Routledge Advances in Game Studies – serie

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64 produkter

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64 produkter

Independent Videogames
Cultures, Networks, Techniques and Politics
AvPaolo Ruffino
Inbunden, Engelska, 2020
2 422 kr
Skickas inom 10-15 vardagar
Independent Videogames investigates the social and cultural implications of contemporary forms of independent video game development. Through a series of case studies and theoretical investigations, it evaluates the significance of such a multi-faceted phenomenon within video game and digital cultures. A diverse team of scholars highlight the specificities of independence within the industry and the culture of digital gaming through case studies and theoretical questions. The chapters focus on labor, gender, distribution models and technologies of production to map the current state of research on independent game development. The authors also identify how the boundaries of independence are becoming opaque in the contemporary game industry – often at the cost of the claims of autonomy, freedom and emancipation that underlie the indie scene. The book ultimately imagines new and better narratives for a less exploitative and more inclusive videogame industry.Systematically mapping the current directions of a phenomenon that is becoming increasingly difficult to define and limit, this book will be a crucial resource for scholars and students of game studies, media history, media industries and independent gaming.
Paradox of Transgression in Games
AvTorill Mortensen,Kristine Jørgensen
Inbunden, Engelska, 2020
2 057 kr
Skickas inom 10-15 vardagar
The Paradox of Transgression in Games looks at transgressive games as an aesthetic experience, tackling how players respond to game content that shocks, disturbs, and distresses, and how contemporary video games can evoke intense emotional reactions. The book delves into the commercial success of many controversial videogames: although such games may appear shocking for the observing bystander, playing them is experienced as deeply rewarding for the player. Drawing on qualitative player studies and approaches from media aesthetics theory, the book challenges the perception of games as innocent entertainment, and examines the range of emotional, moral, and intellectual experiences of players. As they explore what players consider transgressive, the authors ask whether there is something about the gameplay situation that works to mitigate the sense of transgression, stressing gameplay as an aesthetic experience. Anchoring the aesthetic game experience both in play studies as well as in aesthetic theory, this book will be an essential resource for scholars and students of game studies, aesthetics, media studies, philosophy of art, and emotions.
Hybrid Play
Crossing Boundaries in Game Design, Players Identities and Play Spaces
AvAdriana de Souza e Silva,Ragan Glover-Rijkse
Inbunden, Engelska, 2020
2 422 kr
Skickas inom 10-15 vardagar
This book explores hybrid play as a site of interdisciplinary activity—one that is capable of generating new forms of mobility, communication, subjects, and artistic expression as well as new ways of interacting with and understanding the world. The chapters in this collection explore hybrid making, hybrid subjects, and hybrid spaces, generating interesting conversations about the past, current and future nature of hybrid play. Together, the authors offer important insights into how place and space are co-constructed through play; how, when, and for what reasons people occupy hybrid spaces; and how cultural practices shape elements of play and vice versa. A diverse group of scholars and practitioners provides a rich interdisciplinary perspective, which will be of great interest to those working in the areas of games studies, media studies, communication, gender studies, and media arts.
Videogames and the Gothic
AvEwan Kirkland
Inbunden, Engelska, 2021
2 786 kr
Skickas inom 10-15 vardagar
This book explores the many ways Gothic literature and media have informed videogame design. Through a series of detailed case studies, Videogames and the Gothic illustrates the extent to which particular tropes of Gothic culture –neo-medieval aesthetics, secret-filled labyrinthine spaces, the sense of a dark past impacting upon the present – have been appropriated by and transformed within digital games. Moving beyond the study of the generic influences of horror on digital gaming, Ewan Kirkland focuses in on the Gothic, a less visceral mode tending towards the unsettling, the uncertain and the uncanny. He explores the extent to which imagery, storylines and narrative preoccupations taken from Gothic fiction facilitate the affordances and limitations of the videogame medium. A core contention of this book is that videogames have developed as an inherently Gothic form of popular entertainment. Arguing for close proximity between Gothic culture and the videogame medium itself, this book will be a key contribution to both Gothic and digital game scholarship; as such, it will have resonance with scholars and students in both areas, as well as those interested in Gothic novels, media and popular culture, digital games and interactive fiction.
Comics and Videogames
From Hybrid Medialities to Transmedia Expansions
AvAndreas Rauscher,Daniel Steinm. fl.
Inbunden, Engelska, 2020
2 422 kr
Skickas inom 10-15 vardagar
