Contextual Studies Group Project

So after a while of doing research not on my blog, I have decided to put my research on here. Our group has assigned the question; How does the east and west incite fear with games and how do they compare?, quite a set question but it is subject to change once we have gathered all the research for the presentation that we need.

My role is this project is to look at the visuals or aesthetics in horror games from the Eastern side and Western side. I will look into what the style is and how it then incites the horror into the game and hopefully the fear into the person. the 4 common and most observable for horror and fear I will look at is; Resident Evil, Amnesia, Silent Hill and Dead Space, although yes specific they are the most popular and well known games for having horror and fear implemented into them and working.

Dead Space

This is just a short summary of the plot, simple I know but it's the basics

The story behind Dead Space is that a group of people went to go and see what was happening from a distress signal from a mining ship. However 1 of the people that goes gets separated from the group, the group then assists him into fixing the ships. Unfortunately the crew that were on the mining ship discovered something called the Red Marker, encrypted on the Red Marker in a genetic code is a alien virus. This virus turned the crew of the mining ship into 'necromorphs' (mutated and reanimated corpses).

Dead Space uses a gritty and dark subtle palette which helps to create a feeling of suspense and eriness. the lack of bright colours helps to immerse the player within the atmosphere of the game. the style that the game uses helps to balance out the storyline with game play. Being stranded on a ship alone along with corpses that evolve is helped by the way that the style has been used. This has also been helped with the messy gore seen at points in the game. the lack of light source within the game helps to create visually an anticipated horror and makes the player sit on the edge of their seat. Many of the styles can be also noted that they have been influenced by H.P Lovecraft and there is even a nod to H.P Lovecraft: 'Dead Space has always seemed like an aimed tribute to cosmic horror and it's Master H.P. Lovecraft, notably, the NPC Howard Phillips in chapter 7 and the final boss in Dead Space 2 resembling an "Old One" may be the ultimate nods to shake any doubts.' (Singularity Matter | 10:40 AM on 02.09.2011)

Dead Space 2: Mano-A-Necro

Looking at the image above really helps to carry through the gritty and dark style that this game possesses.

the enemies or necromorphs style is very disturbing and uses a skin colour for the rotten flesh parts of the enemy and this helps to produce fear into the player. they have portrayed the enemies as evolved humans by adding tentacles and open wounds to show the cavities of the body, you can see the inside of the bodies and the bones sticking out, all of this style still had a dark and gritty colour which really helps to make them look scarier and with the low lighting in most parts of the game you'll get a glimmer of the enemy with it's claw like hands and open body parts it really does help to create a horror and fear game.

Another style to mention is the crossover of the Japanese influence with the style of the armour used by the main character, it uses a style of Samurai armour whilst still presenting a futuristic look, this I feel is where the Japanese influence takes place in this game and helps to add to the style of the game in a complementing way, you can also see Japanese influences in how they have used Japanese styled train signs.

Armour from Dead Space

Dead Space 2: Taking Aim

Silent Hill

A Japanese game that plays horror visually brilliant. One of the elements to which it makes it a great horror and fear game is the fog used within the game, although back when Silent Hill was first released and technology wasn't advanced, for then Silent hill made good used of what was available and so the fog helped a great deal in helping to create the suspense and atmosphere of a horror and fear game.

The image below helps to show the fog used within game, this style of not being able to see very far into the distance along with the gritty feel and use of subtle colours helps to convey and scary and fearful atmosphere. Silent Hill also uses the same style as Dead Space in that there is a limited amount of light source, this common occurrence in horror film and games help to create the eerie atmosphere and to put fear into the player and make them sit on the edge of their seat.

The main element in which makes this game a horror and fear game is the style of the enemies, the used of the simplistic approach and featureless corpses helps to create a real disturbing and horrific style and implements the fear and horror into the player.

A big influence on the horror set in the game and style is from Francis Bacon, an Irish born artists known for his bold, graphical and emotionally raw imagery.

Other influences of the styles of the game come from:

Hans Bellmer

Joel Peter Witkin

Books

Phantoms by Dean Koontz

Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoevsky

Lost World by Conan Doyle

(link in bibliography)

Sign at the beginning of the game, the fog surrounding the sign and worn look helps to add to the eeriness of the game and atmosphere.

the creatures are influenced by H.P Lovecraft and Stephen King.

the stlye here is somewhat again gritty and dirty, the old and worn out look doesn't necessarily convey a scary feel or horror but definitely adds to the atmosphere and storyline.

the use of the minimal lighting and the gritty style along with the gore style of the corpse helps to represent and horrific atmosphere.

the featureless enemies helps to add the fear and horror into the player, this style works really well.

this image in itself is really creepy and the style of the enemy with it head a massive metal triangular spike helps to create fear and horror as a style.

