The myth of american paradox udas reflected through the characters of metal gear solid ud(a playstation videogame)

摘要

This research took a Playstation videogame entitled Metal Gear Solid with udthe focus on the myth of American paradox. It was aimed to know how the udcharacters in the Playstation video game Metal Gear Solid reflect the myth of udAmerican Paradox and why they perform the paradox. udThe research belonged to descriptive qualitative research. The main data udsource of this research was Playstation CD of Metal Gear Solid directed by Hideo udKojima, produced by Konami Computer Entertainment Japan in 1998. The main uddata of this research were the dialogues, characters’ facial expressions, characters’ udbehavior, and the camera angles which had relationship with the research udquestions. The supporting data of this research were taken from articles and udreferences about American myths, references about game, articles about this udgame, and game script of this game which were related to the research questions. udThe research used sociopolitical, historical approaches, popular culture udand semiotic film theories to answer how the characters in Metal Gear Solid udreflect the myth of American paradox. The same approaches and semiotic film udtheory plus Kammen’s theory of paradox in America were used to answer why the udcharacters in Metal Gear Solid perform the paradox. udCarrying out the analysis, it was found out that the characters in Metal udGear Solid reflect the myth of American paradox through several elements of udcharacter namely physical traits, how he/she dresses, psychological/personality udtraits, motivation, behavior /actions, relationships with other characters in the udstory, weaknesses/faults, strengths/virtues, moral constitution, history and udbackground, changes, and similarities and differences of the characters. Besides udhaving personal reasons and motives as the background for the characters to udperform the paradox, their pasts, highly influenced by social and political udcondition, and social status, also count to their performing of paradox. Things udreasoning their paradox are the tension or conflict and uncertainty or udinconsistency bring people in a state of fear and confusion which eventually make udthem to be paradox in order to survive; cultural transfer and immigration lead udpeople to be paradoxical since they have to face a lot of diversities that some udcontradict each other; high mobility and rapid changes, as significant udcharacteristics of America, put them in unsure conditions and thus they have to udcombine many options that often contradict each other in order to survive; the udinconsistencies of the American government; the fact that ideals do not always udconform to realities.