The image of the other in computer games

Abstract

The article covers one of the topics explored by the researchers of the Laboratory of Computer Games Research — the image of the Other (Alien, Different, Enemy, etc.) in computer games. Being a new form of aesthetic, cultural, social, and communicative experience, computer games are beginning to influence our everyday practices. Many of the processes in social life (production, labour, education, rest, communication) become mediated and playful. Game mechanics are used in non-game contexts (this process is called “gamification”), and due to this procedure, the experience of computer games is transmitted to the areas that are considered to entirely lack playfulness: war, pain, violence, corporeal feelings. All in all, nowadays many social relationships are formed by the game. For instance, the space of MMORPG often becomes a laboratory, where social skills are perfected, the first encounter with the other occurs, and the contours of new intersubjectivity are set. In games humans are even more unprotected than on the stage, in a reality-show, or on the battlefield because they cannot hide themselves behind the mask and have to open their face in front of the other to make the game happen. To begin the game, we let the Other (even if objectified in the form of rules) occupy our being. The article considers the examples of how the image of the Other is constructed in games, how the game space, the media field of the game, engenders certain ethical norms and ways of gaming behaviour. The way we look at each other is is determined by media, and in this sense, the game becomes more influential. This fact cannot be ignored by the social sciences, especially by those who explore media reality. Refs 33.