1. I’m on the theme of empathy because I’m interested in how emotional engagement works in games as opposed to non-participatory media, and empathy with the emotions expressed is what comes to mind when talking about emotional engagement with art. But is that too limiting a view of emotional engagement? What other kinds of emotional responses come up when we’re perceiving art?
2. When it comes to empathy specifically, are we talking about empathizing with the emotions of the characters, if there are any, or with the emotions of the artist or designer?
3. If we are talking about characters, what about a character makes us able or unable to empathize with it? Is our ability to engage with game characters different from our ability to engage with literary characters, and if so, why?
4. Does empathy with an avatar character work differently than empathy with an NPC?
5. If differences like this do exist, that may imply that we experience sudden shifts in style of emotional engagement when switching from gameplay to cutscene. If this is true, how does that affect our emotional experience of a game as a whole?
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