The Dark Side of Game Play

"This book is a richly diverse examination of the ways that games situate players in their perpetration of unconscionable and transgressive virtual acts. The essays in this collection are in different ways sensitive to the medial and cultural context of games and the means by which ludic context and attitudinal frames transform players relationships to such acts. The book broadens our understanding of the complex and easily misinterpreted pleasures that games offer and engage us in." --Tanya Krzywinska, Falmouth University, UK

Torill Elvira Mortensen is Associate Professor at the IT University of Copenhagen. She studies multi-user games and digital media culture. Shes a board member of Norsk Tipping and the author of Perceiving Play: The art and study of computer games (2009). She was a founding member of the editorial group of the journal Gamestudies.org. Jonas Linderoth is a professor at the Department of Education, Communication and Learning, University of Gothenburg, Sweden. He has published several peer-reviewed journal articles about perception, learning and cognition during gameplay and is a contributor to the Routledge volume Sports Videogames. Ashley ML Brown is a lecturer in Game Design at Brunel University London in the United Kingdom. She is a board member of the Digital Games Research Association and the author of a chapter in Dungeons and Dragons and Philosophy as well as her recently completed thesis entitled Sex Between Frames: An exploration of online and tabletop erotic role play.

Part I: Introduction 1. Dark Play: The Aesthetics of Controversial Playfulness Torill Elvira Mortensen and Jonas Linderoth Part II: Discourses of Dark Play 2. Analyzing Game Controversies: A Historical Approach to Moral Panics and Digital Games Faltin Karlsen 3. Of Heroes and Henchmen: The Conventions of Killing Generic Expendables in Digital Games Ren Glas 4. Dont Forget to Die: A Software Update is Available for the Death Drive Emily Flynn-Jones Part III: Dark Play or Darkly Played? 5. Killing Digital Children: Design, Discourse and Player Agency Bjrn Sjblom 6. Little Evils: Subversive Uses of Childrens Games Frans Myr 7. Darkly Playing Others Miguel Sicart Part IV: Dark Play and Situated Meaning 8. Three Defences for the Fourteen-Inch Barbed Penis: Darkly Playing with Morals, Ethics and Sexual Violence Ashley ML Brown 9. Exploring the Limits of Play: A Case Study of Representations of Nazism in Games Adam Chapman and Jonas Linderoth 10. Keeping the Balance: Morals at the Dark Side Torill Elvira Mortensen 11. Fabricated Innocence: On How People Can be Lured into Feel Bad Games Staffan Bjrk Part V: Designing for Dark Play 12. Massively Multiplayer Dark Play; Treacherous Play in EVE Online Marcus Carter 13. Dark Play in Dishonored Kristine Jrgensen 14. Sonic Descents: Musical Dark Play in Survival and Psychological Horror Isabella van Elferen 15. Boosting, Glitching and Modding Call of Duty: Assertive Dark Play Manifestations, Communities, Pleasures and Organic Resilience Alan Meades