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Allegories of Space. The Question of Spatiality in Computer Game
Abstract
Computer games are undoubtedly the most diverse and fast-changing cultural genre that ever existed. And perhaps most importantly, computer games represent a new mode of aesthetic as well as social discourse, an alternative to the narrative, which has been the leading paradigm until now: the primary means to convey knowledge and experience. Now, however, the mode of simulation is sued as an effective pedagogical tool that privileges active experimentation with its subject material rather than observation. Simulation is also a way to explore the partly unknown, to test models and hypotheses, and thus to construct and acquire new knowledge in a way narrative never could. The article at hand defends the claim that spatiality is a central theme in computer games. It starts by expanding this claim: Spatiality is the defining element in computer games. They are essentially concerned with spatial representation and negotiation, and therefore a classification of computer games can be based on how they represent space.
... Las formas de entretenimiento neobarrocas no son susceptibles de lecturas lineales asociadas a textos tradicionales. Como expuso Aarseth (1997), los juegos son «ergódicos», están estructurados de acuerdo con los algoritmos que regulan el comportamiento de la interconexión del ordenador. ...
... Benjamin, 1985: 137) y su exhibición ostentosa de sí 11 Los ludólogos han reconocido la función alegórica de los juegos -v. Juul (2006: 133), Aarseth (1998) y Galloway (2006: 102)-. ...
En este artículo se pretende tratar al videojuego como un lugar de la forma estética en las sociedades digitalizadas. Considerar el juego de ordenador de esta manera pone de manifiesto que se encuentra en algún lugar entre el "juego" tradicional, cuyas estructuras se juegan, y el objeto estético u "obra de arte", que actúa estimulando el juego de las facultades imaginativas y cognitivas en el sujeto de la experiencia estética. El análisis se centra en el juego y coincide con la ludología al afirmar que este concepto debe ser central en cualquier discusión sobre juegos de ordenador. Si queremos valorar el Resumen Este artículo sostiene que los juegos de ordenador pueden ser un lugar para la forma estética en la cultura contemporánea. El contexto para entender esta afirmación es la decadencia del concepto de la obra de arte como portadora de forma a finales del siglo xx tal como Adorno lo entendió. La clarificación de los modos en los que la forma funciona en el juego es tratada desde la teoría estética (Kant), la ludología y la idea de una cultura del entretenimiento neo-barroca (Ndalianis). El artículo sintetiza los principios de estas perspectivas y sostiene que los videojuegos pueden ocupar un papel de crítico u opositor dentro de la cultura y estética contemporáneas.
... The question of spatiality resides firmly within the heart of game studies (Aarseth 2001;Aarseth et al. 2019;Murray 1997). Games are regularly conceived of as spatial objects (Günzel 2008), as is evident in well-cited studies such as Jenkins' "Game Design as Narrative Architecture" (2004), where the question of spatiality has effectively assimilated that of narrative. ...
... My emphasis is on design, but I do not limit design to the labyrinth as viewed from above -in other words, design, in this study, is to comprise the topological side of the game space regardless of perspective and the other aspects discussed throughout these pages. The labyrinths of games are decidedly semiotic, but they are not merely semantic -indeed, and concisely, they are of virtual and objective existence (Aarseth 2001). It is this virtual existence that calls for specialised and accurate terminology. ...
This paper addresses the concept of game space topology-the arrangement of space in games-with regard to the established literature's dependence on spatial metaphors such as labyrinths or mazes. I argue that despite their prevalence in humanistic game studies, these metaphors widely conflate space topologies with aspects of representation, perspective, teleology, and sequentiality. One can rarely tell what specific aspects of the game are addressed by research on this subject. Indeed, labyrinths are ambiguous and highly connotative words, and as such they are unproductive for the classification of game space topology. This paper intends to facilitate more rigorous research on the subject, starting by building on clearly delineated elements of the game world.
... Architectural theory plays a role in the expansive view the paper adopts in relation to contemporary information architecture as much as it does in its analysis of video game spatiality, and for the same reason: to help explain how an information-based environment, be it a game world or a digital / physical ecosystem (Resmini & Lacerda 2016), can "gain significance and a quality of 'place'" (Nitsche 2009, p. 159). A number of scholars posit that spatiality is a foundational element of video games and a way to understand them (Manovich 2000;Aarseth 2001;Adams 2003;Schell 2008;McGregor 2007;Nitsche 2009). In The Language of New Media (2000), media scholar Lev Manovich considers navigation through game space "an essential, if not the key component, of the gameplay". ...
... All games happen in some type of space (Schell 2008). It might be the rigidly bounded space of a football game, the procedural space of a game of hide and seek, the allegorical space of a board game (Aarseth 2001) or the immersive space of a virtual reality game (Manovich 2000). Even games that at first may not seem to present spatial elements, such as for example a game of charades, require a play space: players need to be in visual and aural contact, either because they share the same physical space or because they can operate similarly through the mediation of technology. ...
The chapter analyzes the organization of space and narrative in video games as an instance of the information architecture of digital environments and of the structural role it plays in shaping experience. It does so by adopting two different ways to analyze the space/narrative relationship: Lynch’s spatial primitives for cognitive mapping, and McGregor’s taxonomy of spatial patterns. These are then applied to read three different action/adventure video games: Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time, Shadow of the Colossus, and Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor. The reason is threefold: to illuminate the individual information architectures of games that might, on the surface, be regarded as providing very similar experiences; to contribute to the ongoing conversation on embodiment and spatiality in information architecture; and to provide an example of how contemporary information architecture can be employed to critique different types of information environments.
... These two attitudes roughly correspond to the two current research trends in game space, namely "space ontology" and "spatial experience". Both of them take the game world as the main subject, but the former only deals with the world space itself and analyzes its forms, properties, functions, classification, and related definitions (Aarseth, 2001a;Feis & Tagliabue, 2013;Fernández-Vara et al., 2007;Günzel, 2008). From this perspective, the game world is studied as res extensa or a physical "extensive thing," much like the physical space in a scientific world except that it serves a gameplay function and is designed specifically for this. ...
