Simulation versus Representation

Gonzalo Frasca’s thesis on simulation versus representation contends that video games and other sorts of simulation are not comparable to other more traditional types of narrative medias such as videos and books. According to him, “simulation is the act of modeling a system A by a less complex system B, which retains some of A’s original behavior.”(pg. 3) This means that simulation is good for testing outcomes, but poor for attempting to represent the entire flavor of reality. Recreating reality is a job best left to representation which although will always lack some characteristics of reality, can come very close to exemplifying what it is trying to represent.(pg.1)
So if one desired to know the plot of Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six they should read the book or watch the movie if it existed. But don’t the exact same things happen in the video game? Why not just experience the story of Rainbow Six by becoming a character and living the story through the video game? This is where Conzalo Frasca comes swooping in with his bold yet truthful thesis. It is correct to note that as a player, one could run through all of the same rooms as Ding Chavez (the Rainbow Six team leader) in the same order and dish out the same lethal smack down with the same gun to the same bad guys in the same order. However that is just one possible outcome when the game is played. In the video game ding could just as well turn left instead of right at some point and the story could be changed. Or maybe in the book Rainbow Six a terrorist was sneezing when he should have been standing guard at a door, but that sort of thing can’t be represented in the simulation because it is a less complex version of the story confined by algorithms that dictate the outcomes a player experiences while playing the game.
I found myself coming to the same sort conclusion when comparing the two versions of the Bjork’s All is Full of Love video. As far as narrating the story of a robot being blessed with the gift of human life, there was a definite hierarchy in the versions’ abilities to communicate the same story. The filmed version had more room for smaller and more powerful details such as the white mechanical fluid and closer looks at the operation of the robot that made it feel more robotic to viewers than just an animation of a robot. Just as Magritte implies with her famous paintin La Trahison Des Images (The treachery images) (pg.1), some interpretations of an object bring you closer to the object than others. The intimacy with the viewer and the realistic robotic interpretation of Bjork makes the narration very real and moving to some. Conversely, the animated version is a joke. When an emotionally complex situation is simplified to fit into a less complex and more narrationally challenged media such as the Sim City simulation it becomes painful to watch. The loving caresses from the animated robot made me think, “This is not what this sort of technology is for. This is ridiculous.” Without knowing it I was agreeing whole-heartedly with Gonzalo Frasca; simulations just can’t narrate stories that even approach the complexity of the reality.