Two days ago I watched, once again, Trois Couleurs: Bleu, the first movie in Kieslowski's Colours Trilogy. In that movie music is used to illustrate the main character's missing links with its family. And all the while I wondered: why do games so rarely use music and game elements to such effect. I've seen this done, from time to time, although not to its full potential, and usually limited to the music. Character themes and such.
But how could this be turned into something exclusive to video-games? The usual is removing characters which enable secondary actions (Beyond Good & Evil's partners, Dark Souls's Fire Keeper), or an object (Sands of Time's dagger), but I can't think of an instance in which the player's actual ability to interact with the environment was limited or bolstered by changes in the protagonist's motivation or expectations. Except, once again, Demon's Souls and Dark Souls' human/ghost/undead forms come to mind.
I'll give some thought to ways this could be accomplished, or other games I've seen something like this.
And that's it for today.