With the development of game engines and graphics technology, open-world games have gained popularity all over the world recently. One of the key features of this genre is a realistic open world space for the players to explore, to the extent that some even deemed it as the prototype of virtual world and the Metaverse. However, in comparison with the growing world size, the player's spatial experience is a downward spiral. Interaction in an ever-increasing game space suffered from a repetitive design pattern which rendered the world grandeur on the surface but hollow deep down. How to find meaning in this seemingly hollow world and what game designers can learn from it? From a phenomenological perspective, this paper distinguishes “place” from “space,” and, according to this, proposes a three-dimensional meaning structure of place, that is “orientation-identification-time,” as a design approach to reconstruct a meaningful spatial experience in the game world.
... In spatial terms it refers to the ambiguity arising from dissonance signifying a cavity as well as an opening, at the same time. Note here, that we are not talking about space in computer games, how games are rendered as spatial designs and worlds (Aarseth 2001;Nitsche 2008;Günzel 2008;Möring 2019). Rather, what motivates the deployment of spatiality is the entry point to the structural configuration of games and especially how the complexity of ludus and story is arranged, or should we say misarranged to provoke sensations of disparity and non-identity. ...
This article takes a deeper look at the notion of ludo-narrative dissonance (henceforth LND), a popular term that refers to the perceived clash between the ludic and the narrative aspects of games. We wish to argue that a better understanding of the nature of LND and the reasons it appears in games enables us to look at this phenomenon from a new perspective that was not, as of yet, considered in game studies literature or the popular discourse. The typical approach to LND presents it as a problem or a design flaw that needs to be avoided by the developers. In contrast to this, we suggest that LND can be seen as a source of inspiration for the creators as it inherently invites the developers and the players to reflect on the game structure. We start with a closer look at the notion of LND and present three ways it can be interpreted. In section two we analyze the reasons LND can appear in games (regardless of the developers’ intentions). Section three goes through some of the existing methods of dealing with LND. Here we argue that embracing LND as a result of some of the necessary tensions of game design can result in the creative victory of the developers. We finish the paper, in the fourth section, with a longer case study of Manhunt which we see as a good exemplification of the reinvigorating power of LND.
... In particular, I would have liked to explore mythologies of space and community. Space is often argued to be central to understanding games (Aarseth, 2001a;Aarseth & Günzel, 2019;Bakkerud, 2022;Bonner, 2021;Günzel, 2010;Whistance-Smith, 2021). Some scholars, like Aguirre Quiroga (2022), have explored game space through a mythic lens, and I think these kinds of analyses can be expanded. ...
This dissertation outlines a mythological framework for understanding how games produce meaning. The central question is: how does a mythological approach help to understand the way games make meaning? I first theorise mythology as it applies to games and play. This is expressed through a cycle showing how mythology is embedded into the production of games as well as how it impacts the playing and interpretation of games. This is then operationalised as a method for the analysis of games. I call my theorisation and analytical approach mytholudics. With this established, I apply mytholudics in ten analyses of individual games or game series, split into two lenses: heroism and monstrosity. Finally, I reflect on these analyses and on mytholudics as an approach.
Mythology here is understood primarily from two theoretical perspectives: Roland Barthes’ theory outlined in Mythologies (1972/2009) and Frog’s (2015, 2021a) understanding of mythology in cultural practice and discourse from a folklore studies perspective. The Barthesian approach establishes myth as a mode of expression rather than as an object, a mode that is therefore prevalent in all forms of media and meaning-making. This mode of expression has naturalisation as a key feature, by which the arbitrariness of second-order signification is masked. Otherwise arbitrary relations between things are made to seem obvious and natural. Frog’s mythic discourse approach understands mythology as “constituted of signs that are emotionally invested by people within a society as models for knowing the world” (2021a, p. 161). Frog outlines mythic discourse analysis as a method which focuses on the comparison of mythic discourse over time and across cultures.
Barthes and Frog broadly share an understanding of mythology as a particular way of communicating an understanding of the world through discourse. From this perspective, mythology is not limited to any genre, medium or cultural context. It can include phenomena as diverse as systems, rules, customs, behaviours, rituals, stories, characters, events, social roles, motifs, spatial configurations, and so on. What is important is how these elements are placed in relation to one another. This stands in contrast to certain understandings of myth which may position it as a narrative genre or a socioreligious function of ‘primitive’ societies. Games consist of the same diverse elements arranged in comparable configurations, and so this perspective highlights the otherwise hidden parallels between mythology and games. Therefore, a mythological approach can help us to understand the game as an organising structure in which different and diverse elements are put into relation with one another in order to produce meaning.
To develop this framework, I argue for analysing games as and through myth. Games as myth means viewing the game as an organising structure that works analogously to mythology. Elements are constructed and put into relation with one another within a gameworld, which the player then plays in and interprets. Games through myth means seeing games as embedded within cultural contexts. The cultural context of development affects the mythologies that can be seen to influence the construction of the game, while the cultural context of the player affects how they relate to and interact with the game and the mythologies channelled through it.
With the theorisation and methodology laid out, I exemplify the mytholudic approach by applying it to ten analyses of individual games or game series, split into two chapters of five analyses each.
The first considers the games through the lens of heroism, defined as the positive mythologisation of an individual. To help with comparison and understanding, I outline a number of hero-types, broad categories based on different rhetorics of heroism. These include the hero-victim, the hero-sceptic, the preordained hero and the unsung hero. The examples analysed are the Call of Duty series (2003–2022), The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim (Bethesda Game Studios, 2011), the Assassin’s Creed series (2007–2022), Heaven’s Vault (Inkle, 2019) and Horizon Zero Dawn (Guerrilla Games, 2017).
