Introduction - Wordplay and the Discourse of Video Games - page 9

with the big rhetoric approach embedded in wordplay, which holds that
all games are persuasive and they are inevitably so. Structure and design
are special parts of games that require attention, but they are not the only
part of games to analyze, just as they are a part that must not be neglected
in analysis. Whether or not games are successfully persuasive or to what
ends they persuade is secondary, but all games are persuasive in some way.
Whether the persuasion is to buy the game, play the game in a manner
that is rewarded with a patch, follow a given narrative, use the game as a
surface to bond and identify with one's father, absorb the capitalist lessons
of Animal Crossing 39 or the political messages in Tax Invaders , 40 all games
are persuasive.
A handful of other scholars have also sought to employ the tools of
rhetoric to analyze elements of games. Gerald Voorhees argues that “the
form of the player-game interaction has to be taken seriously if critics are
to come to terms with the rhetorical force of Civilization ,” 41 as it is the
player-game interaction that connects the game to the mind and actively
ignores the constraints imposed by the body, internalizing the role of agent
in the game. Voorhees also analyzes the changing character representa-
tions over the course of the Final Fantasy series, contending, “When every
representation is in some way ideological it is not possible to speak about
representation without also considering it rhetorical.” 42 Looking at online
discussion boards, Moeller, Esplin, and Conway contend it is on discussion
boards where players “push the boundaries of what is considered ethical
or sportsmanlike in a medium where testing the boundaries of an environ-
ment and the limits of the rules is encouraged and expected.” 43 The com-
mon thread through these projects is the interest in how certain elements
of games structure the way those texts are understood and encountered.
These pieces articulate ways in which games persuade to a variety of dif-
ferent ends, of ering examples of how rhetorical analysis can engage both a
game and the text surrounding it.
A number of other research projects studying large-scale elements of
gaming of er potential links to the rhetorical perspective found in wordplay,
as they critically analyze discourse in a manner congruent with a rhetorical
approach. The context for rhetorical analysis is largely set by understand-
ing the vast number of interrelated forces that shape interactions in virtual
worlds. In critiquing the concept of a magic circle, 44 Mia Consalvo articu-
lates what can be seen as a call for rhetorical analysis in the massively mul-
tiplayer online (MMO) game genre, stressing the importance of “the need
to understand how players understand, contextualize, and challenge MMO
games.” 45 Consalvo goes on to explore how structures, real-life infl uences,
and game play experiences interact, stressing the importance of examining
the interrelation of the various factors that shape play interactions in games
and virtual worlds. Similarly, T. L. Taylor of ers a list of interrelated factors
that shape games and their play, including