TY - CHAP
T1 - Realism in play
T2 - the uses of realism in computer game discourse
AU - Martin, Paul
PY - 2021
Y1 - 2021
N2 - There is no school of realism in game development, but the term ‘realism’ is used extensively by game developers, players, critics and journalists. This chapter analyzes 1,039 documents written by these groups to investigate how the term ‘realism’ is deployed in gaming discourse. Within this corpus, the term realism is used to describe two kinds of formal characteristics of games. The first – functional realism – relates to how a game behaves as a simulation; the second – perceptual realism – relates to how a game looks and sounds as a set of moving sound-images. In both of these forms, realism discursively constructs gaming in two contradictory ways. On the one hand, authors use the term realism to align gaming with other media forms in a way that elevates gaming to the status of cinema, art and literature, on the other, they use the term to distinguish gaming from other art forms and media to establish gaming within its own autonomous cultural space. Drawing on Roger Caillois’s categorization of play, the chapter argues that the discursive construction of games through the term realism is a form of boundary work that seeks to establish what counts as a game and who counts as a ‘gamer.’
AB - There is no school of realism in game development, but the term ‘realism’ is used extensively by game developers, players, critics and journalists. This chapter analyzes 1,039 documents written by these groups to investigate how the term ‘realism’ is deployed in gaming discourse. Within this corpus, the term realism is used to describe two kinds of formal characteristics of games. The first – functional realism – relates to how a game behaves as a simulation; the second – perceptual realism – relates to how a game looks and sounds as a set of moving sound-images. In both of these forms, realism discursively constructs gaming in two contradictory ways. On the one hand, authors use the term realism to align gaming with other media forms in a way that elevates gaming to the status of cinema, art and literature, on the other, they use the term to distinguish gaming from other art forms and media to establish gaming within its own autonomous cultural space. Drawing on Roger Caillois’s categorization of play, the chapter argues that the discursive construction of games through the term realism is a form of boundary work that seeks to establish what counts as a game and who counts as a ‘gamer.’
U2 - 10.1075/chlel.xxxii
DO - 10.1075/chlel.xxxii
M3 - Book Chapter
SN - 9789027208064
VL - I
T3 - A comparative history of literatures in European languages
SP - 715
EP - 733
BT - Landscapes of realism: rethinking literary realism in comparative perspectives
A2 - Dirk, Göttsche
A2 - Weninger, Robert
A2 - Rosa, Mucignat
PB - John Benjamins Publishing Company
CY - Amsterdam
ER -