The second considers the games through the lens of monstrosity, defined broadly as a form of negative mythologisation of an entity. Like with heroes, I outline a number of monster-types based on where their monstrosity is said to come from. These are the monster from within, the monster from without, the artificial monster and the monster of nature. The game examples are Doom (id Software, 1993a), the Pokémon series (Game Freak, 1996–2022), Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice (Ninja Theory, 2017), Ghost of Tsushima (Sucker Punch Productions, 2020a) and The Witcher series (CD Projekt Red, 2007–2016).
Finally, I synthesise these two lenses in a chapter reflecting on the hero- and monster-types, all ten analyses and the mytholudic approach in general. I argue that a mytholudic approach helps us to understand how games make meaning because it focuses on the naturalised and hidden premises that go into the construction of games as organising structures. By analysing the underpinnings of those organising structures, we can outline the model for understanding the world that is virtually instantiated and how they are influenced by, influence and relate to models for understanding the world—mythologies—in the real world.
... How space is represented in games has been the topic of interest for over two decades, with [1] pointing out that "computer games are essentially concerned with spatial representation and negotiation, and therefore, a classification of computer games can be based on how they represent -or, perhaps, implement -space" [1, p.154]. This is of particular interest with the advent of ubiquitous access to broadband internet and emergent LBGs, exploiting or augmenting various dimensions of our environment. ...
Location-based games (LBGs) are based on digital representations of our surroundings and the spaces we inhabit. These digital twins of the real world, real world metaverses, are subsequently augmented by imaginary game content. However, the virtual reconstruction of the world inevitably emphasises some aspects of reality and disregards others. In this work we explore and discuss the elements of reality that are included, and omitted, in popular commercial LBGs. We focus on eight popular contemporary LBGs from five different developers and investigate their connections to the real world. Subsequently, we compare the identified real world features of the LBGs to the landscape dimensions of the widely adopted Landscape Character Assessment framework. The findings show that settlement, hydrology, climate and land cover are the most commonly incorporated landscape dimensions, albeit in low fidelity. By contrast, dimensions, such as geology, soils and enclosure were not represented in the observed LBGs. In addition, we discovered several anthropogenic and cultural aspects, such as land ownership and time depth that are implicitly included in some commercial LBGs, notably in the Niantic Wayfarer system providing unique high-fidelity data of cultural and historical locations. Overall, we find only little variance within landscape dimensions between the observed commercial LBGs. Our findings open discussions on choices regarding the virtual representation of the real world in systems, such as LBGs, navigational software and a reality-based metaverse.
... 2. Entendue comme l'étude et l'interprétation des relations de l'humain à l'environnement au sein d'une oeuvre. À ce sujet, nous renvoyons à l'ouvrage de Cherryl Glotfelty et Harold Fromm (1996) (Aarseth, 2001 ;Günzel, 2019 ;Nitsche, 2008 ;Stockburger, 2006), la notion d'habiter n'y est que peu problématisée. La notion de lived space est généralement plus mobilisée, en effet, pour décrire l'espace social du jeu vidéo, que pour comprendre l'expérience de l'habiter au sein de l'image vidéoludique. ...
Habiter les espaces autres de la fiction contemporaine examine les rapports à l’espace et les pratiques habitantes révélés par les fictions non réalistes. Les espaces hétérotopiques, utopiques et dystopiques sont l’objet d’étude privilégié des contributions rassemblées autour de la notion d’habiter. Ces espaces de la condensation du sens, hautement symboliques, souvent analogiques et doublement fictifs, s’avèrent en révéler beaucoup sur notre rapport au monde.
Transdisciplinaire et transmédiatique, cet ouvrage laisse place à des approches variées et à une riche diversité de points de vue. Les contributrices et les contributeurs s’intéressent au cinéma (Alexandre Zaezjev), aux jeux vidéo (Rosane Lebreton, Christophe Duret), aux écofictions (Miruna Craciunescu), à la littérature pour la jeunesse (Florie Maurin) ou d’anticipation (Maude Deschênes-Pradet), quand les corpus examinés ne relèvent pas d’une perspective transmédiatique (Marc Atallah, Alain Musset). L’ouvrage se clôt sur un entretien avec l’autrice de fiction Sabrina Calvo.
La question de l’habiter est on ne peut plus d’actualité, alors que la récente pandémie de COVID-19 bouleverse nos rapports à l’espace — et aux autres — depuis le début de l’année 2020. Alors, également, que l’urgence climatique se manifeste à coups de désastres environnementaux, menaçant nos lieux de vie. Alors que les ultra-riches, un billet en poche pour un vol sur Blue Origin ou SpaceX, visent désormais les étoiles plutôt qu’ils n’aspirent à un être-ensemble-sur-la-Terre. Alors que nous nous informons de plus en plus en vase clos sur les réseaux sociaux, nos opinions politiques nourries par des algorithmes de recommandation favorisant le dogmatisme et l’intolérance. Ainsi, l’actualité nous donne l’impression d’être tombés dans un roman de science-fiction dystopique et rend plus que jamais pertinentes les questions auxquelles renvoient les mondes inventés des œuvres de fiction dites « de l’imaginaire ».
... Computer games are essentially concerned with spatial representation and negotiation; therefore the classification of a computer game can be based on how it represents or, perhaps, implements space" (Aarseth, 2007). ...
Existence of humankind is temporal and spatial. Our experiences of acts are temporal and take place in spaces. When we tell stories, we design a spatiotemporal construction which mimics the reality while addressing to our deeper senses. Therefore the design of time and space is essential in narrative. Through ages, humankind has been telling their stories in evolving narrative forms: starting with a verbal tradition and developing into literature, theater, cinema, and most recently: video games. As a new form of design work in which the production and consumption cycles entirely take place in a digital medium, video games can also give us new perspectives on the experiential and representational relationships of the physical architecture, especially in an age when the borders between physical and virtual are blurring gradually. Interaction, agency and the significant role of flexible operational time in gameplay; creates a fundamental difference between video games and other narrative media. This thesis focuses on a framework of qualitative and phenomenological analysis of video game spaces, complementing and recontextualizing narrative and architectural theories of Gerard Genette, Kevin Lynch, Christian Norberg-Schulz and Michael Nitsche from a multidisciplinary perspective. Starting with an introduction to the history, theory and genres of videogames, this thesis intends to get inspired from frameworks of narrative, space and time discussed in various types of media like cinema, affiliating with architecture. Then an original analytic framework for spatial and temporal experience in video game spaces will be delivered. The framework will be illustrated on levels from Prince of Persia and Assassin’s Creed series, and possible ways to utilize the insights of this framework in the design of architecture and video games will be discussed.
