Look, I don't want to be that nerd saying "video games prepared us for this moment," but I am the kind of nerd who will say we've been telling stories about times like these for as long as we've been telling stories, and one of the ways we tell stories is through gaming. And when we need the distance, solace, reflection, whatever that narrative storytelling provides us, games are just as valid as anything else. So it shouldn't be surprising that I've found myself visiting my SHMUP collection - especially since these games in particular seem to fit the vibe of the present time. Players assume an avatar tinier and far, far more fragile than potentially infinite waves of enemies that can include the terrain itself. To fail is to be erased bodily from the world... although I doubt Cats announces to the Space Media that you were a terrorist or assassin after every Game Over, so I guess video games have that going for them compared to reality. Heck, you don't even need to take on the challenge as a rugged loner hero - SHMUPS, along with the sidescrolling beat-em-ups they share DNA with, were some of the first games to feature cooperative multiplayer. Sure, you may be competing for the higher score (especially if you're aiming for a true arcade experience), but you're fighting a good fight together.
Now this is a broad generalization, and a lot is going to depend on the game and especially the player. Unless (and, often, even if) the game directly provides a narrative, the player has to build their own based on a handful of provided elements: packaging art, in-game design, aspects of gameplay, and, of course, music. When they were still dominant and powerful, arcades were more likely to leave things to the imagination while games for home consoles and computers often put a game's narrative up front... even when porting narrative-light arcade titles. Things blurred towards the end of the arcade era, of course, and some games tried to convey surprisingly complex plots and worldbuilding for short animations intended to catch the attention of passers-by. But ultimately, it was about the shared storytelling that takes place over a play session, with tropes and associations unavoidable. I tend to be more likely to read horizontal (AKA hori or yoko) SHMUPs as resistance narratives than vertical (AKA vert or tate) games. A hori game's invocation of the Death Star trench run in the original Star Wars is undoubtedly intentional, but the limited available motion through spaces not only occupied by enemies, but where the terrain itself can be an enemy inherently conveys a sense of resistance to overwhelming power. Verts, on the other hand, often expect the player to destroy targets below them, which can make me uneasy if they aren't clearly military or as capable of defending themselves as fellow airborne (space-borne?) combatants. Some games can feel a bit too Catch-22 or even Ender's Game with how easy it is to dispatch fiery death on those below - I think this is something that's kept from fully clicking with the DonPachi series, for instance. They make me feel like I'm one soldier out of many in a larger conflict I neither understand nor am invested in. Not that any of these are hard and fast rules, of course, whether it comes story provided directly to the player or developed through vibes. The Seventia games, for instance, are explicitly narratives about law enforcement officers becoming aware of the horrors perpetuated by the system they serve, and turning against that system... and they're made up of one horizontal title and one vertical.
This is the central premise of The Void Rains Upon Her Heart: you are not fighting to destroy or subdue the monsters... you are fighting to win them over. In a very literal sense (or at least, as literal as possible since most of the game takes place in dreams) , you are raining love upon the monsters: your "ship" is a beating hearth, your default bullets take the form of hearts, and the monsters' status bar represents their fear rather than their health. Their destruction represents the lowering of their barriers and choosing to accept the love you are giving. In terms of framing, it's almost a total inversion of every SHMUP trope since the genre's origins. There's an additional twist as well, in that this is a "rouge-lite" game where the different monsters will grant you various special weapons, bonuses, and defenses after beating them. In fact, if you play long enough, they all have various special "events" where these decidedly Lovecraftian creatures take on a form like your to have conversations, make trades, and even play games... each one ending with hugs and "I love you"s. No death, no destruction, no glorification or justification of violence. The act of resistance is one of community-building among those who cannot participate in society... and, in the process, they learn to love and accept themselves, as well.
It's up for debate as to whether games like these could be considered praxis in times of civil strife and struggle. I'd like to think they give hope to the people fighting without the metanarrative wrapping that holds fasces together, that solidity comes from conformity and intimidation, that peace can only be found in a racialized masculine hierarchy, that the worst crime is being a victim of the State. It falls on outsiders to make their own stories and to experience them, and this applies just as much to games as it does to songs or sculptures or stories. It takes love for the Other to fill the voids between us, but it's a love we can all stand on... together.
- B
Send questions, comments, and treatises on what Gradius has to say about the Spanish Civil War to neversaydice20@gmail.com.
