Do Not Feed The Monkeys
From GameLabWiki
About the Game
Do Not Feed the Monkeys is a voyeur simulator in which players can slip into the role of a person who joins the "The Primate Observation Club". They watch "monkeys" in their cages via live video surveillance on the (in game) computer. Within a maximum of 16 game days, more and more "cages" have to be bought in order to stay in the club, the landlady and provisions like food and coffee have to be paid. However, after the first observation it is obvious that these are not actual monkeys or cages, but humans - sometimes empty rooms. The shown strangers are for example at work, at home etc. As an observer, you can collect keywords from conversations and use a search engine to further research on the (in game) Internet and find out a lot about these people; usually also contact information such as addresses, telephone numbers or chat profiles. Based on this, one can interfere or not in various ways. Every decision has different consequences.
RELEASE DATE: 24 Oct, 2018
DEVELOPER: Fictiorama Studios, BadLand Games Publishing S.L.
PUBLISHER: Alawar Premium
Research-Relevant Topics of the Game
Core Game Mechanics
Cages and time management
In each game run there are up to 25 different cages - aka rooms to spy on - to be seen; for some there is a second camera to buy so you can see more and find out more information, but you will have accordingly one cage less in total - it’s a maximum of 25 camera perspectives. According to the Fan-Wiki there are 46 possible cages (20 interactive and 26 non-interactive). With every new game start the game chooses randomly from the possible situations and you’ll only find out which ones there are this time if you buy them all. Every 5 days you have to fulfill a quota of cages to stay in the club - in the game at all. At the end of the first stage you'll need 9 cages, at the end of the second 16 and at the end of the last stage 25.
In the interactive cages different things happen at certain times, day and night. In order to gather all the information, it is necessary to find out when they become active. There will be an acoustic signal when they do and usually the events are repeated at the same time. Therefore, one must plan other activities - like buying food or working – accordingly. These last mentioned parts of playing are only symbolized by past time; you do not actually get to see or play them out. However, you can miss things by doing so, which can have a very negative effect; e.g. if you miss the landlady several times, the flat will be vacated after 5 days at the latest.
The interactive cages can be ended/closed in different ways by making various choices but don't have to be if the player prefers another style of playing.
Characters
Playable is an undefined entity through which the player controls the actions; neither voice nor body are ever visible. It only appears in that, for example, certain response options are given in conversations, but these are usually based on the information collected by the player to date.
The flat is regularly visited by the landlady (to collect money), by a neighbor (to "borrow" money) and by Wylon's Witnesses. One does not learn anything from these characters; they have no (obvious) personalities. After their first visit, the Witnesses leave behind a plant that blooms white or black, based on the chosen playing style – morally good or bad. It does not affect much besides the game achievements.
Furthermore, the various strangers appear in their cages, which the player observes. One can choose to do just that or to interfere but this is prohibited by the Club, defined as “feeding the monkeys”. In any case it is possible to find out more about these strangers like addresses, names, contact information etc.
Players Choice
Styles of Play
There are different approaches or playing styles from which to choose. These choices will influence the game experience and outcome of the game.
Voyeur; only watching, not interfering
According to the rules of the fictitious club, this is the only correct way to play. However, the appeal of the game is to break this rule and test all the possibilities of interaction with the "monkeys".
Observe and take notes
Objects in the picture or scraps of conversation can be used to collect and connect clues and later evaluate them. In this way, for example, contact data can be found. This is also in accordance with the club.
Special case: Voyeur mode; it is easier to manage resources to monitor more, but there won't be achievements.
Constructive interference
Constructive in the sense of: Acting morally correct (even if not in the sense of the club). In the cage, where someone is stuck in an elevator, for example, this would mean finding out who the man is and where he is locked up. With enough information you can convince the wife on the phone that you are telling the truth and save him.
Destructive interference
In almost every case of interference, one can always choose a "morally reprehensible" but usually lucrative option; in the case of the lift cage, at one point you are offered a lot of money by those responsible for the incident to keep quiet and let him die.
Sometimes you can also actively get people into trouble; e.g. in the porch cage you can betray your parents to the authorities or in many cages you can record incriminating video material and put it online.
Torpedoing a game
"Playing seems to be an attempt to postpone an end as long as possible without becoming redundant, and to play rough until all the functional closures have been completed, until there is no narrative remainder left, so to speak." - Claus Pias[1]
Here it is possible in various ways not to generate the longest possible gaming experience. You can uninstall the program prematurely and trigger an immediate end, intentionally not pay the landlady or let the health values drop to 0.
