Digital Games, Image-Consciousness and Superreality
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.5617/jpg.7762Abstract
This paper argues that digital games are best understood as a type of image-consciousness (Bildbewusstein). First, I argue how our experiences of digital games are not perceptions. Second, I provide a summary of the phenomenological natures of three basic modes of consciousness in Hus-serl, Fink and Sartre—perception, phantasy and image-consciousness—in order to demonstrate that the latter ultimately finds its place between the other two. Lastly, I spell out the implications and contributions these insights can have for our understanding of digital games, including their quite unique character and force. Indeed, once one understands digital games as a quintessential instantia-tion of this intermediate kind of consciousness, one can also better understand the immense pull digital games can have on us, not least their ‘superreality’.
References
Games
BEJEWELED. PopCap Games, from 2001.
CALL OF DUTY. Treyarch/Activison, from 2003.
DOOM. id Software, MS-DOS, 1993.
FIFA. EA Sports, from 1993.
FORTNITE. Epic Games, PS4, 2017.
MARIO KART 64. Nintendo, Nintendo 64, 1996.
MINECRAFT. Mojang Studios, from 2009.
ROCKET LEAGUE. Psyonix, PS4, 2015.
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