Google translation of German-language Wikipedia citation:

Sebastian Pranz: Theatralität digitaler Medien: Eine wissenssoziologische Betrachtung medialisierten Alltagshandelns. VS Verlag, 2009, ISBN 3531162438, 202 – 209 & 221.

Screenshots of the original German text: https://imgur.com/a/ZKllUfo

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2.2 The Great Giana Sisters – Obstacle Course Games
The Great Giana Sisters game (Rainbow Arts) was released in 1987 on various home computer systems. The players take on the role of the sleeping Giana. "Which had to endure numerous adventures in its nightmares until it woke up again after 30 levels" (Wirsig 2003: 251). With this game, which today is considered a classic in its comic-like design, a genre is addressed that is popular with gamers and the trade press Usually referred to as jump'n'run, the term platform game is also in use296. I'm talking about parcours games and by that I mean the room structure that is characteristic of this type of game, which is an obstacle course that the player and his character must pass As can be shown, this new configuration of the play area affects all levels of the game - but above all it enables much more complex architectures: It is no longer about playing fields within which the player's actions manifest themselves in the form of moves, but rather Expanding scope for action, while at the same time new and characteristic problems of order arise for this type of game me: For example, the player can no longer see the complete set-up of the game and thus loses the "distance" typical of the game (cf. Chapter 1.2.2) on what is happening on the screen. He must therefore be oriented towards his game, the tasks at hand and the overarching goal of the game using a wide variety of means of orientation. As I would like to show, this is mainly done through the specific perspective and a dramaturgical organization of the course of the game. Another important aspect of the game is addressed with the playing figure. In contrast to earlier game types, it is increasingly at the center of the game, which is staged as a quests, so to speak, and is accordingly broken down into different scenes. So it is also about questions of dramatization or theatricalization in a narrower sense.

2.2.1 Game Room
If you look at the course game against the background of the above considerations on the field game, then differences with regard to the scope are initially obvious. While field games mostly relate to largely unproperty-free spaces, whereby a playing field ultimately only results from the possible formations of playing figures297, the space in the course game is presented as a terrain that brings specific properties into play or as a colorful playground that offers a wide variety of challenges. Both vertical and horizontal game actions are possible for the player: He moves his figure in the horizontal direction of play through the course and has to jump over the various obstacles or hit his opponents by falling down on them from above. With all moves he has to be careful not to get into the out of play, into which he can fall through numerous openings in the floor. After crossing a course in this way, the player reaches an exit on the far right, which leads him to the next level.

With the parcours subject, a new parameter comes into play, namely a vertical Saxon operation, which is represented on the playing level by the diametrical dimensions of jumping force and gravity. This expansion of the scope of action also requires new representation conventions: Since three-dimensional representations of space in the 80s were largely outside the technical possibilities of digital computers298, the ParcoursSpiele solve the representation problem of a three-dimensional space using a perspective trick that is as simple as (format-historically ) is original: figuratively speaking, they tilt the game board into a vertical position and present the play area as a two-dimensional board set up in front of the viewer (see Fig. 2.2a). In the resulting spatial representation, the spatial depth has been given up in favor of the other two dimensions - the playing figure moves horizontally in front of a static background, can jump up and down, but always appears as if it were on a surface recorded'. At the same time, the entire playing field can no longer be seen, but only a specific section - if the player moves his figure using the control buttons, the perspective shifts in the direction of the game, whereby new terrain comes into view.

Abb. 2.2a: Spielperspektive in The Great Giana Sisters.

Compared to the field game, the parcours game is characterized by both extended options for action and an innovative spatial representation. As already mentioned above, these development steps are related or obey related structural logics: It is about new options for action on the one hand and the subsequent regulatory framework on the other. The structure of the game can also be described against the background of these coordinates. First of all, it should be noted that the inventory of game media has increased significantly compared to previous game types. Because the Parcours-Sujét makes it possible to implement an almost infinite variety of objects and to bring them into an orderly sequence of obstacles: barrels, stones, walls, hedges, bridges, boxes. Elevators etc. can represent both obstacles and platforms that the player can include in his game, abysses, fires, peaks, balls, water basins, portcullis etc. represent dangers that must be crossed carefully; Diamonds and bonus or warp stones can be collected or tapped to activate extra functions in the game. In addition, there are opponents with different movement patterns that block the passage and must either be bypassed or beaten.

