What do you think?
Rate this book
Theory Redux (Polity)
The PlayStation Dreamworld
From mobile phones to consoles, tablets and PCs, we are now a generation of gamers. The PlayStation Dreamworld is – to borrow a phrase from Slavoj Zizek – the pervert's guide to videogames. It argues that we can only understand the world of videogames via Lacanian dream analysis. It also argues that the Left needs to work inside this dreamspace – a powerful arena for constructing our desires – or else the dreamworld will fall entirely into the hands of dominant and reactionary forces.
While cyberspace is increasingly dominated by corporate organization, gaming, at its most subversive, can nevertheless produce radical forms of enjoyment which threaten the capitalist norms that are created and endlessly repeated in our daily relationships with mobile phones, videogames, computers and other forms of technological entertainment. Far from being a book solely for dedicated gamers, this book dissects the structure of our relationships to all technological entertainment at a time when entertainment has become ubiquitous. We can no longer escape our fantasies but rather live inside their digital reality.
While cyberspace is increasingly dominated by corporate organization, gaming, at its most subversive, can nevertheless produce radical forms of enjoyment which threaten the capitalist norms that are created and endlessly repeated in our daily relationships with mobile phones, videogames, computers and other forms of technological entertainment. Far from being a book solely for dedicated gamers, this book dissects the structure of our relationships to all technological entertainment at a time when entertainment has become ubiquitous. We can no longer escape our fantasies but rather live inside their digital reality.
140 pages, Hardcover
First published November 1, 2017
8 people are currently reading
491 people want to read
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 30 of 40 reviews
November 5, 2018
Having enjoyed and gleaned much from Alfie Bown's 'Enjoying It: Candy Crush and Capitalism', I was intrigued to dive right into this, his take on Slavoj Žižek's Playstation Dreamworld. Although heavy on academic language, there is much to admire about this study. The fundamental principle analysed here is that like television advertisements, video games influence players whether they are aware of it or not. Through the lens of psychoanalysis, Bown explores the ways in which video games can be perceived and internalised by our subconscious and the implications this may have in terms of our political views.
As with most of Polity's publications, it reads very much like a PhD thesis, but it is well worth your time if you appreciate thought-provoking material. Although from the title you may have assumed this work is primarily addressing those who play such games, these theories actually have ramifications for the whole of humanity. With the upsurge in the use of technology, social media and the internet, it is crucial we all realise that our behaviour is likely being altered by those "pulling the strings". Only through this awareness will we be able to stop this once hidden influence that is blurring the line between fiction and reality so much that in the future the distinction quite possibly could disappear completely.
Many thanks to Polity for an ARC. I was not required to post a review, and all thoughts and opinions expressed are my own.
As with most of Polity's publications, it reads very much like a PhD thesis, but it is well worth your time if you appreciate thought-provoking material. Although from the title you may have assumed this work is primarily addressing those who play such games, these theories actually have ramifications for the whole of humanity. With the upsurge in the use of technology, social media and the internet, it is crucial we all realise that our behaviour is likely being altered by those "pulling the strings". Only through this awareness will we be able to stop this once hidden influence that is blurring the line between fiction and reality so much that in the future the distinction quite possibly could disappear completely.
Many thanks to Polity for an ARC. I was not required to post a review, and all thoughts and opinions expressed are my own.
January 15, 2018
In his last book The Playstation Dreamworld (Polity, 2017) Alfie Bown is not exclusively addressing video game players, whether full time or simply occasional players, but everyone. He understands that video games can be the perfect tool to comprehend the digital media scenario in which we live. So, in the same way, that American cinema from the 40's, 50's and 60's, left a footprint in several generations' lives regardless of whether one watched the movies or not, influencing their clothes, haircuts, the music that they listened to, and the way they walked or smoked, Bown's idea is that video games might be doing the same with this generation, regardless of whether we play video games or not. The digital revolution has arrived and former cultural backbones such as theatre, novel, radio, cinema, and television have been swept away or assimilated by the internet. Video games, however, which were also born before the Internet, seem to be a mean of expression, cultural asset, leisure activity, or whatever you want to call them, which adapts and morphs with technology. Advances in computers allowed games to evolve and designs to become more real, the possibilities of games multiplied, as well as the available offer. The consoles, before the mobile phones, became small and portable and gave the option to play anywhere. The development and implementation of the internet make it possible to play online with people from all over the world, and virtual reality (VR) systems seem to be the last frontier between fiction and reality. In addition to this, with the shift of generations of players, video games have ceased to be a market for children, teenagers or alternative cultures to occupy an important part of the adult leisure market.
Video games appear as a step ahead as a cultural touchstone if we compare them with books or movies because they incorporate one of the key factors to understand the present moment: participation. Constant participation is one of the features that best defines the ethos of today's society. Conceivably, in the past, time for leisure or rest was associated with just that, to rest, to forget work either socialising with friends, traveling, going for a movie, watching television or reading a book. But now the pressure is too great and nobody can afford to remain disconnected for a long time and therefore, at the same time we do any of these things we see what is happening on Twitter and Facebook, check our email, post on Instagram, send three text messages, fifty WhatsApp, and so on and so forth. The inability to concentrate has nothing to do with the quality of the books or films we choose, but with ourselves and with our permanent need to always be somewhere else doing something different than what we are actually doing.
The possibility offered by video games has a double advantage, on one hand it demands a greater degree of concentration since we need not only to look but also to use our hands to play, and at the same time it requires less mental attention than a book or a movie and the games can be split indefinitely, adjusting to our already fractioned schedules. The second advantage is that the fact of being protagonists makes us think that we decide or determine the final result what perfectly matches with our inflated egos and at the same time it guarantees us a greater immersion in the action, say, they are more efficient making us forget the rest of temptations waiting for us.
This differential fact makes the essence of video games different and therefore the analysis that we can make of them must be different as well. During this process of differentiation is when the author found the connection that structures the book video games-dreams-psychoanalysis. It is evident the connection between video games and psychoanalysis, through unsatisfied desires that are time and again fulfilled, and so immediately forgotten and replaced by new desires. Each time, both dissatisfaction and culmination, happening at a higher speed. Games offer also the possibility of being someone else, someone better, or different, than us, someone who succeeds or who is not judged when fails. Through the analytic question, he arrived at the world of dreams and its analysis. Dreams, like games, are experienced actively, and the gamer suffers, thrives, explores, unaware of what is going to happen, within an environment that he does not control. If the involvement in the game is big enough both experiences may be pretty similar, including the return to the real world afterward. The difference is that dreams are exclusively our own while in games we are inhabiting someone else's dream. Walter Benjamin and his ideas of daydreaming while wandering around the city (curiosly under the Paris arcades) are a constant source of inspiration for Bown, since his concept of dreamworld is not limited to the moment of playing but it extends to the whole framework of screens and computers that surround us. This dreamworld has nothing to do with a oneiric fluid-like world, on the contrary, can be deeply ideological and full of political content. Bown's concept of consciousness is closer to Jean-Luc Nancy than to Freud since his consciousness is a consciousness-in-the-world something that exists collectively rather than in a personal or individual Freudian mode.
The contention of the book is that so many hours playing video games or staring at screens are usually 'dismissed as apolitical', as secondary or expendable. Nonetheless, this is a relevant characteristic of modern life and hence to be carefully considered. No human activity is apolitical and video games' political potential is going to be canalised and utilised by someone. In the same way that they can be used as instruments of control and collective stunning, this phenomenon can be reversed and turn this 'dreamworld' into a space for subversion, alien to the control of governments and corporations. Although aware of the control that currently ideological powers exercise over this space, Bown distinguishes some glimmer of hope to turn around the pre-established games' ideology and use them instead as tools for change. For this, it is required swimming against the current, be rebellious, question everything, and develop a critical spirit so gamers are able to play the games no for the purpose with which they were designed but in some sense seeking for a Derridean deconstruction of the original ontology of the game.
Although the approach is powerful, in my view Bown does not go far enough and does not finish materialising the format of this possible subversion. In my opinion, the subversion offered by video games will be the same as those offered by other means of communication or entertainment. Subversion, controversial positions, and 'left merchandising' have become part of the system governed by corporations and states, it can never be anti-system if it is inside the system itself and it is tolerated by it. Capitalist democracies allow this game of freedoms, even taken to the extreme, knowing, at all times, that consequences are minimal and possibilities of change almost nil. In our hyperconnected society we stay less connected than ever before. Political parties are merely puppets in the hands of large corporations, global banks, and rating agencies. The vagaries of the stock market, banks, the oil industry, real estate, pharmaceuticals or the arms industry are listened obediently by governments, while citizen protests are heard as healthy democratic demonstrations without visible effects.
