Showing papers by "Marco Caracciolo published in 2009"

Conceptual Blending in Computer Games: Integrating Fiction and Meaning

Abstract: In this paper, I will build on Fauconnier and Turner‘s (2002) The Way We Think to introduce my own category of ―ceptual blending.‖ This concept can be illustrated by referring to a number of cognitive-scientific sources, and accords with Fauconnier and Turner‘s single most insightful claim: the idea that we live in a blended world. Moreover, I‘ll mention the structural (as opposed to mimetic) resemblance between the way we experience the world and the way we experience aesthetic artifacts, including computer games. By doing so, I will pave the way for what I like to think of as an ―enactivist aesthetics.‖ As to computer games, I‘ll try to show that they construct blended worlds—that is, worlds structurally similar to the one we live in. In particular, computer games integrate an environment (a world, a fiction) with some affordances. ―Affordance‖ is, obviously, Gibson‘s (1979) term for an opportunity of interaction; as we‘ll see, it is also the blanket term through which I intend to capture both the rules of the game and, in case there is one, the narrative it tells. This integration occurs at the level of the interface and, in particular, of what I will call the 2½-D interface. Eventually, turning to my main case study, Assassin’s Creed, I‘ll contend that the interface actually shown on the screen refers to a larger hermeneutic space where the interaction between player and game takes place. This hermeneutic space is also blended.