible; • To defeat the mouths, the player has to click 5 times in each letter; • Mouths have to be spread on the screen; • At the minute 14:53:05, randomly and automatically generated mouths appear every 1.1 seconds – this mouths have their correspondent letter generated since the moment they appear; • At the end of level 4, if the player hasn’t defeated every mouth until the minute 15:35:11, he loses the game, and the game over menu shows up; • If the player wants to try again, he goes back to the minute 09:17:03; • If the player decides to exit, then he goes back to the main menu.

Additionally to the rules, the following items were handed over to Miguel: • A set of design assets: mouth sprites, menu section, buttons, about section, instructions section; • The 24 audios listed and categorised by levels; • Game design sounds: for when the player defeats a mouth, when the player loses, when the player starts the game, when the player passes to the third act, and when the player clicks on the menu buttons; • A script with the exact timings of the mouths.

Fig. 4.14 Still from Deixa-me Falar! that show the documentar layer.

Fig. 4.15 Still from Deixa-me Falar! the show the climax of the documentary.

4.3.3.3 Design and Identity

All the text in the documentary game was handwritten with the intention of making it feel personal, imperfect and amateur. It contrasts with the aesthetic standards of mass media, such as TV. A regular type font would make the documentary feel cold and impersonal, which was not the desired feel. The same idea was applied to the talking mouths that the player has to defeat. A lighthearted style and color palette also contrasts with the violence that is shown, in order to achieve a balance and not make the documentary too dramatic and heavy to watch.

Fig. 4.16 Menu of Deixa-me Falar! and example of how the identity design is applied throughout the film.

4.4 Final Product

Deixa-me Falar (2020) is an expository mode type documentary that utilizes the voices of the protagonists as a voice-of-authority commentary (Nichols 1991, 107) The documentary begins with a compilation of media excerpts talking about women and explicitly saying the word “women” repeatedly to introduce the subject matter to the player. This montage quickly turns into a frenetic clutter of information and voices. The next few sequences show the title of the documentary, shots of the characters’ homes, and finally the protagonists. Cristiana is the first one to talk about the lack of representation of fat women, and between her and Fabrícia, the excerpt of the telenovela Nazaré (2019-20) is shown to illustrate what Cristiana just said. Then it’s time for Fabrícia to speak up about how black women are not represented in the portuguese television, followed up by an excerpt of the telenovela A Única Mulher (2015-17). The excerpt progresses to a list of characters of several telenovelas of SIC that show how many black women are part of it. Tita is the following protagonist to speak, this time about how trans women are just entertainment and how they are not taken seriously. Two excerpts are shown while Tita is talking, one of them is of Vera Verão, a brazilian trans woman that is part of Tita’s references as a child; and an excerpt of the telenovela Ouro Verde (2017). Because the last excerpt has violence, the conflict and the second act begins. Therefore the next sequence with Fabrícia features the game layer. The racists audios play when Fabrícia is on screen; the fatphobic audios when Cristiana is speaking; and the transphobic audios when Tita appears. The pace accelerates and it leads the player to the chaotic and frenetic last minute of mouths. If the player wins, he proceeds to the third and final act of the documentary, if he doesn't make it, he returns to Fabrícia’s sequence where the game begins. The third act starts with photos of women taken by Cristiana and her talking about the importance of self-portraits and how photography can change the way people see themselves. Then it moves to Tita’s song “Typo de Mulher” (2020) and excerpts of her performance “Trypass- Corassão” (2019-20). Tita speaks about how important it is to applaud and cheer trans people. Videos and photos of Fabrícia’s projects on Instagram are shown, and the documentary ends with each protagonist arguing about what it means to be a woman today.

4.5 Concepts for Different Types of Procedural Rhetoric

While the final documentary game uses the procedural rhetoric of collaboration, the other types of procedural rhetoric introduced in the previous chapter could have different intentions and results.

Procedural Rhetoric of Failure Making the game impossible to win could express the frustration that these women have everyday, and how it’s impossible to fight against such a deeply rooted system. It could make the player feel guilty, powerless and impotent, and those negative feelings could either urge the player to take action in real life, or to lose hope.

Procedural Rhetoric of Success This procedural rhetoric could be used in two different perspectives: the perspective of the oppressor and the perspective of women. In the first one, the player would have to be a bully in order to win and no matter what he would do to get out of the game or not win it, he would always win. Putting the player in this role and showing that even if it’s not his intention, or even if he doesn’t do anything wrong, he still contributes to the problem could make the player more aware of privilege. The player could experience feelings of frustration, anger, sadness and guilt, and that could lead him to question these discourses in real life and take action. The second one, the player would be on the side of the women, and independently of his choices and actions in the game, he would always have success and win the game. This could be an opportunity to only present positive solutions and make the player feel like it’s possible to defeat the problem in real life, and that he has a lot of options to achieve it. However, it could give a false expectation of easiness to solve the problem.

Procedural Rhetoric of Exploration The documentary game could use a non-linear narrative structure and allow the player to gradually explore spaces and subjects as he traverses the documentary. This exploration would make the game designer categorize information and that could give an even more profound and deeper knowledge about the subject to the player.

Procedural Rhetoric of Irony The documentary game could follow a nihilistic perspective with hints of humor, but in a tragic horrible way with chaotic and violent discourses against women, but somehow sugarcoated with a very lighthearted and child like design. This would purposefully make the player feel bad and have contradicting stimuli that would make him question what’s acceptable and what is off limits.

Another and simpler way of using it would be by contrasting what the protagonists are saying with actions that the player has to do in order to win the game. This way, he would purposely have to do and perpetuate what the protagonists are denunciating or even make fun of them.

Procedural Rhetoric of Experience Deixa-me Falar! in a way makes the player feel how the protagonists feel. However, it could be interesting to make the experience more personal to the player. One way to achieve this would be by creating a set of profiles that target different people. In the beginning of the documentary game, the player would have to answer questions and make choices that would consequently place him in one of the profiles. And during the documentary game, the player would have to fight against discourses that personally attack him. Aside from the preconceived profiles, using real information of the player such as name, nationality or age, could add to the feeling of being something personally directed to each player.

5. Playtesting and Results

5.1 Objectives

After the prototype was completed, the playtesting phase proceeded and focused on the following four main objectives:

• To verify if the intended message and critique of the documentary game was communicated effectively, that is, if the participants understood the subject and argument behind it; • To understand if the procedural rhetoric of collaboration was able to generate frustration, involvement, interest and/or the sense that the player had to fight and collaborate with the cause; • To understand if the game contributed to produce social critique and to the overall narrative; • To get feedback of the overall experience.

5.2 Characterization of the Sample

The sample consists of 25 participants who are involved academically or professionally in the field of documentary, games and/or interactive narratives.

• 12 participants are more familiar with the documentary field; • 10 participants are more familiar with games; • 3 participants are more familiar with interactive narratives.

60% of the participants have a bachelor’s degree, and 40% a master’s degree. Their ages range between 19 and 42 years old.

5.3 Instruments

The playtesting phase consisted of a play session of the documentary game, followed by a questionnaire about the experience, which contained both closed and open questions.

The questionnaire was sectioned into 5 categories:

• A- Profile of the participant The first section aimed to contextualize the participants demographically, that is, in terms of age, background, and education.

• B- Participant’s consumer habits The second section contextualized the participants in terms of familiarity with games and interactive narratives.

• C- Documentary Game Experience This section was specifically about the experience of the Deixa-me Falar! documentary game.

• D- The documentary game as narrative and as a form of documentarism This section was about the documentary game in general, as a form of communication and documentarism.

• E- Additional feedback

In the last section, participants were able to give feedback of the overall experience, or comment about something that they didn’t get the opportunity for.

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5.4 Methods and Procedures

When creating the questionnaire, the Game Experience Questionnaire (CEQ) was used in section C- Documentary Game Experience, in order to analyse how the players felt during the game (in game module) and after it (post game module). And the Likert scale was used on questions such as 4.1, 9, 10, 11 and 12, in order to measure the participant’s subjectivity in a quantitative value.

In terms of the methodology used to qualitatively analyse the open answers of the questionnaire, Laurence Bardin’s (1977) three phased approach to content analysis was adapted.