The rearrangement of the playing field results in numerous game options that can be used as ludic challenges in various ways. At the same time, the parcours game breaks away from the idea of an increasingly scarce space by requiring vertically broken up spaces that are structured by vertical punctuation of the play route. The parcours subject thus enables much more complex play areas or a coherent spatial structure that only gradually becomes accessible. The player starts in the first level and gradually works his way through the course of the game, having to go through a variety of different scenarios before he finally reaches the goal of the game. In contrast to asteroids, the space here is a finite space that has to be explored little by little or is played through at some point. This creates a new and to a certain extent genre-specific game stimulus: The upper bidding logic of staying in the game as long as possible or earning the highest possible score is replaced by an intrinsic motivation to open up new terrain. It's about the playful discovery of space.

The specific configuration of the play area thus entails a number of innovations and thus generates a type of game that has little in common with field play. At the same time, however, the increasing variability of the scope also creates a problem of order. In contrast to the field game, in which every movement with one's own figure can be understood as a move that generates differences in the game, the actions of the player here are not necessarily beneficial to the game: they can take shortcuts and detours, try to make one special To reach difficult to access objects, to walk in the wrong direction, etc. - whereupon the running time tears him out of the game. In order to be able to generate sense of the game, the course game must therefore provide new means of orientation that align the player both with the game area and with the game tasks that arise here. Just as it was stated above for the field game, the game-specific order is established by arranging the perspectives (see Chapter 1.2.2). While the toroidal space of the field game was represented as a panoptically perspective (flat) field, the more complex space of the course game can no longer be conveyed through a static perspective. it requires a dynamic change of perspective. The perspective frame is still limited to individual game quadrants, but shifts with the movements of the player's figure. His view of the game is more or less like a showcase through which the playing field is drawn like a film strip (see Fig.2.2a) emotional. The player can thus direct his attention 300 to the unknown terrain that comes into play via the right part of the field, because all game objects that leave the playing field on the left side irrevocably disappear from the game reality. Even if he loses the space that is limited to the square of the field game, the player can, in view of the irreversible direction of march given by the parcours game, follow an immanent gradient which, if he masters all obstacles, brings him to the goal of the game.

Aside from its function as a regulatory framework, the specific game perspective can also be understood in connection with the parcours game's own theatricality: While the game board in field games has to be changed after each game task has been completed, the dynamic perspective allows, so to speak, a dramaturgical development of the scope or the staging of a coherent game world. The scope is no longer divided into fields, but is built around a framework story that unfolds in different scenes and with different sets and actors. Even if the game does not lose its agonal character, the player no longer only plays in the dramaturgically designed scope in order to achieve a measurable result (in the form of a score, a record time, etc.). Rather, it's increasingly about finding out the end of the story and unlocking all the secrets of the game. With the tension-filled dialectic of the visible and the (still) hidden, which results from the dramaturgical presentation of the space, a theatrical moment of "getting behind" comes into play (Rapp 1973: 183).



With the increasingly theatrical and dramaturgically presented space, the play figure is finally addressed, who is at the center of the (video game action, at the latest with the ParcoursSpiel is no longer exclusively the purpose of a game medium or that of a toy that the player has to learn to control and master, but rather is to be understood as the protagonist of the game plot , a reading emerges that understands and appreciates the various game tasks as parts of a quest. The theatrical experience of the game is increasingly becoming a reflected game practice:

Imagine that you are a little girl with a nightmare that you cannot wake up from. That's exactly what happened to the girl Gina in the game Giana Sisters (...).

Giana, the heroine of this game, must have 32 levels of a wondrous world. traverse. The brave girl has a lot to do in the various scenes. She runs over bridges that dissolve under her feet, has to fight her way through mysterious caves and jump over deep abysses

With the increasingly complex framing of the figure. the design also changes, which in this sense increasingly imports non-game elements. This is especially true in relation to its staging as a body and the excess meaning it generates: Even if its representation is still strongly stylized, Kann is not only recognizable human ', but also recognizable' feminine ', so it has corporeal characteristics that it as Game figure not required.303 This applies in particular to the elimination of the figure, which is no longer framed as game information but rather is staged as a small dying: the figure that can be injured by unwise play and ultimately dies thus increasingly takes the physical characteristics of the person she is supposed to represent within the media space.

