Zhenia Puzankov

@allworms.bsky.social

1402 Followers 388 Following

IN EXILE from St Petersburg. MA from CGL. Solo game maker and narrative designer. Curator and producer at Briefs. https://linktr.ee/all_worms

Ludo-Narrative Dissonance
But like actual dissonance, not mild irritation we’re told to be scared of.
I mean the gameplay and narrative don’t match at all. The medium can be strangened to the point of othertopia.

Imagine a shooter.
You got a gun, you shoot enemies and they explode in a fountain of blood. You even have a buddy who helps you out. Normal FPS things.

The narrative, however:
Everybody is calling you a doctor but you have military fatigues instead of scrubs. The gun is referred to as scalpel. You shoot people and they explode in blood, but the counter on the side ticks “Patients healed”. Your buddy will even say “Nice surgery, you saved a life today.”

The player will do the apophenia and assume this universe just does surgery this way. Never address the actual process and whether the shot enemies actually live.

Now when the buddy gets hurt, they’ll ask you to heal them. You only have a gun. Do you trust the gameplay or the narrative? You can’t possibly know the right answer.

Bonus points if you commit to the bit and the buddy actually dies from this “surgery”.

Now that is actual Ludo-Narrative Dissonance!

Cover of Strangened Narratives course. A hand with Strangened Narratives written over it with multiple eyes flying around it.

Bunch of weird birds covering the whole page