Succession of tradiational Chinese Opera: focused on connection with the game contents
Authors:   The Society For Chinese Humanities In Korea, f f 
Published: January 2024

Recently, traditional plays that show a combination pattern with online games and exist in a new field and a new way are breaking away from the way of scriptural plays. How should we recognize the crossover game and traditional crossover trend, which is sometimes considered a provocation against the “dignity of tradition”? Through this paper, I specifically tried to review how classical and modern, drama and game elements were fused, and to explore their achievements, problems, and future directions in terms of the modern succession of traditional plays. In this paper, the main research target is the 『Honor of Kings(王者荣耀)』 released game in 2015, which has recently been very popular among the game fields enjoyed by the younger generation in China. Game is a new play culture popular in modern digital society, and it seems to have nothing to do with ‘tradition’. Nevertheless, most of the hero characters in the 『Honor of Kings(王者荣耀)』 game are related to Chinese historical legends, myths or literature, and traditional Chinese culture and values are often projected on them. I believes that the combination of the hero shape character in the game and traditional Chinese characters is the most important cause of the popularity of 『Honor of Kings(王者荣耀)』, and especially focused on the connection with the play characters. Currently, 『Honor of Kings(王者荣耀)』 has officially uploaded the appearance of the hero's skin in conjunction with four plays: Beijing Opera(京劇), Kunqu Opera(崑曲), Sichuan opera(川劇), and Yue opera(越劇). First, as a combination of Peking opera(京劇) and game, it is the skin of Xiangyu(項羽) and Yuji(虞姬) in Peking opera 『Farewell My Concubine(霸王別嬉)』. Second, in the Kunqu Opera(崑曲) 『Jingmeng(惊梦)』, the figure of Duliniang(杜丽娘), which crosses life and death due to love, was transformed into one of the skin sculptures of the beautiful hero Zhenji(甄姬). Although it is not a traditional character, the Mengqi(梦奇), original hero character, in 『Honor of Kings(王者荣耀)』 was also given the skin appearance of Pangdarongrong(胖达荣荣) made by linking Sichuan opera(川劇) plays among traditional Local opera(地方戲). Finally, it is the shape of the game hero Nuxiaosheng(女小生) of Shangguanwaner(上官婉儿), which was introduced with traditional Yue opera(越劇) elements. Looking at these four aspects of game character formation related to Chinese plays, it can be seen that the original symbols and themes of the play characters are maintained as much as possible and the traditional play characteristics are never missed. Now that games have become a major play culture of the new generation, traditional Chinese plays are standing in front of the audience in a lively form of play, breaking away from the history of scripture and art. This shows confidence in traditional Chinese culture and at the same time gives a glimpse of the possibility of various methods and paths of traditional culture succession. Based on the review of this paper, its achievements and meanings were summarized in the following several ways. First, it was confirmed that traditional culture can give special vitality and competitiveness to games, which are modern plays. Second, it was found that online games equipped with traditions are a good platform for promoting history and traditional culture and a new channel for the spread of traditional culture. Finally, while seeking a sense of balance between art and the market, it is necessary to avoid the conservative view that traditional culture hesitates to compromise with the market of modern society. As mentioned above, it was confirmed that the convergence development of traditional culture and Internet games is a new method and opportunity for symbiosis and prosperity.