I second that emotion

November 17, 2006 7:42 AM

"A Console To Make You Wiip: How the Nintendo Wii will get you emotionally invested in video games." Exploring the Wii from the aspect of William James' essay, "What is an emotion?" James contends that all emotions are rooted in one's physical state, e.g. goosebumps when spooked, and blushing while embarassed. Can the overt physicality of playing the Wii make it a more emotional experience?
posted by frecklefaerie (31 comments total)

My mind boggles at the pseudo intellectualism on display in that article.

The goggles, they do nothing.

The Wii really isn't that physically engaging, for all that I've seen. You move the controller in 3-space, but ultimately it's still just a controller not a full-body motion tracker. The motions themselves don't even seem that grossly exagerated either as most seem to be performable with a flick of the wrist not some full body jump up and down twist and turn mechanism.

One does not "inhabit the body of mario" anymore than with the old two-button NES controller. Sure, the motion sensing makes certain activities more intuitive and perhaps a bit more imersive, but this article makes it sound like the Wii is the stage upon which the great dramas of man will be enacted.

Utter drivel.
posted by C.Batt at 7:59 AM on November 17, 2006

Ditto. It's just a different controller, which is super cool, but it's not a new type of gaming.

Content will affect immersion much more than input devices.
posted by mrgrimm at 8:06 AM on November 17, 2006

I don't know about that. I have a friend in a band and he insists that at rehearsals they be as energetic as they are on stage. He says that there are certain movements he makes that coaxes the art out from inside, and I think he's right. How often do you stand up straight and pull your shoulders back when you need confidence in a situation? I agree that using the wiimote is likely to give a different range of gaming experience.
posted by frecklefaerie at 8:14 AM on November 17, 2006

A different controller designed to make gameplay intuitive and accessible to non-gamers.

Because content doesn't cut it if the input device and control set is complex.

The controller is designed such that those who decide to treat it as a different controller may do so. They will be the ones sitting on the couch flicking their wrist. Those who decide to immerse themselves a little more will be swinging their entire arm. Imagine just how immersive the game becomes if you decide to make it immersive? The dual stick controller can only go so far, this allows you to go farther.

It's not all that the writer of the article claims it to be, but it's also not something to dismiss as just being something cool and different. I'm leaning more towards this being the true next-gen console, as the graphics in the 360 and PS3 are only as hyper-realistic as the display and sound system you own allow. So hard-core gamers with big bucks systems? You've got hyper-reality, all right. The rest of the market? They won't see much difference between them and the Wii in that department -- but they will see the controller.
posted by linux at 8:21 AM on November 17, 2006

(For what it's worth, the idea that emotions are rooted in physical states isn't universally accepted either. At least among people doing cog. sci. and philosophy of mind, there's lots of debate as to what emotions are; some people agree with a version of James's ideas, but plenty more disagree.)
posted by nebulawindphone at 8:29 AM on November 17, 2006

The motions themselves don't even seem that grossly exagerated either as most seem to be performable with a flick of the wrist not some full body jump up and down twist and turn mechanism.

You can play that way.
posted by jefgodesky at 8:38 AM on November 17, 2006

...emotionally invested in video games.
posted by Terminal Verbosity at 8:50 AM on November 17, 2006

Ok, ok already. I'll sleep in front of the Best Buy! Are you happy now unstoppable Nintendo PR machine?

I can't help but notice that all the good press for the Wii seems to be in more grownup places, despite the Wii being for a younger gaming target.
posted by Gucky at 8:56 AM on November 17, 2006

Gucky: I was worried this post might sound like PR, but really I was interested in the mapping of this new video game to the ideas of a 19th century philosopher.
posted by frecklefaerie at 9:04 AM on November 17, 2006

The Wii isn't aimed at 'a younger gaming market', it's aimed at a wider market.
posted by influx at 9:05 AM on November 17, 2006

e.g. goosebumps when spooked, and blushing while embarassed

Playing cutesy Nintendo titles on the cutesy little Wii promises a lot of blushing while embarrassed.

