Brett sent me links to two great talks about video games. The first, Fuck Videogames are the slides for a talk by Darius Kazemi about how there is nothing special about videogames as a medium and designers should think about different ways of expressing themselves. How To Destroy Everything, Or, Why Video Games Do Not Exist (And How This Is Great For Everyone) is a transcript of a talk by Marigold Bartlett (and Stephen Swift). They talk about the ableist language in game culture like “lame”, “moron”, “dumb” and so on. They talk about “ludonarrative dissonance” (you have to read the essay) and this leads to other reflections. They end with:
We’re not attempting to guilt you. We’re saying if you’re going to celebrate what the amazing things in this medium can do, you have to equally take responsibility for this culture. You have to take responsibility for the things you don’t own. Give up ownership of video games. See them for the social construct that they are. For the sake of others whose voices aren’t being heard, who won’t be heard unless things change.
Video games don’t exist.
We invented them.
And we can destroy them.