Table 5.1 Table of Bardin’s (1977) analysis methodology adapted to the project.

Phase1 • Material reading and organization; Pre-analysis • Hypotheses and objectives formulation; Phase 2 • Categorization and elaboration of indicators of Exploration of the analysis. material Phase 3 • Inference and interpretation of results; Treatment of results, • Graphical representation of results; inference, and interpretation • Conclusions.

The following hypotheses and objectives were formulated in order to be analysed:

• The correlation between the game process and what it makes the player feel; • How that correlation affects the interpretation of the documentary game; • How not winning the game makes the player feel and infer from the experience; • Understand if the mechanics used worked in favor of the documentary game’s critique.

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5.5 Results and Analysis

Section A + B The first thing to conclude is that although the participants are familiar with interactive narratives (3), games (10) or documentaries (12), they are not familiar with interactive documentaries or a lot of interactive works of fiction, in general. Only 8% of the sample experienced an interactive documentary. And 76% experienced interactive works of fiction, being Netflix’s Black Mirror: Bandersnatch (2018) the most common answer. The majority of the participants play games in their daily lives (68%), mostly on their computers (41%), followed by the second most popular: games on their phones (35%).

Section C “Women” (20 out of 25 answers), “representation” (mentioned in 10 answers), “voice” (mentioned in 6 answers) and “media” (alson mentioned in 6 answers) were the most popular words to describe the subject of the documentary, which indicates that the participants understood the main theme of Deixa-me Falar!.

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Table 5.2 Table of the Game Experience Questionnaire’s scoring guidelines for the in-game module. Component Statement Score6

(1-5)7

Competence B I felt successful. 2 I I felt skillful. 2.2

Sensory and A I was interested in the story. 4.5 imaginative D I found it impressive. 3.4

immersion Flow E I forgot everything around me. 2.8 J I felt completely absorbed. 3.1 Tension F I felt frustrated. 3.5

H I felt irritable. 2.8 Challenge L I felt challenged. 3.8 M I had to put a lot of effort into it. 3.4 Negative affect C I felt bored. 2.1

G I find it tiresome. 2

Positive affect K I felt content. 1.8 N I felt good. 2.6

We could almost conclude that the experience was a failure based on the results of the “Competence” component. However, the documentary game never aimed to make the player feel successful (B) or skillful (I) while playing the game. If anything, it intended to make the player feel frustrated (F) and challenged (L), in which he had to make an effort in order to win the game (M). And the fact that the statement (A) got a high score is also determinant to the positive evaluation of the experience. If the player was indeed interested in the story and in what the characters had to say, despite the negative feelings that he felt during the game, that means the documentary game as a whole worked.

6 This score is an average calculated with the following formula: A (statement) = 1 (scale of Likert) x 0 (amount of participants who answered 1) + 2 (scale of Likert) x 0 (amount of participants who answered 2) + 3 (scale of Likert) x 1 (amount of participants who answered 3) + 4 (scale of Likert) x 8 (amount of participants who answered 4) + 5 (scale of Likert) x 11 (amount of participants who answered 5) / 20 (total of participants who responded) = 4.5

7 Scale of Likert used: 1. Not at all; 2. A little; 3. Moderately; 4. A lot; 5. Extremely.

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Table 5.3 Table of the Game Experience Questionnaire’s scoring guidelines for the post-game module. Component Statement Score (1-5) Positive experience A I felt relieved. 2.9 E It felt like a victory. 1.9 G I felt energized. 1.9 H I felt satisfied. 2.5 L I felt powerful. 1.7 P I felt proud. 1.8 Negative Experience B I felt bad. 2.5 D I felt guilty. 2.3 F I found it a waste of time. 1.3 K I felt that I could have done more 2.5 useful things. N I felt regret. 1.8 O I felt ashamed. 1.7 Tiredness J I felt exhausted. 1.8 M I felt weary. 1.7 Returning to reality C I found it hard to get back to reality. 1.6 I I felt disoriented. 1.8 Q I had the sense that I returned from a 2 journey.

It’s interesting to note the mixed feelings that the players got out of the game. “I felt satisfied” (H) and “I felt bad” (B) had the exact same score. The players felt relieved (A), but also guilty (D) and like they could have done more useful things (K). In fact, if we sum all the scores from the positive experience, and all the scores from the negative experience we realise that the difference between the two is not significant: the positive experience component has a total of 12.7 score points; while the negative experience sums 12.1.

72% of the participants didn’t pass the game on the first try. 45% of the participants who didn’t win the game at first, needed 2 attempts to pass it; 33% needed 3 attempts; and 22% needed 4 (figs 5.1-2). However, 5 participants didn’t win the game.

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3,2 28% Sim Não 8,2 72%

Fig. 5.1 Results from the question “Did you pass the test the first time?

0 0 0% 0%

4 22% 2 tentativas 8 3 tentativas 45% 4 tentativas 5 tentativas 6 Mais de 5 tentativas 33%

Fig. 5.2 Results from the question: “How many attempts did you have to make to pass the game?

8 Translation: “Sim” means “yes”; “Não” means “no”. 9 Translation: “2 tentativas” means “2 attempts”; “3 tentativas” means “3 attempts”; “4 tentativas” means “4 attempts”; “5 tentativas” means “5 attemps”; and “mais de 5 tentativas” mean “more than 5 attempts”.

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Table 5.4 Table of the effectiveness of the message and pertinence of the mechanics of Deixa-me Falar! Component Average (1-5) Effectiveness of the documentary game 4.1 message10 Pertinence of the game mechanics in 4 relation to the subject of the documentary11

When asked to evaluate the effectiveness of the documentary game message, and the pertinence of the game mechanics used in relation to the subject of the documentary, results show an average of 4 (out of 5) which is a success. Some of the participants mentioned how the frustration that they felt dealing with the mouths made them think about the frustrations and obstacles that these women suffer in a daily basis, which was one of the central intentions of the experiment, and specifically of the game layer.

The difficulty in getting the letters right when enemies start to appear more frequently tests the resistance of each player in the face of the situation, if he or she continues despite the abundance of mouths, then he/she is striving to combat these actions and hear the voices of the protagonists. (P7)12

I felt unable to silence the voices and that mechanic was a great way to represent what women feel in the face of criticism and prejudice represented by the media. (P17)

It is really frustrating to want to shut up the voices, to listen to the stories / testimonies of these incredible people and not succeed! It makes you think that this really happens in everyday life and we do little to silence these voices. If more people played the game, more minds would change! (P1)

The mechanics convey that in order to make themselves heard, these women need to make a great effort. (P2)

A small portion of the players commented on the fact that they actually wanted to hear what the protagonist wanted to say, so the game was an unwelcomed obstacle.

10 Evaluated under the Likert scale: 1. Not effective; 2. Not very effective; 3. Not effective or ineffective; 4. Effective; 5. Very effective. 11 Evaluated under the Likert scale: 1. Not pertinent; 2. Not very pertinent; 3. Not pertinent or impertinent; 4. Pertinent; 5. Very pertinent. 12 Translation by the author, original statement in Portuguese can be consulted at the attachment section: D. Questionnaire Summary.

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During the segment with the game mechanics I noticed the symbology behind them but I almost preferred to continue listening to the interviewees’ discourse. The appearance of many loud mouths frustrated me by not being able to hear the main thing, but maybe it can be part of the experience. (P8)

I think the way the documentary started was very interesting, the contexts were introduced very well, the sketches created a lot of impact. However, when the overlay of the voices started and the need to stop them I feel that I completely interrupted the experience I was having. I felt involved in listening to those women talking. The introduction of game mechanics seemed to me simply "gimmick", taking me completely out of the immersion of the documentary. I felt irritated and frustrated because I wanted to hear what those women had to say and I ended up getting tired of clicking on keys without feeling that they were contributing to the experience. (P14)

These statements could mean that the game did not work and/or that the documentary could have had the same message without it. However, the documentary game is called Deixa-me Falar! / Let Me Speak!. If at the end of the game, the players felt like they wanted to hear to what these women had to say, that is, let them speak, then the goal was achieved. The expectation of an immersed and passive experience was not the objective of the prototype, but rather a disruptive interruption that would break that immersion that is so characteristic of traditional cinema, and make the player act and get out of his comfort zone.

