Author: Anika

A game played by creating impromptu narratives, Fiasco turned out to be truly a Fiasco! The narratives my group created had several plot twists and questionable outcomes that had all of our heads spinning. Fiasco, a game unlike others, had a set of rules that were not restricting like other games such as Monopoly and UNO. The rules were more of a guideline that gave my group freedom to make our own choices and essentially create a collaborative story. Playing Fiasco was in some sense writing without physically doing that.

The story our group told ended up with all of us ending up in jail at some point or doing something illegal. Each character faced conflicts that we either took extreme measures to get out of or simply did not resolve the issue resulting in their incarceration or another conflict. In order to even start our narratives, my group members and I had to setup the game which essentially formed an introduction. From the setup the plot slowly unfolded. In many ways, this is very similar to any type of writing that intends to tell a story. There is an introduction giving characters’ identity and purpose, a conflict that the characters must resolve, and an ending where the problems are solved.  Having to go through this process also shed light on the elements of fiction.

Fiasco was essentially creating a fiction. While creating our narratives, my group realized how difficult it was to create one that made sense. It was easy to begin the story, but creating a logical and coherent storyline was difficult. We had to think outside of the box to create new problems and creative solutions that made the narrative interesting. My group started off with two characters getting busted for possession of marijuana, but there were only so many scenarios we could create without being repetitive.

Fiasco was a completely new game to me and very different from the games we played this semester. I had never played a game that had a set of rules, but in the end was mostly open ended to create our own beginning and end. At the beginning, the game was hard since none of my group members or I had played a game like this. We were not sure if we were doing it correctly, causing us to be hesitant when first creating our narrative. I was thoroughly pleased with the results we came up with though. After figuring out, the storyline quickly picked up.

Fiasco was the first role-playing game I have played, and I believe it was rewarding in doing so. Playing a game rather than actually writing those narratives shed light onto the writing process for fiction works and allowed us to have a different perspective on games in relation to writing. Fiasco essentially allowed my group members to work collaboratively rather than work against each other like we would in a typical game. In the future, I believe having the experience of playing this role-playing game will further improve my writing.

Wolf in White Van by John Darnielle presents an additional unique method of coping with trauma: escapism through games. This novel suggests that through games, people can escape into a world where they are psychologically and emotionally sheltered from the repercussions of their trauma. This safety allows individuals to heal and recover from their wounds in an alternative reality. Click here to find out more.

Tomb Raider was the second game Samsara and I chose to do a podcast over. It was quite interesting since this was the first time I had played the game or even heard of it. I usually do not play action and adventure based games. I actually really enjoyed playing this game and learning about its background.

Samsara and I linked the game to the word “reverence”, which we took in different direction than Ian Bogost’s definition in “How to Do Things with Videogames”. We interpreted the meaning of reverence to be a sign of deep respect while Bogost related the word to church. Though taking a different route in definitions, we focused on the developments of the game that displayed reverence and unique feature of having a female protagonist in the game. Our goal was to highlight the deep respect people have for Tomb Raider and uniqueness of the having a female protagonist. Samsara and I both took away that having a female protagonist was empowering to women, showing they could anything that men could. However, we also presented the idea that the game could also be demeaning to women because of way that the protagonist was depicted. In the end, we concluded there was no one right answer and that it was up in the air as to how one would interpret it. In the given time we had, I believe we were able to talk about everything we wanted to.

The process in creating this podcast went fairly smoothly. Samsara and I didn’t have any schedule conflicts and were able to easily meet up and work on the podcast. This podcast production to me was much better than the first. We had a lot more time to work on it and definitely sounded less scripted than our first podcast. It definitely helped to already have experienced creating one podcast previously to create another. It also was helpful to listen to other groups podcasts that recorded before and after us. It gave insight as to what we should or should not do. One of the biggest changes we made in our second podcast was to talk more freely rather than having a script to read off of. It allowed the podcast to flow and seem more natural.

A few lessons that I took from this was digital citizenship/digital identity and collaboration. Though I did not do a lot of editing, I was able to learn to use Garage Band to some extent. I really did enjoy working with Samsara. She was an excellent partner, and I believe we worked together well. Both these lessons that I took away can be applied in other classes and situations in the real world. Collaboration is something everyone will have to do in their lives whether they like it or not, and I believe its skill that everyone should have. Today with how far technology has advanced, having some sense of digital citizenship/identity will help.

As a learner,I feel like I am improving. I learned a lot from the previous podcast we created. For this podcast, it was done more in advanced and felt more planned out. Suggestions I would have for my peers would to be plan further ahead. Also one thing that I really liked that we did this time was recording stuff before we went in to talk to Professor Morgen. It allowed us to figure out what we had and didn’t have before getting critiqued by Professor Morgen.

This was the last podcast we had to make for this semesters English class. I think the outcome was rewarding because I was able to learn many things from this experience.

 

When first being introduced to the idea of creating a podcast about a game, Candy Crush was the first game that popped into my mind. Since 2012, I have been playing candy crush. From the release of the first game to now, I have had the original candy crush saga, the soda saga or jelly saga downloaded on my phone. Being able to analyze and research about the game that I honestly hold dear to my heart was very interesting.

I worked with Samsara in creating a podcast that exposes the relation of Candy Crush with habituation and branding, terms found in How To Do Things With Video Games by Ian Bogost. The process in creating the podcast was interesting and memorable. Samsara and I both individually did our own research and formed our own thoughts before coming together to record. Both of us came up with different ideas and interesting arguments to put forth. We each did editing, though I had a hard time figuring out garage band. I hope to get better at editing for the next podcast.

As to in response to listening other episodes before creating our Candy Crush podcast, I believe it did influence our podcast. Though some of our information and talking sounded scripted, we made attempts to go off script and just say things that came to mind when talking about a certain topic. It was really helpful to listen to a set of podcasts before creating our own. Listening to the other groups helped us figure out our own structure for our podcast.

The main goal in creating this episode was to argue the habitation and branding could be found in Candy Crush and how something can actually be learned playing the game. Actual life skills such as good decision making, the value of each decision made or simply just trusting your gut. Though these skills may seem simple, the result from learning from these lessons can actually be applied to real life and make a difference. Also the connections made between literature and Candy Crush highlights the fact that a simple game like Candy Crush could be considered “literature” or a “work of art”.

There were two learning outcomes that I took away from working on this podcast episode, collaboration and critical thinking and reading resulting in writing. Samsara and I were relatively busy, so sometimes getting together was a bit difficult. However, despite conflicting schedules, we often found time to have short meetings to discuss and plan for our podcast before actually recording. I believe our collaboration went well. We really worked as a team. When I struggled with editing some parts due to a lack of knowledge in editing, Samsara was really a team player on being able to help edit. As for critical thinking and reading resulting in writing, the part on branding about Candy Crush was a bit more difficult to analyze than habitation since there was a lot more information to be found about habitation than branding. It forced us to think and formulate our own arguments and eventually write and record about it.

As a learner, I feel like I am progressing. This was the first time I have created a podcast as opposed to writing an essay, and I believe the results was very rewarding. There are still quite a few things I know I need to work on such as editing skills and going off script to talk about the game itself more freely. I would suggest my peers for future episodes to not create a script and just record what comes to mind. It flows better that way and often unscripted thoughts are more valuable than scripted ones. I am proud of the episode Samsara and I created. I really enjoyed being able to talk about my personal experience which helped amplify the argument of habituation found in Candy Crush.

Creating this podcast was a really good experience, and I look forward to creating another for others to listen to!