Moral intention.

We're all used to morals, aesops, and lessons. There's just no getting around them when it comes to fiction. They're a constant presence from childhood, and it seems natural to use fiction as a way to illustrate a moral concept. This is a combination of two main factors: firstly, "childhood aesops" are used to simplify and illustrate morals that may be too complex for a child to grasp. Secondly, every writer inevitably reflects their viewpoint of the world onto their writing, so in many cases the events of the world will match their political views or philosophical views (subtly or not).

Many of the aspects of "believability" can be traced down to smaller factors influencing the larger whole. Morality is no different, and one of the key points of a "moral" is that it is meant to connect to real life. Many aspects of "unrealistic" concepts are justifiable because they're just there to look cool. This is not the case with most morals: a moral exists to be connected to real life. Of course, that's not always the case (plenty of morals are perfectly applicable only in-universe) but usually if it's identifiable as a moral, then the author intended it to reflect on reality.

Where morals tend to break down is in that applicability. There are several potential reasons for this: a lack of connection to reality, the introduction of mitigating elements, or authorial control. These three concepts form the baseline for what can disrupt or affect a moral, but they all work on basically the same grounds: there is no way for the audience to reasonably apply this moral to their real lives and expect it to work in the same way. The little changes and influences quickly turn a "simple" moral into a moral that requires many additional factors to make sense.

Lack of Connection to Reality
Known on TVTropes as the "Fantastic Aesop", this sort of moral is based on the presence of a factor that isn't present at all in real life, such as magic or time travel. A moral of this kind is only applicable in-universe because of the base fact that whatever allows for that magic has rules existing only in that universe. The lesson cannot be applied outside of the story, not just because it's "unrealistic" but because making a decision involving the lesson is impossible.

For example, take any setting that uses magic. Does that setting have resurrection magic? Has this magic not been used because "that wouldn't be right"? That's this kind of moral lesson. There is technology in-universe, of one kind or another, to do something. The reason that this technology can't be used is vague and "morally centered". There can be some interesting dilemmas if there is a logical backing to that moral justification; for example, using magic in the Warhammer campaign setting is risky, because there might be a backlash and bad things could happen. However, if it's just bad by itself, for no given reason, then it's not enough.

The same is true of any "magic"-based moral, regardless of what it intends to teach. In real life, humans can't use magic. It's just how things are. Trying to make a moral statement about proper magic use has no effect on people in real life because they can't do that anyways.  There is a "moral setup" in such a situation (x magic is Good, y magic is Bad) but the situation is so artificial that it doesn't matter. Again, the dilemma can be interesting in-universe if it's internally consistent, but it's not a moral that can actually be related to real life except in the loosest sense of "making a choice between two things".

Introduction of Mitigating Elements
This is a situation where a real-life moral lesson is being taught, but the justification for that moral lesson is outlandish or unlikely enough to make the moral not work. On TVTropes, this is known as a Space Whale Aesop, named after the plot of Star Trek IV. In short, it can be summed up in this way: would the moral work without the addition of a fantastic element to justify it? If not, then it falls under this umbrella.

One example of this comes from The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King. Eowyn, who has been established as wanting to fight alongside the men (but who is prevented for various reasons), finally gets to establish herself as a strong warrior. She does this by fighting off the Witch King, the leader of the Nazgul, whom no living man can kill. Eowyn, of course, is a woman, and is thus exempt from that particular prophecy.

Now here's the problem: while Eowyn does get a few scenes illustrating her prowess (fighting off the Oliphaunts and various Orcs), this particular example only exists because the prophecy was there to fulfill. It's meant to be uplifting, but the issue is that the prophecy required a woman (or, really, any "non-man") and she was there to be that woman. How applicable is this to our daily lives? You could use her strength as a justification of female soldiers, but when you reached the whole "prophecy" thing, what does that tell us? It essentially renders her characteristics useless, because it stops being about things that exist in real life (strength, determination, courage) and starts being about things that don't (prophecies involving witch-kings).

In short, if any "real lesson" is justified through the use of unrealistic or non-applicable elements, then this is the issue. Why does this exist? Because it's usually more dramatic to show an immediate magical backlash to an action than to realistically try to depict the actual issues. It's one thing if pollution leads to the destruction of valuable resources, it's another if it leads to an ancient evil being unlocked. It's essentially a childish scare tactic, no different than any over-reactionary news bit.

If the issue was defensible, then more plausible scenarios would be perfectly able to encapsulate why something is good or bad. For example, if you wanted to have an anti-pollution message, all you'd have to do is go forward fifty years and show how bad things would be. The potential problem is that things might not be bad enough for the audience to care, which often results in the author or writer exaggerating to try to "make a point".

Another form of mitigating element is a bit of a reversal: an aesop that works "in real life", but not "in-universe". "Chrono Cross" is one example of this. In the game, the humans are chastised for destroying nature even though they live in small villages with little to no major industrialization. In addition, "nature" is represented by a bunch of hostile races that spend an inordinate amount of time trying to kill humans. The aesop might be justifiable in real life, but in the Chrono Cross world it makes no sense because the same elements aren't in play. The reasons why it doesn't make sense are essentially the same (a mismatch of "cause" and "effect"), but the actual lesson only applies to a situation like one present in reality.

A different example is "Final Fantasy Tactics Advance". In FFTA, a magic book teleports the protagonists to the fantasy world of Ivalice. In-universe, this world is just as real as the "real world" is. However, the main character identifies it as "escapist fantasy" because good things happen to the protagonists. His choice, then, is to sever the two realities - potentially destroying Ivalice - on the assumption that escapism is bad. It's perhaps true that escapism is bad in real life, but in this case it's not really escapism, because the world itself is just as real. There are plenty of things he could mention (the risk of death, the fact that he'll never see his mother again, and so on), but he doesn't. He just insists that escapism is bad, and continues trying to destroy the world.

Authorial Influence
Even if both the subject and the lesson are perfectly realistic or plausible, the basic fact is that the author dictates the events of the story. The previous issues were issues of cause-and-effect, but even if that is intact, there's still a measure of probability that can be manipulated. That is to say, if an action might lead to a negative consequence, the author can still portray it while maintaining a logical chain of events. However, that depiction will not reflect the actual likeliness of an action. TVTropes considers this to be part of the Alternate Aesop Interpretation concept.

The classic example of this is the Tortoise and the Hare. To put it simply, the lesson is that slow and steady wins the race. However, depending on the version, the hare's role can vary. In some versions, he tires himself out, while in others he stops to take a nap because he believes he has the clear advantage. The former is more justifiable, because it would have happened anyways. The latter is less so: without the hare's hubris, the tortoise wouldn't have won. In that case, "slow and steady" is only justified by "fast" going out of its way to let it win.

Here is the weakness of the aesop, and this applies to the previous categories as well: all you can do in fiction is depict events with a correlational relationship. The author cannot determine the reaction an audience will have to a lesson. However, they will often have a particular agenda that they are trying to push: one viewpoint is "right", the other is "wrong". Therefore, things must be orchestrated in a way that makes it so that the methods of the "right" side lead to success, and the methods of the "wrong" side lead to failure. Think of any show or story with a "cheaters never prosper" lesson: what if they got away with it, as many cheaters do? The lesson goes right down the tubes. Therefore, the lesson focuses on the times when they didn't prosper, and ignores the times they did. This can result in Laser Guided Karma: the actual likeliness of an event is secondary concern to the moral "cause and effect" relationship. A bad deed must be punished, no matter how unlikely it is.

 One sub-type of this comes from any video game where there's a "good/evil" system. The system rewards you in an abstract sense for carrying out good or evil tasks by giving you appropriate points: good actions get good points, evil actions get evil points. This can create a bizarre sort of dissonance, as it indicates there is an objective good and evil that exists in the universe, rewarding the specific actions that are perceived as one or the other. There's no room for argument: one thing is good, the other is bad.

