Once considered niche, fringe, and the hobby of only outsiders or loners, video games have rapidly become one of the most popular and influential artistic forms of this century. Their imagery is near ubiquitous―children, adults, and even professional athletes know what a Fortnite dance is without having played the game, and every conversation about violence in media eventually turns toward Grand Theft Auto. We’ve reached a point where, through streaming platforms like Twitch, games don’t even need to be played to be enjoyed, as whole robust communities form around watching others play. Games have grown into more than just products; they’re touchstones, meaning that they’ve become popular enough for something radical to have happened: even while culture shapes our games, games have simultaneously begun shaping our culture.
In Story Mode, video games critic and host of the No Cartridge podcast Trevor Strunk traces how some of the most popular and influential game series have changed over years and even decades of their continued existence and growth. We see how the Call of Duty games―once historical simulators that valorized conflicts like World War II―went “modern,” complete with endless conflicts, false flag murders of civilians, and hyperadvanced technology. It can be said that Fortnite’s runaway popularity hinges on a competition for finite resources in an era of horrific inequality. Strunk reveals how these shifts occurred as direct reflections of the culture in which games were produced, thus offering us a uniquely clear window into society’s evolving morals on a mass scale.
Story Mode asks the question, Why do video games have a uniquely powerful ability to impact culture? Strunk argues that the participatory nature of games themselves not only provides players with a sense of ownership of the narratives within, but also allows for the consumption of games to be a revelatory experience as the meaning of a game is oftentimes derived by the manner in which they are played.
Combining sharp criticism of our most beloved and well-known video game series with a fascinating discussion of how our cultural values form, Story Mode is a truly original examination of the unique space games now occupy, from one of the sharpest games critics working today.
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First off – I’m not a gamer. I have a PS3 in my basement and it has had the same game loaded into it for years. It’s a copy of Rocksmith 2014.
So, you think I might not be the audience for a book about gaming. But here’s the thing. Mister Trevor Strunk, PhD does an excellent job tying his discussions of the current generations of games into the larger cultural milieu. Maybe you’re not anticipating your book about video games to have a reference to Judith Butler and Fred Jameson and David Harvey, but you need that theory to talk the games. Strunk is an English PhD, and he does hit on those theory people, but I think the book is accessible and readable. It’s just a carryover from the bird website where he’s a good follow, with smart commentary on the issues of the day. I also hear good things about a podcast, but I don’t follow a lot of podcasts.
There are a couple places where he does get in the weeds about the games, most of which I have never played. And there is a handwave at a larger metatext going on about the games he focuses on that is not necessarily brought into the text, but overall, it is a strong and interesting book. I look forward to the author’s next works.
Strunk is the rare breed of academic who can also write like hell. I guess an English degree CAN come in handy sometimes. Read it, you'll be glad you did.
For this reader, the best chapters were the early ones that focused on genres and not specific games, but that’s mostly because Dark Souls and Metal Gear do almost nothing for me. Reading about how those games interact with their audiences and the broader gaming culture is rather like reading a treatise on extraterrestrial pornography; I can see what’s fascinating about it on its own merits, but because I have no corresponding passion for those games, the chapters were less interesting. I feel for the author, as gaming subcultures can be quite siloed. The Dark Souls-likes, and FromSoft in particular, are surging now due to the popularity of Elden Ring. Alas, I can’t connect to the output from this developer.
I have next to no history with Metal Gear, so I have none of my own experience to bring to that chapter, either, though the discussion on auteurs is one I think is relevant to our times.
The Final Fantasy chapter was more engaging for me, but that’s mostly due to nostalgia, and not any great connection I have with modern Final Fantasy games. I played FFXIV for the PS4 when it launched, and just as with any MMO, at some point, it began to feel like a job I’m not only never paid to do, but rather worse—a job I’M paying Square Enix a monthly fee for the privilege of performing.
It was a conversation around a similar topic I’d hoped Strunk would finally address—this movement of production and economic activity into the realm of purely digital products. Capitalism is always adapting to the problems created by its (judged on its own terms) successes. In the 1970s, in the waning years of the post-war boom, there was less and less room in the marketplace for more consumer goods, which led to further financialization of the market. The 80s and early 90s were all about money making money without the pesky need to create physical commodities. “Financial products” rose in prominence, creating more and more economic instability before culminating in the massive theft of working class savings and accumulated wealth perpetuated in 2008.
Now we see the rise of NFTs and nearly constant media conversations about the “metaverse.” I’m dying to know what Strunk and other leftist thinkers have to say about this new focus on virtual goods and services, especially how it might inform culture or affect the means and methods of production, markets, and work.
Perhaps we might get that in the next book. What’s here already is quite interesting, and Strunk examines and (as relates to me, a relative noob to political economy) uncovers many hidden or unexplored relationships between games and audiences. For the horror section, he calls on the previous work of others related to horror as a genre in other mediums, and I found this absolutely fascinating. I lived through the change from teenage slasher horror films to the “torture porn” of the early to late 2000s. I’d experienced Resident Evil, Dead Space, and a few other horror games as well. I’d never considered teen slasher films to be an expression of sexual conservatism, but now revealed, it’s hard NOT to see. The same goes for his examination about how horror games moved from “terror of being alone in the dark” to fear that one can never be alone, and how this happened in relationship to social, political, and economic goings on during this progression.
All in all, this has been a great book to read, though I do look forward to a conversation about virtual goods as relates to games and current events. Fingers crossed!