Trigger Happy
322
Time, gentlemen, please
Remember that a videogame is not a static “text”; it is a
dynamic form. And since videogames operate through
time, another constituent of good symbolic
conversation is obviously going to be its rhythm, or
how the symbols combine over time.
The importance of rhythm is exemplified most
nakedly in a style of videogame that was hugely
popular at the 1999 Tokyo Game Show, which relies
completely on it, combining a handful of symbols with
complex temporal interaction. As we saw earlier,
Konami’s Dance Dance Revolution shows
combinations of four arrows floating down the screen;
when they reach the bottom line, the player must step
on the corresponding arrows of a sensory floormat
beneath the feet, in time to the banging techno music
from the loudspeakers. Hundreds of young Japanese
men and women were lining up to show off their skills
at this game, practicing their moves groovily in line.
The best of them combined the moves required by the
game with their own creative gestures and twirls.
Beatmania, meanwhile, consists of five large
buttons (styled like half an octave of a piano keyboard)
and a mock DJ turntable; similarly, various
