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THE GAME CULTURE READER

Christine Daviault, David O’Grady, Francisco Ortega-Grimaldo, James W. Creel, Jason C. Thompson, Judd Ethan Ruggill, Ken S. McAllister, Kevin Moberly, Marc A. Ouelette, Randy Nichols, Rolf F. Nohr, Stephan Böhme, Steven Conway



 

In the "Game Culture Reader", editors Jason C. Thompson and Marc Ouellette propose that Game Studies - that peculiar multi-, inter-, and trans-disciplinary field wherein international researchers from such diverse areas as rhetoric, computer science, literary studies, culture studies, psychology, media studies and so on come together to study the production, distribution, and consumption of games - has reached an unproductive stasis. Its scholarship remains either divided (as in narratologist versus ludologist debate) or indecisive (as in its frequently apolitical stances on play and fandom).


Thompson and Ouellette firmly hold that scholarship should be distinguished from the repetitively reductive common places of violence, sexism, and addiction. In other words, beyond the headline-friendly modern topoi that now dominate the discourse of Game Studies, what issues, approaches, and insights are being, if not erased, then displaced?


This volume gathers together a host of scholars from different countries, institutions, disciplines, departments, and ranks in order to present original and evocative scholarship on digital game culture. Collectively, the contributors reject the common places that have come to define digital games as apolitical or as somehow outside of the imbricated processes of cultural production that govern the medium itself.


As an alternative, they offer essay that explore video game theory, ludic spaces and temporalities, and video game rhetoric. Importantly, the authors emphasize throughout that digital games should be understood on their own terms: literally, this assertion necessitates the serious reconsideration of terms borrowed from other academic disciplines; figuratively, the claim embeds the embrace of game play in the continuing investigation of digital games as cultural forms.


Put another way, by questioning the received wisdom that would consign digital games to irrelevant spheres of harmless child play or of invidious mass entertainment, the author productively engage with ludic ambiguities.

 

PUBLICATION DETAILS

LANGUAGE

BINDING

EDITION

ISBN

YEAR

PAGES

English

Hardcover

9781443840941

2013

285

 

TAGS


Publishers: #CambridgeScholarsPublishing (Cambridge Scholars Publishing)

Languages: #English

Format: #Hardcover

Accessibility: N/A

Year: #Year2013

Genres: #GameStudies


Companies:

N/A


Public Figures:

N/A


Games:

#CallOfDuty (Call of Duty, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare)

#Fallout (Fallout, Fallout 2, Fallout 3)

#GrandTheftAuto (Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas, Grand Theft Auto: The Ballad of Gay Tony)

#Halo (Halo, Halo 2, Halo 3, Halo Reach)

#MassEffect (Mass Effect, Mass Effect 2, Mass Effect 3)

#MedalOfHonor (Medal of Honor, Medal of Honor Allied Assault, Medal of Honor Allied Assault Breakthrough, Medal of Honor European Assault, Medal of Honor Frontline, Medal of Honor Heroes, Medal of Honor Pacific Assault, Medal of Honor Rising Sun, Medal of Honor Underground)

#StarCraft (StarCraft)

#TombRaider (Tomb Raider, Tomb Raider 2)

#Warcraft (World of Warcraft)


Misc:

N/A

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