War Games
Memory, Militarism and the Subject of Play
- 288 pages
- English
- PDF
- Available on iOS & Android
War Games
Memory, Militarism and the Subject of Play
About this book
Many of today's most commercially successful videogames, from Call of Duty to Company of Heroes, are war-themed titles that play out in what are framed as authentic real-world settings inspired by recent news headlines or drawn from history. While such games are marketed as authentic representations of war, they often provide a selective form of realism that eschews problematic, yet salient aspects of war. In addition, changes in the way Western states wage and frame actual wars makes contemporary conflicts increasingly resemble videogames when perceived from the vantage point of Western audiences. This interdisciplinary volume brings together scholars from games studies, media and cultural studies, politics and international relations, and related fields to examine the complex relationships between military-themed videogames and real-world conflict, and to consider how videogames might deal with history, memory, and conflict in alternative ways. It asks: What is the role of videogames in the formation and negotiation of cultural memory of past wars? How do game narratives and designs position the gaming subject in relation to history, war and militarism? And how far do critical, anti-war/peace games offer an alternative or challenge to mainstream commercial titles?
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Information
Table of contents
- Cover
- Contents
- List of Figures
- Notes on Contributors
- Acknowledgements
- 1 Introduction: Studying War and Games Philip Hammond and Holger Pötzsch
- 2 Reality Check: Videogames as Propaganda for Inauthentic War Philip Hammond 17
- 6 Playing the Historical Fantastic: Zombies, Mecha-Nazis and Making Meaning about the Past through Metaphor Adam Chapman 91
- 10 The Wargame Legacy: How Wargames Shaped the Roleplaying Experience from Tabletop to Digital Games Dimitra Nikolaidou 179
- Index