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Section D

When there is a game layer, we feel the theme “under the skin" because we are listening to a real person transmitting real experiences. The voices, when overlapping, make us have to act to hear what the person is saying, making the user feel the struggle that these women suffer daily. (P6)

In section D, most players agreed with the contribute of the game to the awareness of the subject. Nevertheless, it was relevant to understand the disadvantages of these types of experience, that is, of a documentary game.

Table 5.5 Table of advantages and disadvantages of a documentary game according to the participants involved. Advantages Disadvantages Interaction with the documentary game’s The possibility of not winning the game subject Creation of an immersive experience Lack of familiarity with this type of narrative More attentive viewers therefore more Games can be perceived as play and fiction, susceptible to get the message and not as something real and serious Empathy potential Can be a distracting experience Can educate effectively Can be repetitive The player can feel the subject in the first Can be frustrating person Participation and agency of the spectator which Risk of players not knowing how to play or motivates him not being familiar with games Spectator as part of the story Can be disruptive to the experience

Giving the user an active position and some level of agency and participation causes the feeling of belonging in the story and not just an observer. The progress and obstacles of the documentary characters become the user’s progress as well. The user’s emotional involvement and interest in the topic to be discussed is amplified. (P4)

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Section E The last section of the questionnaire received a lot of positive feedback of the experience.

The experience as a whole was innovative and interesting. Even though I was unable to win the game, playing a documentary made me aware of the subject matter. Maybe an alternative where you can see the entire documentary even if you lose the game. Something like "new game ", where even after losing the game I can restart with the full story. I think that the topic addressed is of extreme importance not only to Portugal, but to society as a whole. The way it was approached, giving space to the voices of those who suffer from prejudices, and the dynamics of the game, bringing external noises to the private and intimate environment of people, caused a great impact. I hope to find more experiences like this. (P4)

I really enjoyed this experience. The subject touches me a lot for being a woman. But it touches even more because despite being a woman, I am white, which is something in my favor in this society that continues to privilege whites, men and everything that is heteronormative. For this reason, I feel helpless alongside women who belong to marginalized groups. Because they already suffer enough because they are women and suffer even more because they are black, fat, transgender and so on. Their voices lose even more value than mine, in the eyes of society, simply because they have a different skin tone and because they do not comply with the supposed standards of beauty. (P20)

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5.6 Considerations

Despite some players not completing the documentary, the message still got through and they understood the argument, critique and intentions of the documentary game. Those who didn’t make it until the end experienced a variation of the procedural rhetoric of failure: it’s possible but the player couldn’t win. Which does not annul the rhetoric of collaboration since the player knows that in order to get to end of the documentary has to make an effort to win the game. Nevertheless, the text from the game over page could be improved to motivate the player even more so he does not give up and tries again instead. Despite the lack of experience with interactive documentaries or interactive narratives in general, the players were able to understand how the documentary game worked. The intensity and tension in the last minute of the documentary’s layer resulted as a surprise effort for the player making her even more actively involved, focused on the game and challenged. The previous mouths were relatively easy to fight against, since the player had to wait until the end of the audio for the letter to come up, but when the letters started to automatically generate, the player had to react immediately to more and more mouths, which increased the difficulty and rhythm of the game. Making the player obliged to hear the mouths until the end made the game more frustrating, especially when the player had to restart the game in order to win it, and although the players complained about that frustration, they also associated it with the subject and meaning behind the documentary game and its mechanics. The choice of protagonists contributed to the success of the experience, since the participants mentioned how interested they were in their stories and work, which also made them want to hear the full interview. Deixa-me Falar! is not a simulation, as in Frasca’s simulation rhetoric, but it uses a system that generates similar feelings of discomfort and frustration that the protagonists feel, but in a more abstract way that creates a space for individual reflection and interpretation. Overall, it was a successful experience which generated curiosity and interest among the participants both for the content and form, and it accomplished the goals of the project.

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PART 3 – CONCLUSIONS

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6. Conclusions

6.1 Documentary game: a proposed definition

Documentary games differ from interactive documentaries in the sense that the former doesn’t use interaction or gamification as a way of traversing the text, but rather uses the unique features of games such as procedural rhetoric as part of the narrative, argument and/or critique. This way, instead of affecting the disposition of the text, it affects the text itself and creates meaning beyond a representational level and narrative. It’s not about making the player choose between paths and optional narrative threads, but make the player do a non-trivial effort to traverse it. It’s not about watching a representation of a subject, it’s about creating and living an experience that will make the player infer meaning and interpret messages that come from his own actions (play performance) and not from words or images.

6.2 Summary

In the end, this dissertation accomplished the main objectives of research and each phases’ objectives: The first phase – the literature review – was a long yet crucial step in order to find the ingredients needed for the final prototype. The second phase – the exploratory studies – was a process of recognizing patterns, which provided the procedural rhetoric typology that ended up being determinant to the conception of Deixa-me Falar!. The third phase – the project – was a process of experimentation with the selected ingredients taken from phase 1, and the formulated possibilities and typology of phase 2. The process of creating a 23 minute long documentary was a learning experience that required a lot of steps, decisions and phases during the pre-production, production and post-production. And the fourth and last phase – the review – was important to consolidate everything that was proposed and argued. The feedback from the tests provided insight and interesting conclusions of the final product.

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6.3 Final Considerations and Contributions

There are several contributions in this research that can generate discussion and some conclusions:

• A proposed definition for documentary games Despite the blurriness regarding the definition of documentary and the definition of interactive documentaries verified in the literature review section, the process of creating a documentary game provided an understanding about what a documentary can be. Which means that finding and defining possibilities of how documentary games can be use, can be a way of building its definition and limits.

• A distinction between documentary games, traditional documentaries and interactive documentaries Related to the previous point, this work towards the definition of a documentary game’s identity contributes simultaneously to a clearer distinction between traditional documentaries, interactive documentaries and documentary games, and that distinction is based on how we can differently use the three.

• A procedural rhetoric typology to produce critique The six types of procedural rhetoric typology to produce critique that was proposed and analysed in this investigation contributes to an understanding of the multiple uses and possibilities of procedural rhetoric, which can be helpful for game designers and contributes to the study of game’s rhetoric.

• Procedural rhetoric of collaboration The procedural rhetoric of collaboration is a new proposal of procedural rhetoric that was not found in any of the analysed games.

• A case studies analysis The selection of games that were analysed in this investigation contributes to the body of work in procedural rhetoric.

• A documentary game Deixa-me Falar! is an example of a documentary game that can be further discussed and analysed as a case study or a means to develop the conversation around the field of documentary games.

• The process behind the creation of a documentary game The process of creation of the documentary game dissected in this dissertation can be helpful for filmmakers and game designers who are interested in creating documentary games, critical games, or games in general.

• Contributions for the study of documentary games As an underveloped field of research, this dissertation can contribute to the further investigation and interest in the field of the documentary game, that is, for the emancipation of the documentary game as a new genre.

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• Games as tools to produce critique Alongside the work that has been done in the field of critical games, this dissertation reinforces the possibility of games being used as effective tools that can produce critique creatively.

• A new narrative form for documentary A documentary game is an alternative narrative model to the representational narrative. It adds rules, play performance and actions to the documentary’s narrative and it can open doors to new ways of constructing meaning and representing reality and actuality.

• Social impact of the documentary game Deixa-me Falar! contributes to the awareness of the lack of women’s voice in the media and how wrongly represented black, fat and trans woman are. The specific context and examples provided of Portugal’s media landscape is something that has not been done before. This work can contribute to the discussion of these problems, and it can be particularly useful and important within the context that we are currently living, that is, the increase of far right discourses and behaviors that are taking place in Portugal, Europe and the world, which are harming marginalized groups of people, and particularly women.

