Photography game

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A photography game is a

Atari 8-bit family[4], in which the goal is to take a photo of the Loch Ness Monster
.

Photography elements can be the only significant mode of gameplay, as in Pokémon Snap or Afrika, or they can be used in combination with other gameplay modes such as action-adventure in Beyond Good & Evil or survival horror in Fatal Frame and Dead Rising.[2][5]

Origins

The first known photography game is Nessie published in 1984 for the

Atari 8-bit family. It was written by Tom R. Halfhill and published as a type-in program in Compute!'s second book of Commodore 64 Games[3] and in COMPUTE's Atari Collection Volume 1.[4][6]
The accompanying article describes the concept:

The game was inspired by a TV documentary on Loch Ness which recounted the hundreds of attempts to photograph the monster. Almost all of these attempts have failed; there exist only a few controversial photos showing parts of fins, shadowy shapes, and blurred figures. The game simulates some of the difficulties faced by would-be photographers of Nessie.[4]

In Nessie, the player has a camera with a 20-exposure roll of film and multiple lenses to choose from. The goal is to get a clear photo of the

Loch Ness monster
and not be fooled by other creatures in the water such as fish and eels. After taking 20 shots, the film is developed and can be reviewed.

Later games

In

PC Engine,[2] the player controls a reticle representing a camera viewfinder moving over the screen. Another early photography game was the 1995 full-motion video game Paparazzi!: Tales of Tinseltown, although the limitations of the FMV format meant players had little control over what they photographed.[2]

The 1999 game Pokémon Snap for the

Blockbuster Video,[8] while players of Firewatch could have the photographs on their in-game camera "developed" and delivered to their home.[2]

In

Outlast series are other survival horror games that give players cameras but no weapons – the aim is to record the monsters and escape without being killed.[9]

Several games with

sidequests. These include Beyond Good & Evil (2003), Dead Rising (2006) and Spider-Man 3 (2007).[2][5] The Touhou Project series games Shoot the Bullet, Double Spoiler and Violet Detector used photojournalist protagonists to combine photography and bullet hell mechanics, with points awarded for the number of bullets in a photo.[10]

Some experimental indie games have used photography mechanics to change the level itself – photographs taken in one part of the level can be pasted elsewhere in order to create new paths and objects. Such games include the 2D Snapshot and the 3D Viewfinder (formerly Polaroid Effect).[2][11]

The genre saw a resurgence in the 2020s with the release of mostly independent games such as Sludge Life, Eastshade (which applies photography game mechanics to landscape painting), Shutter Stroll, Umurangi Generation, Nuts and Season. These fuse photography mechanics with the walking simulator genre to produce slow-paced games, often with environmental themes, as a response to the fast-paced and violent nature of shooter games.[1]

See also

  • Virtual photography, screenshots of video games as an art form
  • arcade games
    involving photography

References

  1. ^ a b c Gordon, Lewis (23 March 2021). "Games Like Umurangi Generation Bring the Moment Into Focus". Wired. Archived from the original on 26 April 2021. Retrieved 6 May 2021.
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h i Jensen, K. Thor (2 May 2021). "Take a Picture, It'll Last Longer: The History of Photography Games". PC Magazine. Archived from the original on 5 May 2021. Retrieved 6 May 2021.
  3. ^
    ISBN 0-942386-64-7
    .
  4. ^
    ISBN 978-0-942386-79-0
    .
  5. ^ a b Lum, Jessica (18 November 2009). "8 Video Games that Feature Photography". Petapixel. Archived from the original on 7 May 2021. Retrieved 6 May 2021.
  6. ^ "Nessie". Atari Mania.
  7. ^ "'New Pokémon Snap': Nature photography in a world of wonderful monsters". Inquirer Technology. 19 June 2020. Archived from the original on 6 May 2021. Retrieved 6 May 2021.
  8. ^ d'Anistasio, Cecilia (16 January 2021). "The Bygone Glory of Blockbuster's Pokémon Snap Station". Wired. Archived from the original on 6 May 2021. Retrieved 6 May 2021.
  9. ^ Davison, Josh (26 April 2021). "10 Photography Centric Games Like New Pokemon Snap". Gamerant. Archived from the original on 8 May 2021. Retrieved 8 May 2021.
  10. ^ "Double Spoiler". Moby Games. Archived from the original on 8 May 2021. Retrieved 8 May 2021.
  11. ^ Balding, Jonathan (4 January 2020). "Take a picture, then walk into it, in this must-see game tech experiment". PC Gamer. Archived from the original on 6 May 2021. Retrieved 6 May 2021.
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