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#Post#: 25--------------------------------------------------
Other Dimensions
DIR By: Pam
Date: May 21, 2021, 6:20 am
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It's a standard feature of adventure stories to show a wide
range of settings over the course of a tale. Dark forests,
scorching deserts, snowy mountains, gloomy castles it's
perfectly common to jump from one to the next as the hero's
journey advances. Sometimes, though, the story requires that the
hero travels not just to a new area, as it were, but another
reality, a separate dimension, or perhaps an altered perception
of a place. Communicating this transition through visuals
requires a different approach than showing the change between
suburbs, climates or biomes, and the techniques used can vary
depending on exactly what this change is, and what the writer is
trying to communicate.
HTML https://adventuregamers.com//?ACT=49&d=33428&fid=43&f=1.png
In the Blackwell series, Rosa's efforts to help the deceased
move on saw her traveling with them for the first step of the
journey to 'nodespace', a writer's impression of the entrance to
the afterlife. It's fairly obvious that the rules of physics
have changed just looking at this comparison from the fairly
mundane, realistic appearance of New York City and its various
boroughs to a mystical zone of glowing, white light, floating
rocks, and even a shimmering portal that appears to lead to
nothing. It's easy to see that these characters aren't in the
corporeal realm anymore when visiting this place.
HTML https://adventuregamers.com//?ACT=49&d=33428&fid=43&f=2.png
For Technobabylon, James Dearden had a specific vision of how
cyberspace should look compared to 'meatspace'. Not only did the
environment art change completely from solid, physical walls to
glowing, abstract shapes, but the characters changed entirely,
too, into idealized/humorous/glitchy avatars that represent
their online presence. This was heavily inspired by the use of
profile pictures on the Internet, and the wide variety of images
these can include, which allowed for some very odd designs to be
used in Trance-based areas.
HTML https://adventuregamers.com//?ACT=49&d=33428&fid=43&f=3.png
For Shardlight's hallucinogenic vision sequence, I tried
something different yet again. Here you can see elements of the
real world relocated into the character's vision particularly
the bench and the doorway. The rest of the details have been
replaced with an impossible landscape and symbols related to
other elements in the story, and the colour scheme changed
completely, but this allowed us to have the character begin the
dream on the same bench she passes from the real world, and to
walk through the door in the dream to re-enter reality, a nice
way of connecting the two phases of the story.
HTML https://adventuregamers.com//?ACT=49&d=33428&fid=43&f=4.png
One of the simplest ways to turn a scene into something more
surreal and otherworldly is a colour change. The bold red colour
that this scene from Monkey Island 2 takes on in Guybrush's
vision is not only immediately indicative that things aren't
normal, but also gives the whole scene a macabre vibe that
matches the dancing, singing skeletons of his parents perfectly.
Nothing else needs to be altered to feel surreal when a colour
scheme change is this violent.
HTML https://adventuregamers.com//?ACT=49&d=33428&fid=43&f=5.png
Beneath a Steel Sky's colour shifting between worlds is
sometimes a little more subtle, but still uses deep, saturated
colours in LINC that contrast nicely with the fairly drab,
earthy tones of the real world. Here the addition of surreal
decorations such as platforms floating in mid-air and a giant
eyeball add a lot to the idea of visual representations of
abstract concepts like software and data. The transformation of
Foster to a generic, nude avatar helps complete the effect,
making him appear literally disembodied and merely using this
visual construct as a means of representation in this other
place.
HTML https://adventuregamers.com//?ACT=49&d=33428&fid=43&f=6.png
Such abstractions can be used to quite meta comic effect. In
this example, Roger Wilco's adventures through time periods in
Space Quest IV take him back to the first game in the series,
which is especially evident due to the fact that the background
shifts in style to look more like the art from that game, done
with fewer colours and much less detail. This is a
medium-specific approach to the idea of time travel, and serves
as a fun and memorable gag.