6.4 Limitations

The fact that the documentary game is not a broadly known and agreed concept with a body of research and creative works that can be used as case studies and further analysis made this dissertation a challenge. The literature review part of the dissertation became an essential step in order to unfold the rest of the investigation, and it required a tight selection of concepts, since we were working with such complex fields as documentaries and games. The lack of knowledge on my behalf regarding games also made me need a lot of time to learn and be familiar with these concepts like procedural rhetoric and ergodic media. Creating a documentary game and this investigation in the middle of a world health crisis that limited transportation, contact with people, access to spaces and materials, and made huge impacts on people’s personal lives, caused this dissertation project to undergo a lot of changes, adaptations and postponements throughout the year. The research methodology initially planned consisted of workshop sessions with specialists, as well as debates and interviews with the them, in order to co-create the final prototype and come up with concepts related to the documentary game that could be further explored. This methodology had to be adapted due to quarantine and social contact restrictions, and an individual process of research and exploration was carried out.

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The instability regarding time, availability and the future caused a constant process of re- adaptation and re-evaluation of the investigation and project, which took a considerable amount of time in itself. The evaluation and tests phase was initially planned as an iterative process with multiple prototypes of documentary games. Those prototypes would represent different concepts and ways of creating a documentary game, and they would be fairly short with only 2 or 3 minutes. However, with the involvement in the project and its subject, a 23 minute long prototype was created in order to make a final product that could be seen as an actual documentary game, and not only as a proof of concept or an incomplete prototype. The process of making the documentary game ended up being a different learning experience from the initial plan, and it allowed the documentary to exist outside the academic context. Regarding the instruments of evaluation, the questionnaire was the most practical, secure (in terms of health) and time effective way of testing the documentary game. The initial plan was to personally interview a reduced number of specialists (qualitative approach), but it was adapted to a broader audience in a model that contained both closed and open questions to develop, which resulted in a simultaneously qualitative and quantitave approach. Not having a team to shoot the documentary also affected its quality of image and sound, however, being the only person involved with the process made the protagonists of the documentary feel comfortable and secure in terms of health and trust. The pre-production process of the documentary where I had to invite and schedule the protagonists was a longer process than usual due to their availability (summer holidays and covid), and to the fact the they were not familiar with what documentary game consisted of. Additionally, casting a trans woman was the hardest part of the pre-production phase. Trans women are such a marginalized group that most trans women that I talked to suffered from bad experiences with the media where they had been explored and represented in such a harmful way that it was hard for them to trust being on camera again. This ended up being a problem, so much so that I doubted proceeding with the documentary’s subject. However, I soon realised that the motives for doing it became even more evident – I wanted to give voice to these women and report the problem in a critical way, and the difficulty encountered in finding someone to talk about it proved how deeply rooted the problem actually was, therefore the urgency to make this documentary. The Black Lives Matter Movement also impacted the urgency to talk about these issues and create awareness. To summarize, despite the difficulties, adversities and unforeseen events that affected and shaped this investigation throughout the year, the end result brought new and different perspectives that were also not planned and that fulfilled the same objectives of research, which

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proves how an investigation about documentary games can be performed using different approaches.

6.5 Future Work

Being an underdeveloped field of research, documentary games have a lot of potential to further investigation and development, and here are some proposals of future work:

• Creation and exploration of different modes of documentary games We reviewed Nichol’s modes of documentary as well as Gaudenzi’s modes of interactive documentaries, so it would make sense to create the modes of documentary games in the future. While also exploring the existing modes and adapt them to a documentary game, like Deixa-me Falar! did with Nichol’s expository mode. Can we make a documentary game inspired by Nichol’s reflexive mode, or Gaudenzi’s experiential mode?

• Development of documentary games that use different types of games and technologies For the creation of the documentary game Unity software was used in order to make a digital game, but documentary games could be created under different formats such as mobile games or analog games. And use other technologies like profiling systems, arduino sensory systems, augmented reality or virtual reality.

• Further exploration and experimentation of the other types of procedural rhetoric This investigation proposes six different types of procedural rhetoric but certaintly there are more types to discover and analyse. That exploration and experimentation can create more possibilities for documentary games, as well as newsgames and critical games.

• Exploration of the use of documentary games as educational tools Some of the participants who tested the documentary game mentioned how it would be interesting to use it in schools as an instrument of education. Using documentary games as a learning tool could be an effective choice since it would make the students participate and play in a non-passive and expository way.

• Further exploration of the use of documentary games as a form of social criticism and activism The documentary game created had a strong activist agenda and seeing how impactful it turned out to be on the tests, opens interest to explore it with different subjects that intend to produce critique, social awareness and motivate activism.

• More documentary games! It would be incredible to see more people who have a cinema or documentary film background to work with games and learn from it. Usually there’s a big gap between the two fields but with the growing interest in games, I hope more people start seeing documentary games as a new and exciting way of expression.

Deixa-me Falar! will be shown at the Shortcutz Film Festival and possibly at other film festivals in the near future. The prototype will be adapted to a multiplayer game where people

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from the audience can play together, which is another way of exploring the procedural rhetoric of collaboration. This will be an interesting experimentation and it raises the question: Can documentary games have space in movie theatres?

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References

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Filmography

18 Days in Egypt. 2011. Jigar Mehta, Yasmin Elayat. 34 North 118 West. 2011. Jeff Knowlton, Naomi Spellman, Jeremy Hight. Aspen Movie Map. 1978. Andrew Lippman. Battleship Potemkin. 1926. Sergei Eisenstein. Burning. 2018. Lee Chang-dong. Composition in Blue. 1935. Oskar Fischinger. Crumb. 1995. Terry Zwigoff. Drifters. 1929. John Grierson. Far from Poland. 1984. Jill Godmilow. Immemory. 1997. Chris Marker. It’s Elementary: Gay Issues in School. 1996. Debra Chasnoff, Helen S. Cohen. Koyaanisqatsi. 1982. Godfrey Reggio. Nanook of the North. 1925. Robert J. Flaherty. Planeta Galata. 2011. Florian Thalhofer. Portrait of Jason. 1967. Shirley Clarke. Réponse des Femmes: Notre Corps, Notre Sexe. 1975. Agnès Varda. Salesman. 1969. Albert Maysles, Charlotte Zwerin, David Maysles. Samsara. 2011. Ron Fricke. Sleep. 1964. Andy Warhol. Stories to Tell. 2012. Sarah Polley. Thank You for Playing. 2017. Andréa Cohen-Boulakia, Dominic Desjardins. The Man with a Movie Camera. 1929. Dziga Vertov. The Society of the Spectacle. 1973. Guy Debord. Tongues United. 1989. Marlon Riggs. Walden: Diaries, Notes and Sketches. 1968. Jonas Mekas. Ways of Seeing. 1972. John Berger. Workers Leaving the Lumière Factory. 1895. Louis Lumière.

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Ludography

Animal Crossing. 2001. Nintendo. At-Risk. 2017. Kognito. Bioshock. 2007. Levine, Ken. Boeing 787 Dreamliner. 2009. Boeing. Challenger. 1986. USA Today. Crickler. 2004. Michael and Barbara Crick. Cosmo Quiz. Cosmopolitan Magazine. Cutthroat Capitalism: The Game. 2009. The Wired. Dogness. 2018. Pedercini, Paolo. Dragon’s Lair. 1983. Dyer, Rick; Bluth, Don. Faith Fighter. 2008. Molleindustria. Faith Fighter 2. 2009. Molleindustria. Fallout 3. 2008. Bethesda Game Studios. Far Cry 2. 2008. Ubisoft. Food Import Folly. 2007. Persuasive Games. Go. -2200. Chinese boardgame. Half-Life. 1998. Valve. Hothead Zidane. 2006. Alberto Zanot. JFK Reloaded. 2004. Traffic Games. Layoff!. 2009. Mary Flanagan. Madrid. 2004. Frasca, Gonzalo. McDonalds Videogame. 2006. Molleindustria. Monopoly. 1935. Magie Lizzie. Darrow, Charles. Myst. 1993. Miller, Robyn; Miller, Rand. Oil God. 2006. Bogost, Ian. PeaceMaker. 2006. ImpactGames. Phone Story. 2011. Pineschi, Michael. Pedercini, Paolo. Plants vs Zombies. 2009. PopCap Games. Points of Enty. 2007. Persuasive Games. Presidential Primary Delegate Tracker. 2008. USA Today. Scoop. 2007. Red Mercury. September 12th. 2003. Frasca, Gonzalo. Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic. 2003. Bioware Super Mario. 1985. Nintendo. Take Intern Juli’s Advanced Emauel Brothers Personality Test from Hell. 2008. Wonkette. The Berlin Wall. 2008. Garrymods. The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion. 2006. Bethesda Game Studios. The Political Compass. 2001.

