Half-real: Video Games Between Real Rules and Fictional WorldsA video game is half-real: we play by real rules while imagining a fictional world. We win or lose the game in the real world, but we slay a dragon (for example) only in the world of the game. In this thought-provoking study, Jesper Juul examines the constantly evolving tension between rules and fiction in video games. Discussing games from Pong to The Legend of Zelda, from chess to Grand Theft Auto, he shows how video games are both a departure from and a development of traditional non-electronic games. The book combines perspectives from such fields as literary and film theory, computer science, psychology, economic game theory, and game studies, to outline a theory of what video games are, how they work with the player, how they have developed historically, and why they are fun to play. Locating video games in a history of games that goes back to Ancient Egypt, Juul argues that there is a basic affinity between games and computers. Just as the printing press and the cinema have promoted and enabled new kinds of storytelling, computers work as enablers of games, letting us play old games in new ways and allowing for new kinds of games that would not have been possible before computers. Juul presents a classic game model, which describes the traditional construction of games and points to possible future developments. He examines how rules provide challenges, learning, and enjoyment for players, and how a game cues the player into imagining its fictional world. Juul's lively style and eclectic deployment of sources will make Half-Real of interest to media, literature, and game scholars as well as to game professionals and gamers. |
From inside the book
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... Tennis ( Hitmaker 2000 ) , the video games are much easier to master than their real - life professional counterparts are - namely , soccer and tennis . If we look at any video game , how can we say that the player is using less ...
... tennis activity . Puzzle Pirates ( Three Rings Design 2003 ) works explicitly with this type of meta- phorical substitution . Challenging another player to a sword duel leads to a two - player duel in a puzzle game . This is a duel of ...
... tennis — the raised hand simply implied that it was a chance occurrence beyond his control . Note the difference between the rules of Pong and the rules of the game of table tennis : In the real world , the ball will naturally bounce ...
Contents
Video Games and the Classic Game Model | 23 |
Rules | 55 |
Fiction | 121 |
Copyright | |
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