The most obvious example of this I can think of is one quest from Fallout 3. In this quest, the "good" option is to force Diego to marry Angela, no matter how it happens (the default method is through pheremone-based compulsion). There is no room for disagreement here: players who support Diego's entry into the priesthood will find that their viewpoint is literally not supported by the game's morality system, and players who object to the idea of using ant pheremones to allow a woman to date-rape her prospective boyfriend will be similarly shortchanged. It is not a question of reactions or behaviors - the universe has literally decreed "this is a good thing to do" and that's that.

An alternative system to this is a faction-based system, such as one used by the "Way of the Samurai" series, the "S.T.A.L.K.E.R." series, or in the development kit for "Neverwinter Nights". In this system, there is no morality per se - but there are reactions. If you do jobs for a faction and help them out, they will like you more. If you hurt them, or help their enemies, they will dislike you. In Way of the Samurai 3, helping a faction would result in members cheerfully greeting you as you passed, and their dialogue reflecting a more positive opinion of you. Harming a faction would result in some members attacking you and other members fleeing at the sight of you. This is a logical system based on reputation: people like or don't like you because they know what to expect from you. In addition, you can support a viewpoint that you agree with without it being "right" or "wrong". Instead, the game makes no value judgments and allows you to do what you believe is correct.

The Neutral Story
 To me, a good, believable story does not exist with the meta-influences of "aesops" and "morals". If you set out to influence the audience, your story is going to be slanted. I prefer a story where things happen naturally, and based on those logical events the audience can make their own judgments. For example, you can prove that smoking is unhealthy in many ways, but if you want to prove this to an audience you shouldn't have to exaggerate. On the other hand, if they weigh the risks and rewards of smoking, and say "well, I'd rather smoke than not smoke", then there's not much you can do about it - it's their decision.

This is connected to what is known as the "Death of the Author". This is a phenomenon where the intentions of the author become less relevant because of the role of the audience's interpretation. To put it simply, I support this view. An author influencing their work and shaping it to have the outcome they desire is not something that should be considered positive, at least when it comes to learning a lesson about the subject. Every part of a story is orchestrated, yes, but when that orchestration becomes overwhelming, the audience ought to be driven away. The value of a lesson should be obvious if the author really thinks it is. If the author decides that things must be exaggerated to make a point, then they should reconsider their own perspective.

The difference between a "good aesop" and a "bad aesop" isn't necessarily that big - it's just that things that would be forgiven for a "good aesop" (protect the environment, be nice to people, and so on) are not forgiven when it comes to a bad aesop. People propagate Aesop's Fables not because they're perfectly constructed logical arguments with no potential weaknesses, but because the values they teach are usually ones that people like. If faulty logic is used in defense of a popular group, then it will be accepted as "just part of the story". If faulty logic is used in defense of an unpopular group, it will be identified and attacked. This, perhaps, can serve as its own lesson about cognitive biases and double standards.

The concept of making an argument that appeals to the audience is ingrained in this blog as much as I can make it. Plenty of "realism arguments" fall flat because they appeal to realism for realism's sake. This is fine for some people, but other people don't care. This is why I've tried to make the articles on this blog as universal as possible - they're connecting to senses and emotions and logic, not just a vague sense of "this ought to make sense". Of course, the actual results of that are up to you to decide.

So, to sum up:
1) Morals cannot be abstracted - the further you remove them from reality, the less applicable they are in real life. This is not because of sensory details, but because of logical trains of thought.
2) An author is in control of a story. This must be remembered when analyzing a moral lesson: things happened because the author wanted them to, nothing more, nothing less. It might be coincidentally plausible, but it is not truly logical.
3) If a moral is "right", then it should stand on its own. Exaggerating to prove a point only establishes insecurity about the value of a course of action.

Canon and continuity.

One of the most basic rules of fiction is that the fact that it's made up should be in some way disguised - not overtly, but subtly. Getting the audience to identify the actors as characters, or the sets as places, is a key aspect of creating fiction, and is largely connected to immersion and depth - the goal of this blog. If a setting or series does a good job of this, the environment will seem intriguing and immersive enough for the audience (and potential new writers) to want to be part of it. They'll like the characters, the background, the aesthetics, and so on.

However, there are some times when there will be breaches in the meta-framework of the setting - two writers will disagree on the tone, or an audience member will like one part, but not another. In my analysis of Lost Planet and Warhammer 40k, I pointed out the parts that I thought were interesting and the parts I thought should have been left out. This creates a conundrum: If I, or any other person, only like those parts, then why don't I create my own setting instead, and incorporate the parts I like? Of course, I would have to borrow from that setting to include those parts, but there are many things (such as vampires, dwarves, elves, and so on) that are already "public domain", as it were.

Another example is fan-fiction: if the writer wants to look at a scenario using a main character, but writes them like a different person, then why don't they just make up a story about a new person? Even if they represent the main character "accurately", why do they do it? What makes up for their lack of imagination when it comes to storytelling?

So in essence here's our issue: what is it about "established franchises" that makes them appealing enough to prevent people from simply making their own, even though making a setting isn't that complex? Relatedly, why is the "canon" of a series important - isn't it all made up?

Suspension of Disbelief
Canon is a strange thing. Some people claim not to care about it, and say "just think what you want", but the intrinsic issue is that fiction is fake, and more importantly to get immersed in the setting you have to try to hide that somehow. A story is valuable in the sense that you temporarily try to ignore the fact that it's fake. You get involved in the characters and their actions even though "the characters" don't exist, and are just actors in costumes. If you realized they were just actors in costumes, or this fact wasn't disguised, it wouldn't be possible to get the same level of emotional attachment. Therefore, you willingly suspend your disbelief so that you can get that attachment and convince yourself that, on some level, it's "real".

This may explain a few different things. For example, the issues of PvP/PvE and authorial fiat are both tied to this: even when something is just made up, the "fake reality" of the situation allows the audience to feel that it's got some kind of importance even though they're being lied to about it. It may also explain why people prefer to attach to existing franchises, rather than constantly making up new ones to fit their own viewpoints and preferences. Regardless of the fact that an author is just as "human" as you or me, their status as being in control of a franchise gives their words additional weight and importance. In the meta-sense, they're just making stuff up (even if that stuff is internally logical), but the necessity for suspension of disbelief means that it becomes more "real" than that. If that could be replicated without the author, we wouldn't need authors or writers at all.

The emotional reactions that we experience in response to the events of a show or movie are based on this sort of buildup. Why should we care if a character dies, or if a planet is destroyed, or an entire species is wiped out? It's not really happening; it's all just made up words. They could say that a guy killed a billion people and it would be just as easy for them as saying that they killed a million, or a thousand, or one. The point of believability (or at least the "logic" aspect) is to add the kind of depth that prevents the audience from saying that - to make the world feel more real, and thus avoiding plot holes that would drag the audience out of the experience.

Continuity
If the brain can be convinced that a fictional thing is, on some visceral level, "real", then what happens when the same source for that information tells you something you don't want to hear? There are plenty of franchises that have been ruined forever, and while that TVTropes article may play it off like people are overreacting, you have to think about the logic here:

1) I, the viewer, am suspending my disbelief to pretend that this franchise is "real" - real enough for me to care about, to sympathize with the characters, and so on.
2) There is a part of this franchise that does not have the appeal of the parts I like, in terms of its nature or logic or whatever.
3) If I pretend that one part is real, I cannot pretend that another part isn't real - because they come from the same "source". I cannot pretend that one doesn't exist without damaging the parts that I like, because I am drawing attention to the fact that the whole thing is fake.

Now, this isn't absolute - some people are just capable of only caring about the parts they care about, and ignoring everything else. But let's use the Aliens franchise as an example (SPOILERS AHEAD). In "Aliens", the audience is made to care about the survivors, and when Ripley, Hicks, Newt, and Bishop make it off that rock, we get a sense that finally something has gone right for them. It's a happy ending, albeit one that comes at a high cost. This provokes an emotional reaction in the audience - one of bittersweet victory, but ultimately connected to the idea that they're going to be a family.

