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What’s better: Security cameras following your every move, or shopkeepers annoyed when you don’t buy anything?Vote now as we continue deciding the single best thing in games
Vote now as we continue deciding the single best thing in games
Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/KO_OP
Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/KO_OP
Last time, you decided decisively thatthe spell Fireball is better than a button to unlock all unlocks. I should have known because our dear old friend Fireball is always there for us, always readily available, always keen to punch someone in the face, neck, and chest with a lump of solid fire. Thank you, Fireball. I love you. This week, it’s a question of anxiety. What’s better: security cameras following your every move, or shopkeepers annoyed when you don’t buy anything?
Security cameras following your every move
When I see a security camera in a non-stealth game, I hope it will follow me. It should always do its best to focus on me, the star of this video game. The teensiest break of the fourth wall. Ideally it should make a good noise while doing so, or at minimum have a glowy little red LED.
I like how curious cameras in games indicate the opposite of in reality: no one is watching. It’s not a security guard watching you closely and making sure you know they’re watching, it’s just a script set up to follow you. Whereas if I see cameras follow me around the Scotmid, my anxiety is spiking. If this cameras actually did something, like in stealth games, you would have opportunities to evade its gaze. So you can be almost certain that this camera will bring no consequences for anything it sees you doing. This is just decoration! Ha ha, how fun! What a fun little trick! Crime all you like! Unless… it wants to lull me into a false sense of security? A game wouldn’t do that, would it? Oh no.
Shopkeepers annoyed when you don’t buy anything
This is not so in games. No matter the graphical fidelity or variety of voiced lines, you do not feel the pressure of a social encounter with a real person, even if their raytraced eyes track you around the shop like a security camera. The shopkeeper is a medkit dispenser menu which happens to have a face. You’ll rarely derive satisfaction from it as a social encounter either. I’ve come to quite enjoy checkout chit-chat in reality but in games I really do want to just offload your vendortrash then hit the next quest. Sorry, no time for #bants. So to make you feel something, fast, the game’s shopkeeper will slag you a bit.
But which is better?
Honestly I’m getting too anxious thinking about these scenarios in real life and must abstain this week. Which do you think is best in games, reader dear?
