"Eternal Darkness" as metacommentary: direct address in video games by Ryan Banfi, p. 1

Eternal Darkness as metacommentary:
direct address in video games

This essay examines the use of direct address in video games, particularly regarding the medium’s relation to the player/user. I argue here that Viktor Shklovsky’s concept of defamiliarization and Russian formalism are productive strategies to examine video games’ direct address rather than using Bertolt Brecht’s concept of a distancing effect (or Verfremdungseffekt or V-effect) (Brecht, 1964, p. 91) or Augusto Boal’s Theater of the Oppressed (specifically how the audience can become “spect-actors”) (Boal, 2013, p. 135). I take up this issue because the latter theorists and their methods are commonly used to examine how characters directly address the audience in television, film, and video games (Clayton, 2022, p. 1047; Lim, 2021; Fiddler, 2017, p. 86; Paul, 2004, p. 232).

Academics often argue that by directly addressing the player or viewer, the text breaks the fourth wall, which can alienate or distance the gamer/watcher from their immersion in the fiction. In this light, Jane Feuer argues that “direct address is an ‘alienation effect’ in the Brechtian sense, but it does not ‘alienate’ us in the everyday sense of the term” (Feuer 1993, p. 41). While film scholar Tom Brown admonishes Feuer that “more care needs to be taken with the term ‘Brechtian,’” he notes that direct address in cinema can be a “device for ‘Brechtian’ alienation if we restore Brecht’s proper relation to long-established entertainment strategies and see ‘alienation’ as consistent with the influences he drew from popular culture” (Brown, 2012, p. 16).

Brecht’s theories are obviously compatible with the theater but less so with “industrial art” (film, TV, and video games (see James, 1989, pp. 7-9)). For Dana Polan, art’s self-reflexivity “may be nothing other than an expansion and making manifest of inherent qualities of art” (Polan, 1974, n.p.). Polan argues that when many theorists forego including a discussion about Brecht’s call to action and the politics embedded in his plays, they “adopt Brecht’s theory but only after declaring it necessary to eliminate Brecht’s concern for content. A new Brecht—Brecht the formalist—arises” (Polan, 1974, n.p.). While Russian Formalism, specifically Viktor Shklovsky’s defamiliarization (or ostranenie) (Shklovsky, 1991, p. 6), inspired Brecht’s art, Brecht’s reason for “alienating” his audience was political. In contrast, as Victor Erlich argues, Russian Formalism tried to be devoid of politics when analyzing art (Erlich, 1980, p. 19). For this reason, formalism and Brechtian theory must be separated, especially when considering the distancing effect.

Following this logic, I analyze Eternal Darkness: Sanity’s Requiem (Silicon Knights, 2002) for this essay. I use the game as an example of a text that interacts with the player by not breaking the fourth wall (as it is already broken)[1] but instead commenting on how games are made to expand upon the artistic practices of ludology.[2] I suggest that these strategies of direct address are not Brechtian, but rather a metacommentary—which is the term that I will use to replace what many scholars describe as “alienation”—on how games are made. I will use a formalist approach to examine how Denis Dyack (the director of Eternal Darkness) directly addresses the player to heighten the game’s horror. Eternal Darkness explores “the relation between ludic design features and the pleasures and affective experiences evoked by them” (Harrer, 2021, p. 537; see Bizzocchi & Tanenbaum, 2011; see Harrer, 2013), which is essential to the video game medium.

To begin this paper, I explain how Eternal Darkness directly addresses the player. I then examine Dyack’s analysis of his work and discuss how journalists comprehend the effects of alienation on Eternal Darkness. For clarity and space, I focus on strategies to heighten horror (a more exhaustive account of how it can be used for other reasons, such as comedy,[3] would be too large of a project for an essay). Instead of examining the direct addresses in The Stanley Parable (Galactic Cafe, 2013) (de Wildt, 2014; Vught, 2022, p. 292) or Spec Ops: The Line[4] (Court, 2021; de Wildt, 2014; Murray, 2016; Smethurst 2017) (which are two games extensively written about in game studies) I hope to call attention to lesser academically analyzed games like Eternal Darkness.

In the latter part of this paper, I explain the difference between triple-A games (such as Eternal Darkness) and independent games. To do this, I draw on the writings of Victor Shklovsky, Roman Jakobson, and Boris Eikhenbaum and note how game scholars have discussed Brecht and Boal. This will provide this essay with the context for arguing that formalism is appropriate for discussing direct address in video games.

Eternal Darkness and formal analysis

Above] Tome of Darkness: A book that generates sanity breaking features.

[Right] Pious, Eternal Darkness’ villain who is changed by the Tome of Darkness .

