series: Video Games and the Humanities

Published by De Gruyter Oldenbourg

Video Games and the Humanities

Edited by: Nathalie Aghoro, Iro Filippaki, Chris Kempshall, Esther MacCallum-Stewart, Jeremiah McCall and Sascha Pöhlmann

ISSN: 2700-0400

e-ISSN 2700-0419

Overview
Volumes

This series provides a multidisciplinary framework for scholarly approaches to video games in the humanities. It focuses especially on the dialectics of methodology and object: how do different scholarly fields apply their theories and methods to video games, and how do video games in turn affect these theories and methods?

This series seeks to reconnect media-centric Game Studies to the disciplines it had to distance itself from in its foundation, such as literary studies or film studies, in an attempt to use their differences and contact zones in a mutually productive dialogue. It also seeks to present innovative approaches in other fields in the humanities that have yet to consider video games in a systematic way, and give a home to ground-breaking publications that push the boundaries of existing discourses and debates. In this endeavor, the series is committed to a decidedly global scope as it assembles perspectives from different cultural and academic contexts.

In short, this series wants to see what the humanities do with video games and what video games do to the humanities.

Proposals can be send to: rabea.rittgerodt@degruyter.com

Advisory Board:

Alenda Y. Chang, UC Santa Barbara

Katherine J Lewis, University of Huddersfield

Dietmar Meinel, University of Duisburg-Essen

Ana Milošević, KU Leuven

Soraya Murray, UC Santa Cruz

Holly Nielsen, University of London

Michael Nitsche, Georgia Tech

Martin Picard, Leipzig University

Melanie Swalwell, Swinburne University

Emma Vossen, University of Waterloo

Mark J.P. Wolf, Concordia University

Esther Wright, Cardiff University

Topics

book: Assassin’s Creed in the Classroom

Book Ahead of Publication 2023

Assassin’s Creed in the Classroom

History’s Playground or a Stab in the Dark?

Erik Champion, Juan Francisco Hiriart Vera

Volume 15 in this series

The open world role-playing Assassin’s Creed video game series is one of the most successful series of all time, praised for its in-depth use of historical characters and events, compelling graphics, and addictive gameplay. Assassin’s Creed games offer up the possibility of exploring history, mythology, and heritage immersively, graphically, and imaginatively. This collection of essays by architects archaeologists and historiansexplores the learning opportunities of playing, modifying, and extending the games in the classroom, on location, in the architectural studio, and in a museum.

DOI:: https://doi.org/10.0000/9783111250724
ISBN:: 9783111250724
ISBN:: 9783111253275
ISBN:: 9783111253473
Subject:: History
Subject:: Topics in History
Subject:: Cultural History
Subject:: Digital History
Publisher:: De Gruyter Oldenbourg

book: Playing American

Book Open Access 2023

Playing American

Open-World Videogames and the Reproduction of American Culture

Sören Schoppmeier

Volume 14 in this series

Videogames have always depicted representations of American culture, but how exactly they feed back into this culture is less obvious. Advocating an action-based understanding of both videogames and culture, this book delineates how aspects of American culture are reproduced transnationally through popular open-world videogames. Playing American proposes an analytic focus on open-world videogames' "ambient operations" and traces practices of "playing American" through the stages of videogame development, gameplay, and reception. Three case studies – concentrating on the Grand Theft Auto, Watch Dogs, and Red Dead Redemption franchises, respectively – highlight different figurations of "playing American." Thematic foci range from public discourses on systemic racism and neoliberal capitalism to the justification of real-world surveillance practices and to the reconfiguration of the Western in the digital age. Playing American provides those interested in either videogames or American culture with a fresh angle and new concepts regarding its subject matters. It demonstrates that videogames are agents of cultural reproduction that do distinct cultural work for American culture in the twenty-first century.

