Fact, Fiction and Virtual Worlds

This paper considers the medium of videogames from a goodmanian standpoint. After some preliminary clarifications and definitions, I examine the ontological status of videogames. Against several existing accounts, I hold that what grounds their identity qua work types is code. The rest of the paper is dedicated to the epistemology of videogaming. Drawing on Nelson Goodman and Catherine Elgin's works, I suggest that the best model to defend videogame cognitivism appeals to the notion of understanding

Worlds at our fingertips:reading (in) <i>What Remains of Edith Finch</i>

Video games are works of written code which portray worlds and characters in action and facilitate an aesthetic and interpretive experience. Beyond this similarity to literary works, some video games deploy various design strategies which blend gameplay and literary elements to explicitly foreground a hybrid literary/ludic experience. We identify three such strategies: engaging with literary structures, forms and techniques; deploying text in an aesthetic rather than a functional way; and intertextuality. This paper aims to analyse how these design strategies are deployed in What Remains of Edith Finch (Giant Sparrow, 2017) to support a hybrid readerly/playerly experience. We argue that this type of design is particularly suited for walking simulators because they support interpretive play (Upton, 2015) through slowness, ambiguity (Muscat et al., 2016; Pinchbeck 2012), narrative and aesthetic aspirations (Carbo-Mascarell, 2016). Understanding walking sims as literary games (Ensslin, 2014) can shift the emphasis from their lack of ‘traditional’ gameplay complexity and focus instead on the opportunities that they afford for hybrid storytelling and for weaving literature and gameplay in innovative and playful ways

Gaming the heart of darkness

The history of Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness has been one of adaptation and change. The enduring story is based upon Conrad’s experiences in the Congo in the 1890s and has been published as a novella in 1902. Since then the story has been criticised for racism by Nigerian writer Chinua Achebe (1975) and relocated to Vietnam by Francis Ford Coppola as Apocalypse Now (1979), influencing computer games such as Far Cry 2 (2008) and Spec Ops: The Line (2012). In examining the adaptations of Heart of Darkness we can consider how the story evolves from the passive reading of post-colonial narratives through to the active participation in morally ambiguous decisions and virtual war crimes through digital games: examining Conrad’s story as it has been adapted for other mediums provides a unique lens in which to view storytelling and retelling within the context of how we interpret the world. This paper compares the source material to its adaptations, considering the blending of historical fact and original fiction, the distortion of the original story for the purpose of creating new meaning, and reflects on whether interactivity impacts upon the feeling of immersion and sense of responsibility in audiences of different narratives

Narratology

This essay provides an overview of the different types of study that can be conducted when considering the narrative aspects of video game play. It contextualizes this research among the larger movements of narratology, particularly concerning the structuralist roots of the discipline and the parallels between gameplay and narrative structures. A brief overview of the key points of the ludology/narratology debate is made, followed by an introduction to the three domains of narrative in video game studies: story content, story structures, and narration as the discursive mode that games use to relay the game-state

Playing with Identity. Authors, Narrators, Avatars, and Players in The Stanley Parable and The Beginner’s Guide

This article offers a comparative analysis of Davey Wreden’s The Stanley Parable (Wreden 2011 / Galactic Cafe 2013) and The Beginner’s Guide (Everything Unlimited Ltd. 2015) in order to explore the interrelation of authors, narrators, avatars, and players as four salient functions in the play with identity that videogames afford. Building on theories of collective and collaborative authorship, of narratives and narrators across media, and of the avatar-player relationship, the article reconstructs the similarities and differences between the way in which The Stanley Parable and The Beginner’s Guide position their players in relation to the two games’ avatars, narrators, and (main) author, while also underscoring how both The Stanley Parable and The Beginner’s Guide use metareferential strategies to undermine any overly rigid conceptualization of these functions and their interrelation

Chronotypology:a comparative method for analyzing game time

This article presents a methodology called “chronotypology” which aims to facilitate literary studies approaches to video games by conceptualizing game temporality. The method develops a comparative approach to how video games structure temporal experience, yielding an efficient set of terms—“diachrony,” “synchrony,” and “unstable signifier”—through which to analyze gaming’s “heterochronia” or temporal complexity. This method also yields an approach to the contentious topic of video game narrative which may particularly recommend it to literary scholars with an interest in the form. Along with some examples from conventional games, a close reading of the “reality-inspired” game Bury Me, My Love will serve to demonstrate the use of a chronotypological approach

Avatars Going Mainstream: Typology of Tropes in Avatar-Based Storytelling Practices

Due to the growing popularity of video games, gaming itself has become a shared experience among media audiences worldwide. The phenomenon of avatar-based games has led to the emergence of new storytelling practices. The paper proposes a typology of tropes in these avatar-based narratives focusing on non-game case studies. Suggested tropes are also confronted with the latest research on avatars in the area of game studies and current knowledge of the issues concerning the player-avatar relationship. Some of the most popular misconceptions regarding the gameplay experience and its representation in non-game media are exposed as a result of this analysis. The research confirms that popular culture perceives gaming experience as closely related to the player identity, as the latter inspires new genres of non-game narratives