Journal of Gaming & Virtual Worlds - Volume 3, Issue 2, 2011

Drawing on the Greek concept of mētis provides a way of highlighting the unique spatial epistemology of the video game and establishing connections between game theorists and scholars working on issues of space/place in other fields. Addressing ‘the antagonist[ic] relationship’ between the humanities and the social sciences with regard to video game studies (Wolf and Perron 2009: 14; citing a personal e-mail from critic Jesper Juul), this article emphasizes the priority of a mobile knowledge of space as enacted in video gameplay, and subsequently establishes important connections with key ideas on knowledge and space from Lefebvrian philosophy and from the interdisciplinary field of spatial theory.

This article aims to trace the relationship between specific types of video games and digital media performances and the central theatrical concept of participation and plague introduced by Antoine Artaud, in his major and highly influential theoretical work Le Theatre et son Double/Theatre and its Double. The emphasis is on immersive, action, adventure and role playing games, especially combat, fighting, shooter games and survival horror, taking place in a digital 3D space. Relevant digital media performances like those introduced by Stelarc and Kac, among others, which incorporate an actual stage or real space, are also included in the discussion. Artaud’s ‘ludology’ and his metaphor of plague are directly applied as a conceptual reflection, an aesthetic model or a method of performance to the above digital media genres, to explore their function as participated, embodied and sensed experiences onstage and/or in virtual environments. The discussion takes the form of a comparative study of drama and new media concepts. This leads to the conclusion that a new interdisciplinary area exists between theatre/performance and digital new media. In this area, Artaud’s notion of plague is materialized and developed further with the aid of digital technologies. This happens in a manner that precisely follows Artaud’s fundamental aesthetics, principles and causes of his plague-like dramaturgic method, in a recent digital adaptation of his theatre of cruelty, introducing a novel type of dramaturgic realization.

The 1987 West and Zimmerman article ‘Doing gender’ argues that throughout our daily lives, we are always ‘doing gender’, reinforcing what is acceptable behaviour for females and males according to socially defined gender roles. Through the examination of a qualitative study, this article explores the relationship between ‘doing gender’ and ‘playing gender’ in online virtual worlds, comparing differences in the conception and performance of gender in Second Life, primarily a social world, and Guild Wars, primarily a role-playing game. It also explores players’ perceptions of their own avatar gender choices, gendered play styles more broadly, as well as perceptions of in-game gender ratios.

A study using contemporary computer games, including Civilization IV, Making History: The Calm & the Storm and RollerCoaster Tycoon 3, illustrates how the design of the game interface and its associated behaviors can guide game player activity. Affordances, or potentials for action, can constrain and promote particular game player activity by influencing game player goal formation and constraining the corresponding action potentials to achieve those goals. Results demonstrate the importance of paying close attention to what the game interface offers players, as it serves to constrain in-game activity while providing salience to particular actions. These actions can be designed in ways that guide game player activity towards the achievement of ‘Serious’ goals. Patterns between the use of the game interface and game player intentions reveal the importance of the relationship between the game interface and player activity.

REALISM VERSUS REELISM: THE SCOURGING OF TOTAL WAR NAPOLEON: TOTAL WAR, THE CREATIVE ASSEMBLY (2010) Tokyo: Sega, Direct Download, $39.99 (USD) SCOURGE OF WAR: GETTYSBURG, NORB SOFTWARE DEVELOPMENT (2010) New Jersey: Norb Software Development, $54.99 (USD); ($22.99 (USD) Direct Download)