The Arrival by Shaun Tan

The Arrival is a silent graphic novel (is every book silent because it contains no audio or is reading in itself some sort of audio? I dunno man) that depicts the journey of an immigrant and his family to a new and strange world in which author, Shaun Tan uses symbols, facial expressions, and brilliant world building to tell the story as opposed to words. In The Arrival we see Tan's ability to manipulate the readers feelings. The story does not lay out on the table "THIS IS AN IMMIGRATION STORY, IT IS ABOUT MY GRANDPA GOING TO ELLIS ISLAND", but instead using surreal imagery and architecture to alienate the reader and make the reader FEEL like an immigrant as opposed to just telling the reader how immigrants might have felt going to a new place. We as the reader do not know the language of this new place and are as confused at times as the character that we are following throughout the novel. This manipulation of the reader gives us a direct connection with the main character because we are going through the story with the character as opposed to watching the character from an omnipotent point of view like you might if you read a book about an immigrant going through Ellis Island when you might already know the history of immigration at Ellis Island. Shaun Tan's immersive story telling is something I would like to implement into gaming. The concept of immersion is huge in video games and with the innovation of virtual reality, the game industry is working towards making more immersive experiences, but I think with more analysis of stories like The Arrival one could learn how to more directly immerse the player into a story.