Gonzalo Frasca, "Simulation Versus Narrative: Introduction to Ludology"

(In The Video Game Theory Reader)

- Against the narrative approach; simulation, not representation
- There are common elements, but different fundamental mechanics
- Ludology studies games in general and video games in particular
- Literature, film, narratological theory as a way of creating a coherent discipline by appealing to existing structures (but ill-suited)
- Games are not completely non-narrative, but are not structured like narratives, so formalism/structuralism is a necessary "first step" to understand their basic characteristics
- Representation-via-narrative is a powerful concept, simulation can be an alternative
- Not sequences, systems
- "to simulate is to model a (source) system through a different system which maintains (for somebody) some of the behaviours of the original system"
- "machines that generate signs"
- Frasca claims that examining the narrativized output/experience of a game is insufficient (questionable?)
- Video games are "the first complex simulational media for the masses"
- Narratives/narratology are "too familiar"
- "Advergames" are a means to an end, not just entertainment: a site for expanding the potential/our understanding of games (ie: serious games, newsgames)
- Frasca unironically juxtaposes the marketer-driven mainstream industry against advergames?!
- Game rhetoric vs narrative rhetoric
- Narratives are binary by nature (something happens or does not happen), with no modifications to the story (and yet he acknowledges that some kinds of narratives are variable, such as oral storytelling...)
- Knowledge/interpretation of a simulation requires repetition (I suppose?)
- Narrative is fixed, fated; simulation is variably determined
- The difficulty of a games can be a comment by the designer on the probability of change in the world (surely only sometimes?)
- Boal's game/theatre hybrids (repetition, variability)
- Narrative coherence, closure is incompatible with player freedom/experimentation
- Gratification of make-believe
- Ludus (goal rules) and paidia (rules that define parameters)
- Ideological critique of ludus games for having a beginning/middle/end structure (as opposed to open-ended games), evidently a value judgement
- Frasca assumes that the defined goal of a ludus game will be the ideologically preferred situation (ie: save the princess), but his formalism blinds him to the fact that it is perfectly possible for a game to have an ideologically undesirable goal in order to comment on that very ideology (certain war games, for example)
- "Manipulation rules" is a pretty weak term for what he is referring to (rules that define the possibility space)
- Three levels of ideology in games: surface representation (shared with narrative), "manipulation rules" and ludus/goal rules (Frasca clearly positions these on a simplistic heirarchy in which the meanings generated by goal rules always supercede other meanings, see note above about defined goals)
- Possible fourth level: meta-rules (level editors, etc.)
- Author always remains in control of all levels of meaning-making (total player freedom is impossible)
- Simulation is not a replacement for representation, an alternative
- Frasca claims that the basic assumption of a simulation is that change is possible, but this seems naive