Video Game Art Reader

The inaugural issue of VGAR celebrates video game culture as inclusive and global. Opening with an interview with the art director of the first independent Cuban video game, Savior, while the following essays from art historians, literary theorists, game designers, artists, educators, museum curators, and programmers all engage with video games as an important part of the global art landscape. Each engages with what makes good game art with special attention to the transnational cadre of gamers that play them

Gaming the Network Poetic: Networking and Code in Art Games

Videogames have historically used networking either to connect players for competition or cooperation or to provide an ephemeral connection to allow the upload, comparison, or assessment of single-player achievement data. The majority of videogames take place on a screen and on established platforms each of which have physical, technical, and sociocultural constraints that dictate how a player will interact. Recent art games, such as those by Jason Rohrer and the Atari VCS games of Ian Bogost highlight experiments in a more focused use of the medium from concept to interaction, both between the player and the software but also foregrounding the code (both social codes and actual software) of the games. These artists are part of a growing movement of videogame creators that are involved not only as designers but also as cultural critics invested in the analysis of platforms and the distribution of their games. This thesis documents the development and exhibition of Gaming the Network Poetic, a series of five videogames developed by the author. This was itself an experiment in both the use of networking and in the exhibition of a cohesive art object incorporating these games. The work is then contextualized through the analysis of game-based art movements, the contemporary independent (or Indie ) games movement, and contemporary software/code-based art. Also, given that much of the theory around videogames is rooted in literary criticism, philosophy, and cultural history, these disciplines are also referenced throughout the discussion. Further, this thesis will address questions about the aesthetic, mechanical, and audience-related considerations of developing and installing videogames in a contemporary art space that shows mostly static work. What roles does the audience play in such an environment? How can videogames create meaning? How does one communicate emotion through a single videogame? How does the open networking of several videogames quickly add complexity, and how can that complexity be managed? What are the issues involved in choosing particular hardware and software platforms on which to present the work

Exposed Nerves and Archival Impulses: Digital Ruination and the Death of Adobe Flash

Senior Project submitted to The Division of Social Studies of Bard College

Game design research: an introduction to theory & practice

Design research is an active academic field covering disciplines such as architecture, graphic, product, service, interaction, and systems design. Design research aims to understand not only the designed end products but also how design as an activity unfolds. The book demonstrates different approaches to design research in game design research

The challenge of visuality for electronic literature: Conference panel: The medium

Whilst there may be aesthetic tropes within digital media, there is no universally accepted authority within contemporary culture nor is there an easy mutual acceptance of what is “right and proper” or indeed legitimate outside the now virtue of being popular and well followed. Indeed the now bodily distanced and disinhibited digital citizen frequently demonstrates a palpable distain for the elite and pretentious. Considering this, any community with Literature in its name may have an identity problem; literariness still pertains to an elevated quality of artistic or intellectual merit and is thus counter to popular cultural production. In addition, mainstream culture has successfully commoditized many counter-cultural communities. Electronic Literature has arguably not been through such commodification processes, and the question of interest is why not? To that extent this paper seeks to explore possible answers. Investigating the broader shifts towards increased visuality within modern culture the paper will discuss and revisit the discourses on the power structures of the gaze, consider spectatorship’s dominance over readership and interaction and co-creation and the function of the image within contemporary narrative forms inside and outwith Electronic Literature. The paper will also consider the politics implied in the move to open access, the fluid distribution of often context-less “images”, how this relates to prior notions of literary publishing, and whether this manifests as an opportunity or a challenge to Electronic Literature’s dissemination. Lastly and toward a conclusion, the paper will propose that if we consider the tradition of literature as one that is driven by the expression of human experience, where in today’s context literary “traditions” are not longer built around specific commonalities of form (i.e. predominately verbal language) but rather subject matter, themes and worldviews then the questions of identity and of “literariness” can evaporate to make space for fuller participation in the ocular freedoms in contemporary culture

HyperBody: An Experimental VR Game Exploring the Cosmotechnics of Game Fandom through a Posthumanist Lens

Interdependencies among ACGN (Anime, Comics, Games, and Novels) communities in China, Hong Kong, and Taiwan are growing. However, game studies and fan studies remain distinct disciplines. This cross-disciplinary thesis bridges this gap by investigating "game-fandom" practices in VR production, defined as the fusion of game and fan studies within the ACGN context. Drawing from Yuk Hui's "cosmotechnics" and Karen Barad's posthumanist perspective, this research reconsiders the relationship between cosmology, morality, and technology (Hui 2017). It employs "intra-action" to emphasise the indivisible, dynamic relations among specified objects (Barad 2007). Cultural practices in C-pop idol groups, Chinese BL (Boys' Love) novels, science fiction, and modding communities are analysed, illuminating the ACGN fandom's cultural, technological, and affective dimensions. This work features the creation, description, and evaluation of an experimental VR game, "HyperBody", which integrates the written thesis by reflecting game-fandom's cosmotechnics and intra-actions. The thesis offers two significant contributions: "queer tuning", a theory illuminating new cultural, technological, and affective turns within fandom and computational art, and a "diffractive" approach, forming a methodological framework for posthuman performative contexts. This diffractive framework enables practical contributions such as creating and describing experimental VR productions using the sound engine. It also highlights a thorough evaluation approach reconciling quantitative and qualitative methods in VR production analysis, investigating affective experiences, and exploring how users engage creatively with queer VR gamespaces. These contributions foster interdisciplinary collaboration among VR, game design, architecture, and fandom studies, underscoring the inextricable link among ethics, ontology, and epistemology, culminating in a proposed ethico-onto-epistem-ological framework

CRUISING GAME SPACE: Game Level Design, Gay Cruising and the Queer Gothic in The Rawlings

This thesis explores the emerging paradigm shift in game studies called queer game studies. Through research creation, this project explores cruising in Stanley Park, Vancouver as an empirical and conceptual starting point to prototype a surreal horror game called The Rawlings. Synthesizing queer game studies with theoretical engagement represented by queer Gothic studies, this thesis proposes that if cruising can be understood a form of play with unique dynamic spatial qualities, it might have implications for the discipline of level design in video game development. It is concluded that queer Gothic studies may provide inroads to our understanding of both the sexuality of space and the spatiality of sexuality in queer spaces. Particularly, this thesis investigates how cruising illuminates space with qualities that exhibit markers of deviancy and monstrosity. This project demonstrates the implications of space as monstrous body with its own identity, motivation and desires for queering level design