Nonviolence and Mechanics in Bridge Simulators
Table of Contents
Building on Violence in Interactive Storytelling, let’s talk about concrete mechanics that could build better bridge simulator experiences.
Building blocks for Nonviolence
Let’s start by exploring what we can build nonviolent experiences out of. What needs to exist (and what cannot exist) in order for this to work?
Nonviolence is built on Trust
Trust is a fundamental building block here.
The Evolution of Trust is a great resource for understanding how trust evolves in social systems, using game theory to model how different participants in a group can cooperate or defect over time. Taken from the concluding pages of that site:
Game theory has shown us the three things we need for the evolution of trust:
Repeat Interactions
Trust keeps a relationship going, but you need the knowledge of possible future repeat interactions before trust can evolve.
Possible Win-Wins
You must be playing a non-zero-sum game, a game where it’s at least possible that both players can be better off – a win-win.
Low Miscommunication
If the level of miscommunication is too high, trust breaks down. But when there’s a little bit of miscommunication, it pays to be more forgiving.
This evolution of trust in a bridge simulator experience would require long-term, repeat interactions in order to be useful. This implies that on the spectrum of single shot, arcade-style flights to long-term campaigns, repeat interactions are only reasonably possible in the latter style of flights. Even so, implied reputational consequences can be brought into the frame on short flights. An explicit reputation score mechanic is one approach, though that becomes an invitation to “game the system”. Implicit reputational consequences could come as a matter of narrative, perhaps through messages sent from NPCs praising or condemning your actions.
Nonviolence cannot be achieved all the time
As noted in those examples, cooperation is best but it may not always be possible in the face of entropic failures. Sometimes, weapons of violence are just tools to clear your path. Blasting lasers at asteroids that are about to strike your ship is nowhere near as morally fraught as aiming those same lasers at an opponent.
It would also seem improper to simply accept all violence blindly. It’s one thing to simulate many rounds of a game to evolve trust, it’s another to be out in the middle of deep space, facing down some hostile force, expecting an appeal to Gandhi being the correct solution. Having some means of retaliation or defense seems to be necessary. Having appropriate guardrails in place to prevent
Violence is a state of mind
People are quite createive when it comes to turning non violent tools into weapons of violence. Hence, violence cannot be controlled merely by taking away all the weapons - though, we can choose what tools we place at the disposal of a crew. It’s one thing to carry defensive lasers and probes, it’s another thing altogether to equip armed thermonuclear torpedos.
Hence, storytelling is the most powerful tool to promote stories and experiences that are morally rooted in nonviolence. A bad crew could turn the most passive of missions into a disaster. A good crew could turn an inherently violent mission into a victory for nonviolence. It’s all about choice.
Ideas for mechanics rooted in nonviolence
With all of that in mind, here are some ideas for nudging stories towards “the better angels of our nature.”
- Players should know and experience reputational consequences long-term
This is best served through narrative: shorter flights could include implied reputational consequences through NPC messages that condemn or praise crew choices, while longer flights could include more explicit consequences as a matter of branches of story.
- The purpose of any given tool should be rooted in nonviolence
Energy beams and probe casings are for defense and not offense, even if they can be used offensively.
- Acting with violence requires the crew to pay a personal price
This could be as banal as “You have to fill out paperwork to justify your actions” or as extreme as narrative consequences from engaging in battle (E.g. the crew makes a morally fraught decision that puts the crew in danger, leading to a loss of NPC trust or the formation of grudges).
- Score keeping based on choices
Tracking means and ends of choices could feed into tracking scores around reputation, trust, moral standing, etc. These scores could influence narrative options as well, e.g. if the crew doesn’t trust you because of choices you’ve made, they may be less likely to follow you into risky situations. On a campaign, perhaps crew members exchange at home base, attracting or repelling crew members that are more aligned with your past actions. This self-reinforcing mechanism could lead to different storylines playing out for a crew.
- Player versus world or self
Stories that are inherently player versus world or self will lean less into violence and more into other storytelling dynamcis. A Cry in the Dark (a space center flight about an environmental disaster) relies on weapons to clear asteroids. There is little concern for moral conflicts intelligent life.
Player versus self stories are more difficult to tell in a bridge simulator, but could still be possible, and would also avoid the moral conflicts of player versus player (or NPC) conflicts. This is particularly possible when faced with an overwhelmingly powerful adversary - one against whom violence cannot win - requiring creative solutions beyond violence.
Building a different game
The assumption of travel between stars and planets, encountering NPCs, and the like brings with it the collective headspace of RPGs, bridge simulators, and other narrative-driven games built around some variation of the Hero’s Journey. The Hero’s Journey structure is about transformation and growth in the face of adversity and conflict, usually by a singular hero and usually against a violent force.
In some ways, engaging in storytelling using the above ideas is more an exercise in “neither wolf nor dog”: it’s an invitation to consider a post-violence narrative structure. This could involve exploring themes of peace, cooperation, and mutual aid, rather than the traditional struggle against violence. “Player versus nature” and “Player versus self” takes the place of “player versus player (or NPC)” conflicts.
Such post-violence narrative strucutre could be formed around Ursula K. Le Guinn’s “Carrier bag theory of fiction”, which suggests that instead of conflict, heroism, and dominion, stories ought to be about gathering, holding, and sharing.1
Animal Crossing serves as one example of such a game, where the point of the game isn’t to “win” but merely to keep playing. Stories that promote discovery, learning, sharing, survival, mutual aid, and cooperation could all draw from this collection of concepts.