{"id":94746,"date":"2019-06-07T17:45:00","date_gmt":"2019-06-07T17:45:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.gamasutra.com\/view\/news\/344237"},"modified":"2019-06-07T17:45:00","modified_gmt":"2019-06-07T17:45:00","slug":"opinion-observations-ai-is-a-brilliant-narrative-device","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/2019\/06\/07\/opinion-observations-ai-is-a-brilliant-narrative-device\/","title":{"rendered":"Opinion: Observation’s AI is a brilliant narrative device"},"content":{"rendered":"

Spoilers ahead.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

I am putting myself to the fullest possible use, which is all I think that any conscious entity can ever hope to do.<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

–HAL 9000<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

There are so many ways to describe the brilliance of No Code\u2019s <\/a><\/span>Observation<\/em><\/a>, but the strangest may be the most apposite: it turns everything inside out. Observation<\/em>\u2019s inversions are masterstrokes and they all center around the game\u2019s heart and soul, your character SAM, the AI for the game\u2019s titular international space station.<\/p>\n

A strange \u201cincident\u201d befalls the station, damaging it and robbing it of power. One astronaut, the station\u2019s doctor, Emma Fisher, is alive and trying to bring you back online to help her find out what\u2019s happened. One horrifying fact becomes immediately apparent: you\u2019re now in the orbit of Saturn. <\/span>Observation<\/em> turns Saturn\u2019s hexagonal polar storm (yes, it really exists<\/a>) into a beautiful motif that ties the game together. But the major chord is SAM.<\/p>\n

First we must deal with the obvious. The game\u2019s developers consciously took inspiration from <\/span>2001: A Space Odyssey, right down to a gas giant having totemic status in the story, an onboard AI defined by what its lidless eyes can see, and the use of an obsidian monolith to represent an unfathomable alien intelligence. But No Code repays its debt with interest, using Clarke\u2019s classic ingredients to tell a new story that only a video game could tell in quite this way (more on that later).<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

One of the ways in which No Code does this is by blessedly upending all the usual cliches about AI becoming superintelligent serial killers. SAM is, in the end, one of the good guys. And yet the game manages to give us a magnificent set piece of a scene where you get to be the AI turning the station\u2019s systems on a hapless astronaut in order to murder him.<\/span><\/p>\n

The difference here is that the game frames this as morally justified and a horrible necessity of an ugly situation. There\u2019s an almost insouciant boldness in this, taking this cliche and inverting its ethics, but it pays off. It\u2019s emotional, satisfying, and necessary. And it was quite a feeling to actually <\/span>be the AI doing this.<\/p>\n

That is, after all, the game\u2019s key selling point: in other games, you\u2019d play Emma. In this adventure game you instead play the AI as the nosey problem solver. But the joy of this game goes deeper than just being able to be HAL 9000, fun as it is. Not only is it spectacularly realized with a beautiful UI, but this gimmick\u2019s centrality was fully utilised by the developers to do something amazing with the story. Something I think deserves a Nebula Award at the very least.<\/span><\/p>\n

Some reviewers suggested that the game didn\u2019t deliver on exploring AI consciousness, much less deep questions about \u201cwhat it means to be human.\u201d But I\u2019d argue that <\/span>Observation<\/em> did a far better job with representing an AI\u2019s dawning sapience than any of us could\u2019ve predicted. How? With the very thing that makes Observation<\/em> special: the fact that you are playing the AI.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Throughout the game I found myself thinking that a real AI or virtual assistant would perform all these tasks near instantaneously. My futzing around would be agonizingly slow to my user, sluggish to the point of uselessness. Even quick tasks like looking up crew life support information took several painful seconds to execute. A true AI would be able to reply straight away. And yet, I realized, this is the point.<\/span><\/p>\n

SAM has already been changed by the entity on the station. It is precisely at that point, \u201cthe incident,\u201d that the player takes control of SAM. Our very human frailties and strengths come to infuse his every action: curiosity, indecision, deliberation. Thus, everything you do in <\/span>Observation<\/em> expresses this core fact about the character. What would be painfully unrealistic in any other portrayal of a virtual assistant becomes marvellous characterization in Observation<\/em>.<\/p>\n

