Walkthrough: videogames and technocultural form - Seth Giddings

part 3: towards a new media studies
3.1 beyond the media text
It is argued that the emphasis within the dominant discourses of Cultural and Media Studies on a linguistic
or textual model of culture and communication is key to the shortcomings of their attention to new media
and technoculture. The model of communication as one of encoding a message (at the moment of production
of a media ‘text’) and of its decoding (at the moment of consumption) that underpins mainstream Cultural
and Media Studies, is tested for its adequacy in analysing the popular use of digital technology and software.
Firstly it is argued that this textual metaphor elides the fundamentally material nature of culture and
communication in general, secondly - more specifically – it is argued that the textual model doesn’t allow for
an understanding of videogame play as irreducibly technological and embodied (cybernetic, even), and
thirdly – questions are raised as to the relevance of foregrounding ideological critique in media
consumption, particularly in relation to ludic media artefacts and practices.
3.2 augmenting Media Studies
The critique of the ‘anti-technological determinist’ credo of Cultural and Media Studies is developed and
alternative theoretical resources on the cultural role of technology are introduced, notably actor-network
theory and science and technology studies. Drawing on these approaches a retheorisation of media
technologies as material and as agents is posited. One of the key concerns of this thesis, the proposition that
videogames are constituted by technological as well as human agency is addressed.
3.3 cybertextual analysis
Videogames are popular media texts as well as technologies. This section will test the limits of prevalent
modes of textual analysis derived from Media and Film Studies in the study of videogames. A conceptual
framework that factors in both technology as actor and as media images is offered. The following questions
are asked: what are the analytical implications of studying computer-based media? What characteristics and
uses of computer hardware and software need to be identified to make sense of digital games and digital
gameplay? New media forms integral to the digital game (such as interactivity and simulation) have their
origins in computer science rather than popular media; what conceptual frameworks and modes of analysis
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