Then Alien 3 killed off Hicks and Newt in the opening and put Ripley back onto a planet with a xenomorph. Wait, what?! That's what you're going with? They die in a spaceship crash without even getting home? This might not even have been so bad if it wasn't for the fact that this was done for totally meta reasons. The franchise continued because people need to make money, and Hicks' and Newt's actors weren't available for one reason or another. So now when you watch Aliens again, you have to face the ending with the knowledge that, in-universe, Hicks and Newt both died without ever being part of Ripley's family - that happy ending is just an illusion.

Now here's the conundrum: people like Aliens because they connected with it, and thought of it as a universe that, while not actually real, was at least "real" in its own sense. You care about the characters because you're suspending your disbelief about them. When Alien 3 is thrown into the mix, you have two choices: one, accept the ending that makes things awful, or two, pretend that Alien 3 never happened - and bring to light the fact that Aliens could just as easily be considered "fake" or "not real", which makes it kind of silly to care about those characters in the first place.

One of the complaints about the New Star Trek was that, unlike old additions to the Star Trek mythos, the new one actively erased the rest of the continuity. That is, everything else is no longer canon - or at least it cannot be built upon. This introduces us to the other half of the "canon" issue: who's allowed to do what. This applies both going forwards and going backwards.

Star Trek XI is of the "forwards" variety: all new Star Trek material is going to have to play by its rules if it wants to be considered canon. The people in charge of making new Star Trek movies are going to enforce this, but even if they didn't, suspension of disbelief would maintain that rule for them. "Forwards canon" is based on ownership and established rules: George Lucas operates on the canon that George Lucas has established, and all new material in the Star Wars universe is going to have to connect in some level to that canon.

When people complain about "forwards canon", it's not just because of the fact that they don't like the upcoming product. It's because they're never going to see the product they like ever again. The new X-COM (or XCOM) game, for example, might end up overtaking the old, established franchise. There have been bad X-COM games before, but they existed off to the side. None of them have ever reinvented the franchise in a way that indicates the good parts are never coming back. The same is true for Deus Ex 3: the backlash isn't just because it's not like the original Deus Ex, but because it is going to overtake the original Deus Ex, and effectively cut off any potential for the original getting a proper sequel.

"Backwards canon" refers to the concept of retroactive continuity: the official process of pretending something didn't happen, or that it happened in a way that was different from what had happened before. In the context of the Star Trek example, it's like this: in the new universe, the old universe is destroyed - but it had to exist at some point so that it could be destroyed, and all the things in that universe happened in a meta-sense so that they couldn't happen when the past was changed. This is all a complicated way of saying "even if you retcon things, people are going to remember what happened before that".

For example, the movie "Superman Returns" is a sequel to Superman I and II, and ignores III and IV. Those movies cannot be "undone" - you can still go find them and watch them - but this new one is going to pretend that they didn't exist, like many fans tried to. The thing is, though, that there's no real sense of "prioritization". Can you really say that Superman Returns is more "real" than Superman III/IV? Would you want to, given that the story is basically just a retread of Superman I? Again, the same difficulty pops up: they're all equally fake, so how can you pretend one is "real-fake" and the other is "fake-fake"? It can't be undone that easily.

A term that I use a lot to describe these kinds of situation (both forward and backwards) is demoralizing. I enjoyed the heck out of the original Star Wars, as did millions of other people. I'm sure you won't be surprised at this point to find out that my favorite part was the Empire. You also might not be surprised to find out that I didn't enjoy the totally nonsensical military system in the prequels, because there was no real lead-up to the kind of government that the Empire became.

Like the Aliens example, one part of the franchise influenced the other. I can't accept the original trilogy without it being influenced by what happened in the prequels. I can enjoy it on its own, sure, but that's tempered by the fact that it comes from such ridiculous origins. In this sense, the prequels are demoralizing. It's not just that they're bad, it's the fact that they call attention to the fakeness of the original trilogy. Yes, you can say that "I liked this part" or "I liked those characters", but if you want to accept the prequels as being fake, then you have to acknowledge the fictional nature of the original as well.

The end result is that the original feels somehow more hollow, because as mentioned before, my choices are "admit it's fake, become less immersed" or "hold onto suspended disbelief, include the prequels". This is the kind of thing I feel like a lot of people dislike George Lucas for: he's almost going out of his way to make you feel bad about liking the movies he's made. That's demoralizing.

"Developing Characters" vs. "Iconic Characters"

In fiction, there are basically two sorts of characters. "Developing characters" are people who naturally develop through the course of the story. They're part of an ongoing cycle of events that changes situations, events, and how they think about things or perceive the world. A developing character is also tied ot their actor, for the most part - they are an individual, and thus "who's portraying them" is an intrinsic part of the role. Developing characters are most often found in limited productions - shows or movies with a definite endpoint, rather than an ongoing super-mythos. They have one run. Harry Potter is a "developing character", because after seven books he's done. Throughout the story, Harry grew and changed things, and each book is a year of his life. Even if a new book comes out, it would be set later in his life - it wouldn't just retread his previously established school years.

"Iconic characters", on the other hand, are "roles". It's okay if we know what happens to them - they exist as a sort of "comfort food", to be seen over and over, rather than actually worrying about a developing story or setting. Robin Hood, for example, is a key iconic character. We know his story, and we don't expect a lot of deviation from it. We watch the countless shows and movies not to see what happens to him (usually), but to experience "Robin Hood and his Merry Men fight the Sheriff of Nottingham and Prince John". Most superheroes are the same way - Batman versus The Joker, Superman versus Lex Luthor, Captain America versus Red Skull, whatever. The audience doesn't expect things to change or develop - they come to watch the fight. There's not a "finite amount" of adventures that these people can have. If they want a new Batman movie, bam, there's a new Batman movie. It might even be its own short-term continuity, which happens for most Superhero movies: you keep track of things that happen to "Tobey Macguire as Spider-Man", but that has nothing to do with "Spider-Man" as a larger character.
 
Developing characters have limited runs, and everything counts the first time through. Iconic characters are like Saturday Morning Cartoons - only a few things (if any) actually change, and the viewers are just there to see that week's adventure. A developing character exists for the story, and has a hand in its events. An iconic character is pure escapism. The audience shows up not because they think he or she might actually die for real, but just to take part in their adventures. You could argue that there's a lot of protagonists who blur the line, but in essence developing characters are part of a story, and iconic characters just sort of exist. There's no point worrying about canon for iconic characters, because they exist in a way that allows for perpetual adventures. The Status Quo is the most important part, because if things changed (the bad guy was actually caught, for example) then the adventures would be over.

Iconic characters exist because they provide a solid emotional connection. You know these characters, and you've known them all your life. They provide an easy way for the audience to go "hey, yeah, it's that guy! I love seeing that guy do stuff!" It may not be exciting in a developmental way ("Gee, I wonder if they'll kill Sherlock Holmes off?") but the point is that you're there to watch a familiar character do things, and that triggers a lot of comfort zone sensors. Like with games, the point of an iconic character is to make it so that things keep going. In a game, if one faction actually won, then there would be no more game. For an iconic character, it's the same thing. If they just shot Cobra Commander or Skeletor or the Joker, the game would be over. For a developing character, there must be a conclusion eventually.

Earlier, I said that fanfiction was unusual because people often change things enough that it might as well be a new franchise with thematic similarities to the intended original product. This, I feel, is the reason why: the pre-existing emotional connections and suspensions of disbelief that make an established universe more "real" to an author than something they just made up. They've already gone through the process of subconsciously convincing themselves that, on some level, it's real enough to care about. Why would they go through that again? It provides context, familiar characters, and social connections as well (it's easier to find people who like Harry Potter than to convince people to like "Wizard school I just made up"). The fact that people have internalized Draco Malfoy or Ron Weasley makes a story about them (even a "non-canon" one) more familiar, because they're starting on established ground. It may not be a challenging or creative concept, but it does have its justifications.