... And there is a growing interest in studying on academic grounds. Studies like "Allegories of space: The question of spatiality in computer games" (Aarseth, 2001), "The Role of architecture in video games" (Adams, 2002), "The importance of architecture in video games" (Brouchoud, 2013), and "Building imaginary worlds: The theory and history of Subcreation" (Wolf, 2012) can be considered as pioneers. Therefore, the use of architecture in video games is a popular subject. ...
This study aims to evaluate the structures of Azeroth, the fictional built world of the World of Warcraft video game, as samples of vernacular architecture. Therefore, the scope of the study contains video game architecture, vernacular architecture, and structure samples from the mentioned video game. For the methods of the study, first, the storytelling and worldbuilding concepts are investigated. Then, the use of architecture in video games is analyzed in the light of pioneer academic studies. Moreover, the term vernacular architecture is introduced to name the structure of World of Warcraft as samples of it. The elements affecting the design of vernacular architecture samples are mentioned. Finally, in the case study, the settlements and the structures of the fictional races with distinct cultures, from the mentioned video game, are studied in detail. And in result, some unique determinations of mentioned game’s use of architecture, in both videogame architecture and fictional vernacular architecture terms, are proposed.
... Games take time and place both literally and figuratively (see Aarseth (2007), Borries et al. (2007) and Zagal and Mateas (2010)). The spatiotemporal modality accounts for the real place and time where and when gaming happens, on the one hand, and the place and time of the game worlds being simulated, on the other. ...
... Games take time and place both literally and figuratively (see Aarseth (2007), Borries et al. (2007) and Zagal and Mateas (2010)). The spatiotemporal modality accounts for the real place and time where and when gaming happens, on the one hand, and the place and time of the game worlds being simulated, on the other. ...
... Games take time and place both literally and figuratively (see Aarseth (2007), Borries et al. (2007) and Zagal and Mateas (2010)). The spatiotemporal modality accounts for the real place and time where and when gaming happens, on the one hand, and the place and time of the game worlds being simulated, on the other. ...
... Games take time and place both literally and figuratively (see Aarseth (2007), Borries et al. (2007) and Zagal and Mateas (2010)). The spatiotemporal modality accounts for the real place and time where and when gaming happens, on the one hand, and the place and time of the game worlds being simulated, on the other. ...
... Games take time and place both literally and figuratively (see Aarseth (2007), Borries et al. (2007) and Zagal and Mateas (2010)). The spatiotemporal modality accounts for the real place and time where and when gaming happens, on the one hand, and the place and time of the game worlds being simulated, on the other. ...
... Games take time and place both literally and figuratively (see Aarseth (2007), Borries et al. (2007) and Zagal and Mateas (2010)). The spatiotemporal modality accounts for the real place and time where and when gaming happens, on the one hand, and the place and time of the game worlds being simulated, on the other. ...
... Para encaminhar essa discussão, lançamos mão da literatura que trata especificamente do caráter mediador das imagens (COUCHOT, 1993;MACHADO, 1984MACHADO, , 1990PANOFSKY, 1997;QUÉAU, 1993); da bibliografia que relaciona representação, domínio e poder no campo da geografia (como DODGE;KITCHIN;PERKINS, 2011;HARLEY, 1989;ROSE-REDWOOD, 2015;THRIFT, 1996) e, ainda, dos textos oriundos dos estudos de jogos (AARSETH, 1998;CALLEJA, 2011;JØRGENSEN, 2013;NITSCHE, 2008). Alguns autores dessa última frente de estudos destacaram a potência da noção de "geografias de ação" e suas derivações (DE CERTEAU, 1998) para a discussão do status ontológico dos mundos de jogo e das possibilidades e requisitos da jogabilidade (GOLDING, 2013;SCULLY-BLAKER, 2014). ...
Este artigo aborda o impacto das imagens dos mundos de jogo sobre as práticas espaciais dos jogadores. Inicia lembrando que as imagens não são ingênuas e passa à revisão da literatura sobre a carga ideológica de dois tipos de imagens comuns em jogos digitais: mapas e projeções em perspectiva. Considerações sobre o papel mediador das imagens dos mundos de jogo destacam a interdependência das práticas espaciais conhecidas como mapeamento e percurso. Mapas e perspectiva reificam os valores e crenças Modernos, mas sua ocorrência conjunta destaca o hibridismo da experiência espacial. Nos games, esse potencial é intensificado pela aparente liberdade de controle do ponto de vista.
... 12. Among influential analyses, Aarseth's (2001c) ...
Design media have an intimate relationship with architecture, and also serve as the means of its practice. With new technologies, and especially virtual reality, a new rhetoric of design media is becoming increasingly possible. That is, media being used as means both to design and to experience space. Such rhetorics expand the formal manifestations of architecture besides building, as well as the horizon of what can be design as well as what can be aesthetically experienced as architecture.This research is concerned with the topic of ‘Virtual Architecture.’ That is architecture specific to the virtual domain that is experienceable, however unbuildable. As an alternative mode of computational design, Virtual Architecture is concerned with a latent domain of architectural experience that is not attainable through traditional practices of building but only accessible through the virtual dimension, and as such its design is not restricted by the concrete physical world.The aim of the paper is to construct the research foundations for ‘Virtual Architecture,’ through the assembly of knowledges from multiple epistemic domains. It sets off by highlighting disciplinary limitations and challenges as well as the potentials of transdisciplinary practice that are central to this research. It proceeds by reviewing relevant literature domains and precedents from architecture and game studies, identifying and examining their limitations. Furthermore, it describes practical constraints in the design-investigation of media-specific virtual environments which require a shift of paradigm in design media. More specifically, that is the replacement of the Cartesian-Euclidean understanding of space to the spatiotemporal model of Riemannian non-Euclidean geometry that treats ‘space’ as a variability. Lastly, it describes how design knowledge can contribute in experimental studies of virtual environments for the investigation space-related aesthetics capacities.
