|
 |
Video games exist as a rare form of popular entertainment largely
untouched by polysyllabic analysis. That is changing; events like
the recent Computer
Games and Digital Textualities have been examining the medium
with a nuanced sense of narrative and media history, and sites like
MyVideoGames have
raised the level of discourse above that of commercial sites and
fan sites that too often alternate between drooling admiration and
snotty dismissal.
A new periodical,
GameStudies,
has emerged as arguably the highest-minded Web site on video
games. While the first issue is an inspiring foray into videogame scholarship, I
hope that game analysis in the future will examine more games and less
narrative theory.
Big Britches
Billed as "the international journal of computer game research,"
GameStudies attempts to straddle the gap between the gleefully sophomoric
mentality of most electronic entertainment and the professoriate's
passion for detached media studies. The editors feel their time has come:
"Today we have the possibility to build a new field. We have a
billion dollar industry with almost no basic research, we have the
most fascinating cultural material to appear in a very long time, and
we have the chance of uniting aesthetic, cultural and technical
design aspects in a single discipline" (Computer Game
Studies, Year One by Espen Aarseth). This sense of purpose
pervades the essays, infusing analysis with an attitude borne
of passion for a subject heretofore rejected by the academy.
Universities have hosted academic discussions about
electronic entertainment for decades now; a
conference about the meaning and impact of video games at Harvard took place
back in 1983 (see Video Games Visit Harvard Yard by Edna Mitchell). MIT and USC have
each hosted lively events in
the last few years (Computer and Video Games Come of Age, MIT, February 2000,
and Entertainment
in the Interactive Age,, USC, January 2001); and the University of
Chicago will chime in with Playing by the Rules
this fall. Nevertheless, most professors
working to establish video game course offerings have found their
efforts largely rebuffed up until very recently.
Millions of adults spend their recreational hours videogaming and enormous
numbers of kids exist strapped to their GameBoys; with so many people
playing, some nuanced study of electronic entertainment is overdue.
|
|
| |
|