This book offers the first comprehensive study of the many interfaces shaping the relationship between comics and videogames. It combines in-depth conceptual reflection with a rich selection of paradigmatic case studies from contemporary media culture.The editors have gathered a distinguished group of international scholars working at the interstices of comics studies and game studies to explore two interrelated areas of inquiry: The first part of the book focuses on hybrid medialities and experimental aesthetics "between" comics and videogames; the second part zooms in on how comics and videogames function as transmedia expansions within an increasingly convergent and participatory media culture. The individual chapters address synergies and intersections between comics and videogames via a diverse set of case studies ranging from independent and experimental projects via popular franchises from the corporate worlds of DC and Marvel to the more playful forms of media mix prominent in Japan.Offering an innovative intervention into a number of salient issues in current media culture, Comics and Videogames will be of interest to scholars and students of comics studies, game studies, popular culture studies, transmedia studies, and visual culture studies.
Forms and Functions of Endings in Narrative Digital Games
AvMichelle Herte
Inbunden, Engelska, 2020
2 422 kr
Skickas inom 10-15 vardagar
This book looks closely at the endings of narrative digital games, examining their ways of concluding the processes of both storytelling and play in order to gain insight into what endings are and how we identify them in different media. While narrative digital games share many representational strategies for signalling their upcoming end with more traditional narrative media – such as novels or movies – they also show many forms of endings that often radically differ from our conventional understanding of conclusion and closure. From vast game worlds that remain open for play after a story’s finale, to multiple endings that are often hailed as a means for players to create their own stories, to the potentially tragic endings of failure and "game over", digital games question the traditional singularity and finality of endings. Using a broad range of examples, this book delves deeply into these and other forms and their functions, both to reveal the closural specificities of the ludonarrative hybrid that digital games are, as well as to find the core elements that characterise endings in any medium. It examines how endings make themselves known to players and raises the question of how well-established closural conventions blend with play and a player’s effort to achieve a goal.As an interdisciplinary study that draws on game studies as much as on transmedial narratology, Forms and Functions of Endings in Narrative Digital Games is suited for scholars and students of digital games as well as for narratologists yet to become familiar with this medium.
Comics and Videogames
From Hybrid Medialities to Transmedia Expansions
AvAndreas Rauscher,Daniel Steinm. fl.
Häftad, Engelska, 2022
667 kr
Skickas inom 10-15 vardagar
This book offers the first comprehensive study of the many interfaces shaping the relationship between comics and videogames. It combines in-depth conceptual reflection with a rich selection of paradigmatic case studies from contemporary media culture.The editors have gathered a distinguished group of international scholars working at the interstices of comics studies and game studies to explore two interrelated areas of inquiry: The first part of the book focuses on hybrid medialities and experimental aesthetics "between" comics and videogames; the second part zooms in on how comics and videogames function as transmedia expansions within an increasingly convergent and participatory media culture. The individual chapters address synergies and intersections between comics and videogames via a diverse set of case studies ranging from independent and experimental projects via popular franchises from the corporate worlds of DC and Marvel to the more playful forms of media mix prominent in Japan.Offering an innovative intervention into a number of salient issues in current media culture, Comics and Videogames will be of interest to scholars and students of comics studies, game studies, popular culture studies, transmedia studies, and visual culture studies.
Forms and Functions of Endings in Narrative Digital Games
AvMichelle Herte
Häftad, Engelska, 2022
667 kr
Skickas inom 10-15 vardagar
This book looks closely at the endings of narrative digital games, examining their ways of concluding the processes of both storytelling and play in order to gain insight into what endings are and how we identify them in different media. While narrative digital games share many representational strategies for signalling their upcoming end with more traditional narrative media – such as novels or movies – they also show many forms of endings that often radically differ from our conventional understanding of conclusion and closure. From vast game worlds that remain open for play after a story’s finale, to multiple endings that are often hailed as a means for players to create their own stories, to the potentially tragic endings of failure and "game over", digital games question the traditional singularity and finality of endings. Using a broad range of examples, this book delves deeply into these and other forms and their functions, both to reveal the closural specificities of the ludonarrative hybrid that digital games are, as well as to find the core elements that characterise endings in any medium. It examines how endings make themselves known to players and raises the question of how well-established closural conventions blend with play and a player’s effort to achieve a goal.As an interdisciplinary study that draws on game studies as much as on transmedial narratology, Forms and Functions of Endings in Narrative Digital Games is suited for scholars and students of digital games as well as for narratologists yet to become familiar with this medium.