The author manages to thread in the same strand video games, dreams, Lacanian enjoyment, desire, and capitalism. The analysis of today's society is very enlightening and even for an ignoramus in video games like myself the examples used always reinforce the arguments and give depth and breath to the work. Perhaps the weakest part is the political connection, although to be fair I must point out that the book is partly speculative about a future in the short or medium term. By exploring the ideas of Slavoj Zizek and Mark Fisher who stated that we must assume that there is no alternative to capitalism and this fact should not make us pessimistic, but on the contrary, we have to grasp that opportunity. This reminds me of some pseudo-gurus that trying to sell Eastern Philosophy as the remedy for everything, use always as an example the word crisis, which in its original Chinese definition, according to them, means both danger and opportunity. For Fisher and Zizek, what is trully dangerous right now, is a blind belief in some kind of utopian alternative, which ends capitalism for good, and that is so far away to be reached that makes any movement ineffective keeping us inactive. The late Mark Fisher used to mention that small ruptures in the system could be the beginning of big cracks on the surface, highlighting the necessity of focusing on modest realistic objectives more than sonorous ideals. Bown comes aboard this group with his theory of video games as a platform susceptible to generate change, to reverse power ideologies, and to find an environment suitable for revolution and that also fits perfectly with the times we live and probably with the future to come.
Game Over.
Video games appear as a step ahead as a cultural touchstone if we compare them with books or movies because they incorporate one of the key factors to understand the present moment: participation. Constant participation is one of the features that best defines the ethos of today's society. Conceivably, in the past, time for leisure or rest was associated with just that, to rest, to forget work either socialising with friends, traveling, going for a movie, watching television or reading a book. But now the pressure is too great and nobody can afford to remain disconnected for a long time and therefore, at the same time we do any of these things we see what is happening on Twitter and Facebook, check our email, post on Instagram, send three text messages, fifty WhatsApp, and so on and so forth. The inability to concentrate has nothing to do with the quality of the books or films we choose, but with ourselves and with our permanent need to always be somewhere else doing something different than what we are actually doing.
The possibility offered by video games has a double advantage, on one hand it demands a greater degree of concentration since we need not only to look but also to use our hands to play, and at the same time it requires less mental attention than a book or a movie and the games can be split indefinitely, adjusting to our already fractioned schedules. The second advantage is that the fact of being protagonists makes us think that we decide or determine the final result what perfectly matches with our inflated egos and at the same time it guarantees us a greater immersion in the action, say, they are more efficient making us forget the rest of temptations waiting for us.
This differential fact makes the essence of video games different and therefore the analysis that we can make of them must be different as well. During this process of differentiation is when the author found the connection that structures the book video games-dreams-psychoanalysis. It is evident the connection between video games and psychoanalysis, through unsatisfied desires that are time and again fulfilled, and so immediately forgotten and replaced by new desires. Each time, both dissatisfaction and culmination, happening at a higher speed. Games offer also the possibility of being someone else, someone better, or different, than us, someone who succeeds or who is not judged when fails. Through the analytic question, he arrived at the world of dreams and its analysis. Dreams, like games, are experienced actively, and the gamer suffers, thrives, explores, unaware of what is going to happen, within an environment that he does not control. If the involvement in the game is big enough both experiences may be pretty similar, including the return to the real world afterward. The difference is that dreams are exclusively our own while in games we are inhabiting someone else's dream. Walter Benjamin and his ideas of daydreaming while wandering around the city (curiosly under the Paris arcades) are a constant source of inspiration for Bown, since his concept of dreamworld is not limited to the moment of playing but it extends to the whole framework of screens and computers that surround us. This dreamworld has nothing to do with a oneiric fluid-like world, on the contrary, can be deeply ideological and full of political content. Bown's concept of consciousness is closer to Jean-Luc Nancy than to Freud since his consciousness is a consciousness-in-the-world something that exists collectively rather than in a personal or individual Freudian mode.
The contention of the book is that so many hours playing video games or staring at screens are usually 'dismissed as apolitical', as secondary or expendable. Nonetheless, this is a relevant characteristic of modern life and hence to be carefully considered. No human activity is apolitical and video games' political potential is going to be canalised and utilised by someone. In the same way that they can be used as instruments of control and collective stunning, this phenomenon can be reversed and turn this 'dreamworld' into a space for subversion, alien to the control of governments and corporations. Although aware of the control that currently ideological powers exercise over this space, Bown distinguishes some glimmer of hope to turn around the pre-established games' ideology and use them instead as tools for change. For this, it is required swimming against the current, be rebellious, question everything, and develop a critical spirit so gamers are able to play the games no for the purpose with which they were designed but in some sense seeking for a Derridean deconstruction of the original ontology of the game.
Although the approach is powerful, in my view Bown does not go far enough and does not finish materialising the format of this possible subversion. In my opinion, the subversion offered by video games will be the same as those offered by other means of communication or entertainment. Subversion, controversial positions, and 'left merchandising' have become part of the system governed by corporations and states, it can never be anti-system if it is inside the system itself and it is tolerated by it. Capitalist democracies allow this game of freedoms, even taken to the extreme, knowing, at all times, that consequences are minimal and possibilities of change almost nil. In our hyperconnected society we stay less connected than ever before. Political parties are merely puppets in the hands of large corporations, global banks, and rating agencies. The vagaries of the stock market, banks, the oil industry, real estate, pharmaceuticals or the arms industry are listened obediently by governments, while citizen protests are heard as healthy democratic demonstrations without visible effects.
The author manages to thread in the same strand video games, dreams, Lacanian enjoyment, desire, and capitalism. The analysis of today's society is very enlightening and even for an ignoramus in video games like myself the examples used always reinforce the arguments and give depth and breath to the work. Perhaps the weakest part is the political connection, although to be fair I must point out that the book is partly speculative about a future in the short or medium term. By exploring the ideas of Slavoj Zizek and Mark Fisher who stated that we must assume that there is no alternative to capitalism and this fact should not make us pessimistic, but on the contrary, we have to grasp that opportunity. This reminds me of some pseudo-gurus that trying to sell Eastern Philosophy as the remedy for everything, use always as an example the word crisis, which in its original Chinese definition, according to them, means both danger and opportunity. For Fisher and Zizek, what is trully dangerous right now, is a blind belief in some kind of utopian alternative, which ends capitalism for good, and that is so far away to be reached that makes any movement ineffective keeping us inactive. The late Mark Fisher used to mention that small ruptures in the system could be the beginning of big cracks on the surface, highlighting the necessity of focusing on modest realistic objectives more than sonorous ideals. Bown comes aboard this group with his theory of video games as a platform susceptible to generate change, to reverse power ideologies, and to find an environment suitable for revolution and that also fits perfectly with the times we live and probably with the future to come.
Game Over.
December 16, 2017
This is a book with a lot of promise that falls short of reasoned, logical arguments. Alfie Bown utilizes a very readable style and hits on some wonderful, thought provoking ideas but then goes off with qualitative assumptions that fail to demonstrate any proper reason or understanding of the subject or logic of his field. Admittedly I haven't read his previous book, so if this is intended to be a compendium of sorts to that, I may be missing some of that reasoning but I remain skeptical given how grossly presumptive and scientifically inaccurate his claims or the basis for them are.
There are so many miscalculations its frustrating. He takes the idea of interpellation and applies it to the structure of video games as a reinforcement of capitalist ideals which, is an interesting idea because it focuses on the structure as opposed to the content, but then doesn't do the best job and ultimately misses the layup of an alternate explanation of the application of Lacans object of desire. He clearly is a student of Zizek, but not of the people Zizek built upon, save for some Frued. If Alfie put more work into this, he could have assembled something to build on and do for video games what Cambell did, or a more pure Lacanian take, or straight up drop his first chapter for a better psychoanalytic representation of games.
And again, bizzare qualititative statements littered throughout with no connection or proper explanation on the why. Even the good points he makes i only know as good points because Google design ethicists have talked about them for years.
At one point he quotes Ready Player One, which i find fitting because this is middle school reading from an outsiders perspective.
There are so many miscalculations its frustrating. He takes the idea of interpellation and applies it to the structure of video games as a reinforcement of capitalist ideals which, is an interesting idea because it focuses on the structure as opposed to the content, but then doesn't do the best job and ultimately misses the layup of an alternate explanation of the application of Lacans object of desire. He clearly is a student of Zizek, but not of the people Zizek built upon, save for some Frued. If Alfie put more work into this, he could have assembled something to build on and do for video games what Cambell did, or a more pure Lacanian take, or straight up drop his first chapter for a better psychoanalytic representation of games.
And again, bizzare qualititative statements littered throughout with no connection or proper explanation on the why. Even the good points he makes i only know as good points because Google design ethicists have talked about them for years.
At one point he quotes Ready Player One, which i find fitting because this is middle school reading from an outsiders perspective.
June 17, 2020
Počítačové hry. Ešte pred pätnástimi rokmi to znelo ako primitívna zábava stredoškolákov a dospelých detí. Jednoduché vzorce úloh a ťahové stratégie, strieľačky a automobilové závody s nerealistickým ovládaním áut. Bezvýznamné zabíjanie času strávené hodinami pred monitorom stolového počítača za neustáleho klikania káblovej myši. Hučiaci počítač v spálni, detskej izbe, otcovej pracovni.
Dnes sa môžeme vďaka technológiám hrať prakticky všade. S príchodom Nintenda a PSP sme sa k tejto skutočnosti síce priblížili, ale až revolúcia smartfónov redefinovala pohľad na hráčsku prístupnosť. Hra sa teda stáva tak prirodzenou súčasťou pracovnej prestávky, ako cigareta.
