Paul Hanlon graduated from Queen’s University in the Spring of 2005 with a BAH in Film Studies. During his time at Queen’s he acted as the Asst. Director of the ‘Digital Poetics and Politics’ summer institute (August 2004), and the Technical Director of the ‘reelout queer film and video festival’ (2005). He is currently a first year MA candidate in the York/Ryerson Joint Graduate Programme in Communication & Culture, further pursuing his inquiry into Video Game Studies.

Abstract

An Approach to Video Game Studies: A Multiplicity in 25 short theses

This article questions gamers’ attitudes towards their machines with an approach to Video Game Studies from several angles at once. Surveying some of the major texts in the field, the author problematizes the popular conceptions of gaming as a narrative form, a youth-oriented medium, a social inhibitor, etc. Gaming must be studied from a schizophrenic position to understand its place and its logic.