HRNS 353:003 Course Calendar
WEEK 1 // INTRODUCTION
Tuesday, January 22
- What is fun? What is play? What are games? What are videogames?
Thursday, January 24
- Geoff King and Tanya Krzywinska, Tomb Raiders and Space Invaders: Videogame Forms and Contexts, pp. 1-37
- Eric Zimmerman, “Narrative, Interactivity, Play, and Games: Four Naughty Concepts in Need of Discipline,” First Person: New Media as Story, Performance, and Game, pp. 154-164
- To Play: Pac Man and Ms. Pac Man
- In class: flOw by Jenova Chen
WEEK 2 // THINKING CRITICALLY ABOUT VIDEOGAMES
Tuesday, January 29
- Tomb Raiders and Space Invaders, pp. 37-75.
- Steven Poole, Trigger Happy: Videogames and the Entertainment Revolution, pp. 307-321, available online as PDF
- To Play: The Star Wars Arcade Game (via Stella) and Tetris
- In class: 24: The Game (Cut Scenes) and 24: The Game (Interrogation Mission)
Thursday, January 31
- Nick Montfort, “Combat in Context,” Game Studies 6.1 (2006)
- To Play: Combat, Asteroids, and The Crossing
- In class: Classic Atari Commercial
WEEK 3 // EARLY HISTORY
Tuesday, February 5
- Digital Play: The Interaction of Technology, Culture, and Marketing, “Origins of an Industry” and “Electronic Frontiers,” pp. 84-127
- To Play: Space Invaders and Donkey Kong
Thursday, February 7
- Digital Play, “Mortal Kombats” and “Age of Empires,” pp. 128-168
- Due: Inquiry #1
- In Class: Sega Commercial, Sonic Commercial, Streets of Rage Commercial, Crash Bandicoot Commercial
WEEK 4 // NARRATIVE VERSUS GAMEPLAY
Tuesday, February 12
- Janet Murray, “From Game-Story to Cyberdrama,” First Person, pp. 2-11
- Ken Perlin, “Can There Be a Form between a Game and a Story,” First Person, pp. 12-18
- Espen Aarseth, “Genre Trouble: Narrativism and the Art of Simulation,” First Person, pp. 45-55
- Glenn Wichman, “A Brief History of Rogue“
- To Play: Rogue and Pax
- In Class: Passage (and see Jason Rohrer’s Creator Statement too)
Thursday, February 14
- Henry Jenkins, “Game Design as Narrative Architecture,” First Person, pp. 118-130
- To Play: Façade (Game Trailer)
WEEK 5 // SPACE AND TIME IN VIDEOGAMES
Tuesday, February 19
- Mark J.P. Wolf, “Inventing Space: Toward a Taxonomy of On- and Off-screen Space in Video Games.” Film Quarterly 51.1 (1997): 11-23, Available online through JSTOR, on-campus and off-campus
- Tomb Raiders and Space Invaders, pp. 76-97
- To Play: Pitfall and Shift (Hint: You must use the <shift> key in this game)
Thursday, February 21
- Jesper Juul, “Introduction to Game Time,” First Person, pp. 131-142
- Tomb Raiders and Space Invaders, pp. 97-123
WEEK 6 // MISE-EN-SCENE IN VIDEOGAMES
Tuesday, February 26
- Seif El-Nasr, Magy, et al, “Dynamic Lighting for Tension in Games,” Game Studies 7.1 (2006)
- Zack Whalen, “Play Along - an Approach to Videogame Music,” Game Studies 4.1 (2004)
Thursday, February 28
- Due: Inquiry #2
WEEK 7 // INTERACTIVE FICTION
Tuesday, March 4
- Nick Montfort, “Interactive Fiction as ‘Story,’ ‘Game,’ ‘Storygame,’ ‘Novel,’ ‘World,’ ‘Literature,’ ‘Puzzle,’ ‘Problem,’ ‘Riddle,’ and ‘Machine,’” First Person, pp. 310-317
- Nick Montfort, “Toward a Theory of Interactive Fiction“
- Interactive Fiction: Instructions
- To Play: Zork and Galatea
Thursday, March 6
- To Play: The Baron
WEEK 8 // NO CLASS (SPRING BREAK)
Tuesday, March 11 & Thursday, March 13
- Begin playing FreeCiv and Kingdom of Loathing
WEEK 9 // VIDEOGAMES AND SPECTACLE
Tuesday, March 18
- Walter Benjamin, “The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction” (WebCT)
Thursday, March 20
- Tomb Raiders and Space Invaders, pp. 124-167
- To Play: BattleZone and Quake
- In class: World Class Leaderboard (C64), Tiger Woods PGA Tour (360), Wii Sports, Shadow of the Colossus (PS2)
WEEK 10 // VIDEOGAMES AND POLITICS
Tuesday, March 25
- Tomb Raiders and Space Invaders, pp. 168-187
Thursday, March 27
- Alexander R. Galloway, “Social Realism in Gaming,” Game Studies, 4.1 (2004)
- Simon Penny, “Representation, Enaction, and the Ethics of Simulation,” First Person, pp. 73-84
- To Play: Columbine RPG
- In class: Manhunt 2 (Wii)
WEEK 11 // VIDEOGAMES, POLITICS, AND WAR
Tuesday, April 1
- Alexander R. Galloway, “Playing the Code: Allegories of Control in Civilization,” Radical Philosophy 128 (2004): 33-40 (handout)
- To Play: FreeCiv
- In Class: You Are Where You Live
Thursday, April 3
- Digital Play, “Designing Militarized Masculinity,” pp. 246-268
- Clive Thompson, “The Making of an X Box Warrior,” from The New York Times (free registration required)
- In Class: America’s Army, Dead-In-Iraq
- Due: Inquiry #3
WEEK 12 // VIDEOGAMES AND 9/11
Tuesday, April 8
- Ian Bogost, “Political Processes” from Persuasive Games, pp. 67-98 (e-reserve)
- To Play: September 12, Madrid, and AntiWarGame
- In Class: Darfur is Dying and Stop Disasters (from the United Nations’ International Strategy for Disaster Reduction)
Thursday, April 10
- Texts and Games TBA
WEEK 13 // COUNTER-GAMES
Tuesday, April 15
- Alexander R. Galloway, “Counter Gaming” from Gaming: Essays on Algorithmic Culture, Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2006, pp. 107-126; 135-136 (e-reserve)
- Gonzalo Frasca, “Videogames of the Oppressed: Critical Thinking, Education, Tolerance, and Other Trivial Issues,” First Person, pp. 85-94
- To Play: Disaffected! and McDonald’s Videogame
Thursday, April 17
- To Play: The Bomar Gene, Game, Game, Game, and Again Game, and This Is How You Will Die
- Due: Inquiry #4
WEEK 14 // MAKING, PLAYING, AND WORRYING ABOUT VIDEOGAMES
Tuesday, April 22
- Digital Play, “The New Cyber-City” and “Workers and Warez,” pp. 169-217
Thursday, April 24
- Presentations
WEEK 15 // PRESENTATIONS
Tuesday, April 29
- Presentations
Thursday, May 1
- Lingering Questions on Violence and Videogames
- GTA IV NYT Review and GTA IV and the Economy
WEEK 16 // FINAL PAPER
- Due Thursday, May 8
