Kaitlin's Essay
From English 194 Wiki
Christina Rossetti's poem "The Goblin Market" captures the elements of a child-like fascination with the unknown, as well as phrases that evoke themes of religious allegory, sisterhood, and inherently raw sensuality. Rossetti's creation was formed during the Victorian period, a time that societal rigidity was clashing with Darwinism, Marxism, and the like. Inspired by the heroic journey Lizzie undergoes in order to rescue her beloved sister from the clutches of the truly terrifying goblin men, the English 194 Goblin Team collectively decided to fashion a game prototype that could physically encapsulate the experiences endured by Rossetti's characters. Before deciding on "The Goblin Market", the goblin team looked at other works such as Lewis Carroll's Alice In Wonderland and Through The Looking Glass for possible inspiration. While Carroll's fantastical creation might have been beneficial in that the capacity for built-in adventures would be boundless, in the end the seemingly endless content would not be beneficial in contributing to our desired prototype level. Therefore, the team decided that the single journey of sisterhood, temptation, and morality was indeed compelling enough to draw from for the final project.
What truly spurned The Goblin Team into focusing on Rossetti's work is the her utter fascination with all things natural. The author found true solace during bouts of depression in a simple walk in the woods, connecting deeply with each creature she encountered. Rossetti's passion for her surroundings is evident in every line of "The Goblin Market", from her delicious descriptions of the various fruits Laura is tempted with, to Lizzie's sensual experience of salivating at the sight of fresh juices. Even the pace of the poem is is almost rhythmical with the sounds of the Goblin's descriptions of their various wares. The English 194 Goblin Team wanted to create an experience that could truly be engrained in the minds of players regardless of their age. This mindset drew the team's focus to such games as Candyland and Life.
Candyland was an appealing game to draw from as it was able to evoke countless memories among members of The Goblin Team. While theoretically a simple game, Candyland's propensity to hold an audience regardless of age was especially instrumental in the design of our prototype. Additionally, Candyland won The Goblin Team over due to its ability to hold a child's fascination without tiring out the consenting adults with mercilessly long gameplay.
From Wikipedia accessed 15 May, 2007. Candyland And Pop Culture: "The race is straightforward, woven around a simple story line about finding the lost king of Candyland. The board consists of a winding, linear track made of 134 spaces, most of which are one of the rainbow colors(aside from indigo). The remaining few spaces are named locations such as Candy Cane Forest and Gum Drop Mountain, or characters like Queen Frostine and Lord Licorice. Players take turns removing the top card from a randomized stack, most of which show one of six colors, and then moving their marker ahead to the next space of that color. Some cards have two marks of a color, in which case the player moves his or her marker ahead to the second-next space of that color. The deck also contains one card for each named location, and drawing such a card moves a player directly to that location's space on the board. This move can be either forward or backward in the classic game; backward moves are ignored in the current game. Finally, there are three colored squares marked with a dot. A player that lands on such a square is stuck(all cards are ignored) until a card is drawn of the same color as the square. The game is won by landing on or passing the final square-the official rules explicitly specify that any card that would cause the player to advance past the last square wins the game but many people play that you must land exactly on the last square to win. The classic game takes longer to complete than one might expect, because the location cards can send players backwards".
Such memorable childhood pastimes as Candyland and Life were appealing to The Goblin Team during the conceptual phase of our design period in that there is a relatively quick pace in both games. Additionally, the aesthetically pleasing color scheme of Candyland combined with its memorable characters gave The Goblin Team the ability to draw countless parallels between Hasbro's fully fleshed-out creation, and our own vision. The Goblin Team was also inspired by Life due to gameplay being dictated by the spinner, and thus the player's journey is left to chance as well. The English 194 Spring 2007 Goblin Team decided upon the name of "Escape From Goblin Market" due to the built-in adventure that resides with the title, its consequential marketability. The title relates to the work in that a small morsel of the plot is revealed, almost tempting the player to partake in Lizzie's harrowing attempt to save her sister from her obsession with the forbidden fruit, so to speak.
Rossetti's appreciation of human sensuality which is tremendously relevant in "The Goblin Market" can be attributed to being painted by her brother, the artist Dante Gabriel Rossetti, as a youth. This comfort within her own skin could quite possibly be instrumental in developing some semblance of a social commentary on the tremendously confining facade of chastity present during the Victorian period. Furthermore, Rossetti's depiction of the sisters sucking the juices from each others fingers can be interpreted in like form with the rebirth of the exchange of ideas, perhaps a reestablished societal fascination with sucking the marrow of life.
The English 194 Goblin Team was able to preserve the integrity of Rossetti's poem in many ways. Primarily, the mundane existence which the sisters led prior to stumbling into a world of temptation is maintained via the players having to perform various chores in order to advance through the game. The visually lush atmosphere that is evoked via Rossetti's word painting translated to a game board covered in vibrant illustrations of fruit, and even a spinner with an apple attached. Ultimately, the world of "The Goblin Market" is an incredibly sinister one, and thus an ominous color scheme was applied to the spinner itself, with black lettering and gold numbers. Finally, the bouncing fruit descriptions are not lost in transition from poem to game via the assistance of word challenges, tongue twisters, and other attention-grabbing delights.
Unfortunately, a few conflicts arose which prevented Escape From Goblin Market from reaching its full potential. Primarily, the English 194 Goblin Team desired to possibly turn Laura and Lizzie's adventures into more of an online, interactive experience. However, with the limited amount of time afforded by the quarter system, Escape From Goblin Market was not able to leave the prototype stage. Additionally, the members of The Goblin Team had issue with developing a concrete target audience from a work of literature that deals with themes both innocent and inherently sexual. Finally, while a major collective thought process went into ensuring that the imaginative world of the goblin market was maintained, The Goblin Team failed to effectively conduct a test run with players outside of our group. However, in the limited time alotted, a boisterous collective energy was directed toward creating a prototype that The Goblin Team could be proud of.
Works Consulted:
Tucker, Herbert F. "Rossetti's Goblin Marketing: Sweet To Tongue and Sound to Eye" Representations 82(2003):177-133. JSTOR. 16 May 2007 http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0734-6018%28200321%290%3A82%3C117%3ARGMSTT%3E2.0.CO%3B2-J
Grass, Sean C. "Nature's Perilous Variety in Rossetti's "Goblin Market"" Nineteenth-Century Literature 51 (1996): 356-376. JSTOR.15 May 2007 <http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0891-9356%28199612%2951%3A3%3C356%3ANPVIR%22%3E2.0.CO%3B2-0
http://en.wikipedia.orgwiki/Candyland#Candyland_in_Popular_Culture. Accessed 16 May, 2007.