The staging of a human-like figure has its reasons at least in the increasingly complex gameplay of The Great Giana Sisters. The extended repertoire of movements that is necessary here goes far beyond that of the playing figure of the field game: In addition to a basic repertoire, which includes jumps of different heights as well as running, tapping (from stones) and hitting (from opponents), Giana's performance can exceed that Collecting certain game bonuses are increased to a higher power: Giana, pepped up in this way, “transforms (...) into a punk who can even smash stones” .304 The options for action that the player has in the game thus vary with the mode of the game character or can be played with a clever game of extra life. Expand extra weapons etc. Conversely, if he does not carefully steer the sleepwalking Giana through the game scenarios, e.g. the ability to break down walls to valuable bonus rooms or take out opponents from a safe distance. One can certainly speak of a structural connection between the differentiation of the scope and the figure, which as a medium of interaction specializes in this. So it stands to reason that an increasingly complex set of possible courses of action can no longer be displayed using static game pieces, which is why a staging of movable bodies is necessary at the latest with the course subject.

Abb. 2.2b: Figure design

As the study has shown, the Great Giana Sisters shows a qualitative leap that sets the course game apart from previous games. The scope is significantly expanded here and presents itself as a horizontally expanding play course that is divided into vertical sections. This change in the spatial representation on the one hand makes far more complex game scenarios possible or opens up a completely new form of spatial experience. On the other hand, the increase in spatial complexity also requires new frameworks. In this context, the specific perspectives of the game's events must be mentioned. which always focuses only on the currently relevant game sections, whereby the player has to discover the new terrain step by step and leaves the space already traversed behind. One could perhaps speak of a gradient that the player can follow to the goal of the game, or one playful designed dramaturgy, which leads to the fulfillment of the quest. At the same time, own excesses of meaning arise, which can be further processed on the staging level of the game: the presentation of an increasingly condensed space in which the player has to pass a wide variety of tasks before reaching the goal reached. suggests to a certain extent to stage the game as a quest. This motif can be found in many games of this type (see Fig. 2.2c). The play figure can also be understood in this context. which here no longer functions exclusively as a game indicator and interaction medium of the game, but also acts as a kind of plot carrier of a frame story, or at least can be read that way. It is therefore about an increasingly ambivalent status or a framework conflict that is also and above all ignited by the character. As I have shown, the different levels cannot be clearly differentiated: the staging of the body represents a fundamental threat to the framework of the game as much as it makes it possible to make the increasingly complex game events plausible at all via the interaction medium of the game character. This assumption can be substantiated especially in relation to later games in which bodies are staged that at the same time generate playful orders as well as excess meaning and framework conflicts and thus, to a certain extent, risk the gaming experience.

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…according to the specific orientation function that the game principle of the riddle fulfills for the playability of the room, the decisive factor is that the player first has to localize the individual components of a task within a game segment and find out how they work exactly: while with The Great Giana Sisters the game tasks were lined up like a parcours and could be worked through successively, the enigmatic room of Prince of Persia must first be carefully examined, whereby all possible game options should be recognized. Only when he has recorded all the components is the player able to put them together in the right way to create a game task. This means that we can speak of a new form of spatial perception that, with games like Prince of Persia, becomes a reflected game practice:
Inspect every room for secret passages. There are many in this game and you will not be able to finish it without finding them. To find them, jump up and down to look for any floor passages. Jump up and hit the ceiling to look for any ceiling passages.
(..)
Don't be afraid to explore. In order to win the game, you must explore every detail of the game and not miss anything on any level. 314
In the complex and confusing game room, which makes no sense either as a course or as a playing field, the puzzle not only suggests a set of action scripts, but also represents an efficient way of telling the player, who can see every partial solution found as confirmation, that he has acted in the spirit of the game and has come a little closer to the goal of the game, to focus on his game again. In a sense, it is about a reward routine that develops a specific motivational potential that keeps him in the game even over longer passages of unsuccessful action: "As expected, the brain-cracking puzzles are still here, harder than ever, in fact - for the record, my dad and I took 5 years to complete this game. ”

Similar to how it was stated above for the course, the game principle of the puzzle can be used for the game. To a certain extent, it represents a game scheme that is specially tailored to the subject of the room, but that is not…