Posthumanism and digital gaming

Abstract

While play has always constituted an important aspect of human activity, the advent of video games, in tandem with the development of computer technology, has revolutionized our everyday lives to such an extent that digital gaming has become not only a crucial form of entertainment but also, increasingly, an educational means of addressing current global issues. This chapter will first provide a background for the emergence of digital gaming alongside the rise of posthumanism as a discipline concerned with the impact of technology on the human, then with the questioning of anthropocentrism and of the nature of humanity itself. After a brief presentation of the greater symbiosis between the human and the machinic in videoludic entertainment, the role of this integration on the gamer's affect and identification with a virtual avatar will be analyzed, with a focus on the theme of empathy for androids in Detroit: Become Human. The new millennium's mounting awareness of the Anthropocene has led video games to address our precariousness, and the study will then reflect such an evolution, from the earlier superhero saving the world (traditional games) to a more humble character struggling for their life (survival horror games) or to assert their singularity (LGBT+-and disabled-friendly games), to a responsible citizen aware of their situatedness in the world trying to empathize with the endangered planet (ecocritical and nonhuman, object-oriented games).