Opera Essay

     The Magic Flute

     The Magic flute was an opera written by the ever-famous composer, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, written back near the end of the eighteenth century, and was one of the last of his works that he published before his premature death. Reluctantly, I went to see it with my Grandmother, who is a HUGE opera fan, a few years back. But before actually seeing it,  I was forced into watching a stylized version of it on YouTube. It tells the story of the mystical romance between the Prince Tamino on his quest to win the hand of the princess Pamina along with the help of three mysterious Fairy god-mothers, a weird deformed bird-catcher named Papageno, and a magical flute which holds great power. However, the version that I watched on Youtube was a little different than the original version done by Mozart, where as the original was a medieval sort of tale, this version was sort of a mixture of Star Wars and Star Trek and other Sci-fi epics.

     The costume designs were all in touch with the theme of Science Fiction; Tamino being the outsider who has crash-landed on this strange world is the sort of Luke Skywalker archetype, being handsome and human looking, as well as Pamina being a beautiful young human girl. Almost every other role in the opera is some sort of weird alien creature with an unearthly skin tone or extra limb sticking out somewhere. It really does add to the immersion and helps established the polished and futuristic look that the performance has. The set changes also stay faithful to the setting, very alien and foreign looking with weird designs resembling jelly fish, octopi and lizards. It is unique to see and catches the eye of the viewer, entrancing them to await the next stage transition or the introduction of a new character.

     For the time that it was presented it obviously wasn’t presented as a Sci-fi, but rather a sort of Medieval/ King Arthur drama where the hero must travel an unknown land to reclaim a magical weapon or instrument in order to end a brewing conflict. It is rather well received and to my understanding and Is considered one of Mozart’s best contributions to theatre. The audience of the time seemed to have enjoyed the tale of a handsome prince bringing peace to the land with the assistance of a sidekick who only seeks love, a Princess who wishes to spare her kingdom from unnecessary bloodshed, the guidance of three mysterious fairies, and a magical flute. It just hits all the right notes for a simple story with a happy ending.

     It really does come all together; an epic old tale being portrayed in such a drastically different scenario is very interesting to see. For this assignment, the question of how this Opera could be turned into a video game is asked. If I were a video game developer in the 21^st century it would be in a sort of RPG format, not unlike Final Fantasy or Pokémon. I would start with the character, Prince Tamino, finding himself in a foreign land littered with strange and disturbing creatures, the first of which being a giant Reptile-like beast, who would attempt to eat the player. This would lead to a turn-based fighting system in which the player is very underpowered and can’t seem to do any damage to the creature. However, when the monster is about to kill the player the second playable character, Papageno, swoops in to save Tamino. After the conflict is resolved the two are confronted by three Fairy-like ladies, who tell Tamino that the princess of this strange and foreign land is seeking aid in the conflict between her mother and father, who have been at odds with one another for years now, and that she can’t do it alone. Tamino and Papageno both set out on a quest to bring peace to the land.

     I would try to stick to the original source as much as I could in terms of story, but I would take some liberties and change a few things here and there, just to make it more convenient for me to make sure the player was playing a game rather than watching a bunch of cutscenes. I would try to incorporate a lot of music into it, since it’s based on an Opera, maybe Tamino or Pamina would be able to use their voices as a method of offense or raising charisma.

There would be items to collect to aid the player, and maybe a few potions to boost their attributes. I would aim to make it progressively harder as the story progressed but not so much as to make it impossible and I would try to make the enemies different and unique. I aim to make it have some multiple endings to increase replay value and I would attempt to modernize it to maybe take place in a fantasy or Sci-fi setting to not be too out of touch with the current audience of today’s gaming market.

     Overall, it’s a good opera and I wouldn’t mind if I got the opportunity to turn it into a video game.

Link to opera: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t5hqh5VxEOU&t=8933s