Kniha Playstation Svet snov (2020, KPTL) od Alfieho Bowna nie je len o herných konzolách, ako predznamenáva názov titulu. Reflektuje aj spomínané mobilné aplikácie, komponent VR a mnoho iných hráčskych mechanizmov, vrátane hráčskej kooperácie v online priestore.
Vnáša kritický a filozofický pohľad do problematiky virtuálnej reality. Nemali by sme ju brať len ako produkt rýchleho občerstvenia, pretože aj taký formát, akým je videohra, obsahuje početné odkazy a ideológie, k akým existuje relevantný diskusný priestor na intelektuálnej úrovni. Hra sa teda stáva vďačným predmetom skúmania akademickej obce a ponúka rôznorodé témy na podrobnú analýzu. Táto kniha k nej prináša silné impulzy.
Alfie Bown prispieva do debaty, okrem iného, aj psychoanalytickým rozmerom - „Videohra nie je text na čítanie, ale sen na snívanie” (s. 93). Kniha sa ale na tento sen díva prísne. Rozoberá ho ako mienkotvorný spoločenský stimul, ukazuje, ako sa nevedomie vyrovnáva s formálnou aj obsahovou štruktúrou hry, odhaľuje, aké názory jednotlivé hry deklarujú a v čom môžu byť nebezpečné - politicky, alebo militantne angažované.
Autor, ktorý je prispievateľom The Guardian a Paris review, tiež predstavuje vzorce správania v hráčskej konfrontácii s násilím - buď sme schopní agresivitu filtrovať a uzamknúť ju v svete hry podobne ako pri športe, alebo v nás naopak prebúdza kriminálne inštinkty.
Playstation Svet snov sa stavia do opozície voči argumentácii, že hranie je len vlažným prostriedkom prokrastinácie s meniacou sa estetikou, ktorá sa viac a viac približuje k autentizácii reality. Obklopení virtuálne generovaným prostredím s VR technológiou zažívame explicitný pocit strachu, násilia, aj adrenalínu.
Je niečo zlé na infantilnom farmárčení? Existuje na herných platformách dobrá a zlá farma? K čomu nás nabáda Candy Crush? Je americká invázia do Iraku akceptovateľná, ak sa uzavrie v špecifickom priestore herného titulu? Mení Pokémon GO! pohľad na súčasné mesto alebo je to len samoúčelná nelogická prechádzka? Všetky otázky si dávajú za cieľ rozviť plnohodnotné úvahy a my sa stávame ich súčasťou. Dívať sa na film, čítať si knihu, hrať sa videohru. V každom menovanom v súčasnosti existuje priestor pre kritické myslenie.
https://medziknihami.dennikn.sk/clank...
Dnes sa môžeme vďaka technológiám hrať prakticky všade. S príchodom Nintenda a PSP sme sa k tejto skutočnosti síce priblížili, ale až revolúcia smartfónov redefinovala pohľad na hráčsku prístupnosť. Hra sa teda stáva tak prirodzenou súčasťou pracovnej prestávky, ako cigareta.
Kniha Playstation Svet snov (2020, KPTL) od Alfieho Bowna nie je len o herných konzolách, ako predznamenáva názov titulu. Reflektuje aj spomínané mobilné aplikácie, komponent VR a mnoho iných hráčskych mechanizmov, vrátane hráčskej kooperácie v online priestore.
Vnáša kritický a filozofický pohľad do problematiky virtuálnej reality. Nemali by sme ju brať len ako produkt rýchleho občerstvenia, pretože aj taký formát, akým je videohra, obsahuje početné odkazy a ideológie, k akým existuje relevantný diskusný priestor na intelektuálnej úrovni. Hra sa teda stáva vďačným predmetom skúmania akademickej obce a ponúka rôznorodé témy na podrobnú analýzu. Táto kniha k nej prináša silné impulzy.
Alfie Bown prispieva do debaty, okrem iného, aj psychoanalytickým rozmerom - „Videohra nie je text na čítanie, ale sen na snívanie” (s. 93). Kniha sa ale na tento sen díva prísne. Rozoberá ho ako mienkotvorný spoločenský stimul, ukazuje, ako sa nevedomie vyrovnáva s formálnou aj obsahovou štruktúrou hry, odhaľuje, aké názory jednotlivé hry deklarujú a v čom môžu byť nebezpečné - politicky, alebo militantne angažované.
Autor, ktorý je prispievateľom The Guardian a Paris review, tiež predstavuje vzorce správania v hráčskej konfrontácii s násilím - buď sme schopní agresivitu filtrovať a uzamknúť ju v svete hry podobne ako pri športe, alebo v nás naopak prebúdza kriminálne inštinkty.
Playstation Svet snov sa stavia do opozície voči argumentácii, že hranie je len vlažným prostriedkom prokrastinácie s meniacou sa estetikou, ktorá sa viac a viac približuje k autentizácii reality. Obklopení virtuálne generovaným prostredím s VR technológiou zažívame explicitný pocit strachu, násilia, aj adrenalínu.
Je niečo zlé na infantilnom farmárčení? Existuje na herných platformách dobrá a zlá farma? K čomu nás nabáda Candy Crush? Je americká invázia do Iraku akceptovateľná, ak sa uzavrie v špecifickom priestore herného titulu? Mení Pokémon GO! pohľad na súčasné mesto alebo je to len samoúčelná nelogická prechádzka? Všetky otázky si dávajú za cieľ rozviť plnohodnotné úvahy a my sa stávame ich súčasťou. Dívať sa na film, čítať si knihu, hrať sa videohru. V každom menovanom v súčasnosti existuje priestor pre kritické myslenie.
https://medziknihami.dennikn.sk/clank...
Read
November 25, 2020Good short read. The first thing that was able to help me understand my intense nostalgia for childhood video games of the n64 and such. Also I totally understand why I got sucked into World of Warcraft during that period of unemployment. The satisfaction of a job well done, fulfilling work, made frictionless and consistent.
Good as a bibliography, and guaranteed to build your motivation to read Lacan.
Good as a bibliography, and guaranteed to build your motivation to read Lacan.
December 23, 2021
dobrá, len mierne nekonzistentná a občas odbočila úplne inam, akoby sa autor snažil nasilu demonštrovať svoje intelektuálne znalosti (ktoré isto má, ale nevie s nimi organicky narábať)
inak niektoré myšlienky skvelé a podnetné a samozrejme ešte k tomu máte kritiku kapitalizmu zadarmo
inak niektoré myšlienky skvelé a podnetné a samozrejme ešte k tomu máte kritiku kapitalizmu zadarmo
November 23, 2017
After "Enjoying It: Candy Crush and Capitalism", Alfie Bown continues to investigate the effects of technology and gaming on our subjectivities through the lens of psychoanalysis. I think psychoanalysis (at least in its most contemporary form whose biggest influence is Zizek alongside lesser known names to the general public) is most intelligible and useful when it helps us to dissect the swift changes in our societies. Bown uses the relatively small volume of the book effectively in delivering his points again and I don't think name-dropping is an issue for this particular book (author does not expect you to have an extensive knowledge of critical theory or Deleuze and Guattari for that matter) although some interest in Lacanian psychoanalysis would be beneficial. I am much more interested in what could be called "game studies" after this book. I think it is a fascinating area of investigation when one considers the popularity of new types of science and technology studies in academia, Elon Musk, VR headsets and "augmented reality". I am not really a gamer, but I would be really curious what my gamer brother thinks about this book. If only he was slightly interested in psychoanalysis, of course. Gamer or not, if you feel you are interested, I think you should give this book a look.
March 19, 2019
actualizing psychoanalysis for 21 Pokemon-Go century, a much needed critical examination of games as ideologies (and how that relates to their underlying priciples of desire construction). Concise and well written.
June 19, 2021
Ako ich nazvať? Pojem videohra vysvetľuje Slovník cudzích slov (z roku 2005) ako „počítačovú hru hranú na špeciálnom prídavnom zariadení pripojenom k televíznemu monitoru”. Odvtedy sa ale stalo mnohé. Prebehla smartfónová revolúcia, ktorá následne vyvolala aj herné zemetrasenie. Pred dvoma rokmi (2018) uskutočnila spoločnosť Tappable prieskum, ktorý zisťoval, na akom zariadení ľudia najradšej hrajú svoje „videohry”. Na treťom mieste sa umiestnil počítač (26%), na druhom herné konzoly (32%) a prvú priečku si uchmatli smartfóny (42%). Alfie Bown v knihe Playstation svet snov píše, že v súčasnosti sa „videohry” hrá viac ako 20 percent svetovej populácie a dodáva, že „tieto dáta sú pritom veľmi konzervatívne, keďže zahŕňajú iba platené hry a stiahnutia, a nie milióny bezplatných, voľne dostupných foriem online hier”. Takéto čísla volajú po precíznejšom názvosloví aj rôznorodejšej akademickej i mediálnej pozornosti, Bownova kniha má ambíciu túto medzeru sčasti zaplniť.