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The Sims. 2000. Maxis. Star Wars. 1983. Hally, Mike. Atari. World of Warcraft. 2004. Blizzard Entertainment.

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Appendix

A. Production Folder

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B. Game Assets

Fig. 6.1 Reference for the final menu.

Fig. 6.2 Instructions lettering in black with hover in white.

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Fig. 6.3 Game title as start the game button.

Fig. 6.5 Game title with hover.

Fig. 6.4 About lettering in black with hover in white.

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Fig. 6.6 Background.

About

Fig. 6.7 Reference for the final about page.

Fig. 6.8 Text for about section.

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Fig. 6.9 Return lettering button in black with hover in white.

Game Over

Fig. 6.10 Reference for the final game over page.

Fig. 6.11 Try again lettering button in black with hover in white.

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Fig. 6.12 Exit lettering button in black with hover in white.

Fig. 6.13 Game over illustration.

Fig. 6.14 Game over text.

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Instructions

Fig. 6.15 Reference for the final instructions page.

Fig. 6.16 Instructions text.

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Pause Menu

Fig. 6.17 Pause text.

Fig. 6.18 Keep watching lettering button in black with

hover in white.

Fig. 6.19 Return to the menu lettering in black with hover in white.

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Sprites of the mouths

Fig. 6.20 Mouth sprites.

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C. Game Guidelines and Script

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D. Questionnaire Summary

A .Perfil do Participante

1. Indique a área que lhe é mais familiar:

3 12% 10 Jogos 40% Documentário

12 Narrativas Interactivas 48%

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2. Indique o seu grau académico:

10 40% Licenciatura 15 Mestrado 60%

3. Indique o intervalo onde se insere a sua idade:

1 3 4%

12% 8 32% 19 - 24 anos 25 - 30 anos 31 - 36 anos 37 - 42 anos

13 52%

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B .Hábitos de Consumo do Participante

4. No seu dia a dia costuma jogar jogos? (digitais, tabuleiro, cartas, telemóvel, etc)

8 32% Sim Não 17 68%

4.1. Se respondeu sim, indique a frequência, tendo em conta que: 1- Raramente; 2- Ocasionalmente, menos de uma vez por semana; 3- Entre 1 a 3 vezes por semana; 4- Pelo menos 4 a 6 vezes por semana; 5- Todos os dias.

8 7 7 6 6 5 4 3 2 2 2 Número Número Respostas de 1 0 0 1 2 3 4 5 Escala de Frequência

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4.2. Se sim, que tipo de jogos joga com maior frequência?

1 6% Jogos digitais no 3 computador 18% 7 Jogos digitais no 41% telemóvel

Jogos em consolas (PS4, Nintendo Switch, etc)

Jogos analógicos 6 (tabuleiro, cartas, etc) 35%

4.3. Se sim, indique, aproximadamente, quantas horas por semana dedica a jogar.

0 0% 1 1 6% 6% 5 1 - 2 horas 2 29% 3 - 5 horas 12% 6 - 10 horas

11 - 15 horas

16 - 20 horas

8 Mais de 20 horas 47%

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5. Já experienciou um documentário interactivo antes?

2 8%

Sim Não

23 92%

5.1. Se sim, onde? (ex. National Film Board of Canada, Arte TV, contexto académico)

Contexto Académico National Film Board of Canada

5.2. Se sim, quais? (dê um ou mais exemplos)

Bear 71 Territories, The Journal of Insomnia

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6. Já experienciou conteúdos ficcionais interactivos antes?

6 24% Sim

Não 19 76%

6.1. Se sim, onde? (ex. Netflix)

Número de Resposta Participantes 17 Netflix 1 Twine 1 Jogos da Telltale 1 Youtube 1 Jogo 1 Videoclip 1 Playstation 1 (Sem resposta)

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6.2. Se sim, quais? (dê um ou mais exemplos)

Número de Resposta Participantes 13 Black Mirror: Bandersnatch 1 Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt 1 Heavy Rain 1 Detroit: Become Human 1 Jogos da Telltale 1 Rob Scallon’s “Pick an Instrument” 2 (Sem resposta)

C .Experiência do Documentário-Jogo “Deixa-me Falar”

7. Qual é o tema do documentário-jogo “Deixa-me Falar” (2020)?

P1 Crítica Social em representação das mulheres. P2 A falta de voz e representatividade de mulheres, com ênfase nas mulheres negras, trans e gordas. P3 Falta de representatividade e de visibilidade para mulheres. P4 A falta do protagonismo para as pessoas que estão fora do padrão homem-cis hétero, branco e "fitness". P5 Dar voz às mulheres. P6 A luta das mulheres que fogem dos padrões impostos pela sociedade para serem ouvidas. P7 A importância da "voz" e da opinião feminina. P8 O documentário-jogo mostra-nos como a estrutura de comunicação moderna nos impede de ouvir as vozes de mulheres pertencentes a minorias, que decidiram fazer o que lhes bem apetece sem terem de prestar declarações a ninguém. P9 Feminismo/emancipação feminina/ tem como objectivo mostrar que as mulheres (principalmente minorias) ainda são alvo de opressão diária seja direta ou indirectamente (ex. Falta de representação/ representação distorcida). P10 Representação errada e não diversificada das mulheres. P11 Igualdade Humana. P12 Feminismo. P13 O papel da mulher na sociedade e as atrocidades que vão experienciando no quotidiano.

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P14 A opressão das mulheres. Especialmente mulheres gordas, negras e transexuais P15 Falta de representatividade de 3 grupos de mulheres: negras, trans e gordas. P16 Desigualdade entre homens e mulheres. P17 Papel das mulheres nos média. P18 Abordar a maneira como certos estereótipos são vistos e vivenciados. P19 Passar mensagem às pessoas da opressão que as mulheres sofrem pelos média e pela sociedade, nomeadamente as mulheres negras, obesas e transsexuais. P20 A representatividade das mulheres nos midia. P21 Feminismo. P22 ''Deixa-me Falar'' aborda a falta da voz, espaço e representatividade feminina no media. Dá espaço a três testemunhos de mulheres que não são representadas na TV do dia-a-dia por não suprirem o padrão normativo da sociedade por questões raciais, identidade de género e físicas e com estes testemunhos pretende formular uma critica social. P23 É um documentário que denuncia a falta de voz das mulheres, sobretudo, das mulheres negras, mulheres trans e mulheres gordas. P24 Representatividade. P25 A representação das mulheres, nas suas diversas formas, nos media.

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8. Conseguiu passar o jogo à primeira tentativa?

3,2 28% Sim

Não 8,2 72%

8.1 Se não, indique quantas tentativas realizou.

0 0 0% 0%

4 22% 2 tentativas 8 3 tentativas 45% 4 tentativas 5 tentativas 6 Mais de 5 tentativas 33%

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9. Indique como se sentiu enquanto jogava o documentário-jogo, segundo a seguinte escala: 1- Nada; 2- Um pouco; 3- Moderadamente; 4- Bastante; 5- Extremamente.

A I was interested in the game’s story B I felt successful C I felt bored D I found it impressive E I forgot everything around me F I felt frustrated G I found it tiresome H I fel irritable I I felt skillful J I felt completely absorbed K I felt content L I felt challenged M I had to put a lot of effort into it N I felt good

1. Not at all 2. A little 3. Moderately 4. A lot 5. Extremely

Competence/ Competência: B, I; Sensory and imaginative immersion/ Imersão sensorial e imaginativa: A, D; Flow: E, J; Tension/ Tensão: F, H; Challenge/ Desafio: L, M; Negative affect/ Efeito negativo: C, G; Positive affect/ Efeito positivo: K, N.

