University of Southern California Dissertations and Theses

Isolation

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Isolation

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Content ISOLATION
By
Bria Nycole Smith
A Thesis Presented to the FACULTY OF THE USC SCHOOL OF CINEMATIC ARTS
UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
In Partial Fulfillment of the
Requirements for the Degree
MASTER OF ARTS
(Interactive Media)
December 2020
Copyright 2020 Bria Nycole Smith
Table of Contents
Abstract……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….……………………..….iii
Isolation………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..………………………………………………….1
Introduction……………………………………………………………………….…………………………………………………………………….1
Formation……………………………………………………………………..…………………………………………………………………………2
Results…………………………………………………………………………………………………………...………………………………………….4
Bibliography………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….6

Smith ii

Abstract
In-world socialization within videogames is most often confined by a mentality
of manipulation. This occurs even when the game is narratively encouraging an
emotional closeness, as the use of “decision trees” posits the idea that intimacy
requires manipulation of a world state. This is a common ideology within the world
of videogames in general, but the consequences of manipulating people as one
would objects is very rarely considered. Isolation attempted to observe the meaning
of intimacy within uneven relationships by leaning into these tropes. The eruption of
a real life plague similar to the world state of the game itself greatly changed the
team’s approach to the game, as intimacy became an intensely debated topic in the
real world.

Smith iii
Isolation
Isolation is, in so many words, the story of an agoraphobic beach town and
the teen monster who preys upon its denizens. Given more words, it is also the
culmination of my personal social anxieties, but I am a denizen of a vast and
complicated world. That Isolation could predict the Covid crisis was a reminder of
my place within a roving American collective, unique though each member may be,
whose public views, emotions and fears I both affected and was affected by, I had
dreamt of a world made to stand still because I existed in one in which slowing down
seemed a dread-inducing impossibility.
One of the bodies you inhabit as the unnamed monster is that of a white boy
redditor who wears a mask. The player spends their time trying to destroy a loved
one; she herself is a black girl fueled by the belief in her own individuality, without
which she would break. I am three months removed from proper production of this
game, and these individual pieces sit before me in the news. I’m going to spend
much of this time talking through the design process of this small piece of a game,
but I can’t help but do so from what feels like the most distant future.
The premise is the same as it had been around the February of 2019. A single
player acts as a hive-mind attempting to subsume those it encounters into its
collective form in ways reminiscent of natural consumption. Such examples include
natural rot, and the stranger tendencies of certain fungi to either turn into slime or
else zombify their food for reproduction, combining food and sex in a very “sublime”,
religious way. That is, in the way saints are often immortalized with their breasts on
Smith 1
plates or their stomachs engorged with food, reminding the viewer of the
ascension of said saint in the odd marriage of two life giving acts made strange by
their juxtaposition.
I think that at its heart, Isolation has always been about something similar.
There aren’t any saints or otherwise overt religious moments, but it revolves like all
theses do around a question that it attempts to answer. Initially, mine was, “How do I
portray social anxiety and toxicity mechanically?” That, too, didn’t change much
throughout the production process, but I think that an existential question assisted it;
it gets weird so please bear with me. If so many different pieces of media tell us that
human beings are individually “missing” the love of some mysterious other, then
what would becoming “whole” in a literal sense look like? And what happens if it isn’t
all that it was cracked up to be?
We define ourselves by our power over people and the right we feel towards
that power. We create things in turn which devour, and tell stories about our
possession of that power: systems, viruses, engines. We speak through them, and
find ourselves a part of this ouroboros where narratives of consumption and
conquering are replicated as a love language all its own, as a valid way of framing
the world.
Formation
Isolation initially pulled inspiration from several role playing games. In
attempting to figure out a different way of communicating with NPCs, I looked
towards games in which intimacy was a mechanic in itself. The World Ends With You
Smith 2
had similar existential themes, and challenged players to perfectly synchronize the
attacks of two different characters at the same time. This created a set of
mechanics that told its own story of the difficulties of paying attention to and
utilizing two different screens, which created an excellent foundation for a story
about human closeness and the worthiness of life.
However, this was a game in which both characters are presented equally
within the mechanics. While this was a single player game with a single main
character, during combat both the protagonist and their current partner could be
played. Isolation is not a story of emotional equality and bonding, but rather of
manipulation.
Undertale was another big influence for its approach to combat. While
fighting and filling your way through encounters is an option, the ending considered
most “ideal” requires that players never attack. Instead, they must go through a
series of interactions unique to each monster which include dancing, telling jokes
and simply refusing to fight. This didn’t stop the opponent from attacking, and the
player had to participate in a sort of bullet-hell scenario wherein they had to avoid a
range of attacks.
Both of these examples were compelling, but relied heavily upon the player’s
reaction speed. Isolation initially attempted to land somewhere between the two by
giving the player two lines they could control, with one needing to literally trap the
other by traveling around it in a sort of homage to Snake. However, this required
that there be a secondary screen for these interactions to take place, and as
Smith 3
production wound on I realized that I preferred a more seamless integration of the
socializing mechanic and the game at large.
Results
I believe that there is still valid work to be explored here, as my own
experiments only seemed to scratch the surface. While the decision to move to a
more tactile way of interacting with the system was well received, the game itself
was not playtested nearly enough to further that initial conception. This was due to a
few things, most glaringly my own anxiety. In attempting such an experimental
project, I became doubtful of my own abilities to see the project to its completion.
Ironically, this became a self fulfilling prophecy, as I found myself avoiding the
necessary criticism needed to make something truly compelling. Nonetheless, I don’t
believe that this was a total error. My thesis opened up space for an interesting
conversation around what conversation truly is. It is not a series of coded choices
laid out before us, but rather a complicated system of thought and reaction. The
tactility was compelling because it added a sense of intimacy that is often lost, but
at its heart the system was still a type of decision tree. A game is a combination of
interesting decisions enforced by the system, and I do hope to come back to this
question one day, and attempt to break the nature of those decisions.
However, with the world in its current state, I admittedly have trouble
attempting to conceive of a place for my thesis with its themes remaining intact. For
as much as it revolves around the unexplored possibilities of socialization mechanics,
it was equally about the surreality of immense loneliness. The player acts as a
Smith 4
strange entity which devours all it can, the source of a thick malaise settling over the
town. The player is the one forcing these people inside, and the surreal world I
attempted is now too greatly mirrored by our own reality.
I think that that is a testament to the strange nature of creating in and
reacting to the world around us, those occasions when life imitates art. But there
becomes a further question, equally worthy of examination. What is one’s
responsibility in these situations? This had been by its nature a reaction to the world
as it was in 2019, but in releasing this today it would be taken as a reaction to current
world events. Thus, it would become a judgement of the Covid epidemic, and I am
not sure that I understand just yet what I want to say about this time in the world.
For me, this project seems to be a strange reminder of who I was before the plague,
and attempting to reorganize it to fit the current climate fits me with mixed emotion.