DOI:: https://doi.org/10.0000/9783111317755
ISBN:: 9783111317755
ISBN:: 9783111244846
ISBN:: 9783111317984
Subject:: Cultural Studies
Subject:: Topics in Cultural Studies
Subject:: Popular Culture
Subject:: History
Subject:: Topics in History
Subject:: Cultural History
Subject:: Digital History
Subject:: Public History
Publisher:: De Gruyter Oldenbourg

book: (Not) In the Game

Book 2023

(Not) In the Game

History, Paratexts, and Games

Regina Seiwald, Edwin Vollans

Volume 13 in this series

How do games represent history, and how do we make sense of the history of games? The industry regularly uses history to sell products, while processes of creation and of promotion leave behind markers of a game’s history. The access to this history is often granted by so-called paratexts, which are accompanying elements orbiting texts. Exploring this fully, case studies in this work move the focus of debate from the games themselves to wider, ancillary materials and ask how history is used in, and how we can use history to study games.

DOI:: https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110732924
ISBN:: 9783110732924
ISBN:: 9783110737691
ISBN:: 9783110732993
Subject:: History
Subject:: Topics in History
Subject:: Cultural History
Subject:: Digital History
Publisher:: De Gruyter Oldenbourg

book: Video Games as Art

Book 2022

Video Games as Art

A Communication-Oriented Perspective on the Relationship between Gaming and the Art

Frank G. Bosman, Archibald L.H.M. van Wieringen

Volume 12 in this series

Video games are a relative late arrival on the cultural stage. While the academic discipline of game studies has evolved quickly since the nineties of the last century, the academia is only beginning to grasp the intellectual, philosophical, aesthetical, and existential potency of the new medium. The same applies to the question whether video games are (or are not) art in and on themselves. Based on the Communication-Oriented Analysis, the authors assess the plausibility of games-as-art and define the domains associted with this question.

DOI:: https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110731019
ISBN:: 9783110731019
ISBN:: 9783110735130
ISBN:: 9783110731101
Subject:: History
Subject:: Topics in History
Subject:: Cultural History
Subject:: Digital History
Publisher:: De Gruyter Oldenbourg

book: Teaching the Middle Ages through Modern Games

Book 2022

Teaching the Middle Ages through Modern Games

Using, Modding and Creating Games for Education and Impact

Robert Houghton

Volume 11 in this series

Games can act as invaluable tools for the teaching of the Middle Ages. The learning potential of physical and digital games is increasingly undeniable at every level of historical study. These games can provide a foundation of information through their stories and worlds. They can foster understanding of complex systems through their mechanics and rules. Their very nature requires the player to learn to progress.

The educational power of games is particularly potent within the study of the Middle Ages. These games act as the first or most substantial introduction to the period for many students and can strongly influence their understanding of the era. Within the classroom, they can be deployed to introduce new and alien themes to students typically unfamiliar with the subject matter swiftly and effectively. They can foster an interest in and understanding of the medieval world through various innovative means and hence act as a key educational tool.

This volume presents a series of essays addressing the practical use of games of all varieties as teaching tools within Medieval Studies and related fields. In doing so it provides examples of the use of games at pre-university, undergraduate, and postgraduate levels of study, and considers the application of commercial games, development of bespoke historical games, use of game design as a learning process, and use of games outside the classroom. As such, the book is a flexible and diverse pedagogical resource and its methods may be readily adapted to the teaching of different medieval themes or other periods of history.

DOI:: https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110712032
ISBN:: 9783110712032
ISBN:: 9783110711967
ISBN:: 9783110712117
Subject:: History
Subject:: Historical Periods
Subject:: Medieval History
Subject:: Topics in History
Subject:: Cultural History
Subject:: Digital History
Publisher:: De Gruyter Oldenbourg

book: Rockstar Games and American History

Book 2022

Rockstar Games and American History

Promotional Materials and the Construction of Authenticity

Esther Wright

Volume 10 in this series

For two decades, Rockstar Games have been making games that interrogate and represent the idea of America, past and present. Commercially successful, fan-beloved, and a frequent source of media attention, Rockstar’s franchises are positioned as not only game-changing, ground-breaking interventions in the games industry, but also as critical, cultural histories on America and its excesses.