... Regarding game studies, the concept of objective space has seemingly dominated the discourse, exploring how space is implemented in games (Aarseth 2001), how objects relate to one another in space, as well as how players are able to manipulate spaces (Wood 2012). The study of places, on the other hand, exploring meaningful engagement with subjective locales, has not been as prominent, at least not on its own terms. ...
The aim of this article is to develop an interpretive framework based on the concept of travel, exploring the limits of play as a meaningful activity. By comparing how the concept of travel has been applied to literature and cinema, it becomes possible to discern how the interest of gameplay and travel can be said to align in novel ways, reconceptualising relatively immobile players as moving travellers and assigning them stake in the transformative properties often attributed to travel. It will be held that modern perspectives on travel share an affinity with the medium of games as a venue for action and that this element of games, in turn, generates a sense of presence relative to travel. Examining this intersection, situates the study of games at the borders of leisure and learning, challenging traditional divisions between leisure and self-cultivation, all the while engaging with games as a part of wide-ranging cultural phenomena.
(DOKTORA TEZİ) DİJİTAL OYUN YAPISI VE Z KUŞAĞININ OYNAMA PRATİKLERİ
PhD Thesis
Hinter der konventionalisierten Bildoberfläche des Computerspiels verbirgt sich strukturell eine komplexe Kommunikationsform, die verschiedene Zeichensysteme und intertextuelle wie auch intermediale Bezüge inkorporiert. Nur die Berücksichtigung dieser komplexen Kombinatorik sowie hiermit korrelierter Produktions- und Rezeptionsprozesse wird der soziokulturellen Reichweite von Spielzeichen und -praktiken gerecht und kann die kulturellen Muster aufdecken, die das Dispositiv Computerspiel mit Bedeutung aufladen. Damit fordert das Computerspiel etablierte Disziplinen heraus, sich zu vernetzen, Begriffe anzugleichen und fächerübergreifende Methodenprogramme zu entwickeln. Im Sammelband wird deshalb aus unterschiedlichsten disziplinären Perspektiven den Spezifika von Spielzeichen und ihrer kulturellen Wahrnehmung nachgegangen. Im Rahmen eines medienwissenschaftlichen und kultursemiotischen Schwerpunkts thematisieren die Beiträge dabei unter anderem pädagogische und soziologische Aspekte, gendertheoretische und rezeptionsästhetische Perspektiven sowie Gesichtspunkte des Game Designs. Neben allgemeinen Merkmalen des Computerspieldispositivs liegt ein Schwerpunkt auf aktuellen Tendenzen der Computerspielkultur: Neuere Spiel- und Erzählformate (Serialität, ‚Indie-Games‘ etc.) sowie die Einbettung des Computerspiels in transmediale Kontexte werden auf ihre (medien-) kulturellen Bezüge und Auswirkungen im Hinblick auf die Theoriebildungen der Game Studies befragt.
The architecture design discipline is currently facing a significant gap in collaborative approaches within teams. This project aims to determine how collaborative aspects work in architecture design by looking at it through the lens of game design. It proposes to make the design process more engaging and help create a shared understanding amongst the team as well as increase the efficiency of the design process. Also, it focuses on the group dynamics between the designers and the other disciplines involved in the design process.
The research is based on extensive literature acquired by analyzing games and collaborative processes in architecture, which impacts the game that is being developed, which is created by integrating theoretical and practical design aspects. The game itself is the primary method of investigation in the research since it allows to investigate of the potential of collaborative design techniques by bringing together the various disciplines of game design and architecture.
The result of the research shows that designers in a real-time environment design more efficiently and in less time.
While the thesis provides different insights on collaboration in architectural design processes, future studies may focus on expanding on this method by using gaming technology to explore further into the future technologies.
Keywords: gamification, collaborative, digital, elements, criteria
A presente pesquisa tem como objetivo demonstrar como a identidade dos soldados do Eixo, em suas diversas hierarquias, é representada no jogo eletrônico Sniper Elite 4: Italia através dos conceitos de “maldade” e “bondade”. Tal análise é realizada a partir do conteúdo escrito oferecido pelo game, que se baseia em cartas encontradas durante a experiência do jogo acerca dos inimigos, desde os soldados de baixa patente da Wehrmacht, até a figura de autoridade máxima do III Reich, Adolf Hitler.