Pohľad na politiku za hrami (volajme ich pre potreby tohto článku takto jednoducho) nie je nový. „Táto hra je dôkazom toho, že nás chcú Rusi stále pochovať. Chvejem sa pri myšlienke, ako zasadí ranu našej ekonomike a zníži produktivitu na nulu,” napísal v roku 1989 americký publicista Orson Scott Card pre časopis Compute! o hernom hite Tetris, ktorý v roku 1985 naprogramoval Rus Alexej Pažitnov. Aj politika v hrách jestvuje od počiatkov. Za prvú hru pre počítač (PDP1) sa považuje Spacewars! (1962). „Strieľačka” medzi hviezdami nemala priamy politický odkaz, v čase prebiehajúcich vesmírnych pretekov medzi USA a ZSSR však akákoľvek vesmírna vojna mala aspoň podprahovo jasných aktérov. V 80. rokoch, zlatej ére klasických videohier, už bola tematika studenej vojny prezentovaná celkom otvorene - riadiace stredisko nukleárnych rakiet v hre Missle Command (1980), či Green Beret (1985), kde sa bojovalo proti vojakom v baraniciach v „neurčenej krajine”.
Bown v „tutoriáli” uvádza, že názov knihy sa „dožaduje analýzy hrania z perspektívy snov”. Ľudia sa podľa neho „ocitajú mnohokrát denne v stave, keď sú pohltení do snívania pred obrazovkou”. Konštatuje, že podobne, ako sny, sa takéto zážitky zvyčajne vnímajú ako „apolitické, či druhoradé”. Čo je asi najzaujímavejšie prebudenie zo sna, ktorá táto kniha ponúka. Stačí nálepka „hra” na to, aby svet dokázal tak intenzívne ignorovať odvetvie, ktoré sa vyrovnáva tomu filmovému a ročne vyprodukuje obraty vo výške 135-milárd eur? Aj vďaka hrám na smartfónoch, ktoré nahradili telefóny a mobily aj u najstarších vekových kategórií, sa dnes hrajú prakticky všetky generácie. Napriek tomu, potenciálu hrania rozumie málokto, čo dokazujú aj konzervatívne analýzy herného sveta v médiách, ktoré sa do veľkej miery opakovane venujú tomu, či hranie spôsobuje závislosť, či ničí mladých (dnes sa ako rodičia pýtajú tí, čo vyrastali na Prince of Persia a Doom) a či nie sú príliš násilné.
Bown vyučuje kultúru digitálnych médií na Royal Holloway University of London a zároveň je vášnivým hráčom. Keď v septembri predstavoval Playstation svet snov na knižnom festivale BRaK, divákom prezradil, že si do Bratislavy so sebou vzal hneď dve herné konzoly. Hráčom je od roku 1997, keď jemu podobní boli vnímaní ako súčasť subkultúry „nerdov”, v tomto zmysle podivínov, čo svoj voľný čas trávia detskými zábavkami. Za tých 23 rokov sa zmenilo nielen to, ako sa nazerá na hráčov (a dávno neplatí, že hráč rovná sa nerd), ale aj na samotné hry. „Zatiaľ, čo v roku 1996 sa na elektronický objekt nahliadalo ako na substitúciu reálneho, ktorá sa núkala už akoby predom existujúcej túžbe, v roku 2016 privádza elektronický objekt do života úplne novú túžbu,” píše ďalej v knihe. Boj o povedomie hráčov vyplával až k pozornosti médií v roku 2014, počas tzv. aféry #GaterGate. Odhalila nielen sexizmus v hernom svete, ale aj fakt, že aj o podobu hier sa vedú kultúrne vojny.
Bown vo vojne nie je nestranným pozorovateľom, ale bojovníkom progresivizmu. „Bojovať o politiku tohto priestoru a jeho slastí určite stojí za to,” píše v knihe. Vydarenejším príkladom nastolovania ľudských túžob pomocou hier je jeho analýza hry Pokémon GO, ktorá sa v roku 2016 stala celosvetovým fenoménom (stala sa najsťahovanejšou hrou v 70 rôznych krajinách). Kým médiá venovali pozornosť viac tomu, ako sa hráči naháňajúci pokémonov - zaslepení hrou - stávajú obeťami dopravných nehôd, Bown upozorňuje, že oveľa zásadnejšou bola schopnosť hry ovládať kroky miliónov ľudí vo fyzickom svete. A návnadou nebola fyzická odmena, ale len elektronický objekt - ulovený pokémon. „Byť generáciou pokémonov znamená byť generáciou elektronických objektov, a dokonca elektronických túžob.” Asi nie je lepší príklad ako ľudí podnietiť sa zamýšľať nad tým, že digitálny svet (hier) má napríklad schopnosť meniť spôsob akým fyzicky využívate mesto a služby v ňom.
Level 1: Od farmárskej simulácie k dystopickým ruinám: Hranie & kapitalizmus, prináša dôležité memento: „ak hry dokážu premeniť pocit nudy (…) na niečo produktívne a pozitívne, mali by sme byť opatrí v otázke toho, aké ideologické štruktúry spájame s takouto silou.” Na druhej strane nájdeme tu aj niekoľko až konšpiračne pôsobiacich pasáží. Úvaha o tom, že prostoduché hry typu Candy Crush dávajú aj nudnej práci v korporácii punc významu a zároveň vytvárajú pracovníkom, ktorí sa hrajú v pracovnom čase, výčitky svedomia, ktoré kompenzujú odpovedaním na maily v nočných hodinách - je len recykláciou starých obáv z Tetrisu. A ignoruje komerčné motivácie - len v roku 2014 vybrali autori Candy Crush na nákupoch v aplikácii 1,12 miliardy eur. Aj stať o úlohe post-apokalyptických hier v podpore presvedčenia, že niet inej alternatívy ku kapitalizmu, než je vyprahnutý, vojnou zničený svet ako z hry Fallout, je pripomienkou, že ide viac o text bojovníka, než pozorovateľa.
V Leveli 2: Práca snov: Kyborgovia na analytickom lôžku a Leveli 3: Retro hráčstvo: Politika minulých & budúcich slastí sa rozplietajú podrobnejšie mechanizmy, akými hry vytvárajú túžby. Jeden z tých, ktoré umožňujú vysvetlenie na obmedzenom priestore, nás môže priviesť do úvodného skeču Simpsonovcov, v ktorých Bart na tabuľu píše za trest jednu opakujúcu sa vetu, ktorá ho má priviesť k poučeniu. Podobne fungujú aj hry: „Nutkanie k opakovaniu je prirodzená tendencia každej hry a môže predstavovať spôsob, akým sú rôzne politiky na hráča alebo hráčku nevedome uvalené.” Šéfredaktor Kapitálu Tomáš Hučko na diskusii na BRaKu v úlohe moderátora spomenul, že Playstation svet snov odmietli majitelia obchodov s hrami s argumentom, že ich zákazníci nečítajú knihy. To nie je jediný problém. Ak mala mať kniha za cieľovku aj hráčov, a z názvu posledného levelu: Ako byť subverzívnym hráčom, sa to dá usudzovať, autor možno zvolil privysokú náročnosť.
(Písané pre Knižnú revue)
Pohľad na politiku za hrami (volajme ich pre potreby tohto článku takto jednoducho) nie je nový. „Táto hra je dôkazom toho, že nás chcú Rusi stále pochovať. Chvejem sa pri myšlienke, ako zasadí ranu našej ekonomike a zníži produktivitu na nulu,” napísal v roku 1989 americký publicista Orson Scott Card pre časopis Compute! o hernom hite Tetris, ktorý v roku 1985 naprogramoval Rus Alexej Pažitnov. Aj politika v hrách jestvuje od počiatkov. Za prvú hru pre počítač (PDP1) sa považuje Spacewars! (1962). „Strieľačka” medzi hviezdami nemala priamy politický odkaz, v čase prebiehajúcich vesmírnych pretekov medzi USA a ZSSR však akákoľvek vesmírna vojna mala aspoň podprahovo jasných aktérov. V 80. rokoch, zlatej ére klasických videohier, už bola tematika studenej vojny prezentovaná celkom otvorene - riadiace stredisko nukleárnych rakiet v hre Missle Command (1980), či Green Beret (1985), kde sa bojovalo proti vojakom v baraniciach v „neurčenej krajine”.
Bown v „tutoriáli” uvádza, že názov knihy sa „dožaduje analýzy hrania z perspektívy snov”. Ľudia sa podľa neho „ocitajú mnohokrát denne v stave, keď sú pohltení do snívania pred obrazovkou”. Konštatuje, že podobne, ako sny, sa takéto zážitky zvyčajne vnímajú ako „apolitické, či druhoradé”. Čo je asi najzaujímavejšie prebudenie zo sna, ktorá táto kniha ponúka. Stačí nálepka „hra” na to, aby svet dokázal tak intenzívne ignorovať odvetvie, ktoré sa vyrovnáva tomu filmovému a ročne vyprodukuje obraty vo výške 135-milárd eur? Aj vďaka hrám na smartfónoch, ktoré nahradili telefóny a mobily aj u najstarších vekových kategórií, sa dnes hrajú prakticky všetky generácie. Napriek tomu, potenciálu hrania rozumie málokto, čo dokazujú aj konzervatívne analýzy herného sveta v médiách, ktoré sa do veľkej miery opakovane venujú tomu, či hranie spôsobuje závislosť, či ničí mladých (dnes sa ako rodičia pýtajú tí, čo vyrastali na Prince of Persia a Doom) a či nie sú príliš násilné.