Independent Videogames
Cultures, Networks, Techniques and Politics
AvPaolo Ruffino
Häftad, Engelska, 2022
667 kr
Skickas inom 10-15 vardagar
Independent Videogames investigates the social and cultural implications of contemporary forms of independent video game development. Through a series of case studies and theoretical investigations, it evaluates the significance of such a multi-faceted phenomenon within video game and digital cultures. A diverse team of scholars highlight the specificities of independence within the industry and the culture of digital gaming through case studies and theoretical questions. The chapters focus on labor, gender, distribution models and technologies of production to map the current state of research on independent game development. The authors also identify how the boundaries of independence are becoming opaque in the contemporary game industry – often at the cost of the claims of autonomy, freedom and emancipation that underlie the indie scene. The book ultimately imagines new and better narratives for a less exploitative and more inclusive videogame industry.Systematically mapping the current directions of a phenomenon that is becoming increasingly difficult to define and limit, this book will be a crucial resource for scholars and students of game studies, media history, media industries and independent gaming.
Evolutionary Psychology and Digital Games
Digital Hunter-Gatherers
AvJohannes Breuer,Daniel Pietschmannm. fl.
Häftad, Engelska, 2020
662 kr
Skickas inom 10-15 vardagar
Evolutionary Psychology and Digital Games: Digital Hunter-Gatherers is the first edited volume that systematically applies evolutionary psychology to the study of the use and effects of digital games. The book is divided into four parts: Theories and Methods Emotion and Morality Social Interaction Learning and Motivation These topics reflect the main areas of digital games research as well as some of the basic categories of psychological research. The book is meant as a resource for researchers and graduate students in psychology, anthropology, media studies and communication as well as video game designers who are interested in learning more about the evolutionary roots of player behaviors and experiences.
New Perspectives on the Social Aspects of Digital Gaming
Multiplayer 2
AvRachel Kowert,Thorsten Quandt
Häftad, Engelska, 2019
667 kr
Skickas inom 10-15 vardagar
Expanding on the work in the volume Multiplayer, this new book explores several other areas related to social gaming in detail. The aim is to go beyond a typical "edited book" concept, and offer a very concise volume with several focal points that are most relevant for the current debate about multiplayer games, both in academia and society. As a result, the volume offers the latest research findings on online gaming, social forms of gaming, identification, gender issues and games for change, primarily applying a social-scientific approach.
Fans and Videogames
Histories, Fandom, Archives
AvMelanie Swalwell,Angela Ndalianism. fl.
Häftad, Engelska, 2019
667 kr
Skickas inom 10-15 vardagar
This anthology addresses videogames long history of fandom, and fans’ important role in game history and preservation. In order to better understand and theorize video games and game playing, it is necessary to study the activities of gamers themselves. Gamers are active creators in generating meaning; they are creators of media texts they share with other fans (mods, walkthroughs, machinima, etc); and they have played a central role in curating and preserving games through activities such as their collective work on: emulation, creating online archives and the forensic archaeology of code. This volume brings together essays that explore game fandom from diverse perspectives that examine the complex processes at work in the phenomenon of game fandom and its practices. Contributors aim to historicize game fandom, recognize fan contributions to game history, and critically assess the role of fans in ensuring that game culture endures through the development of archives.
Videogames, Identity and Digital Subjectivity
AvRob Gallagher
Häftad, Engelska, 2019
667 kr
Skickas inom 10-15 vardagar
This book argues that games offer a means of coming to terms with a world that is being transformed by digital technologies. As blends of software and fiction, videogames are uniquely capable of representing and exploring the effects of digitization on day-to-day life. By modeling and incorporating new technologies (from artificial intelligence routines and data mining techniques to augmented reality interfaces), and by dramatizing the implications of these technologies for understandings of identity, nationality, sexuality, health and work, games encourage us to playfully engage with these issues in ways that traditional media cannot.