Do not play
As you can see below, the first action after the start of the game is to agree to the terms and conditions of the club. If you don't want to do this, you must cancel the game.
The game Do not feed the monkeys is not too extensive; a game run lasts up to one hour, depending on the approach. Nevertheless, there is new content to experience after a few runs, because the different approaches and different cages after restarting the game mean that an extremely large number of possible decisions have to be tried out; which is why it is also very suitable for exploratory play. The fact that there is no actual main character, means the player has to fill this role on themselves which also contributes to the feeling of being able to decide a lot on your own. This is also a "voyeur simulator", i.e. something that reflects reality (to a certain extent) or, in science, is an analysis tool for trying something out and comparing it with reality. So in order to do justice to the "simulator", one should try out all possible ways of playing it, while at the same time giving the main character performatively itself various characteristics (e.g. moral/immoral/greedy/generous etc.). A further factor is the achievements. As a result of different playing styles, different Achievements are to be unlocked. However, these are partly mutually exclusive, which means that the game wants to offer further incentives to play it through in other ways as often as possible.
Agency
Due to all the different possibilities of playing style a player has a feeling of quite extensive agency. They can decide how they want to handle the game. At the beginning it is not clear which decision has which further consequences for the own game character. Only after playing through the game several times does it become clear: There are 3 main ends, depending on the style of play. Main end means here: The ends that can be reached by playing through the 16 days of play completely.
The factors that lead to each end are :
1. Were the monkeys fed, i.e. did the player enrich themselves or otherwise actively interfere in the lives of the characters?
2. Did the player provide sufficient information about the observed persons by replying to the club emails?
3. Did the player "survive" - i.e. keep enough health points and buy all the cages necessary to advance to the next phase - but did not do or achieve either 1. or 2.?
On the 16th day of the game the player can then only open the door of the flat and must accept a parcel from the postman. In the 1st case it contains a drug or something similar that leads to death. In the 2nd case he receives instructions on how to behave at the highest level; they have obviously become an observed person themselves. In the 3rd case they are sent by instructions to the actual monkey cage of a zoo and is released from the club.
If a player leaves the club prematurely by uninstalling the "Monkey Vision" programme or by not reaching the cage minimum at the end of a game phase, another end will be triggered; in the first phase (with a maximum of 9 cages) the player is told that they have simply continued their boring life after that. In later phases the neighbours behave conspicuously and it becomes clear that your character is being monitored. If the player tries to get out of the club then or after, they will be arrested for their membership.
All ends have in common that for the player some effects of their actions are summarised. It is usually the case that even when trying to have a positive effect on the lives of the "monkeys", this has turned into a negative one. This makes it clear that the obvious agency of the player is only superficial. The game always suggests in the end: you can't do more than that.
In a way, this is a somewhat frustrating outcome each time and tempts you to play the game again and find out what other decisions could have what consequences. This leads to a reciprocal relationship between the player action and the game. Every new decision of the player and the resulting consequence in the game creates the desire to try new decisions, which - possibly - can lead to new consequences. According to Salen and Zimmermanns text "meaningful play" arises [2]; the game reaches its ultimate goal, being played (again and again).
Morality
What are moral decisions? To what extent are they made here at the level of the game world or at the level of the "real" world?
As already mentioned above, in this game you are in the position to shape the main character yourself, for example by incorporating moral positions from real life - for the "good" or "bad". This also means that you may be more concerned with actual morality than in other games. In a first-person shooter, for example, you rarely ask yourself whether it is not reprehensible to kill your opponents; it is part of the game mechanics.
The overall top of this game is the criminal or unethical behaviour of voyeurism. No information is given about the voyeur whose role is to be played. We know nothing about the person or background. Therefore it is the task of the player - whether consciously or not - to fill this gap themselves and take over the position of the voyeur. In this way it is more immersive than playing a specific character, as the line between player and acting figure is sometimes blurred. Of course this does not mean that the player confuses game with reality. However, through this process of filling in the gaps the experience becomes more intense, because one's own thoughts and feelings are drawn upon, which can lead to a real confrontation with morality. The player is acting performative, without even noticing. Parallel to a theatre situation, they put themselves in the position of another being by accepting strange situations and feelings and reacting accordingly. In this way they create their own reality through interaction with the game.[3]
So, making decisions is the driving part of this game; do I submit to the big rule? Or do I "feed the monkeys", do I interfere in the affairs of others? Option A means pure observation, perhaps providing the club with information, but in any case not intervening yourself: remaining passive. Option B is the decision to become active and to influence and thus breaking the big club rule. The latter is of course much more interesting, as you can find out a lot of spicy details about people's lives, and also more tempting just because it is "forbidden". But still, the fact that you are in a way playing a version of yourself can make you think: Is this decision justified? It can make you feel more responsible for your actions since they feel more like your own.
