Phone Story and We Become What We Behold are both serious games with explicit messages that the player should be able to take away by the time they finish playing it for the first time. There are two things I'd like to bring to attention: 1) replaying serious games and 2) engagement in serious games.
Let's start at number one. While an explicit serious game may intend for the player to play and understand the its message, does the message stay intact if a player chooses to replay the game? Is it possible for some players to replay the game and find a message or another way of play not intended by the programmer?
In Phone Story', there are two buttons at the start of the game, "Story Mode" and "Obsolescence Mode", though only Story Mode is first available to you. In doing this, the game requires that you go through it exactly as the programmer intends so that you learn the message the game is imposing. But in Obsolescence Mode, there is no story, just the literal mini-games without narration. In this mode, Phone Story bypasses the obstacle of replaying. In this mode, the visual graphics of these mini-games are still intact, invoking the messages for each scene. And still, without a narration to pay attention to, the player can delve into an exploration of the game's mechanics. I suppose then, that the question for Phone Story when it comes to its Obsolescence Mode, is how many replays does it take for the message to stop resonating through the visual graphics? Given the name of this mode, it seems even the programmer knows this particular mode will become obsolete eventually.
Consider now, number two. Can it still be fun to play explicit serious games? Do you have to make your own fun in explicit serious games?
From my personal experience, I did not have fun playing Phone Story but I had a lot of fun playing We Become What We Behold. The readings told us that an implicit, embedded approach, telling of a game's message is more effective in getting across than the explicit. When I played Phone Story, I focused more on the narration the narrator was saying rather than on playing the mini-games, resulting in falling short of the goal at least once for every level. This might just be me with an inability to multitask well, but I this was a main source of annoyance that sapped enjoyment from the game. However, in We Become What We Behold, I had more fun I think in part because I had to make my own fun. The mechanic to take pics of interesting things for the media was used to my advantage. I took too many pictures of squirrels simply because they seemed really funny to me. By doing that, I tried to see how many squirrels I could get in the background of pictures with people. (Not many, unfortunately.) Still, I was able to comprehend the message of how media alters our perceptions of others until we only see each other as enemies or "others".
Here then, I was able to take away a the messages of each game, but was able to make my own fun in one of them. Perhaps not every programmer of an explicit serious game wants the players to enjoy it. That's entirely valid; Phone Story's subject matter isn't one to take too lightly. But perhaps, if there were more ways to consider allowing for fun in explicit serious games, people wouldn't be as resistant to their messages.
Interesting take! I also felt as if Phone Story quickly sapped itself of any enjoyment as it progressed, especially into Obsolescence Mode. I also agree entirely with your final paragraph where you pointed out that the case may be that not every explicit serious game programmer wanting the players to enjoy it as a game and also that the game's explicit message may resonate better with that same audience if it were more fun. I felt that the explicitness of the game in not only being "unfun" but also in calling out the player as "complicit" shattered the immersiveness and enjoyment of the game experience, which also tied directly into the loss of message it was so explicit about. If…
I was really interested by you saying "When I played Phone Story, I focused more on the narration the narrator was saying rather than on playing the mini-games, resulting in falling short of the goal at least once for every level," because I actually found myself doing the opposite, despite wanting to pay attention to the narration. I think this game is really interesting in that I think it's meant to frustrate the player and force one to pay attention to one or the other, which makes me wonder why the obsolescence mode is there. Which is why I also agree with you and understand when you say that the game wasn't particularly fun. I wonder if the game also…
Totally agree with both you and Larry about Phone Story -- I found it at times troubling and frustrating, but I couldn't figure out exactly why at first. It's not exactly boring, but there's something essentially unsatisfying about it. On the one hand, I really appreciate the gestures toward unethical consumerism, manufacturing, and material sourcing. And in theory I think games don't need to be fun. (The basic form really is just activities within parameters; player reaction seems to be more like an effect than a property.) On the other hand, if a designer wants people to engage with a serious game, I think the same quality threshold that one would expect of any product still applies. For me, Phone…
I understand what you mean when you said Phone Story wasn't particularly fun. I also had to restart all the levels more than one which caused me a lot of irritation and forced to put the game aside for 30 minutes. However, I feel like you hit it right on the nose when you said that the programmer could have made this game without the intention of making it enjoyable. If Phone Story had been an enjoyable game, I don't believe the message would have shined through like it did. If this game had been made with the intention of making it "fun", I feel that it would have made a mockery of the message that is embedded within it.