The Role and Context of the Player Avatar

It’s obvious, but most games need some form of player avatar. The form this avatar takes informs the innate design of the game. From the start of Super Mario Bros (1985) the fact that the player avatar is Mario, rendered in the games world as a regular human informs the player of the capabilities they’ll have. Until the player progresses further into the game, the player cannot do anything as Mario a regular human can do.

(Sure, it’s possible to jump on mushrooms and turtles. You just shouldn’t)

It’s when the player encounters things from the game world that their capabilities are increased beyond the normal - though this change is telegraphed by the gameplay - the super mushroom moves after being created, which draws the players eye. The fire flower changes Mario's colour palette, signifying a change in capability.

Player avatars allow for immersion in the narrative, as well as assisting the player in understanding the mechanics. Depending on the genre, the player avatar doesn’t always have a physical form. For example, Anno:2070 incorporates the player into the narrative by framing their decisions as those of a mid level manager. Non player characters speak directly to the player as a talking head in a popup window. This i sufficient for the genre,but an argument could definitely be made that removing direct physical agency from the player also removes the player from a layer of potentially useful feedback,

1999’s Theme Park World used an advisor as an intermediary between the game world and the player - though even in this case the advisor wasn’t able to interact with the world, namely just conveying the current situation from within the game in a more user-friendly fashion than the typical graphs and charts that are cornerstones of the tycoon game genre.

The Tropico series took an interesting approach in that the player is framed in the narrative as being ‘El Presidente.’ Issuing edicts and shaping the infrastructure of their island from their disconnected perspective, whilst also having a physical avatar of El Presidente wandering the island - both on it’s own volition and optionally directed by the player to undertake specific courses of action.

Splitting the player between their abstracted ‘management’ viewpoint and a physical avatar is an interesting design choice - though the nature of the genre leads to the player avatar lacking the detail and emotional connection that is typical of more character-driven games.

One potential explanation as to why this solution hasn’t necessarily gained traction is that the genre of management and tycoon games tend to thrive on the granular details of the task at hand. For the Anno series this is sprawling production chains to fulfil the needs of your populace, Tropico has you balancing the economy of your island, the well-being of your populace, international relations AND the value of your accounts in various tax havens. To add in a physical player avatar raises the suggestion that it similarly needs a robust set of granular mechanics - perhaps based on the Maslow's Hierarchy of needs, as popularised by The Sims. This may be cohesive with other mechanics in terms of depth and nuance, but could also just as easily be seen as an unnecessary level of detail to be managed. It could easily become frustrating if you’re locked out from fixing the larger scale or longer term problems in the game because your player avatar is feeling too hungry, or sleepy to do the necessary actions.

The tycoon, management and city builder genres have always framed the player in idealised positions within the context of the game. SimCity has you operating as the mayor of the city you’re developing, though in an idealised role with much greater direct agency than their real world counterparts. The work of a theme park manager is more focused on the business side of the venture than the granular aspects of the layout, aesthetics and mood of the venue that Rollercoaster Tycoon suggests.