But what does Rockstar’s version of American history look like, and how is it communicated through critically acclaimed titles like Red Dead Redemption (2010) and L.A. Noire (2011)? By combining analysis of Rockstar’s games and a range of official communications and promotional materials, this book offers critical discussion of Rockstar as a company, their video games, and ultimately, their attempts at creating new narratives about U.S. history and culture. It explores the ways in which Rockstar’s brand identity and their titles coalesce to create a new kind of video game history, how promotional materials work to claim the "authenticity" of these products, and assert the authority of game developers to perform the role of historian.

By working at the intersection of historical game studies, U.S. history, and film and media studies, this book explores what happens when contemporary demands for historical authenticity are brought to bear on the way we envisage the past – and whose past it is deemed to be. Ultimately, this book implores those who research historical video games to consider the oft-forgotten sources at the margins of these games as importance spaces where historical meaning is made and negotiated.

Watch our talk with the author Esther Wright here: https://youtu.be/AaC_9XsX-CQ

DOI:: https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110716610
ISBN:: 9783110716610
ISBN:: 9783110716696
ISBN:: 9783110716467
Subject:: History
Subject:: Topics in History
Subject:: Cultural History
Subject:: Digital History
Publisher:: De Gruyter Oldenbourg

book: Women in Historical and Archaeological Video Games

Book 2022

Women in Historical and Archaeological Video Games

Jane Draycott

Volume 9 in this series

This volume focuses on the depiction of women in video games set in historical periods or archaeological contexts, explores the tension between historical and archaeological accuracy and authenticity, examines portrayals of women in historical periods or archaeological contexts, portrayals of female historians and archaeologists, and portrayals of women in fantastical historical and archaeological contexts.　

It includes both triple A and independent video games, incorporating genres such as turn-based strategy, action-adventure, survival horror, and a variety of different types of role-playing games. Its chronological and geographical scope ranges from late third century BCE China, to mid first century BCE Egypt, to Pictish and Viking Europe, to Medieval Germany, to twentieth century Taiwan, and into the contemporary world, but it also ventures beyond our universe and into the fantasy realm of Hyrule and the science fiction solar system of the Nebula.　

DOI:: https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110724257
ISBN:: 9783110724257
ISBN:: 9783110724196
ISBN:: 9783110724271
ISBN:: 9783111356624
Subject:: History
Subject:: Topics in History
Subject:: Gender History
Subject:: Cultural History
Subject:: Digital History
Publisher:: De Gruyter Oldenbourg

book: The World Is Born From Zero

Book 2022

The World Is Born From Zero

Understanding Speculation and Video Games

Cameron Kunzelman

Volume 8 in this series

The World is Born From Zero is an investigation into the relationship between video games and science fiction through the philosophy of speculation. Cameron Kunzelman argues that the video game medium is centered on the evaluation and production of possible futures by following video game studies, media philosophy, and science fiction studies to their furthest reaches. Claiming that the best way to understand games is through rigorous formal analysis of their aesthetic strategies and the cultural context those strategies emerge from, Kunzelman investigates a diverse array of games like The Last of Us, VA-11 Hall-A, and Civilization VI in order to explore what science fiction video games can tell us about their genres, their ways of speculating, and how the medium of the video game does (or does not) direct us down experiential pathways that are both oppressive and liberatory. Taking a multidisciplinary look at these games, The World is Born From Zero offers a unique theorization of science fiction games that provides both science fiction studies and video game studies with new tools for thinking how this medium and mode inform each other.

