{"id":225,"date":"2016-10-26T18:10:48","date_gmt":"2016-10-26T18:10:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/courses.digitaldavidson.net\/wri101toys\/?page_id=225"},"modified":"2016-11-18T18:38:03","modified_gmt":"2016-11-18T18:38:03","slug":"project-3-videogames","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/courses.digitaldavidson.net\/wri101toys\/project-3-videogames\/","title":{"rendered":"Project 3: Videogames"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>In <em>How to Talk about Videogames<\/em>, Ian Bogost models one approach\u2014among many possible approaches\u2014to contextualize, analyze, and think about videogames. Your goal for this writing project is to emulate Bogost, not so much in terms of style but rather, in the way he forces readers to reconsider what they think they know about videogames.<\/p>\n<p>Each chapter of Bogost&#8217;s book features its own idiosyncrasies, but we can find recurring characteristics in his writing:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>He occasionally makes bold, even absurd statements as attention-grabbing hooks, and then proceeds to argue that his counter-intuitive statement does in fact have some evidence supporting it.<\/li>\n<li>He&#8217;ll focus on two or more games, often using the later examples to provide mounting evidence for his argument, or taking a comparative approach that uses one game&#8217;s deficiencies to highlight another game&#8217;s successes.<\/li>\n<li>He&#8217;ll bring in familiar examples from other media, such as film, television, literature, or art.<\/li>\n<li>He contextualizes games with miniature social, cultural, and technology history lessons.<\/li>\n<li>He is a critic of videogames in the sense that he expects more out of them than what they usually offer. He is also a critic in the sense he describes in his introduction: the critic&#8217;s job is to &#8220;catalog and to clarify the world&#8221; (x) and &#8220;to get to the bottom of something&#8221; (xii).<\/li>\n<li>He strives to <em>defamiliarize <\/em>games, making us question what we think we know about videogames.<\/li>\n<li>He has done his research, integrating on average 5 outside sources. Sometimes he uses these sources to support his points, while other times he brings the sources in only to refute them.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>You should keep all of these features in mind as you work on your project. If there is a single guiding principle here, it is <em>to get to the bottom of something<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p>This guiding principles demands that there is in fact something to get to the bottom of. In other words, you can&#8217;t manufacture your own problem. The central controversy or mystery of your project must actually exist. Finding this problem is essential intellectual work.<\/p>\n<h5>How to Find a Videogame to Talk About<\/h5>\n<p>Every kind of videogame is fair game, from titles you played as a kid, to casual games on your phone, to the latest blockbuster console game. If you&#8217;re at a loss of what to write about, do some searching to see what games have caused debate online. Ask your friends what games have frustrated them lately. Peek at what games people are playing when they&#8217;re supposed to be working.<\/p>\n<h5>Schedule<\/h5>\n<ul>\n<li>Draft due by class on Monday, November 7. Drafts should be approximately 2,500-3,000 words.<\/li>\n<li>Final versions due <span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">as PDF<\/span> via Google Drive by midnight on Monday, November 21.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h5>Works Cited<\/h5>\n<div class=\"csl-bib-body\">\n<div class=\"csl-entry\">Bogost, Ian. <i>How to Talk About Videogames<\/i>. University of Minnesota Press, 2015.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<a href=\"https:\/\/courses.digitaldavidson.net\/wri101toys\/project-3-videogames\/\" rel=\"bookmark\" title=\"Permalink to Project 3: Videogames\"><p>In How to Talk about Videogames, Ian Bogost models one approach\u2014among many possible approaches\u2014to contextualize, analyze, and think about videogames. Your goal for this writing project is to emulate Bogost, not so much in terms of style but rather, in the way he forces readers to reconsider what they think they know about videogames. Each [&hellip;]<\/p>\n<\/a>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-225","page","type-page","status-publish","h-entry","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.digitaldavidson.net\/wri101toys\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/225","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.digitaldavidson.net\/wri101toys\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.digitaldavidson.net\/wri101toys\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.digitaldavidson.net\/wri101toys\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.digitaldavidson.net\/wri101toys\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=225"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/courses.digitaldavidson.net\/wri101toys\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/225\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":276,"href":"https:\/\/courses.digitaldavidson.net\/wri101toys\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/225\/revisions\/276"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.digitaldavidson.net\/wri101toys\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=225"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}