1st Edition
Asian Histories and Heritages in Video Games
This book explores the representations of national Asian histories in digital games. Situated at the intersection of regional game studies and historical game studies, this book offers chapters on histories and heritages of Japan, China, Iran, Iraq, Taiwan, South Korea, Indonesia, Singapore, Turkey, and Russia.
The volume looks beyond the diversity of the local histories depicted in games, and the audience reception of these histories, to show a diversity of approaches which can be used in examining historical games– from postcolonialism to identity politics to heritage studies. It demonstrates various methodological approaches to historical/regional game studies: case studies of nationally produced historical games that deal with local history, studies of media reception of history/heritage-themed games, text-mining methods studying attitudes expressed by players of such games, and educational perspectives on games in teaching cultural heritage. Through the lens of videogames, the authors explore how nations struggle with the legacies of war, colonialism and religious strife that have been a part of nation-building - but also how victimized cultures can survive, resist, and sometimes prevail.
Appealing primarily to scholars in the fields of game studies, heritage studies, postcolonial criticism, and media studies, this book will be particularly useful for the subfields of historical game studies and postcolonial game studies.
1. An Introduction to Asian Histories and Heritages in Video Game Studies
Michał Mochocki, Paweł Schreiber, Jakub Majewski, Yowei Kang, Kenneth C. C. Yang
2. Reflections and Expressions of Turkish Politics in Legends of Istanbul: Tulip Warriors and Istanbul Doomsday Games
Ertuğrul Süngü & Güven Çatak
3. The Implicit Ideology of Russian Historical Video Games: The Case of Blitzkrieg 2
Leonid Moyzhes & Maksim Podvalnyi
4. (De)colonial Difficulties in Japanese Games: Collective Memory & (Post)colonialism in Atelier Ryza
Ryan Scheiding
5. From Simulation to Repurposing: Evolving Historical Designs in Chinese Digital Games
Zihan Feng
6. “This whole war is on you”: Historical and Military Framing of Iraq in House of Ashes
Christine Tomlinson
7. The Temporal Closure of Iran: Coverage of a Historical Video Game about the Iranian Revolution in U.S. Media Outlets
Brian McKernan & Elham Pourtaher
8. Constructing Taiwanese Identity through Historical Digital Games and Gameplay
Yowei Kang & Kenneth C.C. Yang
9. When Playing Squid Game Matches the Real-Life Experiences of Contemporary South Korean Culture and Society: An Intersected Hyper-Reality Perspective
Kenneth C.C. Yang & Yowei Kang
10. Mobile Game Esports as an Indonesian National Identity
Haryo Pambuko Jiwandono
11. Imagining the Immigration Past through an AR Game in Singapore
Vivian Hsueh Hua Chen
12. Digital Game-Based Learning on Historical and Cultural Heritage in China: A Systematic Review
Haixia Liu & Yining Zhang
Biography
Yowei Kang (Ph.D. in Rhetoric and Composition Study, The University of Texas at El Paso) is an Assistant Professor at the Continuing Bachelor Program of Digital Humanities and Creative Industries, National Chung Hsing University, TAIWAN. His research interests focus on new media design, digital game research, visual communication, new media & political communication campaigns, and experiential rhetoric.
Kenneth C.C. Yang (Ph.D. in Telecommunications, The Ohio State University at Columbus) is a Professor in the Department of Communication at the University of Texas at El Paso, USA. His research focuses on new media applications in political and environmental communication campaigns, cross-cultural consumer behavior, and Asia studies.
Michał Mochocki holds a PhD in Literature and Dr. habil. in Culture and Religion Studies, and works as an associate professor at Faculty of Literature, UKW in Bydgoszcz. His primary research interests are historical role-playing games, which he examines from the angles of transmedia narratology and heritage studies.
Jakub Majewski (PhD) holds the position of Assistant Professor in the Department of Game Studies and Digital Culture at the Kazimierz Wielki University in Bydgoszcz, where he teaches a range of subjects across game design, game writing, and game studies. His specific research interests are game narrative, worldbuilding and open-world role-playing games, history, culture and cultural heritage in games, as well as the history of games as a medium.
Paweł Schreiber (PhD) works as an assistant professor at the Faculty of Literature at the Kazimierz Wielki University in Bydgoszcz. His main research interests include post-war British historical drama, interactive fiction and video game narrative, with particular emphasis on the relationship between narrative and space. Apart from his academic interests, he has also done work in theatre criticism and game writing.