Bown vyučuje kultúru digitálnych médií na Royal Holloway University of London a zároveň je vášnivým hráčom. Keď v septembri predstavoval Playstation svet snov na knižnom festivale BRaK, divákom prezradil, že si do Bratislavy so sebou vzal hneď dve herné konzoly. Hráčom je od roku 1997, keď jemu podobní boli vnímaní ako súčasť subkultúry „nerdov”, v tomto zmysle podivínov, čo svoj voľný čas trávia detskými zábavkami. Za tých 23 rokov sa zmenilo nielen to, ako sa nazerá na hráčov (a dávno neplatí, že hráč rovná sa nerd), ale aj na samotné hry. „Zatiaľ, čo v roku 1996 sa na elektronický objekt nahliadalo ako na substitúciu reálneho, ktorá sa núkala už akoby predom existujúcej túžbe, v roku 2016 privádza elektronický objekt do života úplne novú túžbu,” píše ďalej v knihe. Boj o povedomie hráčov vyplával až k pozornosti médií v roku 2014, počas tzv. aféry #GaterGate. Odhalila nielen sexizmus v hernom svete, ale aj fakt, že aj o podobu hier sa vedú kultúrne vojny.
Bown vo vojne nie je nestranným pozorovateľom, ale bojovníkom progresivizmu. „Bojovať o politiku tohto priestoru a jeho slastí určite stojí za to,” píše v knihe. Vydarenejším príkladom nastolovania ľudských túžob pomocou hier je jeho analýza hry Pokémon GO, ktorá sa v roku 2016 stala celosvetovým fenoménom (stala sa najsťahovanejšou hrou v 70 rôznych krajinách). Kým médiá venovali pozornosť viac tomu, ako sa hráči naháňajúci pokémonov - zaslepení hrou - stávajú obeťami dopravných nehôd, Bown upozorňuje, že oveľa zásadnejšou bola schopnosť hry ovládať kroky miliónov ľudí vo fyzickom svete. A návnadou nebola fyzická odmena, ale len elektronický objekt - ulovený pokémon. „Byť generáciou pokémonov znamená byť generáciou elektronických objektov, a dokonca elektronických túžob.” Asi nie je lepší príklad ako ľudí podnietiť sa zamýšľať nad tým, že digitálny svet (hier) má napríklad schopnosť meniť spôsob akým fyzicky využívate mesto a služby v ňom.
Level 1: Od farmárskej simulácie k dystopickým ruinám: Hranie & kapitalizmus, prináša dôležité memento: „ak hry dokážu premeniť pocit nudy (…) na niečo produktívne a pozitívne, mali by sme byť opatrí v otázke toho, aké ideologické štruktúry spájame s takouto silou.” Na druhej strane nájdeme tu aj niekoľko až konšpiračne pôsobiacich pasáží. Úvaha o tom, že prostoduché hry typu Candy Crush dávajú aj nudnej práci v korporácii punc významu a zároveň vytvárajú pracovníkom, ktorí sa hrajú v pracovnom čase, výčitky svedomia, ktoré kompenzujú odpovedaním na maily v nočných hodinách - je len recykláciou starých obáv z Tetrisu. A ignoruje komerčné motivácie - len v roku 2014 vybrali autori Candy Crush na nákupoch v aplikácii 1,12 miliardy eur. Aj stať o úlohe post-apokalyptických hier v podpore presvedčenia, že niet inej alternatívy ku kapitalizmu, než je vyprahnutý, vojnou zničený svet ako z hry Fallout, je pripomienkou, že ide viac o text bojovníka, než pozorovateľa.
V Leveli 2: Práca snov: Kyborgovia na analytickom lôžku a Leveli 3: Retro hráčstvo: Politika minulých & budúcich slastí sa rozplietajú podrobnejšie mechanizmy, akými hry vytvárajú túžby. Jeden z tých, ktoré umožňujú vysvetlenie na obmedzenom priestore, nás môže priviesť do úvodného skeču Simpsonovcov, v ktorých Bart na tabuľu píše za trest jednu opakujúcu sa vetu, ktorá ho má priviesť k poučeniu. Podobne fungujú aj hry: „Nutkanie k opakovaniu je prirodzená tendencia každej hry a môže predstavovať spôsob, akým sú rôzne politiky na hráča alebo hráčku nevedome uvalené.” Šéfredaktor Kapitálu Tomáš Hučko na diskusii na BRaKu v úlohe moderátora spomenul, že Playstation svet snov odmietli majitelia obchodov s hrami s argumentom, že ich zákazníci nečítajú knihy. To nie je jediný problém. Ak mala mať kniha za cieľovku aj hráčov, a z názvu posledného levelu: Ako byť subverzívnym hráčom, sa to dá usudzovať, autor možno zvolil privysokú náročnosť.
(Písané pre Knižnú revue)
December 18, 2017
A bit of a specialist, focussed read, building on the idea that we are a generation of gamers and it accordingly looks at our relationship to this and technological entertainment-at-large.
This is not a book for the casual reader, despite it being written in a fairly casual and accessible style, as it conveys a lot of often complicated or nuanced messages that demand interpretation. Analysing matters such as capitalism, dream analysis, society and gaming, it can draw you in and even if you don’t necessarily understand or agree with all the findings it still is an interesting read. Is our video-gaming and other techno-entertainment being commodified for the benefit of narrow external interests? Is there scope for ‘the left’ to reshape their politics and serve the domination of a hegemonic capitalist consensus? Can we understand our society through the prism presented by video-gaming? The author shares freely of his views and may answer many of these questions and more besides.
Fortunately, the price of the book is not going to break the bank, so you can afford to take a gamble if you are unsure whether you’ll get on with it. You will struggle not to takeaway a lot of good, interesting knowledge and thought by the end of the book. For some it can be a real lightbulb moment.
It was an enjoyable, albeit slightly over-focussed, way to spend an evening reading.
This is not a book for the casual reader, despite it being written in a fairly casual and accessible style, as it conveys a lot of often complicated or nuanced messages that demand interpretation. Analysing matters such as capitalism, dream analysis, society and gaming, it can draw you in and even if you don’t necessarily understand or agree with all the findings it still is an interesting read. Is our video-gaming and other techno-entertainment being commodified for the benefit of narrow external interests? Is there scope for ‘the left’ to reshape their politics and serve the domination of a hegemonic capitalist consensus? Can we understand our society through the prism presented by video-gaming? The author shares freely of his views and may answer many of these questions and more besides.
Fortunately, the price of the book is not going to break the bank, so you can afford to take a gamble if you are unsure whether you’ll get on with it. You will struggle not to takeaway a lot of good, interesting knowledge and thought by the end of the book. For some it can be a real lightbulb moment.
It was an enjoyable, albeit slightly over-focussed, way to spend an evening reading.
July 17, 2022
4.5/5 🌟
November 12, 2019
What would be the outcome of a Lacanian psychoanalytical approach applied to videogames? Add a critical political economy discussion to its context and you will get to Alfie Bown’s new book “Playstation Dreamworld”. As the author defines, the book intends to “investigate what politics could be found inside this semi-conscious world full of commodities into which we scape [games], but where we are also formed and constructed, and a theory regarding what makes this experience possible and how it may operate on us as subjects” (p.119). It discusses the effects that new technology might have on a global population as reality is becoming increasingly like games.
The book is organized in different discussions: gaming and capitalism; psychoanalysis of the electronic objectivity; and the subversive possibilities of videogames. The main and most innovative approach of the book is using psychoanalytical concepts of desire and unconscious (Freudian/Lacanian) to understand the displacement of our imaginary mediated by new technologies. Based on the idea of an electronic objectivity, it shows how mobile devices, connected applications and gaming are working “not to give us what we want but to transform what and how we desire (p.25). Consequently, it aims at assessing subjectivity to be able to change: “in a society in which technology and entertainment are inseparable and obliquus, a psychoanalysis of technology makes the new politics of desire, enjoyment and pleasure visible to us” (p.131). And in the era of online distribution, this analytical approach “places videogames in a unique position: they can reveal to us the dreams and fears that we do not yet know we have” (p.48).
Second, the book integrates this psychoanalytical perspective with analysis of the industry behind game production. As described in the book, new medias and mobile services are dominated by corporations and governments with high interests in fostering this new consciousness for specific purposes. Based on critical theory from Frankfurt School , the book goes through actual effective use of technologies such as China and UK government’s initiatives to “improve” social life that ends up organizing enjoyment to contain and control the population. Specifically for games, “the nature of our consciousness is changed by our relationship with machines and technology (…) An attempt has been made to explore the politics of these changes, thinking through the ways in which gaming creates new possibilities for empathy, identification, impulse and desire. The focus has been on who is taking advantage of this potential and to what ends they are working” (p.124).
