Breaking out stories and networks of interdependency: using actor-network theory to trace emergent challenges to narrative norms in AAA and indie game development sectors.

My intervention in this thesis is two-fold: Firstly, I aim to explore how design practitioners are leveraging the form of videogames to tell new types of stories that speak to and help shape newly emerging audience formations, and how the material and organisational structures of the industry constrain or enable those attempts. Secondly, the thesis implements a novel framework adapted primarily from the production studies work of John Caldwell (2008b), which has been recognised as an urgently needed addition to the growing critical tool kit of game studies (Banks et al., 2016), and combined with actor-network theory of Bruno Latour (2005), in order to make an original contribution to the growing methodological field of game studies. I argue that the innovative framework of actor-network theory (Callon et al., 2009; Latour, 2005; Law, 2004) applies particularly well to the shifting videogames industry as an object of study. My specific focus is on the kinds of stories that are told in the complex and shifting production contexts of game design, but also the kinds of trade stories that circulate within production cultures. Thus I link textual analysis and the study of production by exploring how such narratives are formed within real material spaces of production. I do so by utilising a mixed method of anthropology of production cultures and semi-structured interviews (Galletta, 2013). In particular I have attempted to make the game studio a unit of analysis within the complex flows of narrative intention and economic realities, which ties my work into an emerging field of Studio Studies (Farías and Wilkie, 2015), and I specifically focus on the emergence of the independent studio as a significant challenge to industry norms and the narrative forms and core gamer identities that rest upon them. In doing so I build on a new generation of work in game studies (Anable, 2018; Chess, 2017; Keogh, 2018a; Nooney, 2017; Ruffino, 2018a) seeking to challenge the entrenched academic orthodoxy of game studie

An “other” experience of videogames: analyzing the connections between videogames and the lived experience of chronic pain

In this dissertation I argue for the connections between the lived experience of chronic pain and videogames, exploring what interacts with and influences them. To answer this, I draw on cripistemology as I engage in autoethnography, close-reading and close-gameplay, restorying, mixed methods design, formal interviews, surveys, and inductive coding. I further argue for pushing back against the unhelpful binaries that define the “human” and a false idea of “universal” experience or ability, instead pointing to the intersectionality that better reflects the biopolitics of disability, including both debility and capacity. I engage with these methods in three specific projects that consider additional sub-questions to further tease out why videogames disability, chronic pain, game design, lived experience, human centered design, embodiment in video games have impacted me so deeply and how this ties to my identity as a disabled woman. I further offer this dissertation to highlight the growing research of lived experience and disability in the field of game studies, providing empirical data that offers a foundational look of how I as a member of the chronic pain community think and feel about videogames, as well as how a small portion of the chronic pain community discusses videogames and the range of experiences this encompasses. In doing so, I unpack and argue on the relationship that exists between chronic pain and videogames, and further articulate why this matters. In Chapter 1 I provide necessary history and information regarding my research to better articulate the findings as presented in the following chapters. In Chapter 2, I analyze my connection to Animal Crossing: New Leaf (AC:NL) (Nintendo EAD, 2012) and explore opportunities about genre and mechanics as reflections of my own daily lived experience with chronic pain, especially including my experience in a 2014 pain rehabilitation program. Through this process, I define the “slice of life” genre and argue that AC:NL is exemplary of its markers. In Chapter 3 I provide a deep reading and analysis of Nintendo’s GameCube release Chibi-Robo! (Skip Ltd. et al., 2005) to “restory” the titular main character to have chronic pain like my own. Through the lens of debility and capacitation machines, I map these ideas onto the biopsychosocial model to organize a thorough analysis of his restoried identity. In modding the game’s narrative to reflect a lived experience of chronic pain like my own, I interweave fanfiction with deep reading and deep gameplay to unpack what representation I am looking for in videogames both narratively and mechanically. In this I further argue how this practice can be used to inform future game design. Finally, in Chapter 4, I interview members of the chronic pain community to understand their perspective on the connections between their lived experience with chronic pain and videogames, as well as how additional factors of their identity impact those experiences. For this I engage in a mixed methods design to conduct a survey and formal interviews to offer foundational work on how the chronic pain community interacts with videogames. I offer this project to intersect current research in chronic pain and videogames (and its related technology) that focuses on games as tools for “curing” pain, and argue the importance of considering what embodiment people with chronic pain already have in videogames instead. Ultimately, I argue for the necessity to complicate current design practices in human centered design (HCD) and game design. To do so, I highlight the lived experience of Othered identities to combat misguided notions of “universal” intent. In this, I analyze the inherent connections between videogames and disability, in this case chronic pain, through embodiment and lived experience. I center in on how my experience of chronic pain has impacted the way in which I engage and think about with videogames, and further, how my experiences align with that of the chronic pain community

Webfilm theory

Since its inception in 1989, the World Wide Web has grown as a medium for publishing first text, then images, audio, and finally, moving images including short films. While most new media forms, in particular, hypertext, have received scholarly attention, research into moving image on the Internet had been limited. The thesis therefore set out to investigate webfilms, a form of short film on the WWW and the Internet, over a period of 9 years (1997-2005). The thesis was theoretically embedded in questions regarding new media as new field of research, since the increasing visibility of new media had resulted in the emergence of the discipline of 'new media studies'. This context raised issues regarding the configuration of new media studies within the existing academic disciplines of media and cultural studies, which were explored in depth in the literature review. The case studies of the thesis explored and analysed webfilms from a vantage point of actor-network theory, since this was arguably the most appropriate methodology to a research object considerably influenced by technological factors. The focus was on the conditions of webfilm production, distribution, and exhibition, and the evolution of webfilm discourse and culture. The aim was to seek answers to the question 'How didwebfilm arise as (new) form of film?' In the process of research, a number of issues were raised including the changing definition and changing forms of webfilms, the convergence of media, and the complex interdependency of humans and their computers. The research re-evaluates the relationship between human and non-human factors in media production and presents a fresh approach by focusing on the network as unit of analysis. The thesis as a whole not only provides new information on the evolution of webfilm as a form of film, but also illustrates how the network interaction of humans and nonhumans lies at the heart of contemporary new media and convergence culture.sub_mcpaunpub79_ethesesunpu