The Auteur Theory of a Videogame
In the 1950’s French magazine Cahiers du Cinema famously coined the theory of the auteur director by pointing out that they are in control of the mise en scene (the medium of the story). This is most easily explained by looking at the rolls of all the other members of a production.
In theatre no matter what the director tells the actors, when the curtain opens he is powerless to change the action. At the same time the actors are powerless to change the events of the screenplay. Hence the playwright is considered the author of the play: Shakespeare, Goethe, and Williams are the names we know in theatre, not the actors or directors. In film the director is the person in control of everything: the action, the camera, the script. All these elements are his to put together in any way they see fit. After the images are imprinted in celluloid there’s nothing anyone can do to change it, even if they try.
The auteur of a videogame is the player. No matter what the director, animator, texture sampler, programmer, or publisher does to a game, after it ships the player is the ultimate author of the game. Every experience is unique. Every playthrough different. This is why speed runs and super plays are so entertaining: we can watch how someone else decided to play out the events, how they authored the sequences and actions.
This is precisely the reason that games don’t evolve. Designers are still trying to deliver the same experience to every player that purchases their game. Sterilized to the point of ubiquity, many games feel like the player’s role is diminished, or even worse unnecessary. The best films are tied to the director, even ones with weak stories or poor writing: that’s not what the medium is as concerned with. Theatre is the realm of writers: even when a poor performance of Hamlet is premiered the writing isn’t what’s criticized. If a player is allowed to turn a game’s world into their own then the writing, acting, and mechanics can be excused.
Morrowind is possibly the strongest example I can think of to prove this. I spent over 300 hours in the game over about 4 different characters. I made the world my own, I broke the systems just as a law could be broken. I explored when and where I wanted. Never was I demanded to follow the tracks of a roller coaster for entertainment. The many, many faults of the game are easily overlooked since I had such freedom. As the auteur of my own experience I owned Morrowind like no one else ever will–well not exactly like anyone else. Games with deep mechanics works the same way, look at any 2D fighter. Diago has dominated his opponents by making every character bend to his will on screen in ways no one else can. His name is possibly more synonymous with Street Fighter than any of the developer’s names.
There are different ways to give the player auteurship (uhh, sure, that word works), and until developers find ways of allowing players to auteur different emotions games can’t evolve. Just putting emotions into the writing, or through actions (Aeris), will never be enough.
More thoughts on this later.







