The Video Games Textbook


Book Description

The Video Games Textbook takes the history of video games to another level, with visually-stimulating, comprehensive, and chronological chapters that are relevant and easy to read for a variety of students. Every chapter is a journey into a different era or area of gaming, where readers emerge with a strong sense of how video games evolved, why they succeeded or failed, and the impact they had on the industry and human culture. Written to capture the attention and interest of both domestic and international college students, each chapter contains a list of objectives and key terms, illustrative timelines, arcade summaries, images and technical specifications of all major consoles. Key Features Explores the history of video games, including the social, political, and economic motivations Facilitates learning of material with illustrative timelines, arcade summaries and images Highlights the technical specifications of all major consoles Illustrates the breakthroughs and trends of the gaming market




Paratextualizing Games


Book Description

Gaming no longer only takes place as a ›closed interactive experience‹ in front of TV screens, but also as broadcast on streaming platforms or as cultural events in exhibition centers and e-sport arenas. The popularization of new technologies, forms of expression, and online services has had a considerable influence on the academic and journalistic discourse about games. This anthology examines which paratexts gaming cultures have produced - i.e., in which forms and formats and through which channels we talk (and write) about games - as well as the way in which paratexts influence the development of games. How is knowledge about games generated and shaped today and how do boundaries between (popular) criticism, journalism, and scholarship have started to blur? In short: How does the paratext change the text?




Spelunky


Book Description

A game's creation as told by its creator, perhaps the best rpimer on game design.




Queerness in Play


Book Description

Queerness in Play examines the many ways queerness of all kinds—from queer as ‘LGBT’ to other, less well-covered aspects of the queer spectrum—intersects with games and the social contexts of play. The current unprecedented visibility of queer creators and content comes at a high tide of resistance to the inclusion of those outside a long-imagined cisgender, heterosexual, white male norm. By critically engaging the ways games—as a culture, an industry, and a medium—help reproduce limiting binary formations of gender and sexuality, Queerness in Play contributes to the growing body of scholarship promoting more inclusive understandings of identity, sexuality, and games.




Minecraft For Dummies


Book Description

Don't be a Minecraft tourist - get expert tips and advice in this full-color primerMinecraft For Dummies is the primer you need to get up to speed.




Minecraft: Guide to Exploration (2017 Edition)


Book Description

Introduces the game, outlines basic features, and describes such elements as hostile mobs, naturally generated structures, and biomes.




Film Narratology


Book Description

In Film Narratology, Peter W.J. Verstraten makes film narratives his primary focus, while noting the unexplored and essentially different narrative effects that film can produce with mise-en-scène, cinematography, and editing.




Reverse Design


Book Description

The Reverse Design series looks at all of the design decisions that went into classic video games. This is the fourth installment in the Reverse Design series, looking at Half-Life. Written in a readable format, it is broken down into six sections examining some of the most important topics to the game: 1. How Half-Life is a key step in the evolution from the composite style of videogame design to the set piece of style of design; 2. How Half-Life defined almost all of the core concepts of the cover-based shooter, and redefined the level architecture of the FPS genre; 3. The small tricks and flourishes that Half-Life used to tell a story through its mechanics, AI and environments--back cover.




Half-life 2


Book Description

*Unprecedented access behindHalf-LifeandHalf-Life 2 *A forward by Valve founder Gabe Newell *Hundreds of art, design, preproduction, and other art pieces crammed into the book *Over a dozen key members of Valve's staff interviewed *Officially approved by Valve *Behind City 17 and other locations *The development of the Source engine *A rogue's gallery of beasts, characters, and monstrosities *Key weapons development revelations *A tour of many of the game's locations, from inception to completion *Filled with art, screens, and anecdotes from the Valve team




Minecraft


Book Description

"Discover the uses of redstone components, learn how to make working circuits, then create clever builds using your new skills. With insider info and tips from the experts at Mojang, this is the definitive guide to engineering in Minecraft." -- page [4] of cover