GREEN SUNS: THE POETICS AND POLITICS OF FANTASY IN THE MEDIUM OF VIDEO GAMES
Daniel Illger
This study seeks to develop a new perspective on the fantasy genre while exploring whether a particular affinity exists between fantasy and the medium of video games. In engaging with common assumptions about the genre, that it is politically reactionary and aesthetically unimaginative, it develops a transmedial poetics of fantasy that also enables a political assessment of the genre.
The central argument is that fantasy seeks to evoke a feeling of “longing for the radically Other,” which always entails a challenge to the historicity of a given community. The medium of video games, in turn, allows this aesthetic feeling to be experienced in a distinctive way, since it literally places the unfolding of fantastical worlds into the hands of players.
The implications of this are explored through poetic and aesthetic analyses of artistically outstanding games such as Dark Souls, Skyrim, and Hellblade. In doing so, the study opens up new possibilities for scholarly engagement with video games, as genuinely aesthetic thinking about the audiovisual imagery of individual games remains an underdeveloped area within game studies.
PUBLICATION DETAILS
LANGUAGE | BINDING | EDITION | ISBN | YEAR | PAGES |
German | Hardcover | | 9783110693645 | 2020 | 370 |
OTHER NAMES
Green Suns: The Poetics and Politics of Fantasy in the Medium of Video Games
Grüne Sonnen: Poetik und Politik der Fantasy am Medium Videospiel
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Authors: #DanielIllger
Publishers: #DeGruyter (De Gruyter)
Languages: #German
Format: #Hardcover
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Year: #Year2020
Genres: #GameStudies
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