Günümüzde video oyunları; sanat, tasarım, bilim-teknoloji ve pazarlama stratejilerinin bir arada kullanılmasıyla önemli bir meta’ya dönüşmüştür. Oluşturulan hedef kitle sayesinde ve oyun üreticilerinin büyük kazançlar elde etme hedefleri ile birlikte video oyunları sürekli olarak gelişim göstermektedir. Bu gelişmenin en önemli faktörlerinden birisi, oyun üretim sürecinde oluşturulan çevre ve mekân tasarımlarıdır. Bu araştırmada, video oyunlarında 2 boyutlu olarak sunulan ancak 3 boyutluymuş gibi algılanan çevre ve mekân tasarımlarının, fiziki dünyada çevre ve mekanların algılanması noktasındaki farklılık ve benzerlikler incelenmiştir. Geçmişte, günümüzde veya gelecekteki ortam ve mekân tasarım kurgusunun sinematografinin temel kurallarıyla birleştirilmesiyle etkili bir anlatı dili oluşturulmaktadır. Böylece 3 boyutlu oyun motorlarının desteklediği çok yüksek çözünürlükteki görüntülerle neredeyse gerçeğe çok yakın görüntülerin elde edilmesine olanak sağlanması sonucunda, günümüzde video oyunlarının başka bir boyuta taşınması bu araştırmanın literatüre katkısını oluşturmaktadır. Oyuncu algısı dikkate alınmadan, detaylandırılmadan tasarlanmış çevre ve mekân tasarımlarını kullanan oyunların, oyuncu üzerinde yeterli tatmin duygusunu sağlayamadığı için beklenilen başarıyı yakalaması oldukça güçtür. Dolayısıyla bu çalışmada, bir oyunun başarısını etkileyen en önemli faktörlerden bir olan çevre ve mekân tasarımının oyuncu algısı üzerine etkisi incelenmiştir. Araştırmanın sonucunda; video oyunlarında, oyuncunun oyun içerisinde etkileşimde bulunduğu ve hareket edebilme eylemini gerçekleştirebilmesini sağlayan iyi tasarlanmış çevre ve mekân tasarımları oyunun başarısına katkısının önemine vurgu yapılmıştır.
The space in videogames is not a visual extension of conventional narrative structures, as in traditional media, but it becomes a tool to organize the tale. The possibility of exploring space and acting on it makes the videogame the closest medium to the embodied experience of a story. This feature attributes a central role to the spatial representation that help the player in the construction of meanings which are necessary to understand the narration. The spatial suggestions become a formal and structural code of visual signs, able to emphasize tones and atmospheres and/or to express emotional valances. Starting from these considerations, the research aims to analyze the relationships between visual representation and narrative language in videogames. The survey methodology includes a comparative analysis of videogame spaces, starting from the main types of stories: realistic, verisimilar and unrealistic. This distinction allows to identify three macro-groups of spatial representations. The empathetic/anempathetic spaces reproduce perceptions similar to those existing in a physical space. The utopian/dystopian spaces propose perceptions that do not coincide with existing reality but that are potentially realizable in certain space-time conditions. The impossible/elsewhere spaces, finally, offer perceptions that not only do not coincide with reality, but that are also impractical in the physical world. This research underlines how the scientific area of representation can contribute significantly to the study of videogame, understood as a narrative form in which the drawing of the space is applied as an irreplaceable modality for the construction of a visual code of thought.KeywordsVideogamesGamespaceNarrative SpaceVisual Culture
The narrative and worldbuilding of digital games are often constructed through their architectural design. This paper analyzes how virtual architecture can enable interactive digital storytelling through the case study of the game NaissanceE (Limasse Five 2014), which displays particularly imaginative architectural spaces within the panorama of digital games. NaissanceE’s architecture will be looked at through the lenses of 18th century visionary architecture, such as the works of Italian engraver Giovanni Battista Piranesi and French architect Étienne-Louis Boullée, as well contemporary mangaka Tsutomu Nihei, in order to understand which architectural elements carry the narration, how they are employed, and how they are understood by players.KeywordsArchitectureNarrativeVisionaryPiranesiBoulléeNaissanceE
This article explores how atmosphere is implicated in the establishment of place in gameworlds through the concept of the ‘refrain’. The atmosphere of a video game is often one of the most memorable constituents of our ludic experiences and is defining of the video game places we encounter during play, yet atmospheres remain highly under-researched and under-theorized within game studies. The article introduces some key theories of atmosphere and explain their relation to ‘place’ and subsequently explore how ‘place’ has been theorized and developed within game studies. I then elaborate on how atmosphere, understood existentially, is conducive to the creation of an atmosphere by addressing the examples of Dark Souls ’ hub area and boss arenas. Working through the Deleuze‐Guattarian concept of ‘refrain’, I argue that patterns of sound, images and behaviours establish a territory marked by a certain affective intensity, or atmosphere, enabling the experience of place.
The Kingdom Hearts franchise (2002-2020) is truly a product of convergence culture: in its aesthetics and narrative world, it unites games, films, animations, fairy tales, comics and cartoons. The games’ premise to merge intellectual properties from Disney and Square Enix into one coherent universe strikes as an ambitious effort with contrasting themes, motifs, characters, and worlds sharing a single stage on top of a new cast of characters and an original storyline. An analysis of any franchise is often associated with complex licensing structures, its economic impact, and the great financial endeavour to create multimedia franchises. With a franchise such as Kingdom Hearts however, its franchise relationships to other media can be made apparent through a media-centred analysis, allowing us to understand its franchise character from within. One method to make this approach possible for instance is to look at how the franchise delivers on its cross-collaboration premise by creating game worlds inspired by Disney. Some of these worlds are seemingly exact copies of their original and others deliver a new experience altogether. It is exactly this ambivalence that truly stands out in the franchise, juggling between old and new.
This introductory chapter lays out the theory of Mikhail Bakhtin’s chronotope—literally “timespace”—and its adaptation for the study of the video game medium. By reforging the chronotope as a topological engagement with video game timespace, the introduction establishes this method of slow reading alongside the existing scholarship on the study of game temporality and spatiality. As an interpretive heuristic, the chronotope serves as a powerful metaphor through which to understand how video game timespace communicates ideology, that is, how form is always already content. This chapter also establishes the theoretical guardrails of the study, including psychoanalysis, “deconstruction,” and an ontology of singularly plural being as it relates to the player fashioned as a player-reader who makes meaning of games—their mechanics, images, rules, interfaces, sounds, and narratives—through a playful process of a bodily-rooted imagination. Such reading is the jouissance of the game-text, and the goal of such readings is to open up new—and sometimes unsettling—spaces of contact between players and games toward moments of contingent justice experienced by players inside and outside the game.
