Tuesday, November 11, 2014
Bound and Headed for Execution or: The Beginning
Welcome, welcome Nords and Khajits alike. If you are on this site you are probably already familiar with the popular game Skyrim from Bethesda Games that was released November 11, 2011. If not, let me give you a brief overview of the game. The game opens with the main character awakening in the back of a wagon, as the game is set in a fantasy world based loosely on the medieval period, to find his or her hands bound along with several other prisoners. You quickly discover that the main character has been caught in a raid meant to capture the leader of a group called the stormcloaks, a rebel group entrenched in civil war. As the four of you that were captured are led to your execution by beheading a dragon appears and destroys the city and the main character narrowly escapes. During this sequence the player is able to create their customized character from 7 races: Wood Elf, High Elf, Nord, Imperial, Orc, Khajit (cat people), and Argonians (lizard people). The rest of the game is played in an open world, which means that the character can roam the country of skyrim and talk to people in any order to discover quests. However, there are two main story lines that the player can follow. The first main storyline involves the main player choosing a side of the civil war and helping them win the war. The second storyline revolves around the dragons return to skyrim. The main character finds out that he or she is the legendary dragonborn, a person who can consume the souls of dragons and use their power.
While navigating through this website, look for the discussion of the principles of digitality at work in the various pages. The principles highlighted are taken from a text by Lev Manovich entitled The Language of New Media. The purpose of this website is to show how Lev Manovich's principles can be identified in the genre of Skyrim online media. Each page will define the terminology of Manovich's text and then show, through the examples that are present on each page, how that piece of media is using the principle discussed and conversely what point the given examples make about Manovich's terms.
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I'm not familiar with Skyrim--well, you could plug the name of any game in there--but I did dabble a bit in D&D back in the analogue days. Is that the inspiration for Skyrim, or is it based more on Tolkien?
ReplyDeleteBTW, I never did post my first meme that I was so proud of, Jason—and now it’s already severely dated…nevertheless, it’s at http://www.memegen.com/meme/czc4wt.
ReplyDeleteThis is a very succinct summary. I think that the particular points you covered give a good taste of the game. (I never dabbled in the civil war myself.) Giving a description of the beginning of the game and the races was an excellent choice. I also liked how you presented Manovich at the end. Very well done.
ReplyDeleteHa ha, Dean that meme was very funny. I think one of the benefits of memes is that even if they are semi-dated they still remind us to be relieved and laugh a little about the stressful experiences we encounter in life. Anyway, to answer your question from your first comment, Skyrim is similar to D&D in that you have a unique character that you take on various adventures. However, in D&D your character has attributes like dexterity and strength but in Skyrim your character has skills like one-handed weapons and restoration magic. Skyrim is also different from D&D in that in the latter you are really free to do whatever the DM thinks up but in the former it is more like Manovich's principal of modularity: there are many self contained story lines that can be interchanged and used at various times to create a semi-new experience each play-through.
ReplyDeleteHa ha by succinct you probably mean short, but that is okay:) It seems you all had more to say than I do. I may end up adding additional details to my page if it looks strange when I make it. Thank you for the compliments on my writing.
ReplyDelete