Twitch Plays Pokemon is one of the most entertaining and successful social experiments to take place in the history of gaming. The story of this intriguing test lies with an anonymous Australian programmer. They set up a system whereby they would stream a game of Pokemon Red via the popular streaming site twitch.tv.
The viewers, however, are the ones in control of the game. They control it by typingcommands such as ‘up’, ‘start’, ‘b’, etc. into the chat. The concept very quickly became popular and suddenly 100,000 people were trying to play the same game at same time. What ensued was both anarchic and gripping.
The stream lasted just over 16 days. That's over 384 hours of constant playing. All that time and effort culminated in an impressive and heart-warming victory against the Elite 4 and the League Champion.
How did this strange social experiment become so popular? How did it spawn almost an entire sub-culture in the time that it was running? Stunning artworks were produced and stories were written about it that would make the most stoic of people weep. How did a simple game of Pokemon manage to capture the hearts of so many? The key lies in the community.
Over the two weeks of constant playing, the fan base crafted a strange, yet compelling, meta-narrative for the stream. What started as a game of Pokemon morphed into something else entirely. Suddenly, Pokemon wasn’t even the game anymore… Pokemon was the platform. The game became Twitch Plays Pokemon. The players were, in essence, the ones dictating what the game was.
The community formed the idea that the main character, Red, was hearing every command as voices inside his head, and his actions were him obeying the voices. Red started trying to use certain items so much that the community decided he was worshipping them. There became an entire fictional religion based around worshipping an item called The Helix Fossil. When it came time to try and teach a Pokemon surf, they had a choice between evolving an Eevee into a Vaporeon or getting a Lapras. The crowd chose Eevee, but they bought the wrong evolution stone and evolved it into a Flareon. They called this event “The Great Disappointment”, and hailed Flareon as “The False Prophet” who was sent to lead them astray from The Helix Fossil’s teachings. Ridiculous? Sure. However, it was also gripping and entertaining.
The meta-narrative became so coherent in such a short amount of time because of the number of people contributing to it. Places where the community would talk, such as the Twitch Plays Pokemon sub-reddit, became awash with artworks and stories. When one person would put forward an interpretation of an in-game event, countless others would run with that idea and refine it, and then others would run with those refined concepts and refine them even further. Within a short amount of time, a beautiful narrative was created and there were gorgeous artworks to compliment it.
”I’d Like To Think They All Found Each Other in the End” by tumblr/reddit user 7ofdiamonds. This picture was used with their permission. Their work can be found here: http://kiyokon.tumblr.com/tagged/tpp
The PC has an option to release any Pokemon that the user has caught while playing. Because of the sheer number of commands Twitch would receive, it was inevitable that any time a PC was used there would be casualties. The above picture was made in memory of the Pokemon that were accidentally released when Red would use the PC. This is the great thing about Twitch Plays Pokemon. For the first time it made people consider what actually happened when a Pokemon was released. It made people interpret in game events, and weave them into the constantly evolving story. As I said before, Pokemon became a platform for the game instead of the game itself.
Why is this significant? Because to me it represents another stage in the evolution of gaming. There is another game that took that first tentative step towards video games being a platform instead of a rigidly defined experience. That game is Minecraft. Minecraft is only as fun as you and your friends make it. You organically develop your own fun and your own story. I vividly remember playing with a group of friends, building two castles within close range of each other, and having an all-out war. We developed a backstory as to why these bastions were fighting each other so viciously, and we all suddenly became characters in a tale of our own creation. Ask most other Minecraft players, and they’ll be able to recount similar stories to mine.
These open and player defined experiences are what I see as the next stage in gaming. I don’t mean that all games will become these open and player defined experiences, but there is a growing market for allowing players to craft their own enjoyment. Twitch Plays Pokemon certainly shows that.
The streamer is currently running a game of Pokemon Crystal now that Pokemon Red has been completed, and with the change of generations the hype surrounding it has died down somewhat. Consistent viewership has dropped from around 50,000 to 15,000. However, consider that these viewers are just the overlap between those who enjoy Pokemon and those who want that player driven experience – Just as the playership of Minecraft is the overlap between those who enjoy world building and those who want the player driven experience.
Twitch Plays Pokemon has been a special experience. It has flared up a wave of nostalgia for the old editions of Pokemon, and has confirmed in my mind a want for games that are a platform and a base for players/communities to craft their own enjoyment. This is on top of the fact that it proved that tens of thousands of people can in fact co-ordinate themselves just enough to fight their way through a game that requires patience and diligence even for one person playing it. For that, it has to be commended.
For those wishing to read up on the Twitch Plays Pokemon story or join in on the current stream, here are some useful resources:
The Book of Helix: A chronicle of Red’s story and the religion of The Helix Fossil http://issuu.com/audreydijeau/docs/the_book_of_helix
The TPP Sub-Reddit: A place where the Twitch Plays Pokemon community can share ideas and artworks http://www.reddit.com/r/twitchplayspokemon/
The TPP Google Document: This document regularly updates and shows the current pokemon team, as well as where the main character currently is, and a brief history of the current stream’s events https://sites.google.com/site/twitchplayspokemonstatus/