HTML https://adventuregamers.com//?ACT=49&d=33428&fid=43&f=7.png
Sam & Max Hit the Road does something slightly similar here
Sam's foray into the world of virtual reality is represented as
a comical, angular vision of wonky shapes that move in odd ways.
It feels like the designers were using this to poke a bit of fun
at the idea of escapism in games, particularly the simplistic 3D
experiences that were possible with the technology at the time.
The fact that it shows Sam's actions back in meatspace adds to
the moment, with his movements, when taken out of context, being
a bit more fun at the expense of virtual escapism.
HTML https://adventuregamers.com//?ACT=49&d=33428&fid=43&f=8.jpg
Telltale's Sam & Max Save the World does something similar, to
an entirely different effect. Here, the area around their office
is virtualized, the characters becoming digitized versions of
themselves, representing the idea of websites being a
replacement for actual stores, and the like. We can see the
online version of Bosco's Inconvenience, with the placement and
design of elements being similar enough that it's easy to tell
that this isn't escapism into some fantasy world so much as an
electronic representation of the real world.
HTML https://adventuregamers.com//?ACT=49&d=33428&fid=43&f=9.jpg
The Longest Journey's premise is quite different to this idea of
another dimension being a source of comedy or representation.
We're asked to take the worlds of Stark and Arcadia seriously,
with both being living places in the story. Here the elements
that define each world the technology of Stark and magic of
Arcadia are used by artists to show the difference between the
two. Defining these worlds this way in the narrative provides a
great tool for defining them separately, in colours, forms and
designs.
HTML https://adventuregamers.com//?ACT=49&d=33428&fid=43&f=10.jpg
Another great example of an interesting approach to playing with
other worlds is in Grim Fandango, where the surreality of the
Land of the Dead is wonderfully juxtaposed with a representation
of the mortal realm that's even more grotesque and surreal. A
beautiful subversion of the idea of the afterlife being more
horrifying than our own, this visual parody of humanity's world
is both unique and unforgettable. Next to this distorted scene,
the rest of the game looks quite normal and stable, giving some
context to the characters perception of our lives.
HTML https://adventuregamers.com//?ACT=49&d=33428&fid=43&f=11.png
Another example of contrasting a surreal setting with an even
more surreal one is the dream sequences in Dropsy. Here the
game's strange, abstract vision of the world is replaced with a
more unsettling, violent version, with elements appearing across
worlds being more distorted and twisted in these dreams. A
chilling, powerful visual effect. Notice that here, as in Monkey
Island 2, the colour red is used to great effect, amplifying the
creepy feeling at a glance, even before we have a chance to take
in the details.
HTML https://adventuregamers.com//?ACT=49&d=33428&fid=43&f=12.png
Another fun example is the representation of cyberspace in else
Heart.Break(), which has the added challenge of presenting a
setting in which the lines between the real and the digital have
been blurred. In a town like Dorisburg, where you can hack a
cigarette to speed up time, or a coffee to make you more
beautiful, the bright, abstract forms that the game uses fit
very well. When strange, glitchy patches of the world appear,
it's clear that there's a bug in the system somewhere, but it
still feels like part of this same style. By the time our hero
can travel to cyberspace itself, representations haven't changed
that much in colour the bright pinks and yellows of the main
game still remain, it's just that the details have been stripped
away further, so that the geometry is more abstracted. It still
feels cohesive, though, and even a real world door doesn't feel
that out of place in the virtual world due to the colours used
throughout the game.
HTML https://adventuregamers.com//?ACT=49&d=33428&fid=43&f=13.jpg
There are many ways to show these ideas in games. Whether we're
entering a parallel universe, a representation of a character's
mind, or a digital world existing purely in code, there are a
lot of fun ways to show this shift from one reality to another.
This can add memorable moments, both narratively and visually,
and give us fascinating new places to explore. The very act of
shifting between two worlds itself can be memorable, too, but is
much harder to explain here. The two worlds shown from Obduction
above are both beautiful, and worth admiring, but the jump
between the two is something that no screenshot can do justice
to, and is worth experiencing in motion a truly magical,
captivating shift to another dimension.
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