Digital Seriality: On the Serial Aesthetics and Practice of Digital Games

Abstract

In this paper we are concerned to outline a set of perspectives, methods, and theories with which to approach the seriality of digital games and game cultures – i.e. the aesthetic forms and cultural practices of game-related serialization, which we see unfolding against (and, in fact, as a privileged mediator of) the broader background of medial and socio-cultural transformations taking place in the wake of popular media culture’s digitalization. Seriality, we contend, is a central and multifaceted but largely neglected dimension of popular computer and video games. Seriality is a factor not only in explicitly marked game series (with their sequels, prequels, remakes, and other types of continuation), but also within games themselves (e.g. in their formal-structural constitution as an iterative series of “levels” or “worlds”) as well as on the level of transmedial relations between games and other media (e.g. expansive serializations of narrative worlds across the media of comics, film, television, and games, etc.). Particularly with respect to processes of temporal “collapse” or “synchronization” that, in the current age of digitization and media convergence, are challenging the temporal dimensions and developmental logics of pre-digital seriality (e.g. because once successively appearing series installments are increasingly available now for immediate, repeated, and non-linear consumption), computer games are eminently suited for an exemplary investigation of a specifically digital type of seriality. In the following, we look at serialization processes in digital games and game series and seek to understand how they relate to digital-era transformations of temporally-serially structured experiences and identifications on the part of historically situated actors. These transformations range from the microtemporal scale of individual players’ encounters with algorithmic computation processes (the speed of which escapes direct human perception and is measurable only by technological means) all the way up to the macrotemporal (more properly “historical”) level of collective brokerings of political, cultural, and social identities in the digital age. To account for this multi-layered complexity, we argue for a decidedly interdisciplinary approach, combining media-aesthetic and media-philosophical perspectives with the resources of discourse analysis and cultural history. We approach the seriality of digital games both in terms of textual and aesthetic forms as well as in the broader context of serialized game cultures and popular culture at large.

Prolonging the Magic: The political economy of the 7th generation console game

“…Five action-themed titles in particular were singled out during the trade show: Halo 3 (Bungie Studios 2007), Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare (Infinity , Bioshock (Irrational Games and Digital Extremes 2007), and Assassin's Creed (Ubisoft Montreal 2007), all released during the 2007 holiday season, along with Grand Theft Auto IV (Rockstar North), released April 2008. These titles illustrate well how the franchising strategy-that is, the serialization of discrete game titles, or what Denson and Jahn-Sudmann (2013) label "inter-ludic seriality"-dominates video game publishing. Three of these titles are the third and fourth installments in a series, whereas Bioshock and Assassin's Creed are positioned as "franchise starters," launched early in the console cycle to establish new series.…”

“…Rather than discussing seriality vis-à-vis a Triple-A games' "aesthetic-formal" qualities (Denson and Jahn-Sudmann 2013), the Triple-A game will be theorized here as a cultural commodity. I will argue that understanding contemporary console games inherently means investigating game technology as well as realizing that the Triple-A game is always also a cultural product and cannot therefore be fully understood without acknowledging and unpacking its commodity form.…”

“…First there is franchising; an "inter-ludic" instance of seriality (cf. Denson and Jahn-Sudmann 2013). From the earliest stages of creative conception, a Triple-A game is positioned to be part of a specific temporal publishing framework that is initiated when the first title in a (potential) franchise meets its revenue targets, and is subsequently concluded when consumer demand and profitability drops.…”

“…As such, the branching mode of seriality can be positioned between the "intra-ludic" and "inter-ludic" categories of seriality, as it is a category that manifests itself both within a game as well as between games (cf. Denson and Jahn-Sudmann 2013). 8 New games come with a unique code that can be used only once to acquire a specific piece of downloadable content.…”

Seriality's Ludic Promise: Film Serials and the Pre-History of Digital Gaming

“…Denson and Jahn-Sudmann emphasize that because play is a social-cultural practice with its own material history, we should be wary of reducing its study to textual analysis (Denson and Jahn-Sudmann 2013). Unfortunately we have few accounts of how the target audience engaged with serials in the studio era, though reformoriented literature of the late 1920s and early 1930s provides a tantalizing glimpse.…”