Digital Library Keyword Archives
- Proceedings of DiGRA23
videogames
- 26 articles or papers
The Tragedy of Betrayal: How the Design of Ico and Shadow of the Colossus Elicits Emotion
Cole Tom
2015 DiGRA '15 - Proceedings of the 2015 DiGRA International Conference
Ico and Shadow of the Colossus are two games of high critical acclaim that are well known for their emotional affect – particularly because some of those emotions are unusual amongst digital games. Analysis of emotion in video games often focuses on narrative and representative elements, and emotions regularly experienced by gamers such as frustration, victory, joy of discovery etc. This paper uses close textual analysis with support from cognitive theories of emotion to analyse the ludic and mechanical, in addition to representative and narrative, qualities of these games. By doing so it is shown how guilt, grief and loneliness have more chance of being elicited from the player, with emphasis on the use of ambiguity and violation of player expectations. It is hoped that this approach will encourage further work of this type in an area so that both theoretical work and future development might benefit.
Dots, Fruit, Speed and Pills: The Happy Consciousness of Pac-Man
Wade Alex
2014 DiGRA '14 - Proceedings of the 2014 DiGRA International Conference
Spanning 30 years and 40 individual videogames across a range of platforms, Pac-Man is one of the most recognizable of all videogame characters and a pop–culture icon. In spite of its widespread popularity, the game receives little sustained academic engagement or analysis. In an attempt to address this, the paper argues that in its classic iterations Pac-Man generates complex notions of space and time which are indicative of changing cultural, ethical and political considerations in wider society. This is explored through recourse to Borges’ work on labyrinths, Bauman’s discussion of the ethical position of videogames, Poole’s rejoinder and Ritzer’s critique of consumerism, ultimately arguing that the dynamics, themes and leitmotifs evident in Pac-Man are experienced by gamers, consumers and citizens described in Marcuse’s One Dimensional Society, whereby the welfare and warfare state coalesce to generate the Happy Consciousness.
Understanding Videogame Cities
Schweizer Bobby
2014 DiGRA '13 - Proceedings of the 2013 DiGRA International Conference: DeFragging Game Studies
This paper examines the city of Steelport in Saints Row: The Third (Volition, 2011) as a real-and-imagined space that can be described using an urban framework of constitutional, representational, and experiential components. It relates mediated and physical cities through spatial arrangement, processes of representation, and the factors that contribute to a sense of place in both material and immaterial worlds.
Spec Ops: The Line’s Conventional Subversion of the Military Shooter
Keogh Brendan
2014 DiGRA '13 - Proceedings of the 2013 DiGRA International Conference: DeFragging Game Studies
The contemporary videogame genre of the military shooter, exemplified by blockbuster franchises like Call of Duty and Medal of Honor, is often criticised for its romantic and jingoistic depictions of the modern, high-tech battlefield. This entanglement of military shooters and the rhetoric of technologically advanced warfare in a “militaryentertainment complex” is scrutinised by Yager’s Spec Ops: The Line. The game’s critique of military shooters is as complex and messy as the battlefields the genre typically works to obscure. Initially presented to the player as a generic military shooter, The Line gradually subverts the genre’s mechanics, aesthetics, and conventions to devalue claims of the West’s technological and ethical superiority that the genre typically perpetuates. This paper brings together close, textual analysis; comments made by the game’s developers; and the analytical work of videogame critics to examine how The Line relies on the conventions of its own genre to ask its player to think critically about the cultural function of military shooters.
Computer games and violence: Is there really a connection?
Endestad Tor Torgersen Leila
2003 DiGRA '03 - Proceedings of the 2003 DiGRA International Conference: Level Up
The relationship between videogames and violent behaviour was analysed in a representative sample of 9889 Norwegian youth ageing from 13 to 18 years. Videogames were separated in eight different categories. A hypothesis of the relationship between videogames and violence was put forward as a starting – point for reasoning. A unique correlation between violent videogames, specifying first person shooters and action games, and violent behaviour was found. By controlling for age and gender, the effect of first person shooter games disappeared for youth in - between 9th to 12th grades, and the action videogames remained as the significant predictor. Only first person shooter was a significant predictor in 8th grade.
