Play the Game

I found this activity, where I went on a journey of making a choose your own journey game, to be quite the unique experience. My chosen topic was “Tiger Parents”, which was a relevant topic for me where I had to face it in my life. The concept of Tiger Parents is a common term, more common in Asian countries. It’s such a recurring theme, mainly in China, that many shows (Fresh Off the Boat), games (Chinese Parents), and memes on the internet (Steven He) were created. My version of the story is slightly different from the common outright enforcing parents. In this game, I aimed to raise awareness of the topic and shed light on it. At first, my focus was to have people experience being a child of Tiger Parents, which is my experience. However, I later aimed to give a more encompassing experience.

My first try at the matter was the first phase, where I made three scenarios. During that time, I drew on different incidents that I felt were significant to me at the time. However, the result was three relatively similar incidents. I also wanted to paint a picture of the depth of emotions involved, and to do so I required a larger word count. The point of the excessive word count is a) prolong the experience, b) use a variety of words that help shape the image. The issue I faced as a result was that readers lost interest. This was a common theme I found when I first played my 10 games. Among the games I played was Depression Quest, which had a relatively large word count. Peers of mine had also played the same game. However, I noticed that unless the reader could already connect to the topic to a certain extent and is interested in it, it is unlikely that the reader would maintain interest in the topic with a large word count and very similar to a point of repetition in the scenarios. The second issue I faced was that I treated the activity as a storytelling problem, where I tell my story. Retrospectively, I come to realize that a good narrative game cannot be a simple “tell my story issue”, since I only lived one life with a single set of choices. I never experienced the other possible choices.

For my final draft, I aimed to resolve these issues. For starters I researched the matter to see other “potential stories” to tell. This helped me widen both my choices and scenarios. Initially, I wanted to draw the scenarios as some being the reader is a troubled child, while the others the reader’s sibling is the one in trouble. However, for my final draft, I chose to include scenarios, where the reader would grow to be the parent one day and have to make tough decisions for their child. The idea of being the parent was inspired by the game “Chinese Parents”. As such, I wanted to give the player all the different perspectives (child, sibling, parent) rather than a single view.

The second issue I aimed to resolve was the word count. For this, I briefed the scenarios and consequences. Although the briefed version may have fewer vivid details than the first draft, it helps keep the readers more engaged. Instead I relied on the variety of the scenarios and the reader’s personal interest to draw a vivid picture of the emotions.

Finally, I added a note at the introduction, which I think is very important, which says “There is no right or wrong answers, just decisions and consequences”. While designing this game, I realized that every experience of the matter is different. As such there is no general answer that fits all scenarios. I also, more importantly, came to understand that a choice that I might make and prefer the consequences, might not align with another’s decisions. This was particularly true, when I wrote the parent’s perspective. Every parent wants what’s best for their kids, however no one including the child and parents know what is best. A child’s current interest may be, but a fleeting mood and emotion. A parent not wanting a lasting regret for their child, would make a decision that their child may resent. A parent may also hold different views from their child, and what the parent may consider best, may not later on be what the child considers best. Probably, the toughest part of this matter is that a child doesn’t even know what they want until they grow older and the matter in question is far gone and done.

Oscar Wilde best summarized the parent-child relationship when he said, “Children begin by loving their parents; as they grow older they judge them; sometimes they forgive them.”