The Genre

Wednesday, March 5th, 2008 | Editorial

Despite it’s the frequently conversation on the subject, genres tend to be a difficult thing to put ones finger on. This is because the word implies a level of fuzziness. Yet it may not be as difficult as once thought to define the idea of genre.

Posit: a genre is defined by a single work that others then interpret, emulate, or simply copy. In other words, a genre is not a group of things on the same level but a single thing that stands as the king of the hill, and everyone else that pays homage to it. To support this idea I’d like to site several hundred examples.

The benefit of a genre is that it sets up expectations. Someone picking up a new work in a particular genre will know that certain things will be in place and can therefore jump in understanding these things will be in place. It moves the audience up the learning curve so they can get to the point faster. However this can also become a disadvantage because a new consumer, unfamiliar with the works that preceded it in the genre and therefore not privy to the assumed aspects may find themselves lost when the derivative work fails to bring them up to speed.

To start of the examples of genres, take Tolken. J. R. R. Tolken wrote one of the most popular literary works of our modern age combining traditional folk lore of several cultures with the topology of his native England. Since that time the word “fantasy” means that there will be magicians and warriors, elves and dwarfs, a deformed legion of evil, a missing relic, and a hidden king returning to an ancient castle, all taking place on a non-descript but somewhat British middle-ages landscape. Tolken’s Lord of the Rings books have remained the definition of the fantasy genre to this day.

On a more familiar media, Mario has marked the definition of several genres. Super Mario Bros. (1985) spawned what would be called years later the side-scrolling-platform-jumper game. When I was younger any game like Super Mario Bros. were simply know as “Mario-like games.” I remember using that term well into Mario’s second genre defining game, Mario 64 (1996). Mario 64 spawned a new crop of games and for a long time I just called any game that played and looked like Mario 64 a “Mario 64-like game,” but games like Tomb Raider and Quake forced the defining of genre’s by game play mechanics.

Backing up a bit, in 1992 on the PC an unknown programmer named John Romero brought forth an awesome new game called “Wolfenstein 3D”, or Wolf3d for short. Those in the know will point out that Catacomb Abyss was actually the first game that employed the first-person game play mechanic, but the spectacular popularity of Wolfenstein forced even Catacomb Abyss to be labeled “Wolf3d-like.”

Then something happened that is central to the argument of genre because in 1993 Doom was released. Books have been written on the effects of Doom, not the least of which was the re-defining of a genre. Suddenly the term Wolf3d-like passed from vogue and Doom-like briefly entered the vocabulary. Doom’s raised ledges and platforms and visual advances made Doom the new definition of the genre. But now there was some ambiguity in the language used. Was Doom Wolf3d-like or was Wolf3d now Doom-like? The solution was to create a new label that was not dependent on either game but based on the game play mechanic and the term first-person-shooter was coined. Later Quake then Half-Life in turn took their place as cornerstone of the genre, but without needing to touch the name itself.

Two things just happened. First, the genre was named, but not for any item in the genre. Rather a non-specific title is chosen. This non-titular naming of gaming genres the reason why we don’t often recognize the king of the hill model for genres proposed above. Second, the audience bumped the current king to crown a new reigning king. In like manner the Fighter Game genre was first defined by Street Fighter 2, redefined by various “vs” games. Eventually Tenken set the standard for the 3D fighters. The Real Time Strategy genre has similarly seen the baton handed from Warcraft to Warcraft 2 to Starcraft. The third person shooter genre was Tomb Raider’s domain for a long time, tho Prince of Persia may have recently taken the throne. Every genre has their king of the hill and in their span as flagship of the genre all other games mimicked them.

There are several more examples that could be sited but what has been mentioned I believe is sufficient to prove the original point; that a genre is defined by a single work. It is interesting to note that the work that defines a genre is often held by a single work and its sequels, or by a single source’s works, through several reigning titles. This means in a way that a genre is often the property of a single source, which may not be surprising. The author of a work is often the better than a third party may be to revisit the same ground and expound upon it in, as it is their territory in the first place.

In being aware of this definition of a genre one can have a stable basis of comparison for what is otherwise a fuzzy idea. To the reviewer one only needs to compare how much a work is similar or different from the expected source it is paying tribute to. To the developer of games you can with honestly decide that you are copying a work, and use that as the platform to launch your development from. Decide how you are going to do something that will set your work apart and perhaps redefine the genre yourself.

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