Perhaps I'm just not mature enough for Mario Pajama Princess Party XIV.
posted by gurple at 9:06 AM on November 17, 2006

I'm very interested in the Wii, and I'll probably get one, so I don't say this as an anti-fanboy, but:

So many choice incorrect statements:

Unlike every other game console, the Wii controller isn't built around a confusing alphabet of buttons.

Corrected: Unlike every other game console, the Wii controller isn't built around thumbsticks. However, it does share a confusing alphabet of buttons, with the A, B, C, Z, 1, and 2 buttons.

While Sony and Microsoft exercise your thumbs, Nintendo gives you a full body workout.

Corrected: While Sony and Microsoft exercise your thumbs, Nintendo exercises your wrist.

If we want to kill off the Gooper Blooper (an evil squid-like creature), we need to stab and parry and prance, not just twiddle our thumbs.

Corrected: If we want to kill off the Gooper Blooper (an evil squid-like creature), we need to stab and parry and prance with our wrists, not with our thumbs.

Because you've spent the last few hours inhabiting Mario's body, his death will be difficult to shrug off.

Unfortunately, this hypothesis is not supported by experimental data (game reviews).

That's why we have the Playstation and Xbox: they only get our thumbs excited.

This man has never seen someone play Ninja Gaiden on the XBox.
posted by bugbread at 9:09 AM on November 17, 2006

(Note: I'm throwing him a bone by accepting his determination of the threshold for "confusing" buttons. I don't find "A, B, C, Z, 1, 2" confusing. But neither do I find "A, B, X, Y, L1, L2, R1, R2" confusing. Now the Playstation controller...well, yes, I'll admit, I find it confusing. Easy to remember the symbols, but hard to remember their positions if you play seldomly.)
posted by bugbread at 9:12 AM on November 17, 2006

Easy to remember the symbols, but hard to remember their positions if you play seldomly.

Agreed wholeheartedly, bugbread. Sony bizarrely chose to color the square and circle buttons very similarly, and then game manufacturers bizarrely took it upon themselves to make a ton of games in which you have to remember instantaneously which is which when you see the colored symbol flash on the screen. Those sequences are invariably the most annoying parts of games in which they appear.
posted by gurple at 9:16 AM on November 17, 2006

When you swerve to the right, so does Zelda.

Er, Link swerves. Zelda waits to be rescued. Unless there's some wacky multiplayer aspect to Twilight Princess I don't know of.
posted by robocop is bleeding at 9:19 AM on November 17, 2006

Apparently he has never been on the receiving end of a controller which has subsequently been converted, by essence of its newfound flight trajectory, to something more akin to an aboriginal bola. We're getting into full range of motion now, I suppose it's time to start drawing comparisons to quantum mechanics and pondering the role the Wii plays in the structural essence of enzyme reactions incurred via DMT teleportation? You might tear a rotator cuff, lose an eye, or bridge the rift of time that's been driven deeper since your abused childhood; all through embodiment of a squat Italian plumber who powers up on fungii! Nintendo is all about possibilities!
posted by prostyle at 9:25 AM on November 17, 2006

If we want to kill off the Gooper Blooper (an evil squid-like creature), we need to stab and parry and prance, not just twiddle our thumbs.

Corrected: If we want to kill off the Gooper Blooper (an evil squid-like creature), we need to stab and parry and prance with our wrists, not with our thumbs.

Further corrected: If we want to kill off the Gooper Blooper (an evil squid-like creature), we could stab and parry and prance in full motion, or we could stab and parry and prance with our wrists, but as jefgodesky linked, you'd then look like an effin' toolbox.
posted by linux at 9:31 AM on November 17, 2006

Would an effin' toolbox be where one keeps one's sex toys?
posted by nebulawindphone at 9:50 AM on November 17, 2006

Further further corrected: If we want to kill off the Gooper Blooper (an evil squid-like creature), we could stab and parry and prance in full motion, which would probably be more fun than just flicking one's wrist, but neither more nor less effective.

By the same token, to kill off Xavrythyn (the long silver haired vaguely effeminate bad guy in the newest hit PS3 game), we could leap about the room and jump behind the couch in full motion, which would probably be more fun than just twiddling one's thumb, but neither more nor less effective.

