Gaming for Affect: Museum Online Games and the Embrace of Empathy

This article explores how museum online games encourage affective encounters in players. Video game theory has much to say about affect and empathy as ways into narrative worlds, and this literature is revisited to apply to museums’ games. Through two case studies – Ngā Mōrehu (The Survivors) (2010) from Te Papa Museum in Wellington, New Zealand, and Over the Top (2000) from the Canadian War Museum in Ottawa, Canada – appeals to empathy are scrutinized. Both games encourage players to adopt a first-person perspective within environments characterized by challenge and despair. These examples represent two approaches to game design and raise questions about the technical, educational and curatorial parameters of gaming for affect.