In fact, games are being used to contribute to increase productivity as a supplement to capital. Ideas like using games to produce feelings of productivity or subscribe what productivity is (p.33) seeks to transform boredom, fragmentation and depression in productive positivity, ideological positivity. That is clear with different examples of the usage of games as distractions, that by creating a moment of complete waste of time, makes the person feel indebted and try to compensate with useful work and productivity. More than that, occupies sociable and concrete free time with personal enjoyment, precluding workers interactions and collective critical exchange of real life. When distraction appears as alternative to contemplation, there is no time for reflections. And the opposite of distraction becomes only work (p.39).
Another ideological use of games is realized through the production of dystopian futures: “the function of ideology is to insist that we experience out illusions whilst believing them to be reality” (p.107). Examples are given in different games that show no other alternative than capitalism or wasteland (barbary). Or, by romanticizing an organized and collective past, games are “not a subversive critique of corporate globalization but a call for isolationist retreat” (p.43) in which there is only fear of the future. Fear and isolation are the most up-to-date exploratory elements of major scandals on UK Brexit, US Trump or Brazil’s Bolsonaro election using massive data from social networks for political targeted media. “It resonates with Donald Trump’s calls to ‘make America great again’, as well with various European dreams of exiting the EU to return to some prelapsarian national serenity in isolation” (p.47). Or the lack of alternatives between Clinton or Trump when “capitalist realism has smoothed over the differences between the options so far that choices hardly matters, even though each are presented in total opposition to one another” (p. 55). As follows: “both utopia and dystopia have been appropriated to make capitalism appear to be the ‘only alternative’ by naturalizing a timeline that runs from barbarity to capital (…) The chance to envisage changes to capitalist modernity is eradicated, leaving only dreams of tempering its destructiveness (Stardew Valley) or of starting fresh after apocalypse (Fallout)” (p.49) .
The idea of having no alternative appears in other games where the ‘innocent’ narrative that seems to support liberal and humanistic values (liberation from international exploration) shows instead a gameplay structure that remains fascist (p.54). There is a need for negotiation of ludic space otherwise “everyone is caught in an impasse that will be near impossible to overcome, which is a view that comes dangerously close to making an excuse for inaction” (p.59). It reminds us of Russel Jacoby’s end of Utopia description of the moment when the care of each toothache seems achievable but not the ending toothaches as a whole. Or the recent best-seller by Rutgr Bregman that highlights our efforts on treating effects of our actual problems with doctor, psychoanalysts and coaches (training programs) instead of solving them by tackling our stressing life-style, unhealthy routines and an economy that lacks jobs for everyone .
A third perspective of Bown’s book is the analysis of enjoyment in games itself and its capacity of creating new addictive realities. Not only our real behavior is being influenced by data algorithms but also we are promised to be more satisfied with high tech gaming worlds. But as it may look as a sign of limitation, Bown demonstrate a very promising glimpse on new frontiers to be explored by those that seeks real transformation. By making cyberspace politics visible, the dialectics of ideological and disruptive entertainment can be discussed: “those dissatisfied with the current political and cultural situation can nostalgically lament that in 2017 even our deepest desires are algorithmic and that a computer knows what we want before we do, or they can be subversive enough to embrace algorithm in politically useful ways” (p. 25).
Even assuming the possibility of increasing corporate control of desire and the enforcement of traditionalist and conservative values, the author asks: “could we conceive a videogame which aims at reprograming desire against the fascist, corporate and capitalist tendencies found in videogames in general?” (p.78). “Since videogames can naturalize forms of enjoyment in the service of ideological forces, so too do they have the potential to make this naturalization visible, unseating the connection between enjoyment and nature and showing the political structure of enjoyment” (p.79). The programmable nature of desire allows us to aim at reprograming it also by using the dreamworld of videogames.
Instead of a political manifesto complaining about the horrors of tech industry and how the data giants are going to get us killed, Bown struggles to find new paths, new ways to update the political agenda. As most of our literature bends to the threats of data monitoring and social manipulation, the author attempts at discussing where the new subversive resides. In a recent post, Douglas Rushkov discussed what happens when the counterculture becomes mainstream . He highlights that most of the outsider cyberpunk movement agenda is now in the center of governments, corporations and society. Gaming culture included. So, a way ahead to progress might be to understand this new culture and produce the next counterculture to come, progressive in rights, beliefs and dreams. In Bown’s book: “games are more like dreams than they are like books or movies (…) they can make visible structures of which they are not yet consciously aware” (p.56). Even with the risk of just being part of the system. The same challenge that artists went through with music, literature, poetry, cinema, television are now in videogames. To understand both the industry, the players and the content is something that urges to be done. “Google and its subsidiaries send us around the city in directions of its choosing in search of the objects of desire, whether that be a lover on Tinder, a bowl of authentic Japanese ramen, or the elusive Clefairy or Pikachu ” (p.22). And Bown’s contribution is a great step on this direction, to better understand the generation of electronic objects and desires (p.26).
Lastly, the book explore how videogames “are the experience of another’s dream, can be unique form of enjoyment in which the wishes and desires of another are experienced – perhaps momentarily and unconsciously – as the wishes and desires of the gamer’s own” (p.76). It show that even with its dominating industry, for many reasons, the combinations of technology and fun can get people to places never before visited. “The dreamworld is a space for the fulfillment of desires without recognizing the power of the space to transform desire itself […as] we want to want as the other wants” (p.91).
Virtual reality gadgets, artificial intelligence, immersive experiences, mixed-sensors, the possibilities are just expanding. It is true that “real fundamental changes to both social and economic relations, when they occur in a society such as this [of endless changeability], can appear to be nothing more significant than yet more incessant changeability in which, it seems, everything ultimately remains the same” (p.9). To rescue fun from alienation to an entertaining way of consciousness is challenging. Though that can start by changing game analytics of media characters, plot and genre to patterns, images, repressed wishes: “everything that can be found in games” (p.63). In short, “the videogame is not a text to be read but a dream to be dreamt” (p.61), to be experienced actively, as if each player has a role in determining its events and outcomes. By doing so, it might be possible find ways to change players reality through games: “as with dreams, the player returns to the real world afterwards, but things are not always as they were before the dream occurred” (p.62).
“Games are seen to change our relationships to reality as much as they are informed by or reflective of it (…) the need [is] for subversion within technology and in virtual world in place of technophobia” (p.108). The game as a space “is a potentially dangerous one that threatens to throw the subject into crisis, a crisis from which the subject could at least potentially emerge in a different form” (p.120). In that sense, “anyone with subversive intentions needs to work inside the cyberspace, rather than siding with exclusionism and isolationism or falling into technophilia” (p.132). Because “it is now a question of responding without technophilia or technophobia and of working out precisely how to influence machinic subjectivities to mobilize against these corporate forces” (p.133).
Independently on agreeing with every single approach of the author, Bown has a very interesting point to start investigating both the psychoanalytic and politics of videogames. His work inspires many new clues and insights. As Zizek suggests on his own review of Bown’s book, named the perverts guide to videogame , it is not a question of taking the red or the blue pill, but creating a third one. Welcome to the playstation dreamworld!
The book is organized in different discussions: gaming and capitalism; psychoanalysis of the electronic objectivity; and the subversive possibilities of videogames. The main and most innovative approach of the book is using psychoanalytical concepts of desire and unconscious (Freudian/Lacanian) to understand the displacement of our imaginary mediated by new technologies. Based on the idea of an electronic objectivity, it shows how mobile devices, connected applications and gaming are working “not to give us what we want but to transform what and how we desire (p.25). Consequently, it aims at assessing subjectivity to be able to change: “in a society in which technology and entertainment are inseparable and obliquus, a psychoanalysis of technology makes the new politics of desire, enjoyment and pleasure visible to us” (p.131). And in the era of online distribution, this analytical approach “places videogames in a unique position: they can reveal to us the dreams and fears that we do not yet know we have” (p.48).
Second, the book integrates this psychoanalytical perspective with analysis of the industry behind game production. As described in the book, new medias and mobile services are dominated by corporations and governments with high interests in fostering this new consciousness for specific purposes. Based on critical theory from Frankfurt School , the book goes through actual effective use of technologies such as China and UK government’s initiatives to “improve” social life that ends up organizing enjoyment to contain and control the population. Specifically for games, “the nature of our consciousness is changed by our relationship with machines and technology (…) An attempt has been made to explore the politics of these changes, thinking through the ways in which gaming creates new possibilities for empathy, identification, impulse and desire. The focus has been on who is taking advantage of this potential and to what ends they are working” (p.124).
In fact, games are being used to contribute to increase productivity as a supplement to capital. Ideas like using games to produce feelings of productivity or subscribe what productivity is (p.33) seeks to transform boredom, fragmentation and depression in productive positivity, ideological positivity. That is clear with different examples of the usage of games as distractions, that by creating a moment of complete waste of time, makes the person feel indebted and try to compensate with useful work and productivity. More than that, occupies sociable and concrete free time with personal enjoyment, precluding workers interactions and collective critical exchange of real life. When distraction appears as alternative to contemplation, there is no time for reflections. And the opposite of distraction becomes only work (p.39).
