Burn, Baby, Burn: Failure Inferno

I was really interested in our discussion on failure earlier this week. I thought failure was an interesting theme to explore, particularly towards the end of the semester because it's probably one of the last things gamers expect to think about when it comes to gaming. In class, I was curious about my own interpretation of failure because when it comes down to it; I often define failure either systematically (a score less than a certain threshold) or emotionally (a feeling of missing or being unable to reach a particular threshold). I was hoping to write a post that would perhaps expand my own understanding of failure, but also explore how a game like Little Inferno implements failure both explicitly and implicitly into its game mechanics.

At first glance, I thought that Little Inferno was "un-failable". There was little to no objective in the game with minimal reward for feeding the fire. I labelled it as a sort of sandbox game, except instead of building a world around you, you destroy items from the world around you. I suppose the scale of my screen did give me a sense of interiority, but the warm color palette and 'smiling' fireplace made me feel like I was in the right place. As the game progressed, I got increasingly more and more bored; some items in the catalogue stood out to me, notably the teddy bear with human hands and the school bus full of children, because I began to wonder why I even fathomed burning these items, and that led to me to my first interpretation of this situation. You gain currency in this game by burning toys, and ultimately all the currency you make goes straight back into burning toys. Realistically, you could make quite a bit of money from burning only one item because the revenue you make from burning that item can allow you to purchase another of the same item. This infinite stream of revenue though is completely obsolete; you essentially make zero profit since the only thing you can spend your money on is more items to burn. Effectively, you burn all the money you make from burning money. This endless cycle of capitalist purchasing for little to no gain is the first instance of failure in my eyes: and it reminded me a lot of Ancient Greek Punishment, as the satisfaction of making money is immediately terminated by spending it; and there's this vicious growing cycle of accumulating wealth and spending it to accumulate more wealth. I began to realize that while it felt like there was no way to fail, there was equally no way to succeed; because the objective of the game couldn't possibly be to rack up funds as they would just be spent on more items.

Introducing story elements and characters like Sugar Plumps, the Weather Man and Miss Nancy, I began to see a recurring trend of not really being able to interact with the outside world. Yes you could send items to your neighbors, but ultimately, you just ended up burning their letters, perhaps as a metaphor for firing up your external relationships. I then tried following this achievement model, and noticed a trajectory reflective of the game's mechanics. I began to seek out these combinations as a means of unlocking more items to create more combinations, mirroring the make money to spend money model from earlier. These accomplishments were fuelling my thirst for more accomplishments, just as toys and items fuelled this never ending fire. The thing is, the fire would never be satisfied; it would eat up the toy and then fade away, just as making money or racking up achievements never satisfied me; I just kept going to try and seek out those successes, than in the end only fuelled my need for more.

Ultimately, watching my and Sugar Plumps' houses burn down and facing the black and white reality of the outside world; i began to see how the Little Inferno fireplace played a role in this universe: A form of escape from the cold, banality of day to day life, where players can interact with artificial, constructed experiences (a school bus, a teddy bear, a family) and then release them when they were done with them. Though it seems the ashes from these fireplaces fuelled the cold of the outside world, which was a nice touch. Though, in Miss Nancy's discussion of dreams and the Weatherman's pursuit for the sun and Sugar Plumps' escape to the beach; I began to see the outside world as an escape from Little Inferno. The characters, though occupying a black and white world of snow and ash, were all finding ways to escape their realities, through travel, or through the fireplace, and to culminate the ending with you hopping on the weather balloon and flying off; you accept a different kind of escape that faces a new reality rather than constructing a false one. Do we succeed in the end? Do we fail? It's hard to say, because in a lot of ways, the ending is an uplifting one. But I feel like perhaps the ending, is one the player must define outside the game rather than in.