Identity and Play in Interactive Digital Media
Ergodic Ontogeny
AvSara M. Cole
Häftad, Engelska, 2019
667 kr
Skickas inom 10-15 vardagar
Recent shifts in new literacy studies have expanded definitions of text, reading/viewing, and literacy itself. The inclusion of non-traditional media forms is essential, as texts beyond written words, images, or movement across a screen are becoming ever more prominent in media studies. Included in such non-print texts are interactive media forms like computer or video games that can be understood in similar, though distinct, terms as texts that are read by their users. This book examines how people are socially, culturally, and personally changing as a result of their reading of, or interaction with, these texts. This work explores the concept of ergodic ontogeny: the mental development resulting from interactive digital media play experiences causing change in personal identity.
Immersion, Narrative, and Gender Crisis in Survival Horror Video Games
AvAndrei Nae
Inbunden, Engelska, 2021
2 422 kr
Skickas inom 10-15 vardagar
This book investigates the narrativity of some of the most popular survival horror video games and the gender politics implicit in their storyworlds. In a thorough analysis of the genre that draws upon detailed comparisons with the mainstream action genre, Andrei Nae places his analysis firmly within a political and social context.In comparing survival horror games to the dominant game design norms of the action genre, the author differentiates between classical and postclassical survival horror games to show how the former reject the norms of the action genre and deliver a critique of the conservative gender politics of action games, while the latter are more heterogeneous in terms of their game design and, implicitly, gender politics.This book will appeal not only to scholars working in game studies, but also to scholars of horror, gender studies, popular culture, visual arts, genre studies and narratology.
Manifestations of Queerness in Video Games
AvGaspard Pelurson
Inbunden, Engelska, 2022
2 422 kr
Skickas inom 10-15 vardagar
Taking the reader on a journey through queer manifestations in games, this book advocates for video games as a rich, political and cultural medium, which provides us with tools to navigate the future of gaming.Situated at the intersection of New Media, Game, Cultural and Queer Studies, the book navigates diverse interspecies relationships, queer villains from the past, Pokémon memes on border politics, flânerie in post-industrial cities and one-sided erotic fights. It provides new critical engagements with the works of Jose Esteban Muñoz, Bonnie Ruberg, Guy Debord and Jack Halberstam, examining queer representation, gaming subcultures and dissident play practices. Making the bold claim that video games might be the queerest medium today, this book provides organic, self-reflective and, ultimately, thought-provoking thinking in which both games and gamers are queered.This book will be of interest to scholars researching game studies, sex, gender and sexuality in new media, but also readers interested in literature, digital media, society, participatory culture and queer studies.
Video Game Policy
Production, Distribution, and Consumption
AvSteven Conway,Jennifer deWinter
Häftad, Engelska, 2017
730 kr
Skickas inom 10-15 vardagar
This book analyzes the effect of policy on the digital game complex: government, industry, corporations, distributors, players, and the like. Contributors argue that digital games are not created nor consumed outside of the complex power relationships that dictate the full production and distribution cycles, and that we need to consider those relationships in order to effectively "read" and analyze digital games. Through examining a selection of policies, e.g. the Australian government’s refusal (until recently) to allow an R18 rating for digital games, Blizzard’s policy in regards to intellectual property, Electronic Arts’ corporate policy for downloadable content (DLC), they show how policy, that is to say the rules governing the production, distribution and consumption of digital games, has a tangible effect upon our understanding of the digital game medium.
Immersion, Narrative, and Gender Crisis in Survival Horror Video Games
AvAndrei Nae
Häftad, Engelska, 2024
718 kr
Skickas inom 10-15 vardagar
This book investigates the narrativity of some of the most popular survival horror video games and the gender politics implicit in their storyworlds. In a thorough analysis of the genre that draws upon detailed comparisons with the mainstream action genre, Andrei Nae places his analysis firmly within a political and social context.In comparing survival horror games to the dominant game design norms of the action genre, the author differentiates between classical and postclassical survival horror games to show how the former reject the norms of the action genre and deliver a critique of the conservative gender politics of action games, while the latter are more heterogeneous in terms of their game design and, implicitly, gender politics.This book will appeal not only to scholars working in game studies, but also to scholars of horror, gender studies, popular culture, visual arts, genre studies and narratology.
Posthuman Gaming
Avatars, Gamers, and Entangled Subjectivities
AvPoppy Wilde
Inbunden, Engelska, 2023
2 422 kr
