How Can Music Reflect The Player ’ s Choices And Identity Within The Game ?: Videogames as an interactive medium override the perceived distance between media users and media characters ( Christoph , et al . 2009 , p . 353 ). Players become an establish character within the in-game world they are interacting with . Many games offer players the opportunity to make choices and follow their own path within the narrative . Both ‘ Undertale ’ ( Toby Fox , 2015 ) and ‘ Night in the Woods ’ ( Infinite Fall , 2017 ) offer the player choices that can shape their role and identity within the game universe . The music within each game is used to reflect the player ’ s choices .
Within ‘ Undertale ’ ( Toby Fox , 2015 ), there are three main narrative paths the player can choose from . These are : the pacifist , neutral and genocide routes . If a player chooses to spare every monster they encounter in battle they follow the pacifist route ; this route features the majority of the character development and comedic elements . However , if a player decides to fight
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and kill every monster they encounter they end up on the genocide route . The genocide route features darker themes and messages on morality . By only killing a few monsters the player can follow the neutral path , which is similar to the pacifist route but with a different ending . To reflect the distinct route the player has chosen , the music emphasises the themes within each of the moral gameplay paths . On the pacifist route there is a wide range of music . There is comedic and energetic music for the lighthearted parts of the game , such as Papyrus ’ s character theme . For the more serious parts of this route ’ s narrative , more emotional and heart-warming music is used . However , once the player chooses to pursue the genocide route , the music becomes horror based . During the genocide route ‘ much of Undertale ’ s soundtrack is intentionally distorted for the purpose of punishing game participants ’ evil behaviour ’ ( Perez , 2017 , p . 74 ). For example , areas traditionally filled with atmospheric and emotional music in the pacifist route are now filled with little to no music . When encountering
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