For a typical Hollywood production, Gamer, a film that like so many other mainstream films triumphs the underdog who salvages man kinds humanity, the film did have its merits. My interest wasn't so much in the plot, or the special effects, but in the gamine environment. The use of diagetic and non-diagetic sound really sold the "feeling" of a video game to me. Video games are designed to integrate the player into the game, and since the screen barrier is a massive barrier to breach, numerous techniques are used to correlate the gamers experience with that of the avatar. In the films opening sequence the viewer is introduced to a world of gaming culture where the "high" is not from commanding an avatar, but from actually controlling another person, dictating how their lives will unfold for short periods of time (my sister watched the film with me and she found this aspect of the film mundane and unreal, but I just asked her to consider the numerous Sims games). The protagonist is introduced to the viewer in the middle of a game which involves handheld camera images, ridiculous amounts of gunfire and explosions, and limited, if not fragmented visual/point of view. Just like a video game. I liked this, it had a better effect on my relating it to a video game than Doom did with its use of point of view camera shooting. Although I didn't like the continual visual "glitches" that occurred throughout the film that attempted to simulate live feed. It distracted me from the gaming environment.
What was the icing on the cake for me was the diagetic sound. At the beginning of the film when Kable is in the "game' fighting, in the action, the sound is diagetic, full of shouts, gunshots and explosions. Yet when Kable is removed from the action, when he climbs the flight of stairs the diagetic sounds disappear, although they are still there, just outside and below him in the building. Instead, typical of a video game, all the viewer hears is Kable's footsteps and breathing, until he is once again part of the action. Furthermore, continuously throughout the film during gaming sequences the soundtrack turns over to classical music, soothing music that does coincide with the action that is happening on the screen. Like a gamer playing with an avatar, the music, the sound is optional and can be anything the gamer wants it to be. The viewer is subjected to this experience, which separates him or her from the action, insisting that they are not a part of it, because of the screen barrier, amongst other things.
Despite its filmic, Hollywood tendencies, the film does an adequate job at recreating the game-like feel in the film, right down to the excessive gore and violence. Separate from the escape scenes, the film attempts, and almost arguably succeeds in creating the gaming environment on the screen.
This is an oxymoronic aspect of the film, as games themselves strive to simulate reality and immerse the gamer into the game's environment. Yes it is true that the gamer may select alternate sounds, but both games and cinema want to immerse the viewer/player into the simulated environment. eXistenZ toys with this idea of total immersal and conquests over Gamer as at the conclusion of the film neither the players, or the viewers are certain whether or not the game is still in play. Lia M. Hotchkiss also explores this idea in her article Still in the Game. Both games and movies attempt to break the screen barrier and this theme is united in films like eXistenZ and Gamer where the movies, attempting to simulate games, which attempt to simulate reality. This theme of breaching the screen barrier has been continuous throughout this course, as well as simulating an alternate reality, as seen in Surrogates, eXistenZ and Gamer.