DOI:: https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110719451
ISBN:: 9783110719451
ISBN:: 9783110718324
ISBN:: 9783111282169
ISBN:: 9783110719475
Subject:: History
Subject:: Topics in History
Subject:: Cultural History
Subject:: Digital History
Publisher:: De Gruyter Oldenbourg

book: Shaping the Past

Book 2022

Shaping the Past

Counterfactual History and Game Design Practice in Digital Strategy Games

Ylva Grufstedt

Volume 7 in this series

Ylva Grufstedt investigates the role of counterfactuals in uses of history through game designers and through digital strategy games. It discusses the content, form and perspectives that define different types of counterfactuals in the context of game-making – an effort to outline and detail the values and frameworks that shape the past in this popular media.

DOI:: https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110692488
ISBN:: 9783110692488
ISBN:: 9783110692624
ISBN:: 9783110692259
Subject:: History
Subject:: Historical Periods
Subject:: Contemporary History since 1945
Subject:: Other Topics
Subject:: Topics in History
Subject:: Cultural History
Subject:: Digital History
Publisher:: De Gruyter Oldenbourg

book: Delicious Pixels

Book 2022

Delicious Pixels

Food in Video Games

Agata Waszkiewicz

Volume 6 in this series

Delicious Pixels: Food in Video Games introduces critical food studies to game scholarship, showing the unique ways in which food is utilized in both video game gameplay and narrative to show that food is never just food but rather a complex means of communication and meaning-making. It aims at bringing the academic attention to digital food and to show how significant it became in the recent decades as, on the one hand, a world-building device, and, on the other, a crucial link between the in-game and out-of-game identities and experiences. This is done by examining specifically the examples of games in which food serves as the means of creating an intimate, cozy, and safe world and a close relationship between the players and the characters.

DOI:: https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110716603
ISBN:: 9783110716603
ISBN:: 9783110716474
ISBN:: 9783111353081
ISBN:: 9783110716689
Subject:: History
Subject:: Topics in History
Subject:: Cultural History
Subject:: Digital History
Publisher:: De Gruyter Oldenbourg

book: Video Games and Spatiality in American Studies

Book 2022

Video Games and Spatiality in American Studies

Dietmar Meinel

Volume 5 in this series

While video games have blossomed into the foremost expression of contemporary popular culture over the past decades, their critical study occupies a fringe position in American Studies. In its engagement with video games, this book contributes to their study but with a thematic focus on a particularly important subject matter in American Studies: spatiality. The volume explores the production, representation, and experience of places in video games from the perspective of American Studies. Contributions critically interrogate the use of spatial myths ("wilderness," "frontier," or "city upon a hill"), explore games as digital borderlands and contact zones, and offer novel approaches to geographical literacy. Eventually, Playing the Field II brings the rich theoretical repertoire of the study of space in American Studies into conversation with questions about the production, representation, and experience of space in video games.

DOI:: https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110675184
ISBN:: 9783110675184
ISBN:: 9783110675238
ISBN:: 9783110675108
ISBN:: 9783111353302
Subject:: Cultural Studies
Subject:: Topics in Cultural Studies
Subject:: Media
Subject:: History
Subject:: Historical Periods
Subject:: Contemporary History since 1945
Subject:: Other Topics
Subject:: Regional and National History
Subject:: North America
Subject:: United States of America
Subject:: Topics in History
Subject:: Cultural History
Publisher:: De Gruyter Oldenbourg

book: Expressive Space

Book 2022

Expressive Space

Embodying Meaning in Video Game Environments

Gregory Whistance-Smith

Volume 4 in this series

Video game spaces have vastly expanded the built environment, offering new worlds to explore and inhabit. Like buildings, cities, and gardens before them, these virtual environments express meaning and communicate ideas and affects through the spatial experiences they afford. Drawing on the emerging field of embodied cognition, this book explores the dynamic interplay between mind, body, and environment that sits at the heart of spatial communication. To capture the wide diversity of forms that spatial expression can take, the book builds a comparative analysis of twelve video games across four types of space, spanning ones designed for exploration and inhabitation, kinetic enjoyment, enacting a situated role, and enhancing perception. Together, these diverse virtual environments suggest the many ways that video games enhance and extend our embodied lives.

