{"id":11541,"date":"2022-04-27T11:24:16","date_gmt":"2022-04-27T08:24:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.tuni.fi\/playlab\/?p=11541"},"modified":"2022-04-27T11:24:16","modified_gmt":"2022-04-27T08:24:16","slug":"weird-game-mechanics-drama-and-alien-invasions-how-live-streamer-vinesauce-vinny-creates-narratives-and-plotlines-through-the-affordances-of-non-narrative-games","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.tuni.fi\/playlab\/weird-game-mechanics-drama-and-alien-invasions-how-live-streamer-vinesauce-vinny-creates-narratives-and-plotlines-through-the-affordances-of-non-narrative-games\/","title":{"rendered":"Weird game mechanics, drama and alien invasions \u2013 How live streamer Vinesauce (Vinny) creates narratives and plotlines through the affordances of non-narrative games"},"content":{"rendered":"

Vinny Vinesauce<\/h3>\n

Vinny is the original creator of the live streaming group Vinesauce \u2013 the group\u2019s name was and still is the name he uses for his game characters and personas. Although the group creates a variety of gaming content, my personal favorites are edited compilations of Vinny\u2019s \u201clet\u2019s play\u201d streams, in which he creates narratives to non-narrative games like Animal Crossing and Tomodachi Life.<\/p>\n

Vinny\u2019s way of playing and narrating these games is creative and playful: instead of taking the games \u201cas they are” he reads into every coincidential game event, the game characters\u2019 behavior and their dialogue, and builds a larger storyline by giving meaning to and finding connections between seemingly trivial details within the game. His livestreams are then edited down and uploaded to the Youtube channel Vinesauce, sometimes adding fanart to the mix. This is how the Tomodachi Life 1-57 Extended Special, a 90-minute-long compilation of Vinny\u2019s Tomodachi Life gaming streams, came to be.<\/p>\n

Tomodachi Life as the setting, Miis as the characters<\/h3>\n

The story begins with Vinny first setting up the game Tomodachi Life, naming the island in the game Vineland Island, and moving in the first Miis (Nintendo\u2019s player avatars made by players themselves). The Miis Vinny adds to his island create a chaotic group of characters from all across the board: well-known Nintendo characters like Wario and Waluigi, obscure characters from Vinesauce\u2019s old videos, pop culture celebrities like David Bowie and Gordon Ramsey \u2013 even Jesus and Satan make an appearance.<\/p>\n

Tomodachi Life lets the players design these characters themselves and give them different personalities, which then leads to the characters creating varying types of relationships with each other, even leading to marriages and children. One character became a target for Vinny: Two Faced is one of the first islanders to be added and after seeing her perform a song on stage, Vinny decides she\u2019s going to become his avatar\u2019s girlfriend. This decision leads to a love triangle (or rather an unrequited love) as Two Faced starts dating Walrus \u2013 a Mii designed to look like, you guessed it, a walrus. Warlus becomes the sworn enemy of Vinny, and Two Faced lives up to her name when she ends up leaving Walrus and getting together with another islander later in the game.<\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \"A<\/a> \u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0 \"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

While at its core, Tomodachi Life as a game is purely a collection of randomized events without clear end goals or established roles for the islanders, Vinny\u2019s narration and interpretation of everything happening on the screen turns these random events into a somewhat coherent plotline. The humor of this \u201clet\u2019s play\u201d video comes from the coincidences within the game that give Vinny material on which to build stories. I specifically enjoy Vinny\u2019s reactions to whatever absurd situation the game puts the characters in \u2013 I have played the game myself and watching another player be confused by things I\u2019ve already become accustomed to adds another layer of hilarity.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

However, the plotlines don\u2019t end up with just interpersonal conflicts and love triangles: at one point the game crashes and thus data is lost, which to Vinny means a split in timelines. After the halfway mark of the \u201clet\u2019s play\u201d, islanders start vanishing and being replaced by aliens. In reality this is due to Vinny himself deleting and adding islanders offscreen, but within the story of the \u201clet\u2019s play\u201d, it creates a new experience and plotline for the audience. Vinny acts suspicious of the aliens called Jahns, but soon enough familiar faces come for rescue as the island welcomes Mulder and Scully from X-files. The aliens leave peacefully, but one stays behind to integrate into human society, being given the nickname LumberJahn (Vinny gives him a lumberjack outfit). LumberJahn later appears in Vinny\u2019s \u201clet\u2019s play\u201d of Nintendo\u2019s Miitopia, which has a lot in common in Tomodachi Life.\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Although many of the characters in Vinny\u2019s \u201clet\u2019s plays\u201d are only familiar to those within Vinesauce\u2019s fan community and followers, Tomodachi Life\u2019s absurd dialogue and game events together with Vinny\u2019s narration create a chaotic and humorous experience even without the full context of Vinesauce. The extended special gives a look into the world of Vinesauce and Vinny\u2019s live streaming, but also works as a stand-alone piece.<\/p>\n