In Eternal Darkness: Sanity’s Requiem, the player plays Alexandra Roivas as she investigates the murder of her grandfather, Edward Roivas. Alexandra discovers The Tome of Darkness in Edward’s mansion. Throughout the game, Alexandra searches for artifacts connected to the Tome that are hidden in various parts of the house. When Alexandra encounters these antiques, she experiences the lives of twelve different people who discovered the Tome in the past. To destroy the evil spirits connected to the Tome, Alexandra must summon an ancient creature to fight Pious, the antagonist in the text who uses the Tome for sinister purposes.Then, to successfully defeat Pious, the player must play as the several characters Alexandra encounters.

[Above] Eternal Darkness’ manual and explanation of the sanity feature.

[Left] Sanity Meter, the green vial in the top left.

To heighten the game’s horror, Silicon Knights, the developer of Eternal Darkness, and the director of the game, Denis Dyack, implemented a “Sanity Meter” attached to the numerous characters. Eternal Darkness’ manual (which comes with the game’s box) explains the Sanity Meter as follows:

“When you are located by creatures, a sanity loss occurs, causing a decrease in the level of your Sanity Meter. As your Sanity Meter drops, you may start to experience strange hallucinations…The lower your Sanity Meter falls, the more our grasp on reality will slip” (Eternal Darkness Manual, 2002, p. 19).

The Sanity Meter exists on the screen as a part of the heads-up display (HUD).It, therefore, directly informs the player of their character’s status and how the game will affect them if their sanity drops too low. Gamers can encounter 42 different “sanity effects,”[5] such as the game’s reducing and amplifying the volume, as well as returning the game to the start menu or falsely deleting the player’s save files on their GameCube memory card (see Perron, 2018, p. 326).

According to Dyack, Shigeru Miyamoto asked him, “What if someone…throws their GameCube against the wall because they think the game [(deleted their memory)]. What do we have to do for customer service for that?” Miyamoto also asked Dyack if this had ever been executed in a video game before, to which Dyack responded, “No…. I think because you are saying, have you seen this before? That we should do it” (Dyack, 2019, n.p.).

Eternal Darkness’ box art promotes its unique subversion of gaming mechanics (such as memory storage) by highlighting the sanity effects. The back cover states,

“Is it real…or only in your head? Prepare for an epic psychological thriller…As you delve deeper into the dark designs of an ancient evil, you’ll have to fight to save your character’s sanity…and your own” (Eternal Darkness: Sanity’s Requiem Box Art, 2002, n.p., my emphasis).

The back of Eternal Darkness’ box. It advertises the various sanity effects that challenge gameplay conventions.

The game’s box art is one of the first things the player encounters when purchasing a game (Fernández-Vara, 2019, p. 7), which advertises that it undermines traditional mechanics. The game’s subtitle, Sanity’s Requiem, clearly states that sanity is dead. To create that “sanity” effect, Eternal Darkness simulates malfunctions. For example, the game states that it has deleted the player’s save file. This lets players not only fear that they lost their game progress but that their hardware might be faulty or broken or that their saves for all games on their console might also be destroyed. While others have argued that this type of loss of agency is commonplace in horror games (Habel & Kooyman, 2014, p. 7; Krzywinska 2002, p. 208), the breakdown in autonomy is usually contained to the software, not the hardware.

“Deleted” save files.

Part of that loss of autonomy calls attention to Eternal Darkness as a game, such as the simulation of deleted memory; these tactics go beyond the diegesis of the text. Obviously, video games that allow for saving (excluding permadeath and arcade games) are not meant to delete the player’s progress. This is the point of playing a game—to complete levels. In this way, Eternal Darkness directly addresses the player and their expectations of what a game should do and be. It is supposed to save data. But when it does not (or threatens to fail), the game calls attention to what it is, and it does so not only by affecting the software's functionality but also the hardware's integrity. In this case, it threatens the console (the GameCube) that should allow the player to continue to play. This tactic heightens the horror effect as it causes players to believe that the game is in control and not them. Eternal Darkness announces itself as such by asking the player whether they can “save their own sanity” on the box art (my emphasis). In this way, I agree with Jasper V. Vught that analyzing video games via Russian formalism

“should…focus on methodology over ontology…[and] function over material [to understand] how a game works, or better yet, how a specific game works to cue our aesthetic responses” (Vught, 2022, pp. 289-290).

Eternal Darkness calls attention to the functionality of video games as their structure relies on the player’s capacity for interaction with the game, and many celebrate it for doing so.