Another ideological use of games is realized through the production of dystopian futures: “the function of ideology is to insist that we experience out illusions whilst believing them to be reality” (p.107). Examples are given in different games that show no other alternative than capitalism or wasteland (barbary). Or, by romanticizing an organized and collective past, games are “not a subversive critique of corporate globalization but a call for isolationist retreat” (p.43) in which there is only fear of the future. Fear and isolation are the most up-to-date exploratory elements of major scandals on UK Brexit, US Trump or Brazil’s Bolsonaro election using massive data from social networks for political targeted media. “It resonates with Donald Trump’s calls to ‘make America great again’, as well with various European dreams of exiting the EU to return to some prelapsarian national serenity in isolation” (p.47). Or the lack of alternatives between Clinton or Trump when “capitalist realism has smoothed over the differences between the options so far that choices hardly matters, even though each are presented in total opposition to one another” (p. 55). As follows: “both utopia and dystopia have been appropriated to make capitalism appear to be the ‘only alternative’ by naturalizing a timeline that runs from barbarity to capital (…) The chance to envisage changes to capitalist modernity is eradicated, leaving only dreams of tempering its destructiveness (Stardew Valley) or of starting fresh after apocalypse (Fallout)” (p.49) .
The idea of having no alternative appears in other games where the ‘innocent’ narrative that seems to support liberal and humanistic values (liberation from international exploration) shows instead a gameplay structure that remains fascist (p.54). There is a need for negotiation of ludic space otherwise “everyone is caught in an impasse that will be near impossible to overcome, which is a view that comes dangerously close to making an excuse for inaction” (p.59). It reminds us of Russel Jacoby’s end of Utopia description of the moment when the care of each toothache seems achievable but not the ending toothaches as a whole. Or the recent best-seller by Rutgr Bregman that highlights our efforts on treating effects of our actual problems with doctor, psychoanalysts and coaches (training programs) instead of solving them by tackling our stressing life-style, unhealthy routines and an economy that lacks jobs for everyone .
A third perspective of Bown’s book is the analysis of enjoyment in games itself and its capacity of creating new addictive realities. Not only our real behavior is being influenced by data algorithms but also we are promised to be more satisfied with high tech gaming worlds. But as it may look as a sign of limitation, Bown demonstrate a very promising glimpse on new frontiers to be explored by those that seeks real transformation. By making cyberspace politics visible, the dialectics of ideological and disruptive entertainment can be discussed: “those dissatisfied with the current political and cultural situation can nostalgically lament that in 2017 even our deepest desires are algorithmic and that a computer knows what we want before we do, or they can be subversive enough to embrace algorithm in politically useful ways” (p. 25).
Even assuming the possibility of increasing corporate control of desire and the enforcement of traditionalist and conservative values, the author asks: “could we conceive a videogame which aims at reprograming desire against the fascist, corporate and capitalist tendencies found in videogames in general?” (p.78). “Since videogames can naturalize forms of enjoyment in the service of ideological forces, so too do they have the potential to make this naturalization visible, unseating the connection between enjoyment and nature and showing the political structure of enjoyment” (p.79). The programmable nature of desire allows us to aim at reprograming it also by using the dreamworld of videogames.
Instead of a political manifesto complaining about the horrors of tech industry and how the data giants are going to get us killed, Bown struggles to find new paths, new ways to update the political agenda. As most of our literature bends to the threats of data monitoring and social manipulation, the author attempts at discussing where the new subversive resides. In a recent post, Douglas Rushkov discussed what happens when the counterculture becomes mainstream . He highlights that most of the outsider cyberpunk movement agenda is now in the center of governments, corporations and society. Gaming culture included. So, a way ahead to progress might be to understand this new culture and produce the next counterculture to come, progressive in rights, beliefs and dreams. In Bown’s book: “games are more like dreams than they are like books or movies (…) they can make visible structures of which they are not yet consciously aware” (p.56). Even with the risk of just being part of the system. The same challenge that artists went through with music, literature, poetry, cinema, television are now in videogames. To understand both the industry, the players and the content is something that urges to be done. “Google and its subsidiaries send us around the city in directions of its choosing in search of the objects of desire, whether that be a lover on Tinder, a bowl of authentic Japanese ramen, or the elusive Clefairy or Pikachu ” (p.22). And Bown’s contribution is a great step on this direction, to better understand the generation of electronic objects and desires (p.26).
Lastly, the book explore how videogames “are the experience of another’s dream, can be unique form of enjoyment in which the wishes and desires of another are experienced – perhaps momentarily and unconsciously – as the wishes and desires of the gamer’s own” (p.76). It show that even with its dominating industry, for many reasons, the combinations of technology and fun can get people to places never before visited. “The dreamworld is a space for the fulfillment of desires without recognizing the power of the space to transform desire itself […as] we want to want as the other wants” (p.91).
Virtual reality gadgets, artificial intelligence, immersive experiences, mixed-sensors, the possibilities are just expanding. It is true that “real fundamental changes to both social and economic relations, when they occur in a society such as this [of endless changeability], can appear to be nothing more significant than yet more incessant changeability in which, it seems, everything ultimately remains the same” (p.9). To rescue fun from alienation to an entertaining way of consciousness is challenging. Though that can start by changing game analytics of media characters, plot and genre to patterns, images, repressed wishes: “everything that can be found in games” (p.63). In short, “the videogame is not a text to be read but a dream to be dreamt” (p.61), to be experienced actively, as if each player has a role in determining its events and outcomes. By doing so, it might be possible find ways to change players reality through games: “as with dreams, the player returns to the real world afterwards, but things are not always as they were before the dream occurred” (p.62).
“Games are seen to change our relationships to reality as much as they are informed by or reflective of it (…) the need [is] for subversion within technology and in virtual world in place of technophobia” (p.108). The game as a space “is a potentially dangerous one that threatens to throw the subject into crisis, a crisis from which the subject could at least potentially emerge in a different form” (p.120). In that sense, “anyone with subversive intentions needs to work inside the cyberspace, rather than siding with exclusionism and isolationism or falling into technophilia” (p.132). Because “it is now a question of responding without technophilia or technophobia and of working out precisely how to influence machinic subjectivities to mobilize against these corporate forces” (p.133).
Independently on agreeing with every single approach of the author, Bown has a very interesting point to start investigating both the psychoanalytic and politics of videogames. His work inspires many new clues and insights. As Zizek suggests on his own review of Bown’s book, named the perverts guide to videogame , it is not a question of taking the red or the blue pill, but creating a third one. Welcome to the playstation dreamworld!
September 7, 2025
Em suma, uma análise curta e psicanalítica lacaniana de jogos digitais. Em algumas ocasiões Alfie Bown segue em algumas searas sem muita clareza de onde quer chegar, e sua conclusão faz parecer que a obra é mais subversiva/revolucionária do que de fato o conteúdo do texto - analítico, indagativo, convidativo e comparativo - o é. Ótimas referências bibliográficas e um excelente domínio horizontal de campo de pesquisa, mas uma obra que não sinto que, no fim das contas, acrescenta mais ao debate além de enumerar diferentes lentes a partir das quais podemos ler e interpretar os jogos digitais.
Particularmente sinto que no trecho em que está prestes a comentar/criticar como jogos são erroneamente interpretados como "texto" (algo que concordo, uma das minhas maiores críticas a algumas vertentes da ludologia e narratologia), em que indica que vai exemplificar como podem ser "algo diferente", o autor fica preso apenas na exemplificação da interpretação textual – com um exemplo bem água-com-açúcar, inclusive, a série Uncharted - e não desenvolve o contraponto.
Particularmente sinto que no trecho em que está prestes a comentar/criticar como jogos são erroneamente interpretados como "texto" (algo que concordo, uma das minhas maiores críticas a algumas vertentes da ludologia e narratologia), em que indica que vai exemplificar como podem ser "algo diferente", o autor fica preso apenas na exemplificação da interpretação textual – com um exemplo bem água-com-açúcar, inclusive, a série Uncharted - e não desenvolve o contraponto.
August 9, 2019
An interesting account of the dreamlike experience of video games and related technologies. The author attempts to make the point that in a society where tech and entertainment are inseparable, we need a tool set that enables an understanding of the politics of desire, pleasure and enjoyment (you can see the Lacanian emphasis that Brown places in there). Whether or not we do need psychoanalysis to do this is not something I’m 100% convinced about but Brown’s book is definitely interesting and not without merit. The chapter on Gaming and Capitalism was worth anybody’s attention regardless of their position in the Lacan vs Deleuze/Guattari argument.
February 5, 2021
A spiritual successor to Slavoj Zizek's The Pervert's Guide series, Alfie Bown provides a Lacanian reading of videogames. However, I found it lacking. It was disappointing, but that's not to say it is bad. Bown outlines some very crucial and exciting ideas, and he successfully uses a Lacanian register to render legible the invisible processes, functions and dialectical motions of the digital world. Unfortunately, it is a very short book, and the ideas aren't explored in any depth. The book perhaps functions as some sort of manifesto, but it isn't a deep investigation into the relationship between subjectivity, desire, jouissance and videogames.