Gamescapes: exploration and virtual presence in game-worlds
King Geoff Krzywinska Tanya
2003 DiGRA '03 - Proceedings of the 2003 DiGRA International Conference: Level Up
An analysis of the scope for exploration and the extent to which impressions of presence are created in domestic videogames. This paper argues that exploration is an important dimension of play in many games, whether employed in relation to other objectives or as a source of pleasure in its own right. The first part of the paper examines the relationship between freedom to explore and spatial constraint, arguing that many games offer a balance between the two, the precise nature of which varies from one type of game to another. The second part of the paper considers the extent to which different types of game offer illusions of presence in the game-world, from the distanced perspective of management and strategy games to the greater impression of sensory immersion created in games rendered in the first person.
Videogame art: remixing, reworking and other interventions
Mitchell Grethe Clarke Andy
2003 DiGRA '03 - Proceedings of the 2003 DiGRA International Conference: Level Up
This paper explores some of the areas of intersection between videogames and both digital and non-digital art practice. By looking at examples of art practice drawn from videogames, it outlines some categories and so provides an overview of this area, placing it within the wider context of contemporary and historical art practice. The paper explores the tendency for much of this work to have elements of subversion or “détournement”, whilst also identifying areas of tension in the appropriation of videogames as material for art practice
Temporal Frames: A Unifying Framework for the Analysis of Game Temporality
Zagal José P. Mateas Michael
2007 DiGRA '07 - Proceedings of the 2007 DiGRA International Conference: Situated Play
This article introduces the notion of temporal frames as a tool for the formal analysis of the temporality of games. A temporal frame is a set of events, along with the temporality induced by the relationships between those events. We discuss four common temporal frames: real-world time (events taking place in the physical world), gameworld time (events within the represented gameworld, including events associated with gameplay actions), coordination time (events that coordinate the actions of players and agents), and fictive time (applying socio-cultural labels to events, as well as narrated event sequences). We use frames to analyze the real-time/turn-based distinction as well as various temporal anomalies. These discussions illustrate how temporal frames are useful for gaining a more nuanced understanding of temporal phenomena in games.
Ethically Notable Videogames: Moral Dilemmas and Gameplay
Zagal José P.
2009 DiGRA '09 - Proceedings of the 2009 DiGRA International Conference: Breaking New Ground: Innovation in Games, Play, Practice and Theory
In what ways can we use games to make moral demands of players and encouraging them to reflect on ethical issues? In this article we propose an ethically notable game as one that provides opportunities for encouraging ethical reasoning and reflection. Our analysis of the videogames Ultima IV, Manhunt, and Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn highlights the central role that moral dilemmas can play towards creating ethically notable games. We discuss the different ways that these are implemented, such as placing players in situations in which their understanding of an ethical system is challenged, or by creating moral tension between the player’s goals and those posed by the narrative and the gameplay of a game. We conclude by noting some of the challenges of creating ethically notable games including ensuring that the ethical framework in a game is both discernable and consistent as well as ensuring that the dilemma is actually a moral one and that the player, rather than the game characters, is the one facing it.
Notes Toward a Sense of Embodied Gameplay
Bayliss Peter
2007 DiGRA '07 - Proceedings of the 2007 DiGRA International Conference: Situated Play
Despite the increasing maturity of the field of videogame studies, central concepts such as gameplay remain underdeveloped, implicit in many theories yet without clear investigation of the underlying assumptions informing approaches to understanding it. Understanding gameplay as a particular form of interactivity, the approach taken here focuses on the notion of embodiment, drawing on Dourish's work concerning embodied interaction. The implication of this approach is a focus on the concept of interface, which is developed here beyond the meanings adapted from design and production contexts towards a more generalised yet more powerful understanding that sees it as a particular site or space of interaction between two parties - the player and the game. An exploratory theoretical model of embodied gameplay is developed through a synthesis of Dourish's application of various phenomenological theories to interactivity, Gibson's ecological approach to perception, and Järvinen et al's approach to the concept of flow.