Pokemon-Red was a game from gameboy color released in 1996-98 (Japan-US), but still permeate fan theories about gaps or secrets around the game’s history, some very well-founded, but in any case, nothing interferes with its form to play except for the meaning that the most dedicated players seek. In this post we will not talk about Pokemon-Red theories, but as the concept of Semiotic Contingency proposed by Anthropologist and Harvard University Professor Thomas M. Malaby, can be applied to the phenomenon of “Pokemon-Red fans theories”.
Pokemon-Red itself is a easy (or at most a little worked) game to meet the basic objective (defeat all 8 leaders of gyms, beat Elite4 and surpass their rival). But it has a more refined goal that involves capturing all 150 pokemon (which is only possible by making some exchanges with other players) and the legendary pokemon number 151 (which at first could only be obtained without tricks, from Nintendo events). From my own gaming experience, having the sufficient resources (friends playing and knowing the trick to catch pokemon number 151), it is not difficult to win both goals, giving a complete end to the adventure. But then, why do the fans insist on continuing to exploit this game?
The series of Pokemon games and their products has never stopped growing, increasingly refined and more commercial. But it is exactly in its initial version, made relatively crude, that we find a pure extract of the story behind the game. This leads the player to perceive gaps that do not affect the dynamics of the game or do nothing to improve the gameplay and strategies. Everything that is discovered and researched as to how the history fills, serves to give an even greater meaning in the actions of the players.
In this sense, I identify what Malaby defines as Semiotic Contingency, related to the unpredictability of the meaning that always accompanies the attempts to interpret the results of the game. This unpredictability accompanies the Pokemon-Red game on some fundamental issues (relevant to our world too), such as: Pokemon die? If they do not die then why is there a Pokemon Cemetery in the game? Why in the game, even if we hit a pokemon with a very strong blow, it only “faints”?
These are questions that the game does not explain clearly and objectively. Perhaps the production has been put in check in these situations and decided to just ignore, imagining that the most important for players would be only to fight with pokemon and not reflect on these complicated issues. On the other hand, it is possible that the production of the game had the answers to these questions, and even the intention of putting them into the game, but were prevented by the producer from doing so, and acting in a hidden way (in a kind of conspiracy theory), hiding during the course of the game this response so that players could decipher this ultimate great puzzle. But we can also imagine that the answer was present in the game, but by a decision from above, they had to withdraw it and alter all the parts in which it appeared, to make the game softer, thus leaving some gaps or strange contexts that appeared to players, a conspiracy theory.
Malaby illustrates this game of meanings external to the game itself, with its experience in Greece by learning to play Backgammon (a game very respected by the Greeks). As Malaby dominated the game and managed to beat the Greeks, they said, “Now he was a Greek,” or “That the smart American (the Malaby) should have discover a way to cheat.” In other words, they attributed a cultural meaning to the game outside the game itself. In this way, it can be said that the Semiotic Contingency is external to the formal structure of the game. And on several occasions he works (in an unconscious way) in the creation of cultural meanings or in the player’s own moral question.
Costikyan in his book Uncertainty in Games (2013) deals with two examples of games that consciously work with Malaby’s Semiotic Contingency. These examples are on pages 102 and 103 of the book (that’s where I first met and was enchanted by Malaby’s Semiotic Contingency theory):
Train is an art board-game in which players load little yellow “meeples” into rail boxcars, then move the trains about a track. Only when a train reaches its destination is the nature of that destination revealed; all are named for Nazi extermination camps, and by implication, you are delivering Jew to their deaths. This epiphany totally changes the meaning of the game for the players, creating a real and unsettling emotional impact.
Syobon Action is a masocore platformer that uses the tropes of Super Mario Bros. to play with the player’s head. For example, when you reach the end of a level, there is a flagpole at the end of each level and, in that game, you must leap on the flagpole to free someone imprisoned in the nearby castle. In Syobon interesting (and infuriating, and hilarious) to experienced platformer players. In this context, we’re talking about game culture rather than national culture, but that doesn’t change the fact that this is a form of semiotic uncertainty. Once you’ve jumped on a flagpole, you question the meaning of everything else you encounter in the game, rightfully, and are uncertain what the consequences of an action might be.
So, let us now take my favorite example to illustrate how Pokemon-Red instigates players in the face of Malaby’s so-called Semiotic Contingency. For this we need to understand a little about the game.
Our character is called Red while our rival is called Blue. This is a role playing game, so we live the adventure as if we were the Red. In this world we start with a pokemon and we need to travel through the cities and face other pokemon trainers. In this case, we can carry up to 6 pokemon, who will form our battle team. Any more pokemon we capture will go straight into the pokemon storage system, and we can pick it up only at an access point to this system. Each pokemon battle (in this version) alone against another pokemon of the opponent. We lose a battle only when all the pokemon we carry are out of condition to battle. So it does not make sense to have 6 or more pokemon, and not take 6 pokemon to battle, since they will not mess up if we do not use them.
Knowing this, we can follow our character throughout his saga. In some occasions he is confronted with his rival and the two battle, below we will deal with the thirst, fourth and fifth battles:
3st battle: Blue on this occasion has four pokemon, among them, a pokemon called Ratata (it looks like a mouse);
4th battle: Blue continues with four pokemon, among them, a pokemon called Raticate (that looks like a rat, and is evolution of Ratata);
5th battle: Blue is in a kind of memorial or graveyard of pokemon, where people go to cry for their pokemon that have died.
Then Blue immediately states (with a point of slander at the end) that his pokemon do not seem dead, and then the battle begins. On this occasion, Blue appears with five pokemon, but none of them is the Raticate. Another atypical feature is that on all previous occasions Blue suddenly appears and goes straight to the Red to battle. But on this occasion, Red finds Blue alone in the memorial, not caring if Red leaves the room, and even if Red returns after enough time, Blue will remain there, standing in front of the same tombstone and alone.
As mentioned earlier, it does not make sense in terms of strategy, having 6 or more pokemon and not using 6 in battle. Also if we consider that Blue was in a place where people go to cry about the pokemon that died, we can think that Blue’s Raticate died between the fourth and fifth conflicts against Red. But then the doubt arises because Red said that Blue’s pokemon did not look dead, and Blue replied that he went there to capture a pokemon. This can be interpreted in two ways:
- Red is a good guy and Blue truthfully told the truth about the status of the Red pokemon. And Blue is in fact no longer with Raticate, as he traded with another trainer for one of the two new pokemon he uses in battle, or same the Raticate was dead in another battle and prefer not say the truth about why he was there;
- Red is a bad guy and said ironically about the status of Red’s pokemon just because know why Red is here, because Red don’t think about the hurt of him or anyone, because he already knew about his Raticate, since his death happened in the last fight against Red. And Blue holding back the tears, he replied with coldness that was there to do the same as Red, capture a pokemon and soon after leaves the place not to collapse in front of its rival.
Below is a video of me playing Pokemon-Red and facing Blue in these 3 highlighted battles.
To conclude, the question of Malaby’s Semiotic Contingency concerns the uncertainty with which we see the event. In the case described above, when treating the protagonist as a good guy, we have an interpretation for events, whereas this interpretation becomes totally different when we assume that the protagonist is a bad guy.
From this conflict of perceptions implies that the fans of the game seek to find meaning for the events in the way that best fits with the reality that is held to be coherent. I leave as a suggestion from the reader to play Pokemon-Red (clicking here) and then see some theories of Pokemon-Red fans (click here)
Xoxelho 