July 20, 2022
A good, concise and interesting read. The combination of psychoanalysis, Marxism and close cultural analysis was refreshing and illuminating and the focus on the effects of video games (and by extension, modern data communication technology) on the psyches and political understanding and self-understanding of modern society felt long overdue.
As a #gamer™️, it was comforting to gain a better perspective on the conflicting attitudes that are held in regards to the growing hobby, finding a healthier middle ground between the technophobic rejection and reckless indulgence that often emerge on the question of video games and distraction in the modern world. The specter of communication/consumer capitalism is one that has been insufficiently reckoned with thus far and video games, particularly emergent VR technology, are arguably the most critical of all recent technologies for the subtle dispersement of hegemonic ideology. As Bown convincingly argues, the left should neither puritanically condemn video games, nor uncritically accept their widespread influence, but find a middle ground where they are used to subvert hegemonic power, rather than be left to affirm them as a form of 'apolitical' entertainment.
I would say that the selection of games explored could have been broadened, and explored in greater depth. The games focused on were explored well, but more analysis of the difference in genre could have and should have been performed. While the general structure and effect of games remains largely uniform, I would posit that there nonetheless is a valuable difference between for example, sports simulations like Fifa or Gran Turismo, addictive casual games like Candy Crush and its ilk, and more contemplative, philosophically and politically intentional titles like Silent Hill 2 or Bioshock. The analysis could have benefited from going a little deeper, and the conclusion could have had more punch. I would have liked to see Bown lay out what a subsersive game would look like to him. While he correctly cites papers please as an excellent example of a subsersive game, the analysis is a little too specific to be easily applied to subversive games in the future.
The book was just a little too inaccessible for the average reader and the average gamer, with lots of references to some quite difficult political and philosophical theory without explaining it. As I've said before, political texts which strive for progressive goals ought to be as accessible to as many people as possible. While difficult, there are ways to present these ideas clearly and the book would have benefited from not falling back on the assumption that the reader would be familiar with the works of Benjamin, Deleuze, Guattari etc. etc.
An important and worthwhile read, admittedly with some room for improvement. 7/10
As a #gamer™️, it was comforting to gain a better perspective on the conflicting attitudes that are held in regards to the growing hobby, finding a healthier middle ground between the technophobic rejection and reckless indulgence that often emerge on the question of video games and distraction in the modern world. The specter of communication/consumer capitalism is one that has been insufficiently reckoned with thus far and video games, particularly emergent VR technology, are arguably the most critical of all recent technologies for the subtle dispersement of hegemonic ideology. As Bown convincingly argues, the left should neither puritanically condemn video games, nor uncritically accept their widespread influence, but find a middle ground where they are used to subvert hegemonic power, rather than be left to affirm them as a form of 'apolitical' entertainment.
I would say that the selection of games explored could have been broadened, and explored in greater depth. The games focused on were explored well, but more analysis of the difference in genre could have and should have been performed. While the general structure and effect of games remains largely uniform, I would posit that there nonetheless is a valuable difference between for example, sports simulations like Fifa or Gran Turismo, addictive casual games like Candy Crush and its ilk, and more contemplative, philosophically and politically intentional titles like Silent Hill 2 or Bioshock. The analysis could have benefited from going a little deeper, and the conclusion could have had more punch. I would have liked to see Bown lay out what a subsersive game would look like to him. While he correctly cites papers please as an excellent example of a subsersive game, the analysis is a little too specific to be easily applied to subversive games in the future.
The book was just a little too inaccessible for the average reader and the average gamer, with lots of references to some quite difficult political and philosophical theory without explaining it. As I've said before, political texts which strive for progressive goals ought to be as accessible to as many people as possible. While difficult, there are ways to present these ideas clearly and the book would have benefited from not falling back on the assumption that the reader would be familiar with the works of Benjamin, Deleuze, Guattari etc. etc.
An important and worthwhile read, admittedly with some room for improvement. 7/10
March 24, 2021
From a layman's perspective with great interest in psychoanalysis, this book opened my mind to a variety of new perspectives and ideas which I intend to explore further, and with good direction thanks to the provided references after each chapter. The language gets quite academic at times, but armed with persistence and curiosity one can definitely grasp most of the definitions and ideas explored by the author. A very focused and thought-provoking analysis of different gaming trends and patterns through psychoanalytical and political dissection which has a strong potential to influence or completely transform your perspective on the experience of gaming.
June 7, 2020
A fantastic book on a topic I really wish more people did work on. A Lacanian psychoanalysis of how we enjoy gaming, what that means politically, and its implications. Explores issues of persona that I always said were first best explored by Carlo Michelstaedter using proper Lacanian methods of explaining enjoyment.
It is very short, has no filler content whatsoever, no superfluous repetition, and constantly gave me new insights I was not aware of. While Lacan is infamously hard to read, this book is extremely clear and easy to pick up, so I recommended it to just about everyone.
It is very short, has no filler content whatsoever, no superfluous repetition, and constantly gave me new insights I was not aware of. While Lacan is infamously hard to read, this book is extremely clear and easy to pick up, so I recommended it to just about everyone.
March 8, 2018
Alfie Bown is an Assistant Professor of Literature at HSMC Hong Kong and in this very academic book that’s heavy on psychoanalytical theory, he argues that computer games can only be fully understood through psychoanalysis, that subversion needs to operate within this dream world or else risk it falling under the control of corporations and the state and that enjoyment of video games is ideological and subversive.
June 14, 2019
A pretty ideating approach to taking about videogames and philosophy (infinitely better than philosophy and x). He relies heavily on psychoanalysis, especially Lacan, to make good arguments which work and make sense. However, it does feel rather brief and not fully fleshed out. He does not touch too much on the multiplayer games which is a shame. Can imagine a longer "sequel" of shorts to cover more. Also, the only fighting game mentioned was Dead or Alive and it was just in passing.
February 26, 2021
The part about the videogame environment creating one's subconciousness, and supplying the drive's one' wants and needs is quite good. I thought that the part about Guetari's scifi screen play about a machinic subjectivity becoming human by becoming the lacked other's of a specific persona and morphing into that individual is rather interesting in maybe it give a better understanding of idenity fluidity
March 14, 2022
Psychoanalysis of dreams but dreams are videogames. This book offers an amazing analysis of the role od different types of videogames in capitalist production. It also tries to present a new kind of lacanian psychoanalysis which lets us analyze videogames. I don't think I agree with all of the conclusions, but overall, I liked the book a lot. Alfie Bown takes videogames seriously, as we all should.
September 24, 2020
Nástroje psychoanalýzy použité na vplyv hier a ich možné využitie ako ideologickú zbraň kapitalizmu. Taktiež som sa dozvedel prečo ľudí bavia dystopické hry typu Fallout a hry z mladosti. Kniha tiež nepriamo vzbudzuje hlbší záujem o psychológiu, keďže ukazuje v praxi laickým spôsobom jej metódy a nástroje.
February 14, 2021
Really poignant analysis of how the experience of gaming affects us. Heavily drawing from greats such as Fisher, Zizek and of course, Lacan, Alfie Bown builds a very profound theory of human and machinic consciousness in the context of games, and constructs a framework which may well be a guide for true subversion within the art form.
August 6, 2023
“[Papers, Please] reveals that pleasure comes not from a thrilling battle with the bad guys but from law enforcement as such, no matter how mundane and bureaucratic. It may show a Lacanian point that a perverse pleasure is derived from imposing the letter of the law, but it also doubles back on this by virtue of being a simulation of such pleasure, forcing the recognition.”
December 17, 2020
Hm veľmi dobrá psychoanalýza
Dromeny (114)
Videohra -risa emócií
"Každá nostalgia v sebe nesie možný záblesk budúcnosti- diva sa skôr vred než vzad- keďže prináša nový vzťah k minulosti, ktorá hlása a do reality uvádza sama nostaLgia."74
Dromeny (114)
Videohra -risa emócií
"Každá nostalgia v sebe nesie možný záblesk budúcnosti- diva sa skôr vred než vzad- keďže prináša nový vzťah k minulosti, ktorá hlása a do reality uvádza sama nostaLgia."74
December 21, 2020
A breezy and stimulating read for those interested in psychoanalysis applied to a modern medium. The book is concise and well referenced , but I was left wanting with greater elaboration of the core concepts he draws upon, as the arguments made were rather brief.
May 19, 2022
An interesting, if brief, exploration of the permeability and synergy between our politics, surveillence capitalism, technology, and video games, viewed through a predominantly psychoanalytical lense. I would have loved for him to develop his arguments more, but a very good read nevertheless.
November 19, 2018
I only understood half of it, being inexperienced in psychoanalysis, but what I did understand I liked.
July 28, 2021
I really liked its analysis on video games and how they perpetuate colonial and capitalist values. I want to go into the video game industry so it’s definitely something I’ll reread again. It was a bit hard to understand at points, but I enjoyed all the ideas provided. Definitely changed how I see video games more now.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 40 reviews