Videogame, Player, Text

by Atkins, Barry; Krzywinska, Tanya

• ISBN13: 9780719074011
• ISBN10: 0719074010
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2007-11-01
• Publisher: OXFORD UNIV PR

Summary

Videogame, Player, Textexamines the playing and playful subject through a series of analytical essays focused on particular videogames and playing experiences. With essays from a range of internationally renowned game scholars, the major aim of this collection is to show how it is that videogames communicate their meanings and provide their pleasures. Each essay focuses on specific examples of gameplay dynamics to tease out the specificities of videogames as a new form of interaction between text and digital technology for the purposes of entertainment.

Author Biography

Barry Atkins is Senior Lecturer in Computer Games Design at the University of Wales, Newport. Tanya Krzywinska is Professor of Screen Studies at Brunel University.

Table of Contents

List of contributors	p. vii
Introduction: videogame, player, text	p. 1
Beyond Ludus: narrative, videogames and the split condition of digital textuality	p. 8
All too urban: to live and die in SimCity	p. 29
Play, modality and claims of realism in Full Spectrum Warrior	p. 52
Why am I in Vietnam? The history of a video game	p. 66
'It's not easy being green': real-time game performance in Warcraft	p. 83
Being a determined agent in (the) World of Warcraft: text/play/identity	p. 101
Female Quake players and the politics of identity	p. 120
Of eye candy and id: the terrors and pleasures of Doom 3	p. 139
Second Life: the game of virtual life	p. 158
Playing to solve Savoir-Faire	p. 175
Without a goal: on open and expressive games	p. 191
Pleasure, spectacle and reward in Capcom's Street Fighter series	p. 204
The trouble with Civilization	p. 222
Killing time: time past, time present and time future in Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time	p. 237
Index	p. 254
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