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12 10 8 6 4 2 0 A B C D E F G H I J K L M N 1 0 6 10 1 3 2 6 4 6 2 10 0 2 3 2 0 7 4 4 4 1 9 4 4 2 5 3 3 5 3 1 6 1 3 7 6 3 4 8 10 2 2 3 9 4 8 0 2 8 2 5 0 5 1 2 1 9 8 1 5 11 0 2 3 2 5 1 2 0 3 1 4 3 1

1 2 3 4 5

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10. Indique como se sentiu depois de ter terminado de jogar o documentário, segundo a seguinte escala: 1- Nada; 2- Um pouco; 3- Moderadamente; 4- Bastante; 5- Extremamente.

A I felt relieved B I felt bad C I found it hard to get back to reality D I felt guilty E It felt like a victory F I found it a waste of time G I felt energised H I felt satisfied I I felt desoriented J I felt exhausted K I felt that I could have done more useful things L I felt powerful M I felt weary N I felt regret O I felt ashamed P I felt proud Q I had the sense that I had returned from a journey

1. Not at all 2. A little 3. Moderately 4. A lot 5. Extremely

Positive experience/ Experiência positiva: A, E, G, H, L, P; Negative experience/ Experiência negativa: B, D, F, K, N, O; Tiredness/Cansaço: J, M; Returning to Reality: Volta à realidade: C, I, Q.

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18 16 14 12 10 8 6 4 2 0 A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q 1 3 9 13 8 10 17 9 6 11 10 6 13 11 13 13 9 10 2 5 1 3 2 5 1 4 5 5 4 4 2 6 0 3 5 2 3 7 4 4 6 3 2 4 4 2 2 5 3 1 4 3 2 3 4 2 5 0 4 2 0 2 4 1 2 4 2 2 1 0 2 2 5 3 2 0 0 0 0 0 1 1 0 1 0 0 1 1 0 1

1 2 3 4 5

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11. Avalie a eficácia da mensagem do documentário-jogo, sendo 1- Nada eficaz; 2- Pouco eficaz; 3- Nem eficaz nem ineficaz; 4- Eficaz; 5- Muito eficaz.

18 16 16 14

12 10 8 6 6 4 2 Número Número Respostas de 1 2 0 0 1 2 3 4 5 Escala de Eficácia

1 0 4% 0% 1- Nada eficaz 2 6 8% 24% 2 - Pouco eficaz

3- Nem eficaz nem ineficaz 4- Eficaz 16 64% 5- Muito eficaz

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12. Avalie a pertinência das mecânicas de jogo utilizadas em relação ao tema do documentário. Sendo 1- Nada pertinente; 2- Pouco pertinente; 3- Nem pertinente nem impertinente; 4- Pertinente; 5- Muito pertinente.

12 10 10 8 8

6 5 4

Número Número Respostas de 2 1 1

0 1 2 3 4 5 Escala de Pertinência

1 1 1- Nada pertinente 4% 4%

5 2- Pouco pertinente 10 20% 40% 3- Nem pertinente nem impertinente 4- Pertinente

8 5- Muito pertinente 32%

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12.1 Justifique.

P1 É de facto frustrante querer calar as vozes, querer ouvir as histórias/testemunhos destas pessoas incríveis e não conseguir! Faz pensar que isto realmente acontece no quotidiano e pouco fazemos para silenciar estas vozes. Se mais pessoas jogassem o jogo, mais mentes iriam mudar! P2 As mecânicas transmitem que para se fazerem ouvir, estas mulheres precisam de realizar um grande esforço. P3 Considero muito pertinente porque é uma representação prática e fácil de ser entendida sobre a situação cotidiana de muitas mulheres. Mesmo com muito esforço, foi impraticável silenciar as vozes externas. P4 O doc jogo expõem o tema e os problemas sociais de maneira clara e humanizada. Entretanto não deixa claro um caminho para algum tipo de melhora do cenário atual. Essas pessoas são marginalizadas, estereotipadas e silenciadas e a sensação que fica é que as coisas serão desta maneira. A sociedade irá permanecer como está. As mecânicas são simples e com o crescente aumento dos ruídos, tornam-se frustrantes. Penso ser proposital, entretanto por haver apenas um tipo de mecânica, fiquei com a impressão que há apenas uma forma de combater as vozes e esta forma é pouco eficaz. P5 Eu cheguei ao fim do jogo na primeira tentativa mas mesmo assim estava pouco à nora como jogar e nem sei bem como o fiz. P6 Ao clicar na tecla várias vezes para "calar uma boca" assemelha-se à forma como a luta é feita através da insistência para que estas mulheres sejam ouvidas, através de diversos meios. P7 A dificuldade em acertar nas letras na altura em que os inimigos começam a aparecer com mais frequência testa a resistência de cada "jogador" perante a situação, se o ele ou ela continuar apesar da abundância na quantidade de bocas, então ele/ela está a esforçar se para combater essas ações e ouvir as vozes das protagonistas. P8 Durante o segmento com mecânicas de jogo percebi a simbologia por de trás das mesmas mas quase que preferia continuar a ouvir o discurso das entrevistadas. O aparecimento de muitas bocas barulhentas frustrou-me por não conseguir ouvir o principal mas talvez possa fazer parte da experiência. P9 Achei pertinente como obviamente uma metafora, mas talvez de vez em quando, um exagero Não deixando ouvir o que as mulheres estão a dizer (o que é também um bocado contraditório). Ainda assim, percebi a ideia e o objectivo. Parabéns pela iniciativa! P10 A frustração das vozes em cima das pessoas que tentamos ouvir e o alivio assim que conseguimos tirá-las funciona bem. P11 Tinha que se acertar na letra correta enquanto o alfabeto (suponho) aparecia de forma acelerada, no meu entender a velocidade imposta simboliza a persistência dos indivíduos

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com fobias a pessoas pesadas, de outras raças, transsexuais, etc., enquanto que a ação de clicar numa letra no momento certo significa que nós como seres humanos refutamos as falas deles e ponhamos um ponto final aos argumentos desses tipos de pessoas. Quantos mais indivíduos com tais qualidades aparecem, se não se fizer nada, as atitudes continuarão, dai GAME OVER. P12 Hummmmm.... dificil explicar. achei o conceito fantástico, e como protótipo está excelente. atribui 3 pois achei q o jogo poderia estar dividido em níveis para quando se tem de repetir. P13 Achei interessante o facto das mecanicas serem dificeis de usar para tentar derrotar o jogo fazendo com que fosse complicado "calar as vozes". P14 Acho que a forma como o documentário começou foi bastante interessante., os contextos foram introduzidos muito bem os sketches criaram bastante impacto. No entanto quando começou o overlay das vozes e a necessidade de as parar sinto que interrompeu completamente a experiência que estava a ter. Sentia-me envolvido a ouvir aquelas mulheres a falar. A introdução das mecânicas de jogo pareceu-me simplesmente "gimmick", tirando-me completamente da imersão do documentário. Senti-me irritado e frustrado porque desejava ouvir o que aquelas mulheres tinham a dizer e acabei por me fartar de estar a clicar em teclas sem sentir que estavam a contribuir para a experiência. P15 Não foi percetível o que era suposto fazer no jogo, que letra se devia pressionar... P16 Ajuda-nos a filtrar e escolher o que ouvir, assim como a distinguir ruído sonoro de assuntos que realmente importam. P17 Senti-me incapacitada de calar as vozes e essa mecânica foi uma otima forma de representar aquilo que as mulheres sentem face ao criticismo e preconceitos representados pelos midia. P18 Ideia interessante. P19 Acho que as mecânicas do jogo e a sua narrativa estão muito bem pensadas, porem um pouco difíceis de jogar à primeira e o conjunto de sons que aparece por vezes pode-se tornar bastante alto para quem está a usar headphones. P20 Representam muito bem aquilo que as mulheres, principalmente as mulheres em questão, sentem perante o criticismo feito pelos midia (e sociedade) em volta delas: o cansaço. Estão cansadas de serem estereotipadas de forma incorreta, seja por pertencerem a grupos marginalizados ou por, simplesmente, serem mulheres. P21 Acredito que uma experiência interativa crie uma empatia muito maior no espectador. P22 Achei as referencias pertinentes e uma boa pesquisa de exemplos sobre o que se tratava o documentário. P23 É interessante abordar o tema num documentario jogo, fazendo com que sejamos nós a tomar iniciativa de dar voz a pessoas que são esquecidas no nosso país. Faz-nos ter consciência da realidade paralela em que vivemos diariamente.