Skickas inom 10-15 vardagar
Posthuman Gaming: Avatars, Gamers, and Entangled Subjectivities explores the relationship between avatar and gamer in the massively multiplayer online roleplaying game World of Warcraft, to examine notions of entangled subjectivity, affects, and embodiments – what it means and how it feels to be posthuman.With a focus on posthuman subjectivity, Wilde considers how we can begin to articulate ourselves when the boundary between self and other is unclear. Drawing on fieldnotes of her own gameplay experiences, the author analyses how subjectivity is formed in ways that defy a single individual notion of “self”, and explores how different practices, feelings, and societal understandings can disrupt strict binaries and emphasise our posthumanism. She interrogates if one can speak of an “I” in the face of posthuman multiplicity, before exploring different analytical themes, beginning with how acting theories might be posthumanised and articulate the relationship between avatar and gamer. She then defines posthuman empathy and explains how this is experienced in gaming, before addressing the need to account for boredom, the complexity of nostalgia, and ways death and loss are experienced through gaming.This volume will appeal to a broad audience and is particularly relevant to scholars and students of cultural studies, media studies, humanities, and game studies.
Videogames and the Gothic
AvEwan Kirkland
Häftad, Engelska, 2024
718 kr
Skickas inom 10-15 vardagar
This book explores the many ways Gothic literature and media have informed videogame design. Through a series of detailed case studies, Videogames and the Gothic illustrates the extent to which particular tropes of Gothic culture –neo-medieval aesthetics, secret-filled labyrinthine spaces, the sense of a dark past impacting upon the present – have been appropriated by and transformed within digital games. Moving beyond the study of the generic influences of horror on digital gaming, Ewan Kirkland focuses in on the Gothic, a less visceral mode tending towards the unsettling, the uncertain and the uncanny. He explores the extent to which imagery, storylines and narrative preoccupations taken from Gothic fiction facilitate the affordances and limitations of the videogame medium. A core contention of this book is that videogames have developed as an inherently Gothic form of popular entertainment. Arguing for close proximity between Gothic culture and the videogame medium itself, this book will be a key contribution to both Gothic and digital game scholarship; as such, it will have resonance with scholars and students in both areas, as well as those interested in Gothic novels, media and popular culture, digital games and interactive fiction.
Posthuman Gaming
Avatars, Gamers, and Entangled Subjectivities
AvPoppy Wilde
Häftad, Engelska, 2024
625 kr
Skickas inom 10-15 vardagar
Posthuman Gaming: Avatars, Gamers, and Entangled Subjectivities explores the relationship between avatar and gamer in the massively multiplayer online roleplaying game World of Warcraft, to examine notions of entangled subjectivity, affects, and embodiments – what it means and how it feels to be posthuman.With a focus on posthuman subjectivity, Wilde considers how we can begin to articulate ourselves when the boundary between self and other is unclear. Drawing on fieldnotes of her own gameplay experiences, the author analyses how subjectivity is formed in ways that defy a single individual notion of “self”, and explores how different practices, feelings, and societal understandings can disrupt strict binaries and emphasise our posthumanism. She interrogates if one can speak of an “I” in the face of posthuman multiplicity, before exploring different analytical themes, beginning with how acting theories might be posthumanised and articulate the relationship between avatar and gamer. She then defines posthuman empathy and explains how this is experienced in gaming, before addressing the need to account for boredom, the complexity of nostalgia, and ways death and loss are experienced through gaming.This volume will appeal to a broad audience and is particularly relevant to scholars and students of cultural studies, media studies, humanities, and game studies.
Playful Undead and Video Games
Critical Analyses of Zombies and Gameplay
AvStephen J. Webley,Peter Zackariasson
Häftad, Engelska, 2021
667 kr
Skickas inom 10-15 vardagar
This book explores the central role of the zombie in contemporary popular culture as they appear in video games. Moving beyond traditional explanations of their enduring appeal – that they embody an aesthetic that combines horror with a mindless target; that lower age ratings for zombie games widen the market; or that Artificial Intelligence routines for zombies are easier to develop – the book provides a multidisciplinary and comprehensive look at this cultural phenomenon.Drawing on detailed case studies from across the genre, contributors from a variety of backgrounds offer insights into how the study of zombies in the context of video games informs an analysis of their impact on contemporary popular culture. Issues such as gender, politics, intellectual property law, queer theory, narrative storytelling and worldbuilding, videogame techniques and technology, and man’s relation to monsters are closely examined in their relation to zombie video games.Breaking new ground in the study of video games and popular culture, this volume will be of interest to researchers in a broad range of areas including media, popular culture, video games, and media psychology.