Sicart speaks of "ludic phronesis" as "the moral wisdom that is developed as players experience games"[4]. The player learns through their decisions and the related consequences - whether they are immediately apparent or only after playing through them several times - how one can play for the longest time, namely by obeying (club-) rules and spying on others. But on the other hand they learn again and again that this behaviour does not lead to success in the end, because all ends, even if the rules were followed, are unpleasant to deadly. The fact that the game, even with the player's benevolent intervention, still ends the individual stories badly, as presented in the end screen, puts all decisions into perspective and focuses on the bigger picture. The player is repeatedly thrown out of the previously constructed immersion by his own assumptions and unexpected outcomes, creating an interplay of subject inside and outside the game. It is possible that such a game could set in motion a process of cognition, as Sicart introduces the "ludic hermeneutic circle"; to this end, it could be exciting to go deeper into the subject with this example.
Voyeurism in and out of the game
The Oxford Dictionary of Film Studies defines voyeurism as: "In both everyday and psychoanalytic usage, illicit pleasure or perverse investment in looking at people and their activities without their knowledge."[5] In Film Studies it is common to talk about the voyeurism in watching others. Aren't games to some extent also voyeuristic? A player becomes a spectator and/or participant in more or less intimate scenes in the lives of characters in the course of the game experience. Maybe it is even more intrusive than watching someones life in a film because it is more of an active choice where to go and to look. Furthermore, although interaction with the game and the characters is mostly a big part of gameplay so immersion can be generated, the player is always an extra-diegetic entity too, watching the game and themselves at least as the character they are controlling.
In Do Not Feed The Monkeys the player takes control of an invisible entity. They observe and learn from it how they can/should behave in order to get ahead, as there is no information like background story of their character. As describes above, they have to access their own experiences to fill the void and to make sense of the displayed situation. So as an observer, the player then observes innerdiegetic others. The game mirrors the situation of a flat and most importantly a computer to "work" on. It is possible to observe observing, as the game generates a self-reference in showing players ironically: "This is you!" The developers reflect on that fact as well:
" Yep, we put a PC in your game that's on your PC so that you can work on a PC while you're playing the game that's on your PC!" - Developers about the game on their steam page
Related Research Approaches
Simulations and the Performative
In what ways do simulations in games challenge players to create their own worlds? How are ideas and feelings shared?
Possible Literature:
Fischer-Lichte, Erika: Performativität, Eine Einführung. Bielefeld 2012.
Sicart, Miguel: The Ethics of Computer Games. Cambridge 2009.
Control and Observation: Panopticism
Possible Literature:
Foucault, Michel: Überwachen und Strafen, Die Geburt des Gefängnisses. Frankfurt a.M. 1976.
Sprenger, Florian: Politik der Mikroentscheidungen. Edward Snowden, Netzneutralität und die Architekturen des Internets. Lüneburg 2015.
Further Information/External Links
Fan Wiki: https://do-not-feed-the-monkeys.fandom.com/wiki/Do_Not_Feed_the_Monkeys_Wiki
Oxford Dictionary about voyeurism: https://www.oxfordreference.com/view/10.1093/acref/9780198832096.001.0001/acref-9780198832096-e-0762
Youtube Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lo4mGTfhuDg
Steam Page: https://store.steampowered.com/app/658850/Do_Not_Feed_the_Monkeys/
- ↑ Pias, Claus: Computer-Spiel-Welten. München: sequenzia2000, S. 172.
- ↑ Cf. Salen, Katie and Zimmermann, Eric: Rules of Play, Game Design Fundamentals. Cambridge 2004, p. 33.
- ↑ Cf Fischer-Lichte, Erika: Performativität, Eine Einführung. Bielefeld 2012, S.44.
- ↑ Sicart, Miguel: The Ethics of Computer Games. Cambridge 2009. p.112.
- ↑ https://www.oxfordreference.com/view/10.1093/acref/9780198832096.001.0001/acref-9780198832096-e-0762