Hey, everyone,it's Justin back with another video game essay. Make sure to check out my channel, as well, where I come out with one every week.
I will be talking a fair amount about the game September 1999, and a few other ones, so be warned, there are spoilers for the games September 1999, What Remains of Edith Finch, and Presentable Liberty.
This is Nth Times the Charm, and the study of how games can tell a story or establish atmosphere using repetitive storytelling.
To begin talking about this repetition to tell a story, I want to look back on a personal favorite of mine: What Remains of Edith Finch. I’ve discussed this game before, but I think it’s still a good example of what I am trying to explain here. What Remains of Edith Finch is about a family whose members all die relatively young, and you as the last remaining member of the Finch family explore this colossal shrine to your dead family members that is the Finch house. You go through each of the members rooms, and you read the story of what happened to them, and I want to focus on one of those stories: Walter’s story. Walter was a member of the Finch family who was so terrified of this “family curse” he builds a bunker underneath the house and lives there for 30 years until he finally leaves and gets run over by a train. I don’t want to quite focus on the death, but I do want to focus on the moments leading up to his death. Walter’s story is quite short, taking only around 7 minutes, but it uses repetition to communicate to the player that 50 years has passed. You as the player repeat the same routine 4 times: Wake up to an alarm with music, there’s a rumbling, you eat a can of beans, then your day is over. Each day uses different music, but the routine is the same. There is also the calendar to your left to indicate passage of time, but that’s another small but important detail. This repetition with slightly different variables added to it shows passage of time, but the calendar on the wall indicates just how much time has passed. This is a great utilization of repetition, and not only helps tell the story, it is necessary to.
Another absolutely incredible game that is definitely worth mentioning here is Presentable Liberty. Presentable Liberty is an indie horror game where your character finds themselves locked in a small room. You only become aware of the horrors going on outside through letters and other bits of stuff that comes your way. There’s a lot to unpack in this very simple and focused perspective, and I’m sure I’ll do something on that later. But, Presentable Liberty is one of my favorite games, and it tells a story through a similar routine, slowly removing more and more of the structure as the game goes along, almost resembling growing up itself. You get little letters, and packets, and things from the outside world, all while trapped inside your room. You don’t see any of the horrors going on outside, but you are aware of them all the same, albeit from a different perspective. These stories that repeat themselves all have something in common, in that they are the same setting, with almost the same routine, but more and more variables are tweaked little by little until the story feels so much bigger than the box you are in. I’m sure I’ll talk more about that later.
Which brings me to one of my favorite games, September 1999. Brutally quick and simple, this five-minute game is crafted wonderfully from the view of a found-footage VHS recorder. You start off at the end of a hallway, and walk towards a room a grand total of 3 times, with each cycle getting more gruesome and bloody until you are greeted to something out of a visceral nightmare. The game is a surprising 5 minutes long, and lacks any sort of dialogue, but it tells a story using repetition. What is that story? Perhaps it’s someone’s memory of an event through the eyes of a literal camera, and slowly adds more and more detail to the original memory, perhaps in denial of the events the first few times around. Or perhaps it represents someone’s descent into madness, using repetition to indicate a deterioration of someone’s sanity. But it doesn’t even matter. The game adds more detail with each passing repetition. Now, how you can walk down and respawn at the same place 3 times in 5 minutes is a riddle perhaps Houdini couldn’t even answer. However you choose to interpret it, September 1999 is a beautifully simple game: Walk down a hallway, and find out more. There are no jumpscares, and there are no monsters you experience in the game. No antagonist, no one to block you from completing your journey, except for the dread that builds up inside you. It’s this simple repetition of the same themes, going over and over again, that helps to build up atmosphere in September 1999.
I will be talking a fair amount about the game September 1999, and a few other ones, so be warned, there are spoilers for the games September 1999, What Remains of Edith Finch, and Presentable Liberty.
This is Nth Times the Charm, and the study of how games can tell a story or establish atmosphere using repetitive storytelling.
To begin talking about this repetition to tell a story, I want to look back on a personal favorite of mine: What Remains of Edith Finch. I’ve discussed this game before, but I think it’s still a good example of what I am trying to explain here. What Remains of Edith Finch is about a family whose members all die relatively young, and you as the last remaining member of the Finch family explore this colossal shrine to your dead family members that is the Finch house. You go through each of the members rooms, and you read the story of what happened to them, and I want to focus on one of those stories: Walter’s story. Walter was a member of the Finch family who was so terrified of this “family curse” he builds a bunker underneath the house and lives there for 30 years until he finally leaves and gets run over by a train. I don’t want to quite focus on the death, but I do want to focus on the moments leading up to his death. Walter’s story is quite short, taking only around 7 minutes, but it uses repetition to communicate to the player that 50 years has passed. You as the player repeat the same routine 4 times: Wake up to an alarm with music, there’s a rumbling, you eat a can of beans, then your day is over. Each day uses different music, but the routine is the same. There is also the calendar to your left to indicate passage of time, but that’s another small but important detail. This repetition with slightly different variables added to it shows passage of time, but the calendar on the wall indicates just how much time has passed. This is a great utilization of repetition, and not only helps tell the story, it is necessary to.
Another absolutely incredible game that is definitely worth mentioning here is Presentable Liberty. Presentable Liberty is an indie horror game where your character finds themselves locked in a small room. You only become aware of the horrors going on outside through letters and other bits of stuff that comes your way. There’s a lot to unpack in this very simple and focused perspective, and I’m sure I’ll do something on that later. But, Presentable Liberty is one of my favorite games, and it tells a story through a similar routine, slowly removing more and more of the structure as the game goes along, almost resembling growing up itself. You get little letters, and packets, and things from the outside world, all while trapped inside your room. You don’t see any of the horrors going on outside, but you are aware of them all the same, albeit from a different perspective. These stories that repeat themselves all have something in common, in that they are the same setting, with almost the same routine, but more and more variables are tweaked little by little until the story feels so much bigger than the box you are in. I’m sure I’ll talk more about that later.
Which brings me to one of my favorite games, September 1999. Brutally quick and simple, this five-minute game is crafted wonderfully from the view of a found-footage VHS recorder. You start off at the end of a hallway, and walk towards a room a grand total of 3 times, with each cycle getting more gruesome and bloody until you are greeted to something out of a visceral nightmare. The game is a surprising 5 minutes long, and lacks any sort of dialogue, but it tells a story using repetition. What is that story? Perhaps it’s someone’s memory of an event through the eyes of a literal camera, and slowly adds more and more detail to the original memory, perhaps in denial of the events the first few times around. Or perhaps it represents someone’s descent into madness, using repetition to indicate a deterioration of someone’s sanity. But it doesn’t even matter. The game adds more detail with each passing repetition. Now, how you can walk down and respawn at the same place 3 times in 5 minutes is a riddle perhaps Houdini couldn’t even answer. However you choose to interpret it, September 1999 is a beautifully simple game: Walk down a hallway, and find out more. There are no jumpscares, and there are no monsters you experience in the game. No antagonist, no one to block you from completing your journey, except for the dread that builds up inside you. It’s this simple repetition of the same themes, going over and over again, that helps to build up atmosphere in September 1999.
Thanks for reading.
-Justin
-Justin