Now, I won't lie here: I don't like iconic characters, and relatedly I don't like fanfiction. However, I do try to understand why people do. I get that it's comforting and reliable and emotionally evocative. A lot of the things I like in a story come from its logical development, which is impossible to achieve with iconic characters. It's just that "what I like" and "what they like" come from different places. Believability is about making the product connect with the audience, not just enforcing realism.

So, to sum up:
1) Fiction is fake. When the audience has to think about this, it takes them out of the experience.
2) A divergent part of the franchise can undo the plausibility of a series, which is unimmersive.
3) The emotional connections created by a series are a source of comfort for a lot of viewers.
4) Removing those connections is going to eliminate a primary reason for people watching something.
5) Creators aren't usually going to care about 1-4 as long as they get paid.

Sound and music.

When it comes to media, there's really only two senses that can be represented: sight and sound. Of these, we've largely talked about the former: making things look accurate and look plausible through things like costume design and accessories. Sound, despite being the other 50% of presentation, has been largely untouched. This is because sound design is a lot more subtle than visual design - while visual design is right there in the open to be observed, sound design often has a much lower level of active recognition from the audience. In some cases, you might not even notice it's there - at least not actively. Sound in media expresses itself in a few different ways.

Music
Probably the most direct, overt sound influence, music can be broken up into two groups for purposes of believability: "diegetic" and "non-diegetic". This refers to the nature of the music; diegetic music exists in-universe (coming from a source within the film itself), while non-diegetic music is instead layered over the film with no source. For reasons of plausibility and connection to the characters, the difference is this: the former is part of the immersion, and the latter is part of the "audience experience".

Now let me establish this up front: non-diegetic music in movies and games can do a lot of great things. Music helps presentation in a lot of ways. It can evoke emotions and add a lot of powerful influence to a scene. What music does is reinforce the feelings that the audience are meant to be feeling, from hope to fear, or from awe to terror. The use of leitmotifs can help the audience identify a given character, group, or event. In games, music can help to reinforce the gameplay and make the experience feel more epic and important, whether that be for good or for ill. This is, overall, what non-diegetic music does: it creates a powerful, moving performance in a way that is often not justifiable in-universe.

However, it's also important to note that effects just as dramatic (if not more so) can come from in-universe music, as well. The most obvious example, in my mind, comes from the final scene of Zulu. The nature of the music is still inspiring and impressive, but it exists in a way that's justified and explained in-universe. In addition, what the audience is experiencing is also what the characters is experiencing. Music stirs emotions, yes, but in this case it stirs the emotions of the characters as well as the audience. The presence of music that exists in-universe can cause us to share those emotions with the characters.

The lack of music can also paint a very stark picture. Music's positive effects are also very manipulative, in the same way that a propaganda film is. Music takes an event and frames it in a way according to the emotional theme of the music. Compare the following two versions of a battle from Band of Brothers: with and without music. Or compare two versions of Omaha Beach, again with and without music (or even with inappropriate music). Music affects the emotional tone of a scene, and thus its presence can reinforce or distract from the default audience reaction to the scene.

Non-diegetic music is dishonest in one major way: it can add emotions to a scene that wouldn't have them otherwise. The battle scenes before, which were grim and overwhelming without music, are instead noble and emotionally moving in ways that the soldiers themselves would not have felt. This creates a divide between the audience, who feels those emotions, and the characters, who don't. It's comparable to the phenomenon of singing or reacting to songs that only you can hear (through headphones, for example). In short: music stirs emotions, but if the characters can't hear the music, there's going to be an emotional divide for the audience and characters.

Environmental Sounds
In most environments, there are a lot of sounds that exist in the background, suggesting a scale larger than the immediate scene. In urban environments, the ever-present buzz of people and vehicles creates the feeling that the scene actually takes place in a city, rather than a small set. In a rural setting, the same effect can be created with appropriate sounds like the chirping of birds or the operation of farm equipment. In addition, things like thunderstorms can have an emotional effect as well. As with rational character design, a lot of little stuff adds up: there's a source for every sound, and that source exists somewhere in-universe. This can create depth and make the world feel more "real".

The use of "stock" sound effects, on the other hand, can point out the falseness of the world. When was the last time the Wilhelm Scream contributed positively to a scene? At this so point it's so familiar, and thus so fake, that it immediately draws the audience out of the scene in exchange for, at best, a few laughs of recognition. The human voice, specifically, can create this kind of problem, because each person's voice is different in subtle ways. In Metal Gear Solid 4, the use of stock screams (over constantly occurring background deaths) was enough to become distracting, and made the world feel extremely fake.

The goal of environmental sounds should be to convince the audience that there is a real world in the background, with things going on that are actively causing these noises. This can add depth to a world that, for all intents and purposes, is a relatively small stage with a focused, central set of actors. If the sounds are either not justifiable or too repetitive, the fakeness of the world takes center stage, and the immersion bonus that the audience should feel is lost (if not worsened due to the jarring break).

Tactical
One subsection of background noises is, naturally, gun noises. Like other background noises, the noises of the battlefield exist to show that there's other things going on, namely other battles. In the sense that "every sound has a source", though, combat noises can also be used to illustrate the fact that there is combat, which becomes important when it's the default assumption that there isn't. To return to Metal Gear Solid 4, in online mode there are two contrasting forms of match: "ongoing battles" and "find the enemy". In the former, gunfire is an assumed noise - there's always someone shooting someone somewhere on the map. In the latter, gunfire is an anomaly, meaning that someone's been spotted, and all players should react accordingly.

In real life, guns make fairly distinctive sounds. In combat, the difference between "the sound of friendly guns" and "the sound of enemy guns" is just as important as the color of their uniforms. This is why the practice of using an enemy weapon is frowned upon in real life - because it still sounds hostile, even if it's shot by someone who isn't. The sounds of artillery firing, and where it's firing from, can determine if someone is "safe" or whether they should take cover. Few games take advantage of these concepts. Company of Heroes is one exception - the different machine guns and rifles make different enough noises that you can tell what's going on or where they're coming from.

One thing that annoyed me about Killzone was that while each faction had their own main rifle (the M82 for the ISA, and the StA52 for the Helghast), there was no effort to actually regulate these guns in multiplayer. There was no reason for the ISA to use their gun exclusively, and vice versa. This was done for gameplay purposes (the different guns have different uses), but resulted in gun noises being basically useless. Being able to recognize gun noises would have helped determine if you were, for example, coming up on a group of friendlies. Removing this meant that the sounds of gunfire were just sort of a "background mess" - they were there, but you couldn't get any useful information from them.

Of course, guns aren't the only things that make sounds in combat. Identifying enemy locations from the sound of footsteps or vehicle noises is a time-honored tradition. In Metal Gear Solid 3, the player is equipped with a directional microphone to aid in this task - often necessary due to camouflaged enemies blending into the background. While vehicle noises exist in Company of Heroes (and can be heard through the fog), one thing I appreciated about the Eastern Front mod was the distinctive noise of Russian tanks - a loud, obvious "clacking" noise. This was interesting to me because it wasn't just a generic "there's a vehicle here" sound - you could specifically tell that it was a Russian tank, rather than a truck or something.

Conclusion
There's a lot more that could be said about sound, but it should be said in individual, focused updates. To sum up, though:
1) Music evokes emotion. If that emotion can be shared with the characters, then all the better.
2) Sound has a source. Using sound in the background indicates that whatever caused that sound also exists in the background. This can make the world more believable in terms of background events.
3) The importance of sound as an identifier should not be underestimated. Many games leave sound in the background as an unimportant layer of white noise, rather than having them be an important tactical element (as they are in real life).