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P24 Parece-me pertinente ao fator de que, ao mesmo tempo em que algumas vozes buscam fazer-se ouvidas em sua busca por representatividade e sem buscar o confronto, os opositores da ideia, elevam o tom de voz para embater esse tipo de "discussão", numa tentativa de calar quem busca ser ouvid. P25 As letras demoravam um pouco a aparecer para fazê-las desaparecer, mas pela metáfora que se pretende passar, acho que em parte foi adequado.

D .O Documentário enquanto forma Narrativa e de Documentarismo

13. Como acha que a condição de vitória do jogo (o jogador tem obrigatoriamente de derrotar as bocas para vencer e aceder ao 3ºato do documentário) contribui para a crítica social subjacente a este documentário?

P1 Uma pessoa tem de ser activista! P2 Não fui capaz de vencer o jogo. P3 Para mim, remete às dificuldades de ascensão vividas por mulheres de grupos minoritários. P4 Não consegui vencer as vozes. A mim ficou a sensação de não ter como vencer. P5 Abafar outras vozes para dar voz às mulheres. P6 Só através de uma batalha difícil é que atinge o objetivo definido. P7 Contribui tanto pelo conteúdo que apresentam como pela dificuldade em serem eliminadas. P8 Percebo que um indivíduo tenha de lutar e ser ativo para filtrar todo o "lixo" e chegar ao que realmente interessa - seja na vida real ou neste jogo. P9 - P10 - P11 Se o jogador vencer as bocas, significa que ele apoia e quer ouvir as vozes principais que tentam defender a humanidade. Se ele/ela perder, então não se esforça para calar as bocas (inimigos) ou então não quer ouvir as vozes principais. P12 Boa metáfora, passa a mensagem. No entanto, acho que poderia ter um desfecho diferente quando há o game over - e não ser o obrigado a jogar o mesmo jogo outra vez. Passar parta "outro jogo". P13 Acho que contribui bastante pois não é facil ter-se voz quando se trata de temos complexos em que a sociedade ainda não está habituada a ter. E portanto só com muito esforço é que é possivel passar à frente e criar pensamento critico e a abertura de um pensamento diferente. P14 Acho que não contribuiu em nada.

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P15 Através desta dinâmica, consegui sentir a frustração das vozes que não se fazem ouvir porque têm de "derrotar as bocas para vencer", por isso a condição de vitória contribui positivamente para a crítica social. P16 Não consegui ganhar. P17 Não ganhei. P18 Não sei. P19 Porque simboliza bastante como as pessoas não deixam e nem ligam ao que as pessoas oprimidas exprimem. P20 Infelizmente tentei 4 vezes e não consegui ganhar em nenhuma delas. Por isso não consigo responder a esta questão. P21 Depois ter derrotado as bocas ter ficado a conhecer o trabalho das mulheres que participaram e o que fazem para combater o preconceito e julgamento que sofrem nas suas próprias vidas e das vidas de quem representam. P22 As bocas emitem audios reais do ponto onde o documentario quer chegar exemplificando de forma muito clara e tirando a voz a quem devia ser ouvido porque na vida real é o que acontece. P23 Mostra que nos cabe a nós ter iniciativa de parar com a discriminação e a dar voz a quem precisa. P24 Contribui pelo simples fato de perceber onde se pode chegar ao dar voz a pessoas como as personagens do documentário. P25 É difícil calar estas vozes tão poderosas e preponderantes na nossa sociedade, e que por vezes em vez de combateres estigmas, ainda os perpetuam.

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14. Qual considera ter sido o contributo da camada de jogo para a sensibilização do tema? Justifique.

P1 Mesma resposta anterior. P2 A mecânica exemplificou a problemática abordada. P3 Contribui em termos de empatia. Do jogador obrigatoriamente ter que viver aquilo para prosseguir. P4 Penso que a adicção de mecânicas de um videojogo para progredir no documentário demostram, em algum nível, o esforço necessário que as pessoas entrevistadas devem fazer para terem seus espaços respeitados. P5 Tentar focar o utilizador. P6 Ao haver uma camada de jogo, sentimos o tema "na pele" pois estamos a ouvir uma pessoa real a transmitir experiências reais. As vozes, ao sobreporem-se, fazem com que nós tenhamos de atuar para ouvirmos o que a pessoa está a dizer, fazendo com que o utilizador sinta a luta que estas mulheres sofrem diariamente. P7 Ajudar a transmitir a mensagem pela dificuldade em "calar" as vozes. P8 Criar um elemento de ação e de frustração pode levar sentimentos semelhantes das entrevistadas ao jogador. P9 A frustração que a pessoa sente quando não consegue ouvir está interligada com o que as mulheres sentem no dia a dia quando não conseguem falar, o que pode fazer com que o jogador se sinta mais perto dessa experiência. P10 A sensação de que está nas nossas mãos decidir quem vamos ouvir. P11 Suponho que serviu para perceber que em cada voz ativa existe sempre uma voz que a tenta diferir. P12 Passa a mensagem de que nao sendo uma luta pela qual eu sofra, também tenho de lutar por ela para o bem comum. P13 O jogo permitiu perceber que não é fácil "calar vozes" e ter uma janela de abertura para dar também opinião. P14 Penso que teve um efeito negativo. Parei de jogar devido ao mesmo sem intenção de voltar a jogar. P15 A camada de jogo é algo inovador, porque fomenta a discussão da crítica através da experiência do jogador depois do jogo. P16 Contribui para o foco de todos os que vêem. P17 Dar a entender ao jogador a dificuldade que as mulheres passam para ser ouvida. P18 Enfatiza bem a ideia, pois cria alguma tensão e permite acção perante a mesma. P19 Teve bastante contributo ao simular e ao falar de casos reais.

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P20 O engagement é maior por ser interativo. E como o tema é forte, o jogo faz com que o espetador se sinta responsável pela consequência dos seus atos, na luta contra o preconceito e o criticismo em torno das mulheres. P21 O sentimento de frustração para derrotar as bocas que pessoalmente achei desafiador. Para mim representou de uma maneira simbólica do mesmo sentimento de frustração que sentimos a lidar com comentários preconceituosos, misóginos e problemáticos que enfrentamos todos os dias. P22 Dar espaço a mulheres e voz a mulheres já é um contributo gigante a representatividade. P23 Torna o assunto mais interactivo, mais dinâmico. E acaba por, tal como na resposta anterior nos cabe a nos ter iniciativa de parar com a discriminação e a dar voz a quem precisa. P24 A depender de quem assiste ao jogo documentário, já na etapa do jogo, antes mesmo da vitória, quem jogador percebe o quanto de ruído há por cima das mensagens passadas pelas personagens/depoentes do documentário-jogo P25 É um contributo importante, justamente para dar a entender de calar estas vozes é um trabalho árduo.

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15. Que vantagens retira do uso dos jogos por parte do documentário?

