betajames

While we seemingly get lots of choices in a game about how we get from place to place, how to kill enemies (and with what weapon), and even how we make moral decisions, when the game prompts us we usually get down to doing what it tells us to do.  Even if we don’t, if we really want to play the game, ultimately we will have to.

If the player blows the right moves or says the wrong thing or chooses the wrong place to eat, intimacy is a no go.  “Intimacy” becomes an activity in which a potential lover is acted upon, not a complex system of mutual interaction.  It is also seemingly antagonistic.  The paramour is competing with him- or herself or the desires of their intended lover in order to engage with them intimately.  Failure means that the lover is displeased, transforming them into something more of a threat or obstacle to be overcome than a potential partner.