Longing, Ruin, and Connection in Hideo Kojima’s Death Stranding
AvAmy M. Green
Inbunden, Engelska, 2021
962 kr
Skickas inom 10-15 vardagar
This volume provides an in-depth examination of the video game Death Stranding, focusing on the game’s exploration of ruin, nostalgia, and atonement as its primary symbolic, narrative, and mechanical language.Offering the first close examination of Death Stranding’s narrative, the book also incorporates a strong foundation in game studies, most especially related to the concepts of immersion and embodiment. The focus of the book lies in considering how Death Stranding expands on the themes of ruin, longing, and the need for connection, and whether a reconciliation—on a community level, national level, or even global level—might be possible.This book will appeal to scholars in a variety of disciplines in the Humanities and the Social Sciences, from video game studies and media studies to English, history, philosophy, and popular culture.
Longing, Ruin, and Connection in Hideo Kojima’s Death Stranding
AvAmy M. Green
Häftad, Engelska, 2024
302 kr
Skickas inom 10-15 vardagar
This volume provides an in-depth examination of the video game Death Stranding, focusing on the game’s exploration of ruin, nostalgia, and atonement as its primary symbolic, narrative, and mechanical language.Offering the first close examination of Death Stranding’s narrative, the book also incorporates a strong foundation in game studies, most especially related to the concepts of immersion and embodiment. The focus of the book lies in considering how Death Stranding expands on the themes of ruin, longing, and the need for connection, and whether a reconciliation—on a community level, national level, or even global level—might be possible.This book will appeal to scholars in a variety of disciplines in the Humanities and the Social Sciences, from video game studies and media studies to English, history, philosophy, and popular culture.
Representing Conflicts in Games
Antagonism, Rivalry, and Competition
AvBjörn Sjöblom,Jonas Linderothm. fl.
Inbunden, Engelska, 2022
1 999 kr
Skickas inom 10-15 vardagar
This book offers an overview of how conflicts are represented and enacted in games, in a variety of genres and game systems. Games are a cultural form apt at representing real world conflicts, and this edited volume highlights the intrinsic connection between games and conflict through a set of theoretical and empirical studies. It interrogates the nature and use of conflicts as a fundamental aspect of game design, and how a wide variety of conflicts can be represented in digital and analogue games.The book asks what we can learn from conflicts in games, how our understanding of conflicts change when we turn them into playful objects, and what types of conflicts are still not represented in games. It queries the way games make us think about armed conflict, and how games can help us understand such conflicts in new ways.Offering a deeper understanding of how games can serve political, pedagogical, or persuasive purposes, this volume will interest scholars and students working in fields such as game studies, media studies, and war studies.
Videogames and Agency
AvBettina Bódi
Inbunden, Engelska, 2022
2 057 kr
Skickas inom 10-15 vardagar
Videogames and Agency explores the trend in videogames and their marketing to offer a player higher volumes, or even more distinct kinds, of player freedom. The book offers a new conceptual framework that helps us understand how this freedom to act is discussed by designers, and how that in turn reflects in their design principles.What can we learn from existing theories around agency? How do paratextual materials reflect design intention with regards to what the player can and cannot do in a videogame? How does game design shape the possibility space for player action? Through these questions and selected case studies that include AAA and independent games alike, the book presents a unique approach to studying agency that combines game design, game studies, and game developer discourse. By doing so, the book examines what discourses around player action, as well as a game’s design can reveal about the nature of agency and videogame aesthetics.This book will appeal to readers specifically interested in videogames, such as game studies scholars or game designers, but also to media studies students and media and screen studies scholars less familiar with digital games.The Open Access version of this book, available at http://www.taylorfrancis.com, has been made available under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives 4.0 license.
Representing Conflicts in Games
Antagonism, Rivalry, and Competition
AvBjörn Sjöblom,Jonas Linderothm. fl.
Häftad, Engelska, 2022
566 kr
Skickas inom 10-15 vardagar
