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SUMMARY:Musical Dark Descents: sonic immersion in psychological horror gam
 es - Isabella van Elferen (Utrecht University)
DTSTART:20130123T170000Z
DTEND:20130123T180000Z
UID:TALK42887@talks.cam.ac.uk
CONTACT:30200
DESCRIPTION:Psychological horror games (PHGs) revolve around one thing onl
 y: fear. Situated in dark dungeons and featuring invisible terrors\, these
  games not only frighten players but also play with and upon their fear. P
 HGs are especially notorious for the sections in which gameplay is interru
 pted by “insanity effects”. In these highly disturbing sequences\, the
  game’s main character is revealed to be psychologically unreliable\, of
 ten because of past trauma. Insanity effects often influence the avatar th
 rough visual and sonic “hallucinations” or the occurrence of paranorma
 l events. More importantly they also test players’ psychology by breakin
 g the fourth wall: through seeming corruptions of the software or the inte
 rface\, the graphics become blurry\, the soundtrack gets distorted\, the c
 onsole may seem to delete saved games or even to have crashed.  \n	In game
  reviews the soundtracks to PHGs are often highly rated and assessed as vi
 tal parts of the games’ frightening effect. This is not surprising\, as 
 these games are often visually very dark\, so that the player has to rely 
 more on sound than in other games. My paper explores the ways in which sou
 ndtracks contribute to the dark play in PHGs through a study of the mechan
 ics of musical immersion. As an extensive analysis of Amnesia: The Dark De
 scent (2010) will show\, the shift from external fright to internal psycho
 logical terror is achieved sonically through a blurring of the distinction
  between “outside” and “inside” sounds. This musical form of dark 
 play leaves the player immersed in insanity only: her own insanity as well
  as that of her avatar.\n
LOCATION:Recital Room\, Faculty of Music\, West Road
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