The game: Tomodachi Life for Nintendo 3DS, by Nintendo (2013)<\/p>\n

Video name: [Vinesauce] Vinny – Tomodachi Life 1-57 Extended Special<\/p>\n

Video link: https:\/\/youtu.be\/tVKHNmmaFkc<\/a><\/p>\n

Featured image: the thumbnail of the video<\/p>\n

Other images: screenshots of the video, taken by author<\/p>\n

Additional info: the livestreams of which the video is made are from the years 2014-2017<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

When an imaginative Let\u2019s Player meets the absurd game of Tomodachi Life, you can expect there to be memes, aliens and love-triangles.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":127,"featured_media":11543,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ocean_post_layout":"","ocean_both_sidebars_style":"","ocean_both_sidebars_content_width":0,"ocean_both_sidebars_sidebars_width":0,"ocean_sidebar":"","ocean_second_sidebar":"","ocean_disable_margins":"enable","ocean_add_body_class":"","ocean_shortcode_before_top_bar":"","ocean_shortcode_after_top_bar":"","ocean_shortcode_before_header":"","ocean_shortcode_after_header":"","ocean_has_shortcode":"","ocean_shortcode_after_title":"","ocean_shortcode_before_footer_widgets":"","ocean_shortcode_after_footer_widgets":"","ocean_shortcode_before_footer_bottom":"","ocean_shortcode_after_footer_bottom":"","ocean_display_top_bar":"default","ocean_display_header":"default","ocean_header_style":"","ocean_center_header_left_menu":"","ocean_custom_header_template":"","ocean_custom_logo":0,"ocean_custom_retina_logo":0,"ocean_custom_logo_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_tablet_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_mobile_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_max_height":0,"ocean_custom_logo_tablet_max_height":0,"ocean_custom_logo_mobile_max_height":0,"ocean_header_custom_menu":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_family":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_subset":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_size":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_unit":"px","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight_tablet":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight_mobile":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform_tablet":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform_mobile":"","ocean_menu_typo_line_height":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_unit":"","ocean_menu_typo_spacing":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_unit":"","ocean_menu_link_color":"","ocean_menu_link_color_hover":"","ocean_menu_link_color_active":"","ocean_menu_link_background":"","ocean_menu_link_hover_background":"","ocean_menu_link_active_background":"","ocean_menu_social_links_bg":"","ocean_menu_social_hover_links_bg":"","ocean_menu_social_links_color":"","ocean_menu_social_hover_links_color":"","ocean_disable_title":"default","ocean_disable_heading":"default","ocean_post_title":"","ocean_post_subheading":"","ocean_post_title_style":"","ocean_post_title_background_color":"","ocean_post_title_background":0,"ocean_post_title_bg_image_position":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_attachment":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_repeat":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_size":"","ocean_post_title_height":0,"ocean_post_title_bg_overlay":0.5,"ocean_post_title_bg_overlay_color":"","ocean_disable_breadcrumbs":"default","ocean_breadcrumbs_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_separator_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_links_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_links_hover_color":"","ocean_display_footer_widgets":"default","ocean_display_footer_bottom":"default","ocean_custom_footer_template":"","ocean_post_oembed":"","ocean_post_self_hosted_media":"","ocean_post_video_embed":"","ocean_link_format":"","ocean_link_format_target":"self","ocean_quote_format":"","ocean_quote_format_link":"post","ocean_gallery_link_images":"on","ocean_gallery_id":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[1447],"tags":[1046,286,1673,1672],"class_list":["post-11541","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-game-related-media","tag-lets-play","tag-nintendo-3ds","tag-tomodachi-life","tag-vinesauce","entry","has-media"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tuni.fi\/playlab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11541","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tuni.fi\/playlab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tuni.fi\/playlab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tuni.fi\/playlab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/127"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tuni.fi\/playlab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11541"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.tuni.fi\/playlab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11541\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tuni.fi\/playlab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11543"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tuni.fi\/playlab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11541"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tuni.fi\/playlab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11541"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tuni.fi\/playlab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11541"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}