thinking (before) after dark
abstract in progress:
JoyEssence Hack, Slash, Repeat: the Pleasures of Played and Made Zombification.
The undead of Dead Rising horde the playspace making it a game of numbers. The sheer quantity of enemy aligned with the variety of weapon availability situate the pleasure in slaughter and the specifics of its performance. The method for progression is killing, but more so massacring, essentially constructing an experience based on repetition gratified by nuance. This is what the player does and this is how the player kills for survival.
Survival, however is the awaiting of death and death has a specific operation in games and avatar death is annulled by persistent regeneration. Death in games is always functioning a denial of finality while being an integral part of a punishing curve of progression. Avatar death is necessary in play, it forces learning while respawning as determined by save points forces a replay of territory. The continual experiencing of death in games is the repetitive play of denial, and therefore the death of games is superseded by the guarantee of reanimation. The emphasis is not on the resurrection but the denial of death and this process of repetition essentially zombifies the players situation and status. This is how the player dies, never dies and becomes symbolically undead.
This paper will investigate the jouissance that zombies games perform, made affective by the methods of play and infective by the impact on the player.
