The Shelf Life of a Conceit
Everyone remembers the moment in the film adaptation of The Martian by Andy Weir, directed by Ridley Scott, when the sandstorm roars with a constant hum across the alien desert. It felt like something from the Sahara Desert. If it weren’t for the space suits, I could have been back in the Arabian Desert instead of sitting on the couch and watching Matt Damon getting left behind on the red planet. The crew had to leave him because the launch shuttle was at risk of toppling over in the storm, and there was insufficient time to rescue him. It is weeks later when they receive a video message informing them that their fellow astronaut, the only one left on Mars, is still alive. He has managed to sustain himself by growing potatoes using his own feces as fertilizer. Clever.
A conceit in storytelling is often a Gordian knot that ties the whole of movie, novel, or a video game together; backstory, present day, physics, trophic dynamics, perceived futures, all in the sack which is carried around by the audience. Video games are a fascinating example of an art form that starts a gaming franchise with a concept, which eventually becomes so ingrained that players no longer notice it. This is true even when developers make significant changes to the story and world dynamics to fit their latest installment. Take Assassin’s Creed; Origins. A brilliant game in itself, not the first Assassin’s Creed installment published by Ubisoft, although it tells the story of the beginning of the order of Assassins that the player becomes a part of in all the other Assassin’s Creed games. Origins is historically misleading, as the Assassins in the original game were inspired by an Islamic sect from the Middle East (specifically present-day Syria and Iraq) during the time of The Crusades. Ignoring that mistake, we can appreciate the captivating narrative arc that the game takes us on in Ptolemaic Egypt, starting from Siwa (which happens to be the place where Alexander the Great was informed by an oracle that he was the son of Amon-Zeus) and concluding in Alexandria, encountering notable figures like Cleopatra VII along the way. It’s a great origin arc for the covert order that dominates the game. So it’s odd that the next game released is called Assassin’s Creed: Odyssey, which is set during the Peloponnesian War, almost 500 years before the birth of Cleopatra VII. As a writer, it is clear that the game developers decided to create a game set during the Peloponnesian War, disregarding continuity. Odyssey can either be considered as the actual ‘Origins’ (in that case, what should we refer to the Egyptian game as?) or it exists outside of the overall storyline, standing on its own and hoping that players wouldn’t mind the fact that the entire narrative concept of an origin story had been dismantled.
However, I came to praise the Assassin’s Creed franchise, not to bury it, and we have not even reached the conceit which I am going to focus on. The fact I want to emphasize is that Assassin’s Creed was initially a science fiction game, rather than a historical fiction game. Players, based on anecdotes from many individuals I have spoken to or been friends with, often forget the core premise of the first few games: Desmond Miles is a prisoner of the Abstergo company, who use his DNA to access historical narratives. He lies in a futuristic bed and is transported back to the 12th Century to explore cities such as Damascus and Acre. He is constantly being brought back to the future, and you play through segments talking to a blonde lab assistant who is essentially your minder. This is a great idea, but Ubisoft writers got another thing right in the process of creating the Assassin’s Creed franchise. Make the player forget the conceit. Take them on a journey to captivating worlds, where the rules are subtly altered. As you explore, you will discover that the game’s main focus is the destination, rather than the initial concept.
The games still transport you back to the various labs where the modern version of “you” is working. Desmond Miles managed to escape the lab at the end of the first game. From the second installment onwards, you often find yourself in remote locations where your allies have set up a van or another vehicle with a generator to power the lab. Stories depend on the audience’s ability to overcome obstacles in order to reach their desired outcome. With a book, there is often an implicit understanding that although the reading may require effort, the reward will be worth the level of detail we delve into. However, with a game the payoff is different. It’s like this: you entered this world, learned about the backstory and how the world works, and now I’ll let you move forward — or continue along a predetermined path if the game is linear. There is a strangeness to the conceit because it is the only trustworthy part of the narrative. There may be unexpected turns in the story, but it all starts with a predictable arc, serving as a metaphor for the story’s beginning. Yet we are ready to release ourselves from the conceit, I would argue, even from the first play through of Assassin’s Creed 2. It’s as if Ezio and his world are vivid and vibrant, while Altair’s world was more simplistic and meant for future advancements. So while the metaphor is trustworthy; DNA can be used as a time machine, the time travel element, the machine itself if you will, is left in the past with HG Wells. One day we might encounter him in an Assassin’s Creed game, but we do not require his metaphorical device.
The link between the past and future is held together by us. The audience’s interest in being 21st century players experiencing historical journeys was strong enough that the connection made in the game itself became increasingly unnecessary. Now, as I regularly play Assassin’s Creed: Valhalla, this connection feels weak at best. They have the formula in place, but it is more a reminder of the franchises origins than a narrative device. Maybe I will go back and play the first two games in the series again to recapture the conceit’s power, but I doubt it. Assassin’s Creed teaches us the importance of listening to the audience and delivering what they want from a game. It also emphasizes the need to prioritize enjoyable elements over a slow and technical narrative, which could have ultimately led to the demise of the franchise. It was interesting but at the same time surplus to requirement.