Resident Evil

The style of Resident Evil is somewhat similar to Silent hill and Dead Space, from the beginning of the series with Resident Evil 1 the style and visuals of the game uses the same styled atmosphere with the subtle colours and limited light, however the enemies in Resident Evil didn't necessarily possess the scary and fearful appeal that Silent hill had, this was mainly because the lack of technology back then, when looking at the style of Resident Evil 5 you can they have incorporated the horrific style in which both Dead Space and Silent hill have used, the style of the monsters are mutated and have either tentacles from them or other monsters appearing out from within them. The same grittiness and fuzzy style runs through the other games also, this seems to be a common occurrence and helps to create a horror or fearful atmosphere, the overall appearance helps to convey and incite horror in both the Eastern and Western cultures of video games.

Resident Evil 5

Resident Evil Gamecube

Screenshot of Resident Evil 1

Resident Evil 5

Resident Evil 1, the fuzzy texture overlay on the game helps to create a horror atmosphere

Amnesia: the Dark Descent

Amnesia: the Dark Descent was made by Frictional Games and is classed as a survival horror.

This game is an interesting game through it's style, the whole style is based upon light source, the only control you have over light really is the lamp you have, with it being a light you go insane. so the use of light in this game is what makes it really scary, however obviously not just the light source that makes it scary and fearful. the apparently of the corpses and creatures combined with the simplicity and and featureless style helps to create horror and fear bloody well. this style of the creatures or corpses is very similar to Silent hill where you have the faceless nurse, this style and many of the other styles influenced by Francis Bacon and H.P Lovecraft help to create a truly horrifying atmosphere.

one of the horrifying corpses in Amnesia

The style of the setting also carries across what every other game has in that it is gritty, fuzzy and uses a subtle palette. The key elements of style being a limited amount of light source, the possible influential creatures from Silent Hill, Dead Space and Resident Evil and the overall colours and grittiness helps to create a tense and horrifying atmosphere within the game.

Another visual aspect of the game that adds to the creepiness and horror of the game is the 'Strawberry Jam', blood flows along the walls and follows you once you have completed a certain part of the game, this style really helps to make the player be freaked out and sit on the edge of their seat, it may be a small detail but it adds another level of horror and fear into the game.

Overall all these games use subtle colours, this use of a subtle palette helps to entice the fear and horror within the game, it also helps to create that eerie atmosphere and helps to create the suspense of horror. they all share this common occurrence but not all share the same key elements, both Silent hill and Amnesia use the limited amount of light source to incite fear and yet Silent Hill and Amnesia and made by either a Western company or Eastern company. back when these types of games were only just being made it was the lack of technology that affected the amount of horror and fear in games, Silent Hill made the most of the technology and succeeded with the fog. Resident Evil however didn't necessarily have horrifying creatures but still used the overlay of fuzziness and gritty effects to help enhance the visual horror. As time has passed by each horror game has advanced with it's visuals by the technology available, this can be seen either through Amnesia or Dead Space, the used of dynamic lighting and high res textures help to really immerse the player into the atmosphere, this can be especially seen with Amnesia. when it comes to the enemies and creatures it is quite clear that when it comes to the Western companies they incorporated the film like creatures with whom were brash and quite obvious what they were and a lot of them were created by experiments gone wrong or even man made, this can be seen through Resident Evil or even Dead Space. Even though Resident Evil was created by a Japanese company they still seemed to incorporate an American style with it's man made zombies or scientific accidents and it's style and visuals used. Amnesia and Silent Hill on the other hand use a different style in which the enemies are more to do with being tortured, mutated, evil/hell or even by a cult, this style can be seen by the featureless creatures and highly disturbing style of them, saying this though however most of these games have actually been influenced by the likes of Francis Bacon or even H.P Lovecraft so really it's about what technology was available at the time of making the game and how it was stylised and what influenced the company to make the style like. Today we can see them almost merging as one with the similar styles and the same eerie atmospheres used along with the same colour palettes. So like with other horror games then like Fear we can see that there are key elements in visuals that each one has applied to create the concept of fear and horror; thus being

- Light source and how much there is
- Grittiness and the fuzzy overlay
- The featureless or grotesque creatures used
- Influences and inspirations from the likes of Stephen King, H.P Lovecraft and Francis Bacon

And the rest really is down to the sound, game play and the origins and stories behind either the research for the games or the games itself and not to mention the influences behind horror films.

Bibliography

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Wikipedia for image

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