According to my research on video game magazines’ understanding of Eternal Darkness’ direct address, numerous journalists commented on the sanity effects. They claimed that these features made the game successful in constructing a metacommentary about horror and video games themselves (see Table 1).

Table 1. Eternal Darkness’ Cultural Impact.

Magazines that Consider Eternal Darkness to be
one of the Most Influential Horror Video Games of All Time

Bloody Disgusting (Power, 2018)

Den of Geek (Byrd, 2022)

CBR.com (Stone, 2021)

Collider (Collider Staff, 2020)

Cultured Vultures (Cultured Vultures Staff, 2022)

Gaming Bolt (Cantees, 2021)

Hardcore Gaming 101 (Tysinger, 2023)

Kotaku (Tieryas, 2017)

Nintendo Life (Reynolds, 2022)

Paste Magazine (Martin, 2022)

Screen Rant (Gailloreto, 2020)

SVG (Simmons, 2020)

Unwinnable (Horvath, 2014; Moran, 2010)

VG247 (Raynor, 2023)

Horror games are often evaluated for their effect on the user. Mathew Byrd considers the best horror games to be “the ones that take full advantage of the unique abilities of the video game medium” (Byrd, 2022, n.p.). For Byrd, this includes the subversion of the volume and false corruption of saved data, two components that make a game a game (see Horvath, 2014). Game reviewers like Patrick and Malcolm Kelly state that “Silicon Knights deserves a lot of credit for coming up with such a creative idea, and it works…. [the game] can really freak you out (try playing it at night with the lights out)” (Kelly & Kelly, 2002, 77). For Matt Casamassina, the sanity effects “pick at the mind of the player outside of the game universe” (2002, n.p.). Thus, when Eternal Darkness was first released, many reviewers noted that the game’s intricacies moved beyond the text, and they recognized it as modernizing video games. According to Nathan Simmons, Eternal Darkness “broke barriers and the 4th wall, bringing horror directly to your console and television. At about midpoint in the game, I was saving when the game suddenly started deleting all my save files. I freaked out. Would I have to play through it all over again?” (Simmons, 2017, n.p.).

Like Simmons’ understanding of Eternal Darkness as breaking the fourth wall, Charles Moran states that when the fourth wall is broken in video games, with special reference to Eternal Darkness, “it is a jarring experience that removes the audience from the story. Sometimes, though, the audience can find themselves deeper in that world than they previously thought possible” (Moran, 2010, n.p.). Beyond these journalists and video game reviewers stating that Eternal Darkness breaks the fourth wall, Dyack also believes that his game alienates the player in this way. For Dyack, the game breaking the fourth wall “is a part of the narrative” (2022, n.p.). Dyack is committed to building story-driven games, and to him, the sanity furthers the narrative of Eternal Darkness: it resembles “the early days of Greek theater when the audience could get up on stage”(Dyack, 2022, n.p.).

However, Simmons, Moran, and Dyack misunderstand the functionality of the fourth wall in video games. Eternal Darkness is not breaking the fourth wall like Dyack thinks his game does. His toying with memory represents an understanding that these elements make up video games in the way that Eikhenbaum acknowledges how literary devices work, devices such as “jokes, plays on meaning…verbal mimicry and gesture, inventing special comical ways of speech, sound effects, whimsical word order” (1963, p. 378). Memory functions in video games as jokes and verbal mimicry do in literature. They are necessary in the make-up of the medium. In this way, Eternal Darkness is a metacommentary not just in horror but also in video games.

Shklovsky famously wrote that dissecting art using formalism is necessary

“to make us feel objects, to make a stone feel stony, man has been given the tool of art. The purpose of art, then, is to lead us to a knowledge of a thing through the organ of sight instead of recognition. By ‘estranging’ objects and complicating form, the device of art makes perception long and ‘laborious.’ The perceptual process in art has a purpose all its own and ought to be extended to the fullest. Art is a means of experiencing the process of creativity” (Shklovsky, 1991, p. 6; my emphasis).

In the case of Eternal Darkness, for the game to feel scary, the designers play with the mechanics of video games. In that way, players can better recognize what makes a game a game—including the importance of memory and saving one’s progress. When the developers frustrate these mechanics, players become scared that they are losing progress and thus control of not only their character but of the game and their console. Video games are supposed to allow the player some agency. They can save when they want, but when the game takes control of that aspect, it alarms the player, thus notifying them that they are interacting with a device designed around constraints they cannot always control. This process is directly tied to art and the game developer as a creator. Although, in this case, Dyack may have underestimated the medium of video games (the fourth wall is already broken), he can create a metacommentary on video games that has no political admonition but derives from a poetic inclination to expand upon not just upon what horror can do but what a video game can be.