DOI:: https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110723731
ISBN:: 9783110723731
ISBN:: 9783110723571
ISBN:: 9783110723847
ISBN:: 9783111281971
Subject:: History
Subject:: Topics in History
Subject:: Cultural History
Subject:: Digital History
Publisher:: De Gruyter Oldenbourg

book: Dual Wield

Book 2022

Dual Wield

The Interplay of Poetry and Video Games

Jon Stone

Volume 3 in this series

In recent years, poetry and video games have begun talking to – and taking from – one another in earnest. Poets, ever in pursuit of meaning, now draw inspiration from digital-interactive fantasy worlds, while video game developers aim to enrich their creations by imbuing them with poetic depth. This book investigates the phenomena of poem-game hybrids and other forms of poetic-ludic interplay, making use of both a multidisciplinary critical approach and the author’s own experiments in building and testing hybrid artefacts. What emerges is the suggestion of a future where reading and playing are no longer seen as separate endeavours, where the quests for sensory pleasure and philosophic insight are one and the same.

DOI:: https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110719239
ISBN:: 9783110719239
ISBN:: 9783110719390
ISBN:: 9783111355924
ISBN:: 9783110718331
Subject:: Cultural Studies
Subject:: Genres and Media in Cultural Studies
Subject:: Digital Media and Communication
Subject:: History
Subject:: Topics in History
Subject:: Cultural History
Subject:: Digital History
Publisher:: De Gruyter Oldenbourg

book: White Mythic Space

Book 2022

White Mythic Space

Racism, the First World War, and ›Battlefield 1‹

Stefan Aguirre Quiroga

Volume 2 in this series

The fall of 2016 saw the release of the widely popular First World War video game Battlefield 1. Upon the game's initial announcement and following its subsequent release, Battlefield 1 became the target of an online racist backlash that targeted the game's inclusion of soldiers of color. Across social media and online communities, players loudly proclaimed the historical inaccuracy of black soldiers in the game and called for changes to be made that correct what they considered to be a mistake that was influenced by a supposed political agenda. Through the introduction of the theoretical framework of the ‘White Mythic Space’, this book seeks to investigate the reasons behind the racist rejection of soldiers of color by Battlefield 1 players in order to answer the question: Why do individuals reject the presence of people of African descent in popular representations of history?

DOI:: https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110729306
ISBN:: 9783110729306
ISBN:: 9783111281810
ISBN:: 9783110729849
ISBN:: 9783110729368
Subject:: History
Subject:: Historical Periods
Subject:: Contemporary History until 1945
Subject:: World War I
Subject:: Topics in History
Subject:: Cultural History
Subject:: Digital History
Publisher:: De Gruyter Oldenbourg

book: Hot Tubs and Pac-Man

Book 2020

Hot Tubs and Pac-Man

Gender and the Early Video Game Industry in the United States (1950s–1980s)

Anne Ladyem McDivitt

Volume 1 in this series

This work looks at the gendered nature of the US video gaming industry. Although there were attempts to incorporate women into development roles and market towards them as players, the creation of video games and the industry began in a world strongly gendered male. The early 1980s saw a blip of hope that the counter-cultural industry focused on fun would begin to include women, but after the video game industry crash, this free-wheeling freedom of the industry ended along with the beginnings of the inclusion of women. Many of the threads that began in the early years continued or have parallels with the modern video game industry. The industry continues to struggle with gender relations in the workplace and with the strongly gendered male demographic that the industry perceives as its main market.

DOI:: https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110668575
ISBN:: 9783110668575
ISBN:: 9783110668674
ISBN:: 9783110664461
Subject:: History
Subject:: Topics in History
Subject:: Gender History
Subject:: Cultural History
Subject:: Digital History
Publisher:: De Gruyter Oldenbourg

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