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Thomas Charles Rohleder

Susana Pajares Tosca

Digital Aesthetics

6 December 2012

Slender: The Eight Pages

An analysis of an interactive childhood nightmare

“Slender: The Eight Pages” is a scary horror game based on the mythical

creature Slender-man which only known purpose is to stalk and torture its human prey.

Completely immersed into the game, the player, in the role of a young child, is

searching for eight pages in a dark forest. This paper will explore the aesthetic and

immersive properties of this simple indie game. I will analyse “Slender: The Eight

Pages” by applying relevant theory about aesthetics, immersion and flow.

1. Introduction

2. Aesthetics

2.1 The Narrative

2.2 Immersion

2.3 Flow

3. Discussions

4. Bibliography

5. Appendix

5.1 – 5.3 Screenshot

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5.4 Figure 1 - Player in-game Flow experience

5.5 Figure 2 - The current model of the flow states

1. Introduction

This paper is an analysis of the aesthetic properties of Slender: The Eight Pages.

The indie game is an audio-visual 3D first-person horror game. The game is based on a

very basic graphic engine and a very elaborate soundscape. Thus it is interesting to

explore which aesthetic immersive properties are present in the game. The player

controls the protagonist through a dark forest, in the search for eight pages; also known

as Slender-pages. While searching the player must keep in mind that Slender-man is

pursuing. Being caught by Slender-man obviously means game over.

2. Aesthetics

This section of the paper accounts for the aesthetic properties of the game.

“By aesthetics we are referring to all aspects of video games which are experienced by

the player, whether directly – such as audio and graphics – or indirectly – such as

rules.” (Egenfelt-Nielsen, Smith & Tosca 117)

Visually the game tries to create a photorealistic atmosphere, although the

shortcomings of the graphic engine are obvious, hence the game looks like something,

that could be a decade old. Most of the screen is constantly dark, only illuminated by the

player’s flashlight, which adds a sense of disorientation. In the dark areas of the screen,

trees and other objects are barely visible when being approached (see appendix). The

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game allows the player to know if Slender-Man is near, by applying a visual static effect

to the screen.

In the beginning of the game the soundscape delivers the sounds of the forest

and of the players footsteps through the bottom of the forest. The soundscape of the

game develops and intensifies every time the player picks up a page; for instance by

emulating the sound of the player’s heartbeat and breathing or by the use of

atmospheric music.

The game is constantly pushed forward through forced exploration (Smith, Tosca

140); hence Slender-man is constantly trying to catch the player, who in return has to

continue through the ten areas of the game. The player encounters the areas in a

randomized order.

The eight pages, spawn in proximity of key objects in eight of the ten areas.

The players’ actions are limited to: steering orientation, walking, running,

switching the flashlight between on/off and picking up pages.

The ultimate goal of the game is to gather all the pages without being caught by

Slender-Man. If the player chooses to run through the whole game with the flashlight on,

the consequence is tangible, since Slender-man will catch up much faster, this forces

the player to sneak through the game.

2.1. The Narrative

““Narrative” can be defined as a succession of events. Its basic components are:

the chronological order of the events themselves (story), their verbal or visual

representation (text), and the act of telling or writing (narration)”(Smith, Tosca

196)

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The story of the game is very passive, and is very tightly connected to the myth

of Slender-man. The myth is shortly explained in the in-game wiki. This means the

player is expected to know the narrative beforehand; otherwise the player must imagine

the empty gaps. Fortunately the game plays with the basic human fear of the dark and

the unknown.

2.2. Immersion

The concept of immersion on a diegetic level relates to the immersive properties

of the game. The immersive property is the games ability to catch the full attention of

the player (McMahan 68), meaning that the player looses sense of time, and acts in the

virtual world as if it was the world that the player is embodied within.