Analysis: Warhammer 40,000

Falling into an unusually expansive set of genres, Warhammer 40,000 is best described as "fantasy in space", except when it's "horror in space" or "World War 2 in space" or "World War 1 in space" or "1800s naval battles in space" or any of those things on a planet instead. To put it bluntly, Warhammer 40,000 (or "40k") is all over the board when it comes to believability. The universe is so huge that it's grounded in some areas, unlikely in others, and straight up ridiculous in a lot. Because of my specific focus on grounded elements, this analysis will be focused on the Imperium, with other races (Orks, Eldar, Tyranids, and so on) treated as threats or adversaries.

Setting

Warhammer 40k takes place in the distant future, after humanity has expanded to the stars, experienced a cataclysmic apocalypse that left all its colonies stranded and isolated, and gradually built itself back up with the help of a near-divine psychic leader who ended up sacrificing himself to the point where he exists only as a navigational beacon for psychic ship pilots to traverse the gulf between the stars. So, let's back up a bit. 40k's dense backstory can be summed up in a few key ways:

1: 40k's universe is like our own, with the exception of the Warp, which spawns demons, drives people insane, and also is responsible for some individuals becoming psychic. The Warp is used as hyperspace, which is unpleasant and unreliable and results in there still being a great distance between planets (compared to, say, Star Wars).

2: There's a lot of planets that have humans on them, but have been removed from the rest of humanity for so long that they're basically primitives and/or have built themselves back up to medieval/industrial levels.

3: Most of the technology used by the Imperium is built from modules developed during humanity's spacefaring days, which creates a sort of constant pattern across the Imperium despite the distance between planets.

So, in short: humans are separated by the vast vacuum of space, and are only able to traverse that gap at great cost. The isolated humans have thus created many different cultures, but are unified by their standardized technology (which they don't really understand enough to improve upon). In gameplay, this is reflected by the fact that human forces (the Imperial Guard) use basically the same gear, but have a lot of differences in terms of their abilities and specialties. There's standard troopers, jungle fighters, arctic fighters, desert fighters, and oddities like the Vostroyans, the Mordians, and the Attilans. Each has rules in gameplay for their specialty, and - more importantly - these rules are based off a point-buy system, making it possible for the player to make up their own planet and regiments.

This leads to one of the key charms of 40k, at least to me: there's standardization, but also (as discussed last update) a lot of room to grow. The galaxy's a huge place, after all, but battles generally only involve a few squads. Naturally, it makes sense that there's a huge universe out there to draw those squads from. The standardized gear creates a sort of equipment baseline (so that each regiment isn't an entirely new army) but different tactics and aesthetics make the armies more tailored for personal choice. There's an infinite number of worlds (or close enough anyways), and even individual worlds can have differently themed units, at least in terms of visual design.

Despite its logical inconsistencies in a lot of fields, 40k does an excellent job with the Imperial Guard. Heck, there's an entire book dedicated to describing the gear, weapons, and procedures of the Imperial Guard - and that's all their gear, including mundane things like communication gear, rations, gas masks, and weapon cleaning kits. In that sense, Warhammer 40k is probably the most detailed example of "World War 2 in space", at least in terms of pure detail. Gundam and Star Wars, the other two major contenders, both had to deal with inherent limitations in tactics, but 40k has pretty much made a total transition: it's World War 2 tactics and gear, but sci-fi.

Another aspect of the Imperium that must be noted is the Ecclesiarchy, a pervasive state religion based on the worship of the Emperor (the super-powerful psychic responsible for bringing humanity back to its spacefaring state). Like the standardized gear, the Ecclesiarchy establishes a consistent theme throughout the Imperium: that of Emperor-worship. While the ways in which this is accomplished differ (ranging from institutionalized and organized religion to missionaries and pagan conversion), the underlying faith of the Imperium is pretty much standard. This is also a source of greater motivation - the wars fought by the Imperium are not just for defense, but are righteous crusades as well.

Space Marines
Despite being a minimal part of the series in terms of their usage (as in, 99% of the battles are fought by the Imperial Guard), the Space Marines are one of the most common factions due to their popularity. As mentioned last update, the Space Marines bring a lot of logistical concerns to 40k. While the Imperial Guard are recruited en masse as cannon fodder, the Space Marines are trained and mutated from the best of the best and indoctrinated to their very cores with faith in the Emperor. There are roughly one million Space Marines in the galaxy, compared to trillions of guardsmen. However, on the tabletop, they're not that much better than a guardsman, for balance reasons.

This results in a huge power variation: on the one hand, they're unstoppable killers mounted in the equivalent of tank armor and equipped with a fully automatic RPG. On the other hand, they're better-than-average infantry in nice armor with a machine gun. The background material matches the former, the gameplay matches the latter, and combining the two usually ends badly. There are some things that the Marines are better suited for - hunting monsters, cleaning out abandoned ships and facilities, and engaging powerful or unorthodox foes - but the game naturally shoehorns them into a bunch of standard infantry roles that they're undermanned for (and for which their armor and bright colors are nonsensical).

There is some diversity among the Space Marine chapters, though not as much as the Imperial Guard. There's Roman Marines, Viking Marines, Mongol Marines, and so on. Like the guard, the gear is generally standardized, but unlike the guard this includes their armor (which constitutes 90% of their appearance). However, their armor is actually kind of key to their popularity: its large parts, including the highly notable pauldrons, make it fairly simple to paint - while still allowing for customization in the form of color schemes and insignias.

Non-Human Factions
While the non-Imperial factions have a lot of attention given to them in terms of backstory and individuals, they lack the same diversity that the Imperial Guard do. In some senses you can look at the entire story as being largely Imperial-centric: the Imperium gets the most attention and development, and other races exist to react to, or attack, the Imperium. These races include the Eldar (space elves), the Orks (space orcs), the Tyranids (bugs), the Necrons (space undead), and Chaos (demons and demon-worshippers). None of these races get the same diversity as the Imperial guard; there's different clans and sub-groups among them, but this usually translates to "different colors and one thematic thing".

Why is this? It could be argued that the conditions of the Imperium make it better for gameplay-balanced diversity. Other races can have different things, but without the framework of "religion + technology limitations" there's no reason why they should be so homogeneous. It could also be the standard "aliens are all alike" concept - there's differences among the Eldar craftworlds, for example, but this is limited to minor themes and specialties. Their equipment (including armor, the primary visual signifier) is entirely the same.

In addition, the general "theme" of humanity in 40k is one of constrained adaptability, making them a balanced choice. In contrast, each alien species has their own theme - Eldar are sneaky, Orks are brutish, Tyranids are innumerable, and so on. While there's diversity among their troop types, their general theme cannot be deviated from without changing the species as a whole. This reflects a sort of human-centric concept: humanity are the protagonists, aliens are the diverse invaders that serve as their opponents.

Scale
Unlike a lot of game franchises, "Warhammer 40,000" is actually a pretty gameplay-diverse game. While the original squad-level wargame is the most famous, there's also a space combat game, a gang warfare game, a spaceship clearing game, and RPGs of the high-flying (Rogue Trader) and grim and gritty (Dark Heresy) persuasions. What does this do for a universe? There's rules for pretty much every part of the universe except, perhaps, civilian life - and even that's fleshed out by the RPG for reasons of necessity. When I analyzed Lost Planet, I said that it would work better as an RPG so that gamers could take advantage of the established universe in ways that an action game would not. I feel similarly about the Killzone franchise: there's a lot of neat things that I think are wasted in a simplistic FPS.

While there are a lot of things about 40k that don't really add up, the diversity of games means that there's at least some attempt to flesh out the background out of necessity at the very least. A similar thing happened with the Star Wars RPG by West End Games - the universe had to be explored in-depth so that players could interact with it. The smaller necessary details add up to a larger experience, although keeping them consistent is another matter. In the 40k universe players can be everything from the lowliest thug to the highest general, and that does a lot for a franchise in terms of establishing the scale of events. As I've said before, every large concept is made up of smaller ones, and by analyzing these more personal aspects of the setting, Warhammer 40k has fleshed out its background rather nicely.

