The Interactivity in the Electronic Game Shadow of the Colossus

Abstract

This work analyzes how interactivity is built in the electronic game Shadow of the Colossus and explains how the actancial syncretism is explored towards this goal. Released in 2005 by scei (Sony Computer Entertainment Inc.) to the PlayStation 2 console, the game became famous for involving the player in a lonely environment and for presenting some flaws in the general narrative. An important point that deserves attention is the recurrence of the same narrative program structure, which forms a cascade towards a main narrative program. The interactivity (defined in different ways by diverse authors of several domains) is defined in this analysis as the syncretism between the enunciatee (discourse actant) and the subject (narrative actant). A simulation is created to make the enunciatee/player feel as if he were the protagonist of the game and many elements emphasize this impression throughout the game. Amongst the features explored here, we highlight the break of the classic narrative linearity, the subject enunciative shifting out, the soundtrack, the controller vibration, and the duplicity of interlocutees for the same interlocutor. Because of the actancial syncretism, the enunciator delegates the main action role to two actants: the young warrior Wander and the enunciatee or player. These are some of the points undertook by the semiotic analysis of Shadow of the Colossus, which intends for a deeper investigation into the narrative world of electronic games.