Just a little plug for The Sun Stands Still, a very short Unity based point and click adventure. Naomi Alderman, the author behind it, had a little bit to say about emotions and narrative on the BBC World Service’s Click programme:
Games have access to emotions of agency which you can’t necessarily get when you are an audience-member or a reader. A novel or a film can cake you feel frightened, or anxious for the characters, but it can’t make you feel guilty or hopeful about your own life. Once you’re interacting with it, then you can feel that hope, I hope!
There’s more on the podcast version:
The world of computers is existentialist because nothing exists except through the will of the players who create themselves – within the games, they exist solely through what they do. Any meaning is created by the players themselves.
The Interpretation Game 