P1 Uma pessoa interage com o tema. P2 A interação do jogador. P3 Mesmo da resposta acima. P4 Dar ao utilizador uma posição activa e algum nível de agência e participação causa a sensação de pertencimento na história e não apenas um observador. O progresso e obstáculos dos personagens do documentário torna-se o progresso do utilizador também. Amplifica-se o envolvimento emocional e o interesse do utilizador no tema a ser discutido. P5 Motivar as pessoas e passar melhor a mensagem. P6 Torna a experiência mais imersa, fazendo com que a mensagem seja passada mais facilmente. P7 Espectadores mais atentos e daí mais susceptíveis a captar a mensagem do documentário. P8 O elemento de interatividade por muitas vezes coloca o jogador num papel onde vive as experiências de outras pessoas/personagens ou uma experiência própria, talhada pelo programador. É uma nova camada a ser explorada e com um potencial tremendo para contar histórias. P9 Pode prender mais o visualizador. P10 A imersão do jogo ilude-nos as sensações que o documentário tenta transmitir. P11 Um bom meio de manter a pessoa motivada e interessada. P12 Permite evoluir na construção de uma ideia. P13 Achei interessante algumas das vozes porque contrastavam com o que estava a ser dito no questionário fazendo com que me questionasse. P14 Neste contexto não senti vantagem. P15 É dinâmico e novo, ajuda na concentração e ajuda a perceber a realidade criticada. P16 Ao ter de derrotar as bocas ficamos mais interessados no tema do documentário. P17 A intervenção da pessoa no documentário. P18 Enfatizar ideias. P19 Uma maior interatividade para com o documentário captando mais a atenção de quem está a observar. P20 Torna o documentário mais interessante e mais propício a sensibilizar e educar os espetadores, relativamente ao tema tratado. P21 A empatia que se cria com uma experiência mais envolvente usando os vários sentidos. P22 O paralelismo de nao ouvirmos os testemunhos por conta das bocas no jogo a situação real de mulheres por vezes não terem um espaço de fala (principalmente as minorias representadas). P23 A dinamização do tema. Esta dinamização permite-nos ter uma maior consciencialização da materia abordada P24 Imersão na situação vivida pelas personagens

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P25 Confesso que não sou muito fã da gamificação aplicado ao género de documentário, mas neste caso específico passa uma mensagem e ajuda nessa transmissão dessa mensagem.

16. Que desvantagens retira do uso dos jogos por parte do documentário?

P1 Nada. P2 O facto de não ter conseguido vencer. P3 A necessidade de interação pode ser uma desvantagem em alguns momentos. E a impossibilidade de escolher quais trechos exatos se quer assistir. P4 Condições de derrota de um jogo inibem o progresso no enredo do documentário e podem deixar a mensagem incompleta. A depender dessas condições, a derrota pode parecer a conclusão do documentário. Também deve-se considerar que um o uso de jogos em documentários não é usual e estar a esforçar-se para atravessar uma historia, que normalmente seria entregue sem barreiras, pode desestimular o progresso. P5 Não sei. P6 Algumas pessoas podem acreditar que se trata apenas de um jogo e não terem em conta a mensagem transmitida, porque podem pensar que se trata de ficção. P7 - P8 Se a interatividade for distrativa e empurrar o jogador para longe dos temas iniciais, passa a representar um problema. P9 Pode tornar-se repetitivo, se não for variando. P10 Um balanço desproporcional entre video e jogo pode frustar o espetador. P11 Nesta situação, foi somente as batidas repetidas que as teclas do teclado levaram. Com exceção a esse aspeto, nenhuma me vez a mente. P12 Apesar de passar uma boa "mensagem educativa", penso que retira a essencia etnografica do documentario -- documentar sem assumir uma parte. P13 Por vezes queria mesmo ouvir o que estava a ser dito e não conseguia derrotar as vozes. P14 Sinto que podem ser disruptivos para a experiência. P15 O facto de não ter percebido as instruções do jogo levou a que não conseguisse ver o documentário até ao fim, pelo que a mensagem ficou a meio. P16 Por muito que uma pessoa se possa concentrar no tema do documentário, pode também distrair-se com os elementos do jogo. P17 Nenhuma. P18 A execução. P19 Pode distrair. P20 Nenhuma.

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P21 Por ter sido um pouco desafiante pode criar desinteresse para quem não esta habituado a uma plataforma de jogo. P22 Às vezes era um pouco overwhelming. P23 Tendo em conta este documentário em específico, nenhuma. P24 A dinâmica é complicada, no sentido de que tive de apertar diversas vezes a mesma letra para eliminar cada uma das vozes. P25 Neste caso específico retira a atenção dos intervenientes, e quando a dificuldade do jogo aperta, torna-se difícil concentrar nos discursos deles.

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E .Comentário Livre sobre a Experiência

17. O que pensa da experiência realizada?

P1 Sendo um tema marcante é reconfortante saber que existem pessoas como a Joana a dar voz a quem precisa. P2 A temática é extremamente pertinente. A modalidade escolhida não é usual. Gostaria de ter a possibilidade de assistir ao documentário sem as componentes de jogo. P3 Penso que é um experimento relevante para conscientização sobre o tema e também como obra audiovisual. Uma sugestão é criar uma versão para telemóveis, pensando em outro tipo de interação que funcione no meio. P4 A experiência como um todo foi inovadora e interessante. Mesmo não conseguindo vencer o jogo, jogar um documentário sensibilizou-me para o tema tratado. Se calhar, uma alternativa onde consiga ver o documentário inteiro mesmo perdendo o jogo. Algo do género "new game", onde mesmo após perder o jogo posso reiniciar coma história completa. Penso que o tema tratado é de extrema importância não só a Portugal, mas sociedade toda. A forma como foi abordado, dar espaço as vozes de quem sofre os preconceitos, e a dinâmica do jogo, a trazer os ruídos externos para o âmbito privado e íntimo das pessoas, causou-me grande impacto. Espero encontrar mais experiências como esta. P5 Gostei bastante! Só não entendi bem como se jogava, foi meio aleatório, mas de resto gostei do documentário e dos exemplos usados. P6 Acho que a parte final pode ser um pouco complicada para quem não tenha um à vontade muito grande com o teclado. No entanto, gostei bastante, acho que sensibiliza bem para o tema em questão. P7 10/10, boa forma de transmitir a mensagem que quer transmitir. P8 Uma experiência interessante com um resultado inesperado, proveniente do elemento "interação", e que ajuda a cimentar a mensagem pretendida. P9 Uma boa ideia, e um ótimo tema. P10 Tópico importante e bem ligado com a experiência do jogo, com possibilidades de explorar mais este formato que me deixou bastante curioso. P11 Um bom método de criar ouvintes e responder a perguntas de forma interativa. P12 Adorei. P13 Foi interessante, e penso que pode ser divulgada pelas redes sociais etc para chamar mais pessoas a pensar sobre o assunto. P14 Penso que a ideia de usar elementos de jogos pode ser interessante, no entanto sinto que a interferirem com a mensagem a ser passada podem gerar efeitos negativos. Apesar de os

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elementos do jogo fazerem referência à opressão senti que eles se tornaram opressivos e afastaram-me de querer progredir na experiência. P15 No geral, foi uma experiência interessante apesar de me ter acrescentado pouco ao que já sabia, principalmente por não ter terminado o jogo. P16 Foi uma experiência diferente, com um tema muito interessante que merece protagonismo nos dias que correm e gostei de ter feito parte. P17 Interessante. P18 Ideia muito interessante que devia ser mais explorada. P19 Apesar de necessitar de algumas correções a nível de performance, o jogo aparenta ser uma boa opção para ser adaptado para vários documentários. P20 Apreciei muito esta experiência. O tema toca-me muito, por ser mulher. Mas toca ainda mais porque apesar de ser mulher, sou branca, o que é algo a meu favor nesta sociedade que continua a privilegiar os brancos, os homens e tudo aquilo que é heteronormativo. Por isso, sinto-me impotente ao lado das mulheres que pertencem a grupos marginalizados. Porque já sofrem o suficiente por serem mulheres e sofrem ainda mais por serem negras, gordas, transgénero e etc. As suas vozes perdem ainda mais valor do que a minha, aos olhos da sociedade, simplesmente por terem um tom de pele diferente e por não cumprirem de acordo com os supostos padrões de beleza. P21 Adorei, espero ter a oportunidade que experienciar mais documentários em plataforma de jogo. P22 Gostei, nunca tinha experimentado um documentario interativo principalmente um jogo. Achei inteligente o tema ao título. P23 Que deveria ser aproveitada e mais desenvolvida. Excelente experiência. P24 Achei bastante interessante. É uma dinâmica que poderia ser elevada para escolas, também com outros temas de fundo. É possível aprender sobre a necessidade de ouvir através deste tipo de experiência. P25 Apesar de não ter vencido as vozes, pretendo continuar a fazê-lo até calá-las, tanto no documentário como na vida real!

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