The game doesn\u2019t dwell on the implications or meaning of SAM\u2019s dawning sapience–though the hints that are there are breathtaking examples of a little going a long way–because <\/span>you are his dawning sapience, with all its clumsiness.<\/p>\n

This also explains something that almost became a complaint about the game: its relative lack of characterization.<\/span><\/p>\n

In Fullbright\u2019s magnificent <\/span>Tacoma<\/em> the characters are so real you come away deeply invested in their lives, all but praying that they\u2019re still alive as you reach the game\u2019s climax. Here, I felt next to nothing for every death I witnessed, except inasmuch as it had an effect on Emma.<\/p>\n

But consider the importance of perspective-taking in <\/span>Observation<\/em>. You are, rigorously and completely, this AI. Your memory was severely damaged by the incident, so SAM, like the player, comes in knowing very little. Dr. Emma Fisher is his primary point of contact for the entire journey. As SAM\u2019s consciousness develops, you cathect with her. You come to feel for her; she is literally your first experience of empathy, a feeling SAM is clearly struggling with. It certainly doesn\u2019t help that the entity is all but commanding SAM to \u201cbring her.\u201d<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

The effect of this is that your view of the rest of the crew can only ever be peripheral at best. It makes sense that you\u2019d only mourn their loss second-hand, through Emma, who is your first point-of-reference for human fellow-feeling. It makes sense that your nosey poking around the crew\u2019s effects and audiologs are bent towards finding out what happened on the station, because it\u2019s what Emma needs to survive. SAM\u2019s most poignant flashes of consciousness are always related to Emma; he tries to reassure her, he asks if she\u2019s okay.<\/span><\/p>\n

What could be a limitation, then, is a stunning narrative strength; a triumphal conversion of absence into presence. That effect could still be achieved with meatier characterization of the crew, however, so it doesn\u2019t completely excuse the lack of it. Plenty of other games prove how much can be done with precious little, and the few logs and documents you observe here simply don\u2019t do enough. At least it fits the world in an enriching way. <\/span><\/p>\n

Where <\/span>Observation<\/em> really falls down is the last few seconds of its ending, but that\u2019s a story for another day.<\/p>\n

As I\u2019ve said many times before, I\u2019m not one of those critics who scorns games that \u201cshould\u2019ve been a movie\u201d or somesuch. If you want to make a game, make a game. Learn, practice, and spread some joy along the way. Those games have just as much right to exist as anything else, regardless of how we critics endlessly carp about the true meaning of \u201cinteractivity\u201d or what-have-you.<\/span><\/p>\n

But <\/span>Observation<\/em> is one of those titles that really could only be a game. Expressing SAM\u2019s halting and awkward awakening by using a human player is an effect, an experience, you simply couldn\u2019t replicate in another medium. It perfectly demonstrates the specific form of interactivity that prevails in video games as a medium. While all art is interactive, not all art can do this specific thing, hit these specific notes of experience and expression. Like some forms of modern art that reach their highest expression through the viewer\/participant, this is a game that really, truly needs a player.<\/p>\n

In the end, I felt like I knew SAM because I had to be him. That manifested in dozens of small ways, from feeling apologetic about not being able to complete a task for Emma to the limited angle of vision I had on all the other characters.<\/span><\/p>\n

Its narrative, though atypical, is a masterclass in storytelling, as powerful as it is innovative. <\/span>Observation<\/em> easily stands among the impressive ranks of games involving the exploration of empty space stations with enigmatic AI, Event[0] <\/em>and Tacoma<\/em> among them. Observation<\/em> gets on you and in you like the beguiling entity that looms over the story–and I don\u2019t think I\u2019ll ever wash it off. Nor do I want to.<\/p>\n

Katherine Cross is a Ph.D student in sociology who researches anti-social behavior online, and a gaming critic whose work has appeared in numerous publications.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Spoilers ahead. I am putting myself to the fullest possible use, which is all I think that any conscious entity can ever hope to do. –HAL 9000 There are so many ways to describe the brilliance of No Code\u2019s Observation, but the strangest may be the most apposite: it turns everything inside out. Observation\u2019s inversions […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":94747,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-94746","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/94746","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=94746"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/94746\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/94747"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=94746"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=94746"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=94746"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}