Smith 5
Bibliography
SquareEnix. The World Ends With You. SquareEnix. Nintendo DS. 2007
Fox, Toby. Undertale. Version 1.11. 8-4. PC/Mac. 2015
Smith 6

Abstract (if available)

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Asset Metadata

Creator Smith, Bria Nycole (author)

Core Title Isolation

School School of Cinematic Arts

Degree Master of Fine Arts

Degree Program Interactive Media

Publication Date 12/12/2020

Defense Date 04/15/2020

Publisher University of Southern California (original), University of Southern California. Libraries (digital)

Tag OAI-PMH Harvest,roleplaying,RPGs,video games

Language English

Contributor Electronically uploaded by the author (provenance)

Advisor Wixson, Dennis (committee chair), Fullerton, Tracy (committee member), Lemarchand, Richard (committee member)

Creator Email 11bria.smith11@gmail.com,briasmit@usc.edu

Permanent Link (DOI) https://doi.org/10.25549/usctheses-c89-404270

Unique identifier UC11668761

Identifier etd-SmithBriaN-9207.pdf (filename),usctheses-c89-404270 (legacy record id)

Legacy Identifier etd-SmithBriaN-9207.pdf

Dmrecord 404270

Document Type Thesis

Rights Smith, Bria Nycole

Type texts

Source University of Southern California (contributing entity), University of Southern California Dissertations and Theses (collection)

Access Conditions The author retains rights to his/her dissertation, thesis or other graduate work according to U.S. copyright law. Electronic access is being provided by the USC Libraries in agreement with the a...

Repository Name University of Southern California Digital Library

Repository Location USC Digital Library, University of Southern California, University Park Campus MC 2810, 3434 South Grand Avenue, 2nd Floor, Los Angeles, California 90089-2810, USA