And to kill off the Skroth Graktor 776 (the cyborg mercenary half-demon in the newest XBox game), we could whip the controller from side to side, swinging it about wildly, which would probably be more fun than just sqeezing the side triggers, but neither more nor less effective.

Yes, it's true that the Wii is more conductive to that kind of behaviour than the PS3, XBox360, or Phantom Gaming Console, but the writer of the article isn't saying that, he's saying that excited play is necessary to beat the Gooper Blooper.

(Note: I say this as a person who fully intends to play the Wii with great strenuous overexertion. Again, my comments are not meant to be critical of the Wii, but of this guy's "fanboy with an education" approach to (mis)representing it)
posted by bugbread at 10:11 AM on November 17, 2006

It should be obvious to anyone with half a brain that physical immersion is absolutely necessary for emotional involvement. This is why, prior to the Wii, nobody has ever had an emotional response to a video game before. And take novels for example-- all you're doing is moving your eyes back and forth, and periodically turning a page! It's no wonder that nobody in the world, in the entire history of literature, has ever responded emotionally to something they read in a novel.
posted by Faint of Butt at 10:23 AM on November 17, 2006

Faint of Butt, there's some literature you may want to review, such as "The Face of Feeling," which summarizes some of the recent research on emotional expression feedback, of you may prefer Gladwell's treatment in "The Naked Face." As for your "counter-examples," they all easily fall into the category of micro-expressions. The emotion is still somaticized, it's just repressed (which of course dampens, but certainly does not eliminate, the emotional force; literature just needs to be that much more emotional to overcome that obstacle).
posted by jefgodesky at 10:58 AM on November 17, 2006

jef, I believe Faint of Butt was being snarkastic.
posted by Arthur "Two Sheds" Jackson at 11:16 AM on November 17, 2006

Oh, indeed he was, but I believe his snarks were aimed in the direction that this article's claims are baseless, which is a very foolish position to take. Whatever other problems the article may have in details, its premise is certainly plausible, and intriguing.
posted by jefgodesky at 11:28 AM on November 17, 2006

This man has never seen someone play Ninja Gaiden on the XBox.

Last winter I totally annihilated that game on the hardest difficulty (well NGB to be technical). I would pee on a balrog for a sequel.
posted by weretable and the undead chairs at 11:30 AM on November 17, 2006

All the bonus missions as well?

That took me a while...
posted by Cycloptichorn at 11:40 AM on November 17, 2006

My mind boggles at the pseudo intellectualism on display in that article.

The article certainly reads like Malcolm Gladwell. Take an obscure anecdotal study from someplace and relate it as fact to something current. I've been seeing this pattern of writing a lot in magazines lately.

I like the Wii and will likely get one before a PS3, but the most emotionally engaging game I've ever played is ICO (from Sony). From that experience I'm having trouble accepting the articles premise.
posted by bobo123 at 11:48 AM on November 17, 2006

Snark noted Faint of Butt, but don't tell that to my girlfriend. She was totally distraught towards the end of Shadow of the Collossus.

The girl never met an animal she didn't like. Pixelated or not.
posted by butterstick at 11:50 AM on November 17, 2006

butterstick, Final Fantasy VIII made me cry. Twice.
posted by Faint of Butt at 1:00 PM on November 17, 2006

I always cite Final Fantasy VII when people say that video games can't elicit emotion, but I didn't see the article saying that you can't generate emotion without wild gesticulation, just that it helps (a lot). Nor does that undermne the idea that emotion comes from the body; as I mentioned before, there's micro-expressions.
posted by jefgodesky at 1:34 PM on November 17, 2006

I'm seconding ICO has a game that draws you in emotionally. My girlfriend still says it's one of her favorite games, and she just sat there and watched, she wanted me to play it.
posted by splatta at 9:02 AM on November 20, 2006

I'm seconding ICO has a game that draws you in emotionally. My girlfriend still says it's one of her favorite games, and she just sat there and watched, she wanted me to play it.
posted by splatta at 9:02 AM on November 20, 2006