Description
Human beings have been playing games for as long as they have been telling stories. In this course, students will explore the capacity of both games and literature to inform our understanding of the world, and for shaping our relationships to each other and ourselves. Part hands-on gaming studio, part literature seminar—students will play a range of digital and analog games while reading key works of English literature to consider the shared affordances of literature and games: as frameworks for play, mechanisms for world-building, and equipment for living.
In this course, we will read works in several popular genres of fiction including fantasy literature, detective fiction, and horror. In each case, we’ll analyze the historical intersections of these popular genres with games and gaming culture. First, we’ll read from selected works by J.R.R. Tolkien to trace the fantasy genre’s historical origins in myth, legend, and fairy tales, and explore how the genre conventions of fantasy writing have been reproduced, or subverted, by role-playing and open-world adventure games. Next, we’ll look to detective fiction's use of narrative form, uncovering a distinctive approach that stretches across both literary and gaming cultures. We will read a classic short novel by Arthur Conan Doyle to reveal how the formulaic building-blocks of the murder mystery (e.g., finding clues, mapping social space) mirror the investigative mechanics of social deduction games. Finally, we’ll consider the classic horror stories of Bram Stoker and H.P. Lovecraft to examine patterns of textual fragmentation and the mechanics of hidden information, using them as keys to understanding anxieties about gendered bodies in Victorian England and the psychopathology of race in modern America.
Week 1 - Introduction to the Course
Overview of Course Materials and Peer Introductions
M - 08/19 Review Course Syllabus
W - 08/21 Discuss Nguyen and Burke
Readings Accessible via Canvas
Week 2 - Frameworks for Play
M - 08/26 Discuss Salen & Zimmerman and Jagoda; Play Stardew Valley and Settlers of Catan
W - 08/28 Discuss Chang and Flanagan; Play Octodad and Disco Elysium
Readings Accessible via Canvas
Week 3 - Tolkien and the Fantasy Tradition
Myth, Legend, and Fairy Tale
M - 09/02 LABOR DAY
W - 09/04 Discuss Tolkien, "On Fairy Stories" and "Mythopoeia"
Readings Accessible via Canvas
Week 4 - Open World Building
Space, Choice, and Epic Storytelling
M - 09/09 Play and Discuss The Witcher III
W - 09/11 Discuss Tolkien, The Silmarillion (1977) and The Hobbit (1937)
Readings Accessible via Canvas
Week 5 - Narrative Architecture
Textual Ruins and Metafictional Gestures
M - 09/16 Discuss Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings (1954-5)
W - 09/18 Play and Discuss The Witcher III
Readings Accessible via Canvas
Week 6 - Playing in Faërie
Roleplay and Collaborative Storytelling
M - 09/23 WELLNESS DAY
W - 09/25 Discuss Peterson, "The Two Cultures" and Dungeons and Dragons, 1st Ed.
Readings Accessible via Canvas
Week 7 - Character Creation
Agency and Self-Invention
M - 09/30 Character Creation Exercise
T - 10/01 EXT Play Wanderhome
W - 10/02 Discuss Wanderhome
Week 8 - Clues in the Classic Detective Story
The Mechanics of the Mystery Formula
M - 10/07 Discuss Todorov, "The Typology of Detective Fiction"
W - 10/09 Discuss Conan Doyle The Hound of the Baskervilles (1902)
Readings Accessible via Canvas
Week 9 - Playing at Murder, and Investigation
Social Deduction Games
M - 10/14 Lying to Your Friends is Fun!
T - 10/15 EXT Play Blood on the Clocktower
W - 10/16 Discuss Blood on the Clocktower
Week 10 - Playing with Memory
Gothic Fiction and Literary Form
M - 10/21 Discuss Stoker, Dracula (1897)
W - 10/23 Play Thousand-Year-Old Vampire
Readings Accessible via Canvas
Week 11 - Cosmic Horror
Lovecraft & the Psychopathology of Race
M - 10/28 Discuss Lovecraft, "The Call of Cthulhu" and "The Dunwich Horror"
T - 10/29 EXT Play Unfathomable
W - 10/30 Discuss Unfathomable
Readings Accessible via Canvas
Week 12-14 - Project Development
From Proposal to Prototype
M/W - 11/04-06 Goal Setting and Group Formation
M/W - 11/11-13 Research and Design Workshops
M/W - 11/18-20 Production and Prototyping Workshops
Week 15 - Thanksgiving
Holiday Break
M - 11/25 Progress Report Check-In DUE
W - 11/27 NO CLASS
Week 16 - Conclusion to the Course
Course Wrap-Up and Feedback Survey
M - 12/02 Playtesting Workshop
W - 12/04 Conclusion