[ecrea] G.A.M.E. Issue n. 4 Call for Papers

We are pleased to announce that the Call for Papers for the 4th issue
of G.A.M.E. - Games as Art, Media, Entertainment is now available
(www.gamejournal.it/re-framing-video-games-in-the-light-of-cinema/#.Ux-_4igZFTM).
Once again, we would like to thank you for the support of this project
and to invite you to help  circulate the CFP.

The 4th issue of G.A.M.E. Journal, titled Re-framing video games in
the light of cinema, wants to investigate the complex relations
between video games and cinema, revising and reflecting on a topic
controversially debated over the past 10 years. G.A.M.E. asks, once
more, what is cinematic in video games and what is ludic at the
cinema.


Following, you can find the extended version of the CFP:




RE-FRAMING VIDEO GAMES
IN THE LIGHT OF CINEMA


As audiovisual entertainment whose content is largely
representational, video games have a lot more in common with film and
television than merely characters and plotlines.

Mark J. P. Wolf
('Inventing Space: Toward a Taxonomy of On- and Off- Screen Space in
Video Games', in Film Quarterly, vol. 51, n. 1, 1997, p. 11)


With its 4th issue G.A.M.E. wants to investigate the complex relations
between video games and cinema, revising and reflecting on a topic
controversially debated over the past 10 years. The relationship
between these two media is layered and they are interconnected in
their practices as much as in their theories. Not only are cinema and
video games linked by their audiovisual nature, but they are also
connected by similar production paradigms. Not only does the
cross-circulation of storylines, characters and brands play a primary
role in the rise of convergence culture, but also, on a production
level, they are grounded in common artistic and technical competences
to the point of developing similar industrial systems.

During the past two decades, cinema became the key to access video
games as cultural, artistic and social phenomenon. Consequently,
scholars and researchers in Games Studies developed a strong awareness
of the problems intrinsic to this comparative approach, leading to its
problematisation within academic contexts. Torn between the need to
develop an independent field of studies and the clear intermedial
vocation of the discipline, Game Studies developed a suspicion towards
this relationship, often debated at the margins of one or the other
field. With its new issue, G.A.M.E. wants to offer a renewed
reflection on the "interaction" between video games and films.

Firstly, Game Studies call for an updated reflection on what Wolf and
Perron call (referencing Francesco Casetti's work on film theory) the
"methodological theory". After half a century, Film Studies developed
a constellation of "theories" that cover the ontological and
phenomenological nature of the medium, its practices, its
representative strategies, its history and historiographical value,
and the politics connected to it, finally leading to question its
methodological premises. At the same time video game theory lacks a
conceptual history of the medium capable of abstracting the
specificity of case studies in order to account for a larger
diachronic perspective. Can the cinematic theoretical corpus offer a
contribution to the development of Game Studies? If so, what are the
possible interceptions between these fields? What more can we learn
about video games through the lenses of Film Studies?

On a second level, we want to investigate the characteristics of these
two media, their similarities and differences in terms of aesthetics,
practices and production. The majority of the studies on this topic
assume the narrative quality of the cinematic medium, focusing on the
narrative continuity between these media: genres, tropes and
iconography. Nevertheless, this assumption is debatable and in need of
renegotiation. If, on the one hand, it is true that the cinematic
character of video games is mostly codified through its narrative and
spectacular acceptations, on the other hand it is possible to rethink
the interplay between these two media in different ways. For example,
by positioning video games within the larger history of spectacular
media and attractions to which also cinema belongs, it is then
possible to frame this medium within the tradition that connects
shadow play theatre to the magic lantern and, subsequently, to early
cinema and devices for amplified vision (widescreen, stereoscopy).
Moreover, the rise of the indie market, the proliferation of tools and
commercialised engines, allowed the emergence of experimental work
that challenges the mainstream identification with narrative models,
opening new horizons of research. Titles such as Garry's Mod provide
points of intersection with avant-gardes, problematizing the acquired
definition of the medium, its strategies and internal structure.

Finally, with its 4th issue G.A.M.E. intends to discuss the place of
video games in cinema. Video games' cinematic incarnations have often
been overlooked, mostly referenced with regards to their aesthetic and
iconographic influence. Nevertheless, more than 20 years after the
release of Tron (1982), video games still influence cinema on
iconographic, thematic and linguistic levels. What role do video games
"play" in cinema? Are video games contributing to the development of a
new cinematic aesthetics? Is this process connected to the
commercialisation of new technologies? What are the reasons behind
unsuccessful cinematic adaptations of video games? Video games provide
source material for TV shows and web series, becoming protagonists of
transmedial serialisation. At the same time, they are made cinematic
subject of both nostalgic (Wreck-It Ralph, 2012) and apocalyptic
(Gamer, 2009) discourses. For these reasons, G.A.M.E. wants to ask,
once more, what is cinematic in video games and what is ludic at the
cinema.



Scholars are invited to submit 500 words abstracts by May 3rd, 2014 at
the address: (gameitalianjournal /at/ gmail.com)

Abstract deadline: 3rd May

Notification of acceptance: 12th May

All accepted authors will be expected to submit a full paper by the
3rd of August. We expect to release this special issue in Autumn 2014.


Best regards,

Riccardo Fassone, Federico Giordano
and Ivan Girina
for the Editorial Board of G.A.M.E.


www.gamejournal.it/


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