Theme
One of the most controversial aspects of Warhammer 40,000 is its nature as being "grimdark". In essence, the 40k universe sucks, period. There's religious oppression and governmental oppression to the highest possible degrees, anyone can die at pretty much any moment, and thinking too hard about free speech will cause demons to possess you (if the inquisitors don't get to you first). As always, this is handled in different ways by different authors, but let's start with a base assumption: things are bad in the 40k universe because there are reasons for it to be.

A lot of the more (and less!) "grimdark" examples come entirely from author fiat. The baseline standard for things being awful comes from the universe itself - there's demons, monsters, and aliens, and all of them are hostile for their own reasons. However, there are some cases where things are either worse than normal or better than normal, not for any explained reason, but because it's thematic. The former can lead to Darkness Induced Audience Apathy, because every faction is bad. The latter, as represented primarily by Ciaphas Cain, can result in more audience attachment - but can also undermine the established reasons for everything else being unpleasant.

To me, the latter is worse than the former. When things are worse than normal, there's always a person for the audience to be sympathetic with - and that is the people who are suffering. No, there's no "good" faction, but that doesn't mean there aren't people who are being exploited both by their allies and their enemies. When things are better than normal, however, there should be a good reason for it (and sometimes there is). I singled out Ciaphas Cain because there are a lot of things that he gets away with that he really shouldn't, and the reason that this is allowed is because of author influence. The Ciaphas Cain books are popular because they're less depressing than the standard 40k fare, but at the same time I feel it's important to establish that they're not operating under the same rules. Ciaphas Cain is a snarky adventure novel that happens to be set in the Warhammer universe.

A lot of fantasy is "lighthearted", but it only gets that way because it ignores a lot of the realities of medieval life. When someone dies, it's appropriately dramatic and sorrowful. Protagonists are safe from harm. It's escapism at its most protected - and 40k is almost the opposite of escapism, because the parts of real life that it connects to are the depressing parts that we try to avoid. The same is true of Warhammer Fantasy. It's not unrealistically awful, it's just that in most cases people don't actually know how bad it was during those time periods (and how much worse it would be with the addition of orcs, demons, and so on).

A special note should go to the Orks. The Orks are a savage, brutal warrior race who are also serve as comic relief. They love fighting, treating it as more of a bar-room brawl on a larger scale than actual war. However, as mentioned, they are still brutal murderers who will cleanse an entire planet for fun. Strangely, these two characterizations aren't at odds with each other: it's all a matter of perspective. From their own perspective, the Orks - who have no fear of death - are really just having fun and enjoying themselves in combat. From a human perspective, the Orks are unstoppable monsters, because all the "fun" they have fighting is actually violent and kills people.

This can lead to two characterizations of the fanbase in general: the "meta" perspective ("this shouldn't be so depressing, why can't I have a fun, lighthearted wargame") and the "immersive" perspective ("look at how many people just died, how can this not be depressing?"). Both sides are complicit in the violence, at least in-universe, but one group doesn't want to feel bad about it, and the other group recognizes that war is generally unpleasant for the people involved in it. What bothers me the most about Ciaphas Cain is that people still die - it's just expendable extras instead of protagonists, and that means it can still be lighthearted so that Cain can make some wacky quip. This is not a perspective that I support.

Conclusion

The things I like about 40k are largely scale-related. I like the fact that the universe goes from planets and solar systems down to individuals, leaving a lot of room in between to account for how massive everything is. I like that the gear is intricately justified and explained in a sensible way. I like that when people are hit it's actually a pretty big deal (at least in the roleplay system). I like that the natural weaknesses of humanity are used as a way to create a feeling of survival and vulnerability, rather than the usual "well I'm fifteenth level so I've got 135 hit points".

The things I don't like about 40k are unconnected thematic leaps. I don't like that the Space Marines (and most of the alien races) are so inconsistent in terms of their power. I don't like attempts to either darken or lighten the setting that have no logical basis to them. I don't like, but can accept, the fact that most of the planets are tiny and single-biome. I don't like the clash between "thematic tactics" (stand in the open wearing bright armor) and "sensible tactics" (take cover, use fire support and camouflage).

To me, 40k is at its best when everything connects together: humanity is in its current state because of all the factors that led to it. 40k's design decisions create a lot of dynamics that make it unique, despite using a lot of standard sci-fi concepts. Humanity in 40k is a fascist theocracy that's forced to scavenge technology and is susceptible to the influence of demonic forces. In addition, humanity itself is spread out among countless planets and has been forced to re-adapt new cultures into the larger collective society. This is a setup that basically no other setting can match - they might play with similar concepts, but none of them have that same "big picture". This is why I'm willing to tolerate 40k's bad parts: because its basic treatment of humanity is so interesting and so tangible.

Concepts of scale.

The Normandy Invasions. You may be more familiar with the tiny dot marked "Omaha".

Many of the updates on this blog have been about fairly personal things: connecting fictional images to real senses, fleshing out characters and internal logic, and so on. However, this update is going to deal with the other side: the effects of "zooming out". Many series, no matter their genre or setting, deal with worlds far larger than can be depicted on camera. Even in real life, the people we see and talk to make up only a tiny fraction of the world's actual population. The limits of empathy have been noted in the past - and again, this is something that happens in real life. How are we supposed to understand the scale in a fictional world? How are a world's creators supposed to make it feel as populated as it needs to be?

1) Size and Detail

A lot of shallow sci-fi or fantasy worlds are tiny both in terms of their area and their diversity. While there are certainly plenty of examples (like 99% of the planets in Star Wars), the one that stands out the most to me is the planet Ansion in the Star Wars novel "The Approaching Storm". Ansion was crudely divided into two areas: the "city" (as in, one city) and the "plains". The conflict that the protagonists were there to resolve was between the city-dwellers and the plains-dwellers. This resulted in the protagonists traveling the planet on animal-back to talk to local leaders and unite the clans so that they could hold negotiation meetings with the planetary government housed in the city. This was the entire planet: One city, and a lot of plains, and the plains are small enough to be traversed by an animal within a reasonably short period of time.

Ansion illustrates a lot of problems, but it also illustrates how those problems could potentially solve. Everything about Ansion is ridiculous (its small size, its two groups, the ease with which the protagonists can cross it) for story reasons. I don't mean that it makes sense in-story, but everything about the planet is designed as a place for the story to happen. In essence, a planet is a self-contained unit that holds enough stuff for the story to take place - nothing more, nothing less. So how would we get around this? This is where the idea of focus comes in: the longer you spend in a given area, the more things you're going to have to map out, and thus the larger it's going to feel.

For example, many planets in Warhammer 40,000 fall under the "planetville" category: the entire planet is one thing, and all the people who come from it look the same. However, one exception is the planet Armageddon, which was the subject of a lengthy campaign in real life, with 40k players all over the globe acting out moderated battles that contributed to a larger war. While Armageddon was still basically a limited planet (there was a jungle area and a wasteland area), the scale of the battles was greatly increased compared to "there's one fight here and then it's over". The length of time spent on the campaign made it actually feel like a planet was being fought over, and theoretically the amount of different areas would suggest some sort of geographic diversity (rather than the same four spots being fought over again and again).

This leads into a key way to avoid issues of scale: leave the rest of the area open. The need for protagonist-centered importance often leads to a small group of misfits saving the entire world single-handedly, but what this does is negate the contributions of everyone else in the world they're trying to save. Leaving hints or evidence of a world outside what the audience sees works better than definitively saying "no, only the protagonists are capable of doing everything, this is the only event occurring on this entire planet". However, this can lead into our next issue:

2) Room to Grow
Sometimes authors do try to avert the whole "things outside the audience's vision" concept. Sometimes they try to establish that there is, in fact, a larger force at work. Sometimes this works, and helps the audience understand that there's a lot more at stake than just the protagonists' success. Other times, it doesn't. The thing about solid numbers and figures is that they leave nothing to the imagination: there's this many, and that's it. Even if it's a big number, it's still a limited one.

