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Reality inspired games: expanding the lens of games' claims to authenticity

McMillan, Robyn; Jayemanne, Darshana; Donald, Iain

Authors

Robyn McMillan

Darshana Jayemanne



Contributors

Dale Leorke
Editor

Abstract

This paper considers the potentials of contemporary games staking claims to realism through documentary and journalistic techniques as part of a wide-ranging cultural and technological phenomenon– ‘Reality Inspired Games’ or RIGs (Maurin, 2018). We argue that RIGs employ design techniques and strategies of legitimation that are valuable to the reactive development cycles in the indie sector, whilst also being beneficial for academic research and development. Through examining traditional documentary and the concept of Bruzzi’s performative documentary (2006) we highlight how this concept may allow developers to negotiate performativity and authenticity in their videogames. We discuss examples of such games in the realm of indie productions, such as That Dragon, Cancer (2016), This War of Mine (2014), and My Child Lebensborn (2018) and Bury Me, My Love (2017). All of which represent new ground for game design, documentary and journalistic techniques that have influenced our work on the MacMillan project.

Citation

McMillan, R., Jayemanne, D., & Donald, I. (2020, June). Reality inspired games: expanding the lens of games' claims to authenticity. Presented at DiGRA 2020 : Play everywhere

Presentation Conference Type Conference Paper (published)
Conference Name DiGRA 2020 : Play everywhere
Start Date Jun 2, 2020
End Date Jun 6, 2020
Publication Date 2020-02
Deposit Date Mar 29, 2023
Series Title DiGRA conference proceedings
Book Title DiGRA '20
Public URL http://researchrepository.napier.ac.uk/Output/3060726
Publisher URL https://digra2020.org/