Diegesis In Games and What It Does For Storytelling – Week 8

So before we address what was said in the title we need to know what the difference between Diegetic and Non-Diegetic. When a character, a song, sound or image exists within the game world, we say that it is diegetic: it belongs to the universe of the character. Otherwise, if this element exists only in the player’s world, at the other side of the wall, we call it non-diegetic.

Different games will use diegesis differently but the games that use it well use it to add to the games and narrative immersion. Lets talk about a couple examples.

• Doom 2016 and Borderlands don’t show the UI/HUD until the player character receive a certain item (Doom – The Doomslayers Helmet/Armour, Borderlands – The Echo Device). These are both examples of diegetic elements as they are used by the in game character and exist within the game verse.

• 

• 

• The Fallout Series uses “The Pip-Boy”. A wrist mounted device that the player character uses to access their vitals and inventory.

A game that explores both diegetic and non-diegetic elements really well would be Blizzards “Overwatch”. Below is a picture of one of the characters weapons. This would be Mei’s snow launcher.

In this screenshot we can clearly see the Overwatch UI. Mei’s health is displayed in the bottom left, her abilities and ammo in the bottom right and ultimate charge in the center. These are examples of the non-diegetic elements as we as players know Mei cannot see these things but we can use them to keep track of our stats. Now we are going to specifically look at her ammo count. We can clearly see that currently Mei’s weapon is at 150/200 ammo thanks to the number on the UI. But if you also pay attention to her weapon, you can see a glass canister filled with blue liquid on the back and a small tank with a level meter on the right side of her gun. These are the diegetic elements as they both deplete as the ammo of Mei’s weapon does. These are what Mei would be using to keep track of her ammo. While most players overlook these little details nowadays, if Blizzard didn’t do this and someone noticed Mei’s gun stayed full, the immersion of Overwatch just wouldn’t exist.

However of course diegetic elements are not always good. Some don’t feel necessary or can feel like they are tedious and in the way. A prime example that stands out for me is the fairly new “Animal Crossing: New Horizons”. Me and my friends have been playing a lot of this in our spare time but most of us have one issue in common, the inventory > crafting system. Now in ACNH a player can have as much as they want stored in their house and up to 40 items in their pockets (once the upgrades are purchased). This itself is not a bad system and adds to the story telling of the game. However, the player must be carrying whatever materials are necessary to craft an object in their pockets even if the crafting bench is in the players house. Now of course this does add to the story telling of the game verse but we personally have all found this a little tedious. Realistically if we are crafting in our house it would make sense that we have access to all the stuff stored there. But if we have to have the materials in our pockets it requires us to go through and store stuff we are already holding (for example tools), grab the materials out of storage, place them in our pockets, craft our item, put the excess material back in storage and finally grab our tools back out. Of course this isn’t always an issue but it happens a fair amount if you play like me and like to carry spare tools in case one breaks. When this does happen, the player is forced to enter 3 or 4 extra menus and even more if they need to check what materials they need if they don’t remember the recipe. It feels over tedious and could have easily been solved by letting the player use the stored materials while crafting inside their house.

Overall diegesis is something all developers need to consider in the development of a game but if used well, the game will always feel more immersive, authentic and all round fun.

Thanks Again

-T.S