Don Giovanni: The Video Game
Designing a video game to be played by the public is no easy task; and then having to design it around an 18thcentury Mozart opera doesn’t help the difficulty. In order to keep Mozart’s roots of the original opera in the video game, I would have to pay attention to specific details from the script and performance.
There are six core areas a game designer needs to cover when designing a video game. One of the main components of the design is the game world. Designing a proper game world when creating a game from an opera is key. One of the most important pieces of an opera is the scenery and stage set up. Stage set-up in a play or opera is called “mise-en-scène,” or in simpler terms, it’s just the arrangement of everything on stage. When I was watching Don Giovanni, I noticed that there was always an emphasis on the change of scenery going on in the background. When the scene would change, the camera would focus on the character who was speaking, but they would be off to the side, so the viewer could see the stage crew changing the scenery. While this isn’t as achievable in a video game, a way to sort of replicate the scenery change would be by showing the characters who are speaking travel from one setting to another. This could be done in a similar way by focusing on the character speaking but having them be placed on the side of the screen, so the player can see the scene changing in the background. By doing this, the “mise-en-scène” of both the game and the opera remain similar.
Another important area to consider when designing a game is the storyline. This part is easy to replicate because it can remain consistent with Mozart’s original piece. The overarching issue with replicating the storyline of a 18thcentury opera is that technology has changed so much over time, and everything is outdated. That’s why I would suggest a more modern twist on Don Giovanni. Although it takes away from the originality of the game, it’ll appeal to the target market of the video game. With all the technological advancements, opera has since been outdated, so in order to reach more people, the game would need a modern twist. The story line can remain strikingly similar, but it shouldn’t be identical because it won’t appeal to the right crowd. I feel like turning Don Giovanni into a modern video game wouldn’t be too difficult because many of the events in the storyline are similar to events that happen today. Things such as murder and deception are still common in everyday life.
Characters are always some of the most important pieces to creating a video game. In this case, a cross over from the opera to the game wouldn’t be difficult. The one twist that would have to be put on would be modernizing the characters. A key aspect that I’d have to keep in mind as a video game designer is the specific physical features each character possesses. If you take away their physical features, then you’re taking away from the authenticity from the original opera. Part of the mise-en-scène is where the vocal points are in each scene. Many of those points are on the physical features of characters. When you’re watching any movie or production, one of the first things you notice about characters are their physical features. Those are the things you remember for the entirety of the film/production. If the main physical features of the main characters in Don Giovanni weren’t transferred over to the video game, the game wouldn’t be the same.
The final three essential components to a video game all go together. They’re sound, look and feel. These are all important pieces to not just video games, but any theatrical production. Movies and live performances emphasize the importance of sound, look and feel as well. In Don Giovanni, the live orchestra is an important piece to the opera. The orchestra adds so much to the opera. When someone is singing a solo, they play soft music in the background. During intense scenes they play up tempo loud music to add to the suspense. Without the orchestra, the opera wouldn’t be half as good. For that reason, if I were designing the video game, I would be sure to keep the same orchestra soundtrack running in the background to add the same opera feel to the game. My favorite movie of all time is The Godfather, and in the video game created for the movie, they keep the same songs from the movie in the game, and I felt like it added so much more authenticity to the game.
In order to create a successful video game from Mozart’s 18thcentury opera, Don Giovanni, I’d need to carry over all the aspects which make the opera so unique to the video game, just with a modern twist. Keeping the mise-en-scène similar would be a necessity in order to give the game an authentic feel to the original opera.
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