Gaming and Literature

They’ve been called the scourge of modern day society, but video games are now taking their place on the shelves alongside great literature and within the hallowed halls of educational institutions. Literature is the operative word: dare anyone claim that video games belong alongside the likes of Emily Bronte? Tolstoy? Dickens? The answer is yes: Bronte’s technique of foreshadowing, Dickens’ use of intersecting stories, and Tolstoy’s “zoom into action” strategies are all used in video games.

So, what chutzpah prompts classifying video games as literature? First, a definition of terms is in order. Literature is about:

• Art as imitation of life – life here means everything from the realism of To Kill a Mockingbird to Kafka’s world of the mind to J.K. Rowling’s realm of wizards and mythical monsters. But life as portrayed in literature is linear, we read the words in the order in which they were written.
• Manipulation of perspective – literature gives us a world view unlike our own.
• Story: what happens? We also call this the plot.
• Setting: where does the author place the story?
• Conflict: who’s battling who, what gets in the way of resolution? Is the conflict internal or external? This is the element that keeps us reading to the end.
• Climax or denouement — what’s the ultimate height or pitch? This is the point to which the entire story has built. When it is reached, the story is about over.

And video games are about:

• Art as imitation of life: Same as above, but the worlds of video games are often a study in stunning and often realistic graphics as opposed to the life in literature which readers must picture in their heads. Even more lifelike with video games is their interactive nature, a more realistic rendition of true life with its twists and turns.
• Manipulation of perspective is significant in the often fantasy, community-based environments of video games.
• Story: player determines what happens with the choices put forth by the game creators.
• Setting: although games are designed within a series of settings, the player still determines where the action occurs.
• Conflict: the player chooses who and how to battle
• Climax: it’s all about winning, or is it?

Although the focus here is on video games as literature, video games are finding their way into other classroom content areas. In his article “Using virtual worlds and video games to teach the lessons of reality” (http://www.sciam.com) Larry Greenemeir suggests that video games may be able to turn around today’s failing classrooms. Why? According to Chris Dede, professor of learning technologies at Harvard University, the video game environment provides kids with a low-stress, non-threatening way to practice skills at which they’re not very adept. But by practicing these skills in the video game format, they can improve their competency and become confident.

Within lower level classrooms, Brock Dubbels, an eighth grade teacher at a Minneapolis school, is teaching his students Homer alongside “Sonic the Hedgehog” as a way to “better understand Odysseus’s quest.” (Yusuf, Video games start to shape classroom curriculum, http://features.csmonitor.com)
Likewise, in a Cincinnati history classroom, teacher Jeremiah McCall uses “Rome: Total War,” a real-time strategy game, so students can simulate the experiences of war.

Programs in gaming are sprouting up in higher education as well. North Carolina State University offers a graduate level course for prospective teachers of grades K – 12. Based on the premise that games offer an enriching, engaging, interactive, image-based, and interesting learning platform, the goal is for new teachers to incorporate gaming into their classrooms to promote higher levels of learning and collaboration skills among students.

Not surprising are the many courses in gaming offered by MIT, including Introduction to Video Game Studies, Games and Social Change, Games Design, and Transmedia Storytelling. These courses are part of their Comparative Media degree program, a popular and quickly growing major.

But perhaps the most stunning and innovative initiative is that of a proposed game-based curriculum for a 6 – 12 grade school in the New York City Public School System. Designed and proposed by Katie Salen, associate professor of design and technology at the Parsons School of Design, the school is slated for opening in fall, 2009. She says:

“The school is designed around the way games work. Kids are challenged to step into identities – mathematicians, scientists. They are immersed in an interdisciplinary [setting] and instead of completing units, they go on a series of missions or quests, each of which has a goal.” (http://features.csmonitor.com)

The key word in Salen’s description is “interdisciplinary.” What gaming provides is multi-dimensional, immersive, stimulating simulations and opportunities for experience and experiment. Are these story? Literature?

Yes, gaming is literature, an ever-morphing genre, and one that truly emulates life because of its interactive characteristics. In addition, gaming is a tool for mathematics, science, history, and every subject at all levels. However, its narrative capacity, its ability to provide experience, simulation, and experiment enable players to imitate life no matter what the subject.