The online research portal MEMOZE is based on the local memory site Goldbacher Stollen, a tunnel system built by forced labourers of the Dachau concentration camp. Through different media, among them 360° online spaces, MEMOZE educates users not only about the site itself but also introduces major concepts in memory studies and transgenerational aspects of (mediatised) testimonies. As MEMOZE seeks for a better visibility and accessibility of an ineffective physical memory place, it serves as an example to examine the process of translating such places to the digital sphere. This chapter explores the portal’s possibilities to provide a ‘glocal’ Holocaust Education by analysing the different spaces of MEMOZE. These refer to key aspects of digital memory cultures, such as transfer, transgenerational dialogue, cultural expressions and commemoration. The website also addresses ‘empty spaces’, which represent the incompleteness of cultural memories.
Based on the observation of the comments made to the official and personal accounts on Facebook and Twitter of the mayor of Saltillo, Coahuila, Mexico; an identification is made of the way in which the expression of the digital citizen identity takes place from four variables: support, opposition, demands and proposals. The most outstanding results obtained from a quantitativedescriptive perspective suggest that this identity manifests itself mainly from expressions of demand towards the solution of issues related to the services provided by he city council (security, public lighting, etc.), as a sign of citizen identity. In contrast, proposal-related entries are much less frequent. It is concluded that the participation manifested in the observed platforms reflects a relevant collective sense of identity that its more evident in terms of the immediate spatial contexts (such as the neighborhood or the neighborhood), than in relation to broader areas (such as the region), depending on the platforms observed.
This paper examines three Turkish esports venues formed under the watchful eye of a transnational, neoliberally oriented, and increasingly authoritarian government. Using these sites—an internet cafe open to the public, a gaming house for players, and an esports arena for fans—as case studies, we apply theories of the social production of space to find that Turkey’s neoliberal and conservative policies, which have deeply ruptured the urban social fabric, enabled the seamless integration of the global esports ecosystem into Istanbul. Furthermore, we show that each space follows Western norms surrounding gaming to varying degrees. This association allows affiliated companies to capitalize on the practices and experiences of Turkish gamers by professionalizing gameplay and commodifying esports participation. Ultimately, rather than acting as a mode of resistance, each space reinforces both global gaming and Turkish neoliberal neoauthoritarianism.
O capítulo discute a produção de um documentário realizado em 2020, com meninas, estudantes da rede pública de Salvador, que participam de projetos na Universidade Federal da Bahia. A escuta destas meninas ratifica a necessidade de fortalecer a parceria da Educação Básica e a Universidade, criando espaços de autoria e protagonismo para as jovens a fim de motiva-las a seguir as carreiras relacionadas com as ciências e tecnologias.
O capítulo está disponível no livro organizado por João Mattar.
O documentário está disponível no link https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLFy2B0qb_2ws_v0NrYPj6JfuwfsMbvCmF
O presente capitulo procura focar-se no domínio das competências digitais docentes, em particular no contexto do ensino superior português, tendo como referencial teórico o DigicompEdu, Quadro Europeu de Competência Digital para Educadores. O mesmo apresenta de forma sistematizada a literatura mais recente em torno da temática e no seio do referencial enunciado, no contexto europeu; ao mesmo tempo que apresenta um estudo diagnóstico realizado no ano letivo 2019/2020 com professores do ensino universitário e politécnico português. Os resultados recolhidos bem como a identificação das limitações encontradas na literatura na área são articuladamente mobilizados para identificar ações a estabelecer com vista à edificação de uma agenda de investigação futura, a assumir numa perspetiva local e internacional, em torno do conceito de competência digital docente no seio do ensino superior atual.
The monograph is devoted to the issues of understanding video games as a significant phenomenon of modern culture. The main task that the authors of the book set themselves is to acquaint the reader with a wide range of scientific problems in the field of video game research. The monograph contains a study of the origins and effects of video games, highlights the main stages of the development of the gaming industry and game studies. Videogames are investigated from the standpoint of philosophy, cultural studies, psychology, sociology, religious studies and modern educational issues. The book is addressed to a wide audience, but first of all it will be interesting and useful to representatives of the social sciences who are engaged in the study of digital culture and video games.
Video games have become important but understudied narrative media, which link into as well as perpetuate popular forms of cultural memory. They evoke and mediate space (or the illusion thereof) in unique ways, literally putting into play Doreen Massey’s theory of space as being produced through a multiplicity of trajectories. I examine how Assassins Creed: Syndicate and The Order 1886 (both 2015) configure a neo-Victorian London as a simulated, spatio-temporal imaginary in which urban texture becomes a readable storytelling device in and of itself, and interrogate how their neo-Victorian heterotopias are mediated through a spatial experience. Both games conjure up imaginaries of steampunk London as a counter-site sourced from and commenting on the Victorian city of memory. Through retro-speculation, they re-calibrate neo-Victorian London as a playground offering alternative forms of agency and adventure or as cyberpunk-infused hyper-city. In so doing, they invite the player to re-evaluate, through their spatial experience in such a heterotopic steampunk London, shared imaginaries of ‘the city’ and ‘the Victorian’.
Why do we play games and why do we play them on computers? The contributors of »Games and Rules« take a closer look at the core of each game and the motivational system that is the game mechanics. Games are control circuits that organize the game world with their (joint) players and establish motivations in a dedicated space, a »Magic Circle«, whereas game mechanics are constructs of rules designed for interactions that provide gameplay. Those rules form the base for all the excitement and frustration we experience in games. This anthology contains individual essays by experts and authors with backgrounds in Game Design and Game Studies, who lead the discourse to get to the bottom of game mechanics in video games and the real world - among them Miguel Sicart and Carlo Fabricatore.
