During the last few years, a debate took place within the game scholars community. A debate that, it seems, opposed two groups: ludologists and narratologists. Ludologists are supposed to focus on game mechanics and reject any room in the field for analyzing games as narrative, while narratologists argue that games are closely connected to stories.

Gonzalo Frasca, Ludologists Love Stories, Too

Gonzalo Frasca explains a supposed conflict that took place studying games between Lugologists and Narratologists. Despite their supposed inherent conflict, the argument had dissipated before it had a chance to materialize. This is because of misunderstandings that had resulted from the technology of the medium being relatively young compared to previous arguments and definitions provided by earlier narratologists such as Todorov, Genette, Greimas and Metz (3). This has led to the very term narratologist to mean different things inside and outside the gaming world even though the term of narratology is, and should remain, medium free (Ryan 2001). The idea of narratology verses ludology has evolved into studying games in terms of ludology ‘and’ narratology. This is for reasons that have seen to be established in light of more complex and literary games and the realization about each ‘side’. This might include that Ludologists do not naturally hold a radical position that excludes narratology in games (4).

Frasca also claims that this was never the case and when he suggested the term and that his intention was “to show how basic concepts of ludology could be used along with narratology to better understand videogames” (4). This is supported by other Ludologists such as Espen Aarseth who in Cybertext (referred to Frasca’s article) claims that while there are the two categories, the distinction is not clear cut and there is a significant overlap between them (1). This is because while games are not narratives, games do contain narrative elements and in the end the experience of games and narratives are significantly different. This crossover being almost inevitable, with the narrative being one of the principle factors in shaping game worlds and motivating game play.