Video Games and the 4 Affordances

According to Janet H. Murray, all digital media objects have a specific set of attributes that allow people to use them. She defines these properties as the four affordances. Murray states that every modern digital media object should be procedural, participatory, encyclopedic, and spatial. These affordances combine to allow users to exhibit independent actions with ease.

Video games are highly addictive digital mediums for children and adults alike. The time teenagers spend with a video game in a week is unimaginable. Video game consoles prove to be versatile and provide multiple forms of media to be interacted with. Murray’s four affordances can be applied to video game consoles, defining why this is such a powerful digital medium. Video games consoles are procedural by containing various code and complex formulas to make the system handily interactive. PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and other consoles allow a wide range of activities. Murray’s affordances very well may be the basis of video games as a digital medium. If consoles were not procedural, participatory, encyclopedic, or spatial, the functionality of the console would not exist. The absence of these attributes would limit this gadget.

Video game consoles are computers that allow an increased amount of interactivity. Similar to computers, every console has a motherboard, database, and binary code. On the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One, users can surf the internet, stream music, and watch films. The time spent playing video games is dwindling. Many users prefer to watch Netflix on their Xbox than play a video game. This amount of versatility coincides with Murray’s participatory affordance. The amount of control a user has when using a console is highly significant. With participatory affordance comes a set level of power. When analyzing digital mediums, the most popular objects make the user feel the most powerful. An important attribute that empowers video game users is the customization of the interface. Users are able to customize the way they move throughout the system, changing any colors, symbols, or organization of a page to make it unique. In PlayStation Home, a virtual social media platform, players are able to control the physical look of their character and the world around them.

(Forbes.com)

Programmers have made video game consoles so accessible that the interface itself has become transparent (Murray, “Four Affordances”). Based on Murray’s definition of procedural affordance, this participation creates a sense of agency for the user, an attribute any digital medium should sport.

Procedural affordance works with participatory affordance to create interactivity in video game consoles. The processing power of modern day consoles is what allows users to interact with them. The PlayStation 4 processes 200,000 million instructions per second (MIPS), an incredible amount that allows this digital object to run fluidly (Murnane, Forbes). The speed at which a console performs will determine if it is commercially successful. The digital age is impatient and we as users are custom to receiving media instantly. In any modern age digital medium, procedural affordance is the most significant attribute. Without it, the ease of function in these objects will cease to exist.

(Eurogamer.net)

The powerful processing capability of video game consoles promotes a sense of encyclopedic performance amongst developers. Murray defines this performance by how much media a digital object can contain. The PlayStation 4 and Xbox One have an extensive library of information. The object is a computer at base nature, allowing users to surf the web, watch movies, take pictures, and listen to music. Today, video games themselves are encyclopedic. Games such as Grand Theft Auto and Watch Dogs allow players to interact and perform an action through different mediums (computers, phones, etc.), creating a digital inception. This combination of different media forms collectively makes up the participation that we see with video games today. Murray coins this experience as immersion.

Murray defines spatial affordance as “creating consistent interaction patterns that support movement between spaces.” Consoles exhibit this behavior through the fluid transition between different media applications, and the inclusion of them within each other. PlayStation network and Xbox online allow users to play video games online while they communicate. Even if someone does not have the same video game, modern day consoles have made it possible to give each other content through game sharing. Calls can be made through these consoles while someone is in a different application. The procedural affordance of consoles has created a space in this virtual world of gaming, which transitions throughout all different forms of media.

(PBS LearningMedia)

Viewing video consoles viewed as a digital medium through the four affordances alters my personal perspective of the object. Looking at my personal PlayStation 4, I believe that in the past I have underappreciated it. I am one of the users who own a console and doesn’t play video games. I prefer to watch and interact with Netflix and YouTube while I am using my console. However, I intend to use my gadget to its highest ability. Together the four affordances create an experience of immersion, a feeling that I am not yet familiar with.

Works Cited

Murnane, Kevin. From Pong To PlayStation: The 40-Year Evolution Of Gaming Processing Power. Forbes, 25 Apr. 2016, https://www.forbes.com/sites/kevinmurnane/2016/04/25/charting-forty-years-of-power-ratings-for-video-game-consoles-and-arcade-machines/#3cc07b382472. Accessed 4 Oct. 2017.

Murray, Janet. Inventing the Medium. MIT Press, Nov. 2011