Drawing on Janet Murray (1997), Katie Salen and Eric Zimmerman (2004), and other previous proposals, this article conceptualizes player agency as the possibility space for “meaningful” choice expressed via player action that translates into avatar action, afforded and constrained by a videogame’s design. It further distinguishes between four core dimensions of agency thus conceptualized: First, spatial-explorative agency is afforded by those elements of a videogame’s design that determine the player’s ability to navigate and traverse the game spaces via their avatar. Second, temporal-ergodic agency is afforded by those elements of a videogame’s design that determine the player’s options for interacting with the videogame as a temporal system. Third, configurative-constructive agency is afforded by those elements of a videogame’s design that allow the player to configure their avatar and/or (re)construct the game spaces. Fourth, narrative-dramatic agency is afforded by those elements of a videogame’s design that determine the player’s “meaningful” impact on the unfolding story. The article then moves on to analyze two case studies of independently developed videogames: ZA/UM’s role-playing game Disco Elysium (2019), whose complex nonlinear narrative structure primarily affords configurative and narrative agency, and System Era Softworks’s sandbox adventure game Astroneer (2019), whose procedurally generated game spaces and “open” game mechanics primarily afford explorative, constructive, and dramatic agency.
HYBRIS nr 45(2019)
Article is in polish.
Celem artykułu jest odpowiedź na pytania o istotę i ciągłość światów
przedstawionych w grach wideo. Wykorzystano w nim metody
interpretacji opracowane przez Romana Ingardena w jego badaniach
nad formalną ontologią świata i przedmiotów. Artykuł składa się z
trzech części. W pierwszej zostały przedstawione zastosowane w
interpretacji gier podstawowe kategorie analityczne, takie jak świat
oraz istota. Następnie omówione są warunki tożsamości przedmiotów
oraz świata, rozpatrzone z perspektywy trzech aspektów: „sobości”,
„jedności” i „tożsamości”. Ostania część artykułu jest poświęcona
analizie wybranych przykładów typów gier wideo pod kątem ciągłości
zawartych w nich światów przedstawionych.
SŁOWA KLUCZOWE: Ingarden Roman, fenomenologia, ontologia,
tożsamość, świat przedstawiony, diegeza, światoopowieść.
This article reports on a heritage engagement project called Skullduggery at Old Government House. It offers an approach to augmented reality design based on adventure games as a solution to the problem of “empty rooms” encountered by casual visitors to cultural heritage sites such as historic buildings. Many cultural heritage sites depend on didactic panels and perhaps a few tangible items to communicate the history of a heritage location to casual visitors, however, providing a sense of the “spirit” of a site is harder to present to visitors who may only be passing through. The project is a response to this problem in Old Government House, Brisbane. It is inspired by a theatrical tour of the house and the potential of narrative games to re-create the tour's experiential aspects and engagement with a sense of history and place for casual visitors.
Fuchs examines how the British colonial project is depicted in the videogame The Order: 1886 (2015). A meta-text composed of various myths, tropes and Victorian legends, the game populates London with the undead and uses them to symbolize the vampiric nature of the colonial enterprise. Presenting a narrative that critiques colonialism, Fuchs argues that The Order interconnects with current concerns about globalisation, its addicts and its residue. Ultimately the game shows the city to be an uncanny space which folds the nineteenth-century setting in on itself to create a contemporary double, while repeating the colonialism and capitalist processes that were foundational to that era. Fuchs suggests that while globalisation has obfuscated colonialist and imperialist practices, the processes undergirding Empire are still very much in place in the early twenty-first century.
Introdução O ato de jogar surgiu junto com as primeiras as primeiras comunidades humanas, como atividade de entretenimento diretamente ligada à ludicidade, que molda e é moldado por ritos sociais, sendo parte do processo natural de socialização que prepara a criança para lidar com os riscos que podem ser encontrados mais tarde, na vida adulta (Huizinga, 2000). A partir do surgimento da computação, o ato de jogar encontrou uma nova plataformade interação, na convergência com o suporte tecnológico eletrônico surge o jogo digital. Ampliaram-se as possibilidades do jogar com o surgimento de uma nova mídia imersiva e essencialmente interativa, possibilitando novas e mais intensas interações que os jogos analógicos. Uma ampliação que não apenas transporta os jogos para um ambiente informatizado, mas transcende as suas experiências. O objetivo desse artigo é discutir o papel social dessa nova mídia e entender a sua importância para o mercado da comunicação. Para isso será realizada uma reflexão que perpassa autores clássicos como Marshall McLuhan, Raymond Williams e Pierre Bourdieu, observando como os jogos digitais se peculiarizam em relação às demais mídias. Como sugere Aranha(2004), o jogo digital não é apenas um tipo genérico de jogo que se processa e opera por meio de um computador, mas também como uma linguagem que, como tal, possui suas particularidades. "O videogame é um expressivo e complexo fenômeno cultural, estético e de linguagem, que foi capaz de desenvolver, ao longo de seu 1 Trabalho apresentado no Grupo de Trabalho da V Conferência Sul-Americana e X Conferência Brasileira de Mídia Cidadã.
The emergence of Virtual Reality (VR) as a viable consumer medium for gaming offers an opportunity to reconceptualise understandings of immersion, embodiment and presence in gaming. However, many of the discourses and attempts to conceptualise experience in VR games conflate these terms rather than understanding each as a state of engagement with a VR environment or game. This results in a lack of understanding of the importance of design and intentionality in the VR game with regards to immersion, embodiment and presence. Using a post-phenomenological approach, this paper differentiates immersion, embodiment and presence as three kinds of relation utilising the I – technology – world schema. This approach allows for an understanding of these states of engagement as layered and hierarchical rather than instantly emergent on the part of the technology. The hermeneutic relation between the user and VR game [I → (technology – world)] that indicates presence can be understood as a feeling of place or placehood in VR and is intentionally the state aimed for as optional in VR games. The importance of technological intentionality as a co-constructor of embodiment and presence is exemplified through an analysis of user reviews of VR games either built-for VR or ported to VR. Built-for VR games create the possibility of a sense of place for the games by incorporating the possibility of embodiment and presence into the design of control and movement while ported VR games fail to immerse because of a lack of technological intentionality towards these goals.
ResearchGate has not been able to resolve any references for this publication.