The ability of video games to depict cancer as a dramatic experience. A comparative study with literature and cinema

Given that the democratisation of video games has allowed this industry to appropriate a series of themes traditionally the exclusive preserve of other expressive media, this work analyses the capacity of videoludic expression to elicit emotions and convey the seriousness of cancer by performing a c...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores: Navarrete-Cardero, Luis, Vargas-Iglesias, Juan José
Tipo de recurso: artículo
Estado:Versión publicada
Fecha de publicación:2019
País:España
Institución:Universidad de Sevilla (US)
Repositorio:idUS. Depósito de Investigación de la Universidad de Sevilla
OAI Identifier:oai:idus.us.es:11441/87493
Acceso en línea:https://hdl.handle.net/11441/87493
https://doi.org/10.15581/003.32.3.1-15
Access Level:acceso abierto
Palabra clave:Video game
Literature
Cinema
Narrative
Emotional response
Cancer
Serious games
Videojuego
Literatura
Cine
Narración
Emoción del relato
Enfermedad
Descripción
Sumario:Given that the democratisation of video games has allowed this industry to appropriate a series of themes traditionally the exclusive preserve of other expressive media, this work analyses the capacity of videoludic expression to elicit emotions and convey the seriousness of cancer by performing a comparative study with literature and cinema. To this end, three works (one per medium) were selected to be respectively read, viewed or played by all the study subjects (n=90). A two-step methodology was employed. Firstly, the concepts of emotion and narrative scheme were defined in the context of disciplines relating to the three media and then shared with the subjects. Secondly, once both variables, i.e. the concepts of emotion and narration, had been controlled, a questionnaire was designed to determine which of the three works comprising the corpus best conveyed the experience of cancer. The results reveal that the sample game, in spite of its shortcomings in character design, was judged to be the one that most poignantly described the development of the disease. Therefore, it is possible to claim that the common belief that video games are trivial devices, solely designed to entertain, contrastswith their true expressive ability to convey dramatic experiences.