Let's look at Ansion again. Would it have been so bad if the tiny segment the reader saw wasn't meant to be the whole planet? Probably. The issue that I have with it is that it takes this incredibly small area, with one city and a few miles of plains, and declares it to be the entire planet. This is inaccurate. However, if they'd gone the other way ("this is just one city and its surrounding area, but it's important because it's a starport") then it might have been more excusable - the whole planet is technically still there, we just don't need to see it. Here's the tug-of-war of importance: one's plausible, but humble, and the other is implausible, but important-sounding. Obi-Wan and Anakin help to save an entire planet! Who cares if that planet is so small it's barely a county? It's a planet!

Star Wars naturally provides more examples: there's three million Clone Troopers in the entire Republic army - despite the fact that the Republic constitutes a million worlds, and there's "quintillions" of Battle Droids to oppose them. Even an attempt to fix this fell short - the new number is "a million droids per factory per year", but the idea that there's only a few factories in the entire galaxy seems a bit bizarre (the fact that "Odds" was written by Karen Traviss, who helped provide the initial "3 million troopers" number is also a bit suspect). In a situation like this, the author must weigh the advantages and disadvantages of stating a solid number. The advantages are that the audience has a clearer image of what's at stake and the world thus feels more "solid" or "concrete". The disadvantages are that the world might feel more limited or constrained - especially if the number is inaccurate or unfeasible to begin with.

One thing I liked about the older editions of Warhammer 40,000 was that it had a lot of room to grow - there were countless worlds, countless regiments, countless everything. This had a very specific role in the meta-sense: everything could be "canon", no matter what. If you painted your own regiment of Imperial Guard, then that's fine - they're a regiment that's just as plausible as any of the "established" ones. If you made a chapter of Space Marines, then that's that - they're your chapter, and they exist alongside all the other ones. If a writer or player wanted to make some new characters or a new battle or even a new campaign, then that was okay. Even new species were occasionally acceptable, as shown by the various minor alien races that populate the galaxy. Warhammer 40,000 was a galaxy with very few limits, and this meant that anyone who wanted to contribute to the collective universe was basically free to do so.

However, at some point 40k started trying to get more into limiting the universe. For example, they started introducing special characters like Ursarkar Creed or Marneus Calgar - specific individuals who were meant to be used in a general sense. You're having a battle with your customized unit of soldiers and for gameplay reasons you bring along Commander Dante rather than making your own unit leader. This negates a lot of the personalization - it's no longer "your unit", because the gameplay rules changed the developing story dynamic. If one of those characters dies in your battle, it's not real - it's just a game. No way can they kill a major character off because he got caught up in some random battle. The whole setup now makes no sense, because it's less and less about your story as part of a larger narrative and more about "here are things that everyone who plays this can identify with".

3) Visualizing Scale

One of the underlying issues of scale is that it's simply hard to imagine or understand. There's a certain point where numbers just become "a lot" - what's the difference between one hundred people, one thousand people, and one million people? Sure, you can identify the number difference, but can you really visualize those differences? It's easy to imagine a battle for a village or a bridge or a beach, but it's hard to get a sense of size when an area is wide or open or sprawling. There's just so much "empty space" - fields, forests, city blocks - that it's much more visually compelling to find an identifiable point like a church or a chokepoint like a pass.

This is probably the reason for the aforementioned issue of planet size, or battle size, or any other "this should be bigger, but it's not" scenario. Fiction is primarily character-centric, therefore characters should handle the heavy lifting in a given situation. However, the amount of ground implied in a planet or even a large island is too much for a few characters to handle. Authors therefore try to find some way to make it about a single geographic location, so that the influence of the characters can be clearly established. It's true that small groups generally deal with smaller locations (you can hardly expect a group of five to handle an entire city), but the idea that "bigger locations = more important" results in errors in judgment.

While so far I've praised 40k in terms of scale, this point leads to one important issue: the Space Marines. The space marines canonically exist as 1,000 chapters that are each 1,000 strong - leading to a grand total of one million space marines across the entire galaxy at any given time. Unlike Star Wars, this is at least justified by space marines being super-powerful special forces, rather than cannon fodder. They can be used for special operations, assassinations, tactical strikes, or whatever other precise task can use a hard-hitting strike force. The imperial guard makes up the bulk of the Imperium's forces - the space marines exist as specialty troops and exterminators.

Naturally, this isn't always the case. There are plenty of examples of authors, players, and the game rules themselves treating Space Marines like "regular soldiers, but better". Space marines die in huge numbers because they're treated like normal infantry, rather than being deployed for the exact operations that they're best suited for. In "Steel My Soldiers' Hearts", an autobiography by Colonel David Hackworth, there is a scenario described where a company commander used a skilled sniper with 40+ kills as a standard rifleman. The sniper was killed, as many riflemen are. This was avoidable because his skillset, if used correctly, would have kept him out of harm's way while still being able to do damage to the enemy. A similar problem arises for the Space Marines - they're treated like normal soldiers when there's no reason for them to be, which results in them being killed in numbers far greater than necessary or plausible.

This is a scale issue because there's no way for the Space Marines to have the kind of numbers necessary for this. In one novel, the Salamander chapter sets itself up as "good guys" because they help defend a refugee convoy - a convoy containing millions of people. How did they defend that whole line? Yes, they've got better armor and weapons and reflexes than a normal soldier, but they're still individuals. This is like having a super-prototype mech and using it to guard a backwater base because it seems like the right thing to do. Not only is it wasting resources, but it's also insufficient to do the job no matter how advanced it is. The numbers are too small - you can't make up for that with "being tougher than everyone else".

Compare this example to most other works of fiction. The Salamanders were made to help those civilians not because it was sensible or effective, but because they were the protagonists. A similar issue arose in the Halo book "Contact: Harvest", where a single platoon of militia is basically used to guard an entire planet because of the need to have the protagonist, Sergeant Johnson, do anything of importance. There's no sense of how huge the planet is - it's the equivalent of a small town with five cops fighting off 20 guys, but the need for "planets = important" means that now it's a small town battle over the fate of a whole planet!!

So let's tie these three things together:

Size and Detail: It's better to develop a location as a combined aggregate of sub-locations, because it makes the world seem more diverse while maintaining a "smaller" scale.

Room to Grow: Leave some areas unexplored and some numbers not given, because it's easier to build on more parts to a whole when less things are forbidden or ruled out. Leave some room for creativity and influence, rather than stating that an entire setting works exactly one way.

Visualizing Scale: It's hard to picture larger numbers - so don't pretend you're using them. If your show or movie or game is about one squad, then have it be about one squad. Don't artificially inflate the importance of an objective if a more sensible, grounded one will do.

When it comes down to it, here's a solid, simple baseline: people connect with smaller groups. Larger groups are really just made up of smaller groups. Therefore, if you show off a lot of smaller groups, the connected effect of all those small groups will help make it feel like a larger group - because it will be. A company of soldiers is made up 75 to 200 soldiers, or three platoons and a HQ unit. Each platoon is made up of 16-50 soldiers, or 2-4 squads. Once you get down to the squad level, you've reached a unit that the audience can easily understand and connect with. As you build up the audience's knowledge of each squad, they begin to feel more like humans, and thus the audience comes to know the whole unit by knowing all of its components.

Analysis: Lost Planet

Lost Planet is kind of a weird franchise. It's simultaneously silly and sensible - there's a lot of stuff that doesn't make sense, but it's usually internally consistent enough for it not to be distracting in the long run. It's not realistic by any stretch of the imagination, but it at least puts a lot into the details. Like Star Wars, it's unrealistic in a grounded enough way that the larger issues don't matter. So, without further ado, let's examine the design and universe of Lost Planet.