This book offers an overview of how conflicts are represented and enacted in games, in a variety of genres and game systems. Games are a cultural form apt at representing real world conflicts, and this edited volume highlights the intrinsic connection between games and conflict through a set of theoretical and empirical studies. It interrogates the nature and use of conflicts as a fundamental aspect of game design, and how a wide variety of conflicts can be represented in digital and analogue games.The book asks what we can learn from conflicts in games, how our understanding of conflicts change when we turn them into playful objects, and what types of conflicts are still not represented in games. It queries the way games make us think about armed conflict, and how games can help us understand such conflicts in new ways.Offering a deeper understanding of how games can serve political, pedagogical, or persuasive purposes, this volume will interest scholars and students working in fields such as game studies, media studies, and war studies.
Videogames and Agency
AvBettina Bódi
Häftad, Engelska, 2022
583 kr
Skickas inom 10-15 vardagar
Videogames and Agency explores the trend in videogames and their marketing to offer a player higher volumes, or even more distinct kinds, of player freedom. The book offers a new conceptual framework that helps us understand how this freedom to act is discussed by designers, and how that in turn reflects in their design principles.What can we learn from existing theories around agency? How do paratextual materials reflect design intention with regards to what the player can and cannot do in a videogame? How does game design shape the possibility space for player action? Through these questions and selected case studies that include AAA and independent games alike, the book presents a unique approach to studying agency that combines game design, game studies, and game developer discourse. By doing so, the book examines what discourses around player action, as well as a game’s design can reveal about the nature of agency and videogame aesthetics.This book will appeal to readers specifically interested in videogames, such as game studies scholars or game designers, but also to media studies students and media and screen studies scholars less familiar with digital games.The Open Access version of this book, available at http://www.taylorfrancis.com, has been made available under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives 4.0 license.
Manifestations of Queerness in Video Games
AvGaspard Pelurson
Häftad, Engelska, 2024
611 kr
Skickas inom 10-15 vardagar
Taking the reader on a journey through queer manifestations in games, this book advocates for video games as a rich, political and cultural medium, which provides us with tools to navigate the future of gaming.Situated at the intersection of New Media, Game, Cultural and Queer Studies, the book navigates diverse interspecies relationships, queer villains from the past, Pokémon memes on border politics, flânerie in post-industrial cities and one-sided erotic fights. It provides new critical engagements with the works of Jose Esteban Muñoz, Bonnie Ruberg, Guy Debord and Jack Halberstam, examining queer representation, gaming subcultures and dissident play practices. Making the bold claim that video games might be the queerest medium today, this book provides organic, self-reflective and, ultimately, thought-provoking thinking in which both games and gamers are queered.This book will be of interest to scholars researching game studies, sex, gender and sexuality in new media, but also readers interested in literature, digital media, society, participatory culture and queer studies.
Hybrid Play
Crossing Boundaries in Game Design, Players Identities and Play Spaces
AvAdriana de Souza e Silva,Ragan Glover-Rijkse
Häftad, Engelska, 2022
667 kr
Skickas inom 10-15 vardagar
This book explores hybrid play as a site of interdisciplinary activity—one that is capable of generating new forms of mobility, communication, subjects, and artistic expression as well as new ways of interacting with and understanding the world. The chapters in this collection explore hybrid making, hybrid subjects, and hybrid spaces, generating interesting conversations about the past, current and future nature of hybrid play. Together, the authors offer important insights into how place and space are co-constructed through play; how, when, and for what reasons people occupy hybrid spaces; and how cultural practices shape elements of play and vice versa. A diverse group of scholars and practitioners provides a rich interdisciplinary perspective, which will be of great interest to those working in the areas of games studies, media studies, communication, gender studies, and media arts.

Routledge Advances in Game Studies – serie

Independent Videogames

Paradox of Transgression in Games

Hybrid Play

Videogames and the Gothic

Comics and Videogames

Forms and Functions of Endings in Narrative Digital Games

Comics and Videogames

Forms and Functions of Endings in Narrative Digital Games

Independent Videogames

Evolutionary Psychology and Digital Games

New Perspectives on the Social Aspects of Digital Gaming

Fans and Videogames

Videogames, Identity and Digital Subjectivity

Identity and Play in Interactive Digital Media

Immersion, Narrative, and Gender Crisis in Survival Horror Video Games

Manifestations of Queerness in Video Games

Video Game Policy

Immersion, Narrative, and Gender Crisis in Survival Horror Video Games

Posthuman Gaming

Videogames and the Gothic

Posthuman Gaming

Playful Undead and Video Games

Longing, Ruin, and Connection in Hideo Kojima’s Death Stranding

Longing, Ruin, and Connection in Hideo Kojima’s Death Stranding

Representing Conflicts in Games

Videogames and Agency

Representing Conflicts in Games

Videogames and Agency

Manifestations of Queerness in Video Games

Hybrid Play