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Phantasmal Spaces : Archetypical Venues in Computer Games - Mathias Fuchs
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Phantasmal Spaces

Archetypical Venues in Computer Games

By: Mathias Fuchs

Hardcover | 13 June 2019

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Recognizable, recurring spatial settings in video games serve not only as points of reference and signposts for orientation, but also as implicit sources of content. These spatial archetypes denote more than real-world objects or settings: they suggest and bring forward emotional states, historical context, atmospheric "attunement," in the words of Massumi, and aesthetic programs that go beyond plain semiotic reference.

In each chapter, Mathias Fuchs brings to the fore an archetype commonly found in old and new digital games: The Ruin, The Cave, The Cloud, The Portal, The Road, The Forest, and The Island are each analysed at length, through the perspectives of aesthetics, games technology, psychoanalysis, and intertextuality. Gridding these seven tropes together with these four analytical lenses provides the reader with a systematic framework to understand the various complex considerations at play in evocative game design.

Industry Reviews
A major new work in game aesthetics: Fuchs neatly sidesteps the stale isolationist dogma of game studies by treating videogames as entwined within the same cultural and psychological forces as other artworks. And about time too!
Chris Bateman, game designer and author of Imaginary Games (2011)

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