Background/Setting
Lost Planet takes place on E.D.N. III, a frozen planet colonized by humans in the future. This colonization was interrupted by native bugs, the Akrid, who later turned out to be full of "thermal energy" (T-ENG), which can naturally be used as an energy source. In short, it's like an oil metaphor attached to the movie version of Starship Troopers: kill bugs, get money. Most of the planet's inhabitants are stranded colonists trying to make do with what they have, and maintain enough Thermal Energy that they don't freeze to death.

Thermal energy is interesting in that it serves as both a gameplay mechanic and an in-universe motivator. The goal of the factions in Lost Planet is generally to acquire T-ENG, but you collect it in-game to power your regenerative abilities (via an item called a "harmonizer"). In LP1, people basically need thermal energy to avoid freezing to death, which is emphasized by dead Akrids instantly freezing and shattering once their thermal energy has been spilled out of them. In LP2, there's levels in jungles and deserts, so the whole "thermal energy" thing makes a lot less sense.

The cutscenes indicate that there's always a need for T-ENG, and even big tanks of it will only last a few days - less if there's combat involved. The economy of  T-ENG is pretty weird, because going out and collecting it by killing Akrids often costs so much that it's not even worth it. However, in the immediate sense it's at least plausible - Akrids are full of T-ENG, you need T-ENG to regenerate or power mechs or whatever. It's a good connection of story to gameplay, but it doesn't make that much sense in the larger scale. On the other hand, the cutscenes at least admit that deposits of thermal energy are temporary, instead of having it be treated like a long-lasting sort of riches. It's closer to gasoline in Mad Max than anything else.

Equipment

The various factions in Lost Planet are a visually diverse bunch, but a general underlying theme establishes itself: they're all basically scavengers and rummage sale types. The Snow Pirates are generally the most sensible group, with thick parkas and heavy backpacks that use visual cues to indicate the dangers and nature of their profession.

Other groups combine certain sensible aspects with less explainable choices, such as the "Rounders". There's still a generally reasonable aesthetic, but there are a lot of choices that are clearly there to be distinct. This isn't a bad thing - in fact, it's justifiable as an in-universe choice rather than a designer one. These are, after all, vagabonds and mercenaries using cobbled-together gear. It's not entirely implausible that they'd make some choices that "just look cool", or wear clothes that are more stylish than sensible. Even the "Fight Junkies" have the look of Southeast Asian pirates, although the Jungle Pirates' chain obsession is a little bit weird to explain.

One weird thing about the transition from LP1 to LP2 is that in LP1 every person was tailored for the same environment: the cold. In LP2, the increased diversity of the environments means that a bundled-up Snow Pirate can end up in a jungle, and a stripped-down Jungle Pirate can end up in the arctic. This compounds with the Thermal Energy issue mentioned before - everything about LP1 was designed around the concept of "it's cold, survive in the cold", and then LP2 sort of undid that without really thinking it through.

Each character in LP/LP2 is equipped with a wrist computer used to connect to data posts and terminals for things like map information and sensor data. There's a lot of things about them that don't make sense (such as "why do the data posts pop up only when the player uses them? Don't the pirates in this base use them?"), but in general I thought they were a nice tactile touch even if they were abstracted a bit. It's not just "move your guy next to the base and press E", your character in-universe is actually doing something.

Characters
Each group or faction in Lost Planet is basically meant to be a "post-apocalyptic gang" sort of deal, with the exception of NEVEC (who are PMCs). There's a sense of camaraderie, loyalty, and teamwork, but it lacks the discipline and coordination of actual military units. This is because, well, they're not. They may have combat experience, but they're still bandits, pirates, and survivors, not actual soldiers. They take what works, or what they like, when it comes to outfitting. The only "uniformity" is group-to-group. There's still some chain-of-command, as most groups have some sort of "mission control", but it definitely lacks the stricter organization of an actual military, which also helps to characterize it.

The way casualties are treated is kind of disconnected. It's certainly true that people die in cutscenes all over the place, and most of the units you play as in LP2 talk about severe casualties, but it naturally doesn't count your in-game deaths as being part of that. This is weird considering that your characters in LP2 are basically anonymous anyways, although in certain stages there are recognizable characters even if you don't know who they are.

I felt the character animations in both Lost Planet games helped make them feel more "real" even despite the outlandish sci-fi nature of the game. There's a real sense of momentum when someone throws a grenade or rolls out of the way or whatever. It's a lot of little touches, sure, but when my snow pirate catches his grappling hook on a ledge as he falls, turning his startled slip into a rappel, it just helps make him feel like a person.

The main thing that's lacking in Lost Planet is damage response - the guns are basically a perfect example of "nerf". Bullets impact on the model and explosions knock people around. The Harmonizer is stated to help "regeneration", but it might as well be a shield or something considering what it effectively does. There's really no sense that damage is actually being done until a guy actually dies, at which point they fall over.

Mechs
The mechs in LP2 are known as "Vital Suits", and they're basically closer to powered armor than full "mechs". Most Vital Suits are basically guns attached to a pair of legs (like a walking tank), but some advanced models include arms and arm-based weapons (like a human-type). Vital Suits are feasible in that they serve basically the same role as infantry due to their relative size. They're smaller than a tank or other armored vehicle, and are able to maneuver in places that armored vehicles wouldn't. They might not be plausible in an engineering sense, but tactically they're at least filling a niche that can't be filled by tanks or jeeps.

Like other parts of the game, there's a lot of little touches to the Vital Suits that I appreciate. For example, weapons can be pulled off and swapped, because they're essentially modular. If you find a VS missile launcher in a shed, you can pick it up, bring it over to your VS, and attach it. If your VS is damaged, you can hop out and repair it. While this is fairly basic and you never really hold onto a VS for that long, it was still a neat "scavenger" touch that helped solidify the aesthetic produced by the rest of the game.

Enemies
The main enemies in the game are Akrids, the native bugs that are naturally full of a glowing orange energy source. This provides a tangible reward for killing enemies - they're full of the juice you need to live. In addition, Akrids, like most bug enemies, are basically innumerable. This means that every trooper can rack up a huge number of bug kills, even if they end up dying in the end. There's different kinds of Akrid, too, so there's a few that are large enough to be bosses or mini-bosses. This diversity establishes them as a threat, but also a threat that occasionally comes in smaller, more easily-killed versions.

The other main enemies in the series are, naturally, hostile humans. In the campaign, the difference between the players and their enemies is justified primarily by the Harmonizers, which convert thermal energy into increased abilities and regeneration. In LP1, only the main character has a Harmonizer. In LP2, the player-character teams have access to a less powerful version of that Harmonizer. The various goons and bandits of the Lost Planet world do not have access to Harmonizers, which means that they die in a few hits.

The reaction to death is kind of weird in general - casualties are acknowledged in cutscenes, but seem too common in gameplay to match up. There's a difference between "we lost four guys" and "our entire forces were wiped out because they refused to retreat or escape". The former is PvP, the latter is PvE. Even when the pirate enemies have superior odds and actually manage to kill the players, the fact that the players can infinitely respawn makes them a roadblock anyways.

Conclusion
Lost Planet is a pretty good "game setting": there's a situation that creates a dynamic, and technology/design that supports the dynamic. It's a post-apocalyptic "cobble together your gear" aspect plus a sci-fi "kill bugs by the thousands" aspect. It's definitely more on the "presentation" side than the "real/plausible" side, but there's a lot of little touches that make the world feel more believable. However, it's also pretty limited - despite the backpacks and ammo pouches, there's no mention of gathering food or water or anything other than T-ENG. It's not exactly a living world, but it's at least a world that's consistent with the gameplay. I'd like to see a sandbox game or a pen-and-paper game that takes place on E.D.N. III, because the arcade/action gameplay of the current LP games don't really use the setting to its full potential.