Let’s Plays: An Artform for the Internet Era

Thirteen years ago, I felt like exploring the world of “the dark Zelda game” I didn’t grow up with an N64 and mainly engaged with Zelda through the GBA port of A Link to the Past and Minish Cap. So, the world of 3D Zeldas was foreign and novel to me. I had of Ocarina of Time due to its overwhelming cultural force but the one that interested me most was its weirder sibling, Majora’s Mask. I lived in a small town with no way to get to the city so I could not go out and buy eshop gift cards to purchase the game on Wii virtual console. Nor had I heard of emulation. This left me with perusing the game on the internet, mainly YouTube because as a child I did not know of good communities of video game enthusiasts. This led me to typing the game into YouTube with full playthrough in the search bar as well. What I found opened my eyes and changed my life forever, a “Let’s Play” of the game by Chuggaaconroy. I was vaguely familiar with the idea of a full playthrough of a video game on YouTube but the idea of talking over it and by doing so getting the viewer closer to the action and understanding the player’s thought process was new and exciting. I was transfixed. I binged the twenty or so available episodes on my iPod touch that night and would then tune in every week to watch the next few episodes. Later, I would create a YouTube channel so I could subscribe to Chuggaaconroy and experience other adventures with him.

This was my first experience of Let’s Plays, commentated video playthroughs of a video game that excel at bringing a sense of community. The origin of the term comes not from video but actually from annotated text and screenshot playthroughs where people would describe what they were doing in a game and how the game played out, particularly on websites such as Something Awful. These were similar to something known as After-Action Reports (ARRs) in Paradox gaming circles, where a player would chronicle the rise of their nation or dynasty and describe what had happened and where things when well, or wrong, sometimes in character. The idea would move to video platforms around 2007, with Slowbeef usually being credited as the first full playthrough with commentary (Dlgredael, 2018). Let’s Plays formed a formative part of my adolescence, they provided me with a door into a community I didn’t know existed. They also taught me so much more about video games than I would otherwise.

Community

A core part of what makes Let’s Plays work, and separates them from things such as walkthroughs, is the sense of community they create. Walkthroughs are utilitarian, they help you find secrets and complete games. Let’s Plays function far more as entertainment on their own. The commentary can take a variety of formats but largely the goal is to make the viewer have a good time. One crucial way they do this is the commentary it’s self. The act of the player explaining their though process and reacting makes the viewer feel they are right there in the experience. Instead of just watching an uncommentated full playthrough of a game, you are part of the experience engaging with the player. This was true even in the earliest days of the let’s play through things like comments on the forum post where one can chat with the poster about decisions made. Indeed, many let’s players would often read the comments and respond in later videos, explaining their actions in greater detail. This type of fan engagement and just the nature of the art form led me to discover I didn’t just like video games, I was a video game enthusiast. And for the first time, I had found people like me who I could read the comments of and what their videos. It helped me to become more outgoing and put myself out there and join enthusiast websites such as subreddits like r/games and engage with people on twitter about video games, largely finding them through the comments of my favourite creators or posters.

Watching Let’s Plays is fun enough on their own, but in my opinion, rather than spoiling a good story or moment, the best Let’s Plays pushed me to play the game myself, often along side the Let’s Play. Playing along with the series provides a unique experience in my view. It enhances the community feeling as it makes it seem you are friends playing the game beside each other, learning from each other’s playthrough and exploring together. This is particularly true of games that allow one to make long term game decisions such as Dragon Age where you can explore more options without having to play the game multiple times. It is also great for games like Pokémon where party is so important but also so flexible. You can go through the game with different party members and see the differences and discuss them in the comments with other people playing the game along side the Let’s Play. This created friends and turned some good games into absolutely fantastic games.

Exploring

As a young adult, I didn’t have a particularly powerful computer, and I had even less knowledge on how to use it effectively. I didn’t have apart time job until I turned sixteen and needed gas money and thus my video game budget was low to non-existent. This left things like Let’s Plays as the best way to explore the whole wide world of video games. Sure, I could not play a video game because I didn’t own the system and didn’t know what an emulator was, but I could watch some play it and talk about it. This led me to discover whole new types of video games and rekindle my love for old ones.

While there are many people who would record their first playthrough of a game and put it up as a Let’s Play, my favourite were the ones driven by pure passion for a particular game and was bursting with love for it. These ones were often those with the most information to share. It was a joy learning so much about my favourite games from growing up and new games I didn’t know existed. Things like how the Pokémon stat system actually worked in the old games and cool transgressive games like Persona 3 blew my mind. It’s through Let’s Play I learned about games like the aforementioned Persona series and things that would become my favourite games ever such as Fire Emblem Genealogy of the Holy War and Xenoblade Chronicles. I learned about the brilliance of series such as Suikoden and Burnout Paradise from Let’s Plays.

The community aspect provided here as well. One wasn’t just reliant on the commentator to provide the information, though the best ones were and are very knowledgeable about the game. There was a whole group of watchers who were curious and asking questions and got answers from others in the comments and it was a true great time to discuss with them. They would point to cool websites like wikis before Fandom ruined everything things like Bulbapedia and Serebi. My horizons were truly broadened by engaging with Let’s Plays

One could also learn more about what happens in games than they could play themselves. I didn’t know what Steam was but had heard of a really cool game called Half-Life. Through Let’s Plays I could watch what happened like I had experienced it myself. That’s not to say a Let’s Play is a substitute for playing the game yourself but they provide a gateway a game for those without means. Let’s Plays were also a great way to see if a game was to your liking before spending so much of my limited money on it. Rather than rely on the printed word of someone I didn’t know if I agreed with. I could see the game in action and decide if it fit my taste or not.

Conclusion

Let’s Plays provided a key point in turning me into who I am. They helped shepherd me into a community that respects me. They have also been largely supplanted by streaming. Streaming provides many of the same aspects of Let’s Plays but enhances them. The streamer is right at your fingertips reading chat so they can respond right away to anything you and chat say. You can feed off the energy of other chatters. A Streamer can spread information a chat member provided right away by just reading it aloud instead of having to wait a few days. Saving the stream and posting it on YouTube even allows for people who weren’t able to watch live get largely the same experience as a Let’s Play. I personally, find something different about them. I find there are benefits to an edited video such as removing excessive failures and stammering or the annoying instance of not knowing where to go. Perhaps I simply prefer on demand viewing or maybe part of me is nostalgic for the times I would wake up and watch Superjeenius play Persona 3 before going to school.

Dlgredael. https://www.reddit.com/r/letsplay/comments/9kboe1/comment/e6xy2ar/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web3x&utm_name=web3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button