Video games may not align with the educational expectations of some enthusiastic parents, but they undeniably offer experiences that can expand people’s perspectives. Human internal models and predictions about the world are what drive our engagement with it. Some experts, like Andy Clark and Roger Bartra, believe that experience is the essence of consciousness and the driving force behind it. So how can the world be educated by video games? The simple and powerful tool. Video games are counterfactuals, immersive historical experiences. Julius Caesar never said e tu Brute, and he was not slain by a magi from Siwa, but he could have been, and Assassin’s Creed — with the help of historians, archeologists and classicists — got you in the room. It is also true that people can’t see through the birds, but Assassin’s Creed is allowed to play with physics and biology, and magic because it is… science fiction. Moreover, in Assassin’s Creed Valhalla, the bird you interact with is a raven. Hopefully some will wonder why and find the answer interesting. But the true purpose of video games is to provide a unique experience. You have the opportunity to become a Greek hero in Assassin’s Creed: Odyssey. In the game, you can choose to play as a woman, representing Atalanta. Additionally, you can equip yourself with the armor of Jason, the sandals of Atalanta, the bracers of Theseus, and the helmet of Perseus, which resembles a wreath.
Stephen Fry once said of gadgets, “it is entirely style over substance, and people who think that is a bad thing mistake the matter, the style is the point.” If we consider video games as gadgets, then they can be seen as the ideal gadget. The best games in my opinion are those who build their world to be attractive. That means a strong story, a beautiful world and smooth gameplay. Games that overcomplicate those factors are at risk of creating an unwinnable game with no joy to be found, or a story with no end in sight. A game without any narrative can give the impression of being trapped in a black hole, with no way out. However, if the narrative is too rigid, it can lead to boredom, preventing players from exploring unconventional paths and getting stuck behind insignificant obstacles. A game that falls short in terms of gameplay dynamics, such as the camera, movement, and vibration, is Far Cry 5. The game tries so hard to make you feel like you’re driving a 4x4 through a forest that it can actually make you feel nauseous. Point? The experience is everything.
The long-term impact of that experience may not be fully understood for years, but Ubisoft’s decision to abandon the concept of constantly switching between the time machine and having the character take breaks or engage in conversations with a lab crush was brilliant. The story would have been overbearing by game three… oh wait, it was. The art of the conceit, the metaphor that sends a player on their way is one which can be all but dropped and the missing pieces will be ignored. I will journey into the past, back to the top of this brief essay for a moment. I used the Martian weather in the film The Martian as an example of a use of a conceit, and it turns out that it was exactly the kind of conceit I needed. Andy Weir, the author of the original book, used to work as a NASA engineer in the past. He revealed on a podcast, The Book Shambles, that although he needed the launch rocket to be at risk of falling over for his story to work — a man vs nature story — it could have never happened in reality. The Martian atmosphere is much thinner than Earth’s, and the storm would have passed by without causing any significant disruption. The crew would have joined back up together, risk-free — relatively risk-free — and journeyed home. There would be no story. Sometimes a conceit, although crucial to the beginning and understanding of a world is false when the obsessives in their anoraks come along. It might be better just to ditch it wherever possible. Well done, Assassin’s Creed.
Finally, It may well be that the conceit might be rescued from my evisceration in a very interesting way. The Assassin’s Creed conceit is that DNA can be used as a time machine, so we can experience the past. That, of course, is not true in the way Ubisoft presents it, and they demonstrate this by taking liberties with geography and architecture. In the Valhalla installment, the game takes place in England. I travelled from Leicester to York in three minutes, give or take (I was making a cup of tea while the horse followed the road). The same journey would take over an hour in a car today. What’s more, based on my experience with Time Team, the buildings described in the game do not align with my understanding of Roman Britain (where ruins are still visible in the game) and Saxon England (the historical period in which the gameplay takes place). Does this matter? No. The features are accurate because a team of expert advisors worked on them to ensure they appear as realistic as possible, even when artistic freedom was required.
That process has brought the conceit full circle, because Winchester Museum, in the city which is famous for being the capital of Alfred the Great’s Wessex, has teamed up with Ubisoft to create an augmented reality tour of the city. People can now visit the city gates and see what they would have looked like during Alfred’s reign through their phones. The museum and the game developer have come together to bring the DNA of Winchester into the 21st century, thereby making the conceit within the game reverse itself and hold truth. Sometimes the thing that gets left behind in a franchise can be put to better use. This was true for the Discovery versions of Assassin’s Creed Origins and Odyssey. In those games, players could visit historical sites like Alexandria and learn about the city’s founding and other related aspects. However, in a new model that involves augmented reality and virtual reality, museums and game companies can help you reimagine the past of places where you live and the streets that you walk through while trying to avoid erratic traffic. In this way, the game has become a time machine. Both gamers and non-gamers will have the opportunity to experience Anglo-Saxon England firsthand as they explore one of the country’s most significant historical cities.