Janet Murray has defined the concept of immersion the following way:

“The experience of being transported to an elaborately simulated place is

pleasurable in itself, regardless of the fantasy content. We refer to this

experience as immersion. Immersion is a metaphorical term derived from the

physical experience of being submerged in water. (…) The sensation of being

surrounded by a completely other reality, as different as water is from air, that

takes over all of out attention, our whole perceptual apparatus.” (McMahan 68)

Slender: The Eight Pages seeks to immerse the player through the use of

simulated audio-visual stimuli. On a visual level the movement of the flashlight adds to

the realism of the basic graphic engine. The soundscape of the game is very detailed

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and the strongest immersive property. The respiratory sounds of the protagonist and the

sound of the footsteps through the forest floor have a profound effect on the player. The

soundscape and the aesthetic visual side of the game augment each other in a very

satisfying way. The soundscape slowly but reliably immerses the player further into the

game world, every time a page is picked up and the intensity of the soundscape is

increased. The concepts of immersion relates to the psychological state of flow.

2.3. Flow

“The description of Flow is identical to what a player experiences when totally

immersed in a video game. During this experience, the player loses track of time

and forgets all external pressures. It is obvious that gamers value video games

based on whether or not those games can provide Flow experiences. [Holt

2000]” (Chen 5)

The concept of flow as described by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi is the psychological

effect of intense and focused concentration on the task at hand to the point whereby the

subjects awareness and actions merge, to a degree where the subject is no longer

conscious about interaction and looses the sense of time (Nakamura, Csikszentmihalyi

90), thus being immersed. In other words, the concept of flow is a state of mind,

whereas immersion is a property facilitated through the affordance of the game.

The Flow zone is described as the relationship between challenge and abilities,

this sweet spot where the player is equally challenged without the abilities of the player

being exceeded (see appendix, fig. 1).

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The ease of navigation, described in the paragraph about the aesthetic

properties of the game, keeps the flow zone accessible for both experienced and

inexperienced players (Chen 10). The game rules that are applied, means that

challenge of the game constantly is a little higher than what the player would expect. At

the same time the level of skills it takes to control the game is kept very low. This fits

very nicely with Csikszentmihalyi’s model of the flow states. According to the model the

player anxiety levels can be controlled through the relationship between difficulty and

how much the skill level of the player matters to be able to complete the task. The game

seeks to keep the player in an unpleasant state of flow, as illustrated in figure 2(see

appendix). The game seeks to keep the players flow in a state of anxiety, by applying a

high level of challenge and a low level of skill requirements (see appendix, fig. 2,

Marked with a x)

4. Discussion

“Slender: The Eight Pages” utilizes different strategies in order to capture the full

attention of the player. By the use of audio-visual aesthetic properties (Egenfelt-Nielsen,

Smith & Tosca 117) and a simple passive narrative (Smith, Tosca 196) the game seeks

to immerse the player into the game world (McMahan 68). The visual aspect of the

game seams very simple. The graphical engine looks like something, which easily could

be a decade old.

The soundscape of the game is very effective; thus a supporting column, the

soundscape seem to be the strongest immersive property of the game.

The players flow is constantly challenged by forced exploration. If the player

stops moving Slender-man will catch up. By applying a simple well-known classic first-

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person navigation system, and by keeping the skill level, which the game demands,

very low (Nakamura, Csikszentmihalyi 90), the game is able to keep both experienced

and inexperienced players in the flow zone (Chen 10).

4. Bibliography

Grau, Oliver. “Virtual Art. From Illusion to Immersion”. Cambridge, 2003 (pp. 2-23,

193-211)

Frasca, Gonzalo. “Simulation versus Narrative: Introduction to Ludology”.

London: Routledge 2003

Calleja, Gordon. “Digital Games as Designed Experience: Reframing the Concept of

Immersion”. Victoria University of Wellington. 2007

Egenfelt-Nielsen, Smith & Tosca. “Understanding Videogames” New York:

Routledge. 2012

Chen, Jenova. “Flow in games” Communications of the ACM, 2007

Lister, Martin. “New Media: A Critical Introduction.” Routledge London. 2003

McMahan, ALISON. “Immersion, Engagement, and Presence: A Method for

Analyzing 3-D VideoGames” 2003

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5. Appendix

5.1 Classic forest view.

5.2 Slender page on container

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5.3 Slender-man

5.4 Figure 1 - Player in-game Flow experience (Chen 10)

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5.5 Figure 1 - The current model of the flow states (Nakamura, Csikszentmihalyi 95)