Portal as a required college text
brainygamer.com
brainygamer.com
Judging from videos I've seen, Portal would be exactly the kind of game that I can't comfortably play. Normally that is not an issue because I don't have to play games I don't like. But if they get a kid like me in the class, how will they deal with it?
And in terms of academic interest, I think SimCity or Civilization, among a dozen other choices, is far more compelling than Portal, and we also have enough distance to see how games like that influenced their successors. Mostly the choice of Portal smells to me of a university picking a famous recent title in an attempt to stay relevant--- like if they'd picked The Matrix or Inception as the one film to include.
I don't see how you can get that from the article. It explains pretty clearly the specific topics they're going to emphasize, and how Portal ties in with the rest of the course.
What's nice about Portal is that it has such clear elements, that it gets people to see things they ordinarily wouldn't look for in a game. It's a great introduction to the idea that games can engage humanity.
For starters, it's got great set design, sounds, and music. The characters are studies in their respective types. The set shows a clear progression from clean "lab"-style environment to broken-down warehouse style (both well-executed) and then back again, with a gradual transformation between styles that mirrors the transition of the protagonist's relationship with her environment. The game also raises lots of different issues: the morality of experimenting on humans, the possible emotional nature of AIs, the effectiveness of various incentives (like curiosity, or guilt) and disincentives (like "death", more guilt, or pessimism).
I really would not have any trouble writing a humanities paper on this game, there's a lot going on. It's not the best video game ever, but I think it's good to start with a super-accessible game like Portal because so many people don't take games seriously.
I do agree that it's easy to write humanities papers about games from a purely narrative direction, but it's a hallmark of the not-games-focused humanities academic usually--- the literary theorist or film scholar who wrote a paper about a game as if it were a novel or a film. That kind of work is thankfully getting much less common than it was 10-15 years ago.
And if you want to focus on the game, there is an interesting game mechanic, too.
Also, _delirium: this is a brand new course, so it has no “usual” reading list to compare.
It's very short (5 minutes,) free, and you don't have to worry about anyone in the class not having enough skill to complete it.
It's also communicates in a way that only a game can. The rules of the game themselves are most of what gives it its expressive power, not the narrative or the visuals.
Waaah, life sucks And you're going to die Isn't it horrible And meaningless?
Portal at least has some craft to it.
I do agree that this is a worrying trend, and Stallman make a valid point in The Right to Read, but I think the point he is making is that once you have DRM, you can stop people borrowing stuff. That is bad, but we haven't got there yet.
* I did not downvote.
But, and I hate to bring this up, but I wonder how differently this idea would play at a college that was not all-male. I've attended a lot of CS education talks that have a strong tension between "games are a way to engage students" and "games are way less engaging for girls than boys". This is a different context, of course, but I'm still curious.
They have special rooms with a capable machine set up, and you check in. Or, apparently for some, you can check OUT a game console to play the game at home.
Additionally, I can run Portal satisfactorily on my $250 computer. Not that this makes it accessible to every single person- some people cannot afford $250- but the number of people unable to play will be drastically reduced in the very near future.
Should money be associated with these things? If you feel the answer is 'no', remember that books cost money to buy, and so do movies. It is a bit harder to rent a video game and PC at the library, but we're getting there.
(It is important to remember that while culture may be free, the medium is not. It is also important to remember that 'Library' just means 'Someone else is paying', albeit at a reduced cost.)