22 April, 2015

Matthew Weise

W agency, communication, cut-scene, Dialogue-Scene, Expression, First Amendment, ideology, interactivity, meaning, Opinion Summary, Speech, Videogaming Community

HOW VIDEOGAMES EXPRESS IDEAS

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Authors: Weise Matthew

Source: DiGRA ’03 – Proceedings of the 2003 DiGRA International Conference: Level Up, 2014

Volume: 2 ISBN / ISNN: ISSN 2342-9666

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Abstract:

What are the exact aspects of the videogame medium, the precise features or combinations of features that lend themselves to expressing ideas and meaning? To chart this out, I begin with an American legal case that serves as a foundation for the basic issues involved and then move on to show how this relates to some of the broader attitudes the world of videogame discourse. Based on this, I break down the expressive strategies of videogames into three aspects—non-playable sequences, rule-based systems, and the relationship between the two—which I then illustrate with examples proving that videogames can indeed be an expressive medium.

Keywords: agency, communication, cut-scene, Dialogue-Scene, Expression, First Amendment, ideology,interactivity, meaning, Opinion Summary, Speech, Videogaming Community