LUDOLOGY MEETS NARRATOLOGY: Similitude and differences between (video)games and narrative
"Literary theory and narratology have been helpful to understand cybertexts and videogames. Aristotelian Poetics [Laurel, 1993], Russian formalism [Porush and Hivner, ?], and poststructuralism [Landow, 1992] are some of the different perspectives that have been used to study the subject.
Some authors see cybertexts and videogames as a new form of or as an expansion of traditional narrative or drama. The fact is that these computer programs share many elements with stories: characters, chained actions, endings, settings.
However, there is another dimension that has been usually almost ignored when studying this kind of computer software: to analyze them as games.
The problems of using a 'game' perspective are many. Basically, traditional games have always had less academic status than other objects, like narrative. And because of this, game formalist studies are fragmented through different disciplines, and not very well developed.
In this paper we will propose to explore videogames and cybertexts as games. Our intention is not to replace the narratologic approach, but to complement it. We want to better understand what is the relationship with narrative and videogames; their similarities and differences."
(Gonzalo Frasca, 1999)
Frasca, Gonzalo (1999) 'Ludology Meets Narratology. Similitude and Differences between (Video)games and Narrative'. Originally published in Finnish in Parnasso 1999: 3, 365–71.
CONTRIBUTOR
Simon PerkinsSHARE
Rob Bryanton: Imagining the 10th Dimension
"Since the extra dimensions beyond spacetime that physicists talk about are all spatial dimensions (or 'space–like' as some prefer to say), thinking about how the simplest spatial dimensions relate one to another gives us tools for imagining the more complex ones. The key to remember with all this is that each additional spatial dimension is at 'right angles' to the one before: so each new dimension allows an observer to see 'around the corner' in a way that was unattainable from the previous dimension. This time, let's work through the dimensions with that idea in mind."
(Rob Bryanton, October 2009)
Rob Bryanton (2006). "Imagining the Tenth Dimension: A New Way of Thinking About Time and Space", Trafford Publishing.
CONTRIBUTOR
Simon PerkinsSHARE
Aristotle: a whole composed of causal relationships
"Now, according to our definition Tragedy is an imitation of an action that is complete, and whole, and of a certain magnitude; for there may be a whole that is wanting in magnitude. A whole is that which has a beginning, a middle, and an end. A beginning is that which does not itself follow anything by causal necessity, but after which something naturally is or comes to be. An end, on the contrary, is that which itself naturally follows some other thing, either by necessity, or as a rule, but has nothing following it. A middle is that which follows something as some other thing follows it. A well constructed plot, therefore, must neither begin nor end at haphazard, but conform to these principles."
(Aristotle, The Poetics, Part VII, The Internet Classics Archive)
CONTRIBUTOR
Simon PerkinsSHARE
Research as a mode of construction; engaging with the artefact in art and design research
"We contend that it is entirely feasible, and indeed desirable, to provide training for research degree students in art and design based on the premise that, firstly, research is a viable mode of art and design practice, as it is for the practices of the engineer or the doctor; and that secondly, to move from practice to research depends on the potential for conceiving the artefact as divisible into an ordered arrangement of parts that can be articulated as elements of a research process, whose primary outcome is knowledge. The need to understand that practice and research entail differences in terms of approach, outcome and constituency is as important for supervisors as it is for research degree candidates themselves. In an institutional environment in which the modernist concept of the object as an assemblage is a cliché, and within which we all pay lip service to the idea of research process, transferable knowledge is the last taboo. Knowledge transfer is taboo because it seems to violate the terms of the art and design artefact, in a way that radical design practice and conceptual art could never do. Moving beyond this taboo requires us to think of new forms of causality, economy and teleology for the art and design artefact, within an economy of research."
(Dr Naren Barfield & Dr Malcolm Quinn Glasgow School of Art, Scotland and Wimbledon School of Art, England)
Barfield, N. & M. Quinn (2004). "Research as a mode of construction; engaging with the artefact in art and design research", Working Papers in Art and Design 3 Retrieved
CONTRIBUTOR
Simon PerkinsSHARE
Telematics Timeline
Walker Art Center
The Internet––specifically the World Wide Web––has become such a successful "meme" in our society, that there is almost a cultural amnesia about telecommunications–based art that pre–dates the Web. As powerful as early projects such as Muntadas's "File Room" (1994) or Ken Goldberg's "Telegarden" (1995) were (and are), many artists were working in the embrace of telecommunications for almost twenty years prior. Kit Galloway and Sherrie Rabinowitz's 1977 "Satellite Arts Project" first introduced the notion of a virtual space––a video space in–between physical spaces––and their 1980 "Hole–in–Space" was a kind of magic of open–systems, bi–coastal communications that may have since become commonplace but which directly inspired several of the artists in the exhibition. Many others, from Bob Adrian to Roy Ascott to Carl Loeffler to Heidi Grundmann, proseletyzed the aesthetics and politics of a global connectivity over the ensuing years, using the available means, from fax to Slowscan TV to early computing networks. Their work and thoughtfulness about it is inspirational. The telematics timeline attempts to capture some of these highlights as well as a longer history of enabling technological innovation. Most importantly, it is open source. Anyone can upload new information or interpretations into the timeline via the Internet.
CONTRIBUTOR
The Constellations ProjectSHARE
