Date of Award
5-2024
Degree Type
Honors College Thesis
Academic Program
English BA
Department
English
First Advisor
Craig Carey, Ph.D.
Advisor Department
English
Abstract
This thesis examines how the opening segments of Japanese role-playing games use different techniques to educate and immerse the player. Informed by game studies scholarship, I consider how games create exposition differently from other narrative mediums, coining the term “player exposition” as a useful heuristic for game analysis. The thesis will be divided into two sections—education and immersion—to identify the two significant aspects of player exposition. I argue that exposition in Japanese role-playing games draws on concepts from other mediums, specifically film and literature, while using educational and immersive concepts to introduce the player to the game’s fictional world. In the first section, I utilize educational theories based on behaviorism and constructivism to show how JRPGs integrate the player to take the role of the character and engage with the game’s complex systems. In the second section, I argue that JRPGs also involve and immerse the player through narrative, spatial, and affective forms of involvement. By adopting these two approaches, I consider how the opening moments of JRPGs have developed unique ways of expositing information and training the player to engage with the entirety of their narrative, fictional, and gamic worlds.
Copyright
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Recommended Citation
Danenhower, Callan, "Player Exposition: Education and Immersion in JRPGs" (2024). Honors Theses. 985.
https://aquila.usm.edu/honors_theses/985