The title of this text makes reference to Adorno and Horkheimer's essay 'The Culture Industry' from 1944, which when extended to include current IT industries, needs to address the production of computer games. Unlike TV news broadcasting, the users of computer games have little difficulty in distinguishing between the creation of real as opposed to illusory worlds in that games are clearly labeled as such. But on the side of the game producers we can observe that, the propaganda of consumer games lulls players into accepting ideological conditions, in such a way that the design and story of 'shoot them up' games necessitates the 'war against terrorism.' Here it is especially interesting that the praxis of 'total conversion', so-called TCs in gamer's lingo, was made popular with a game about terrorism (Counter-Strike based on Half Life), which can be seen by its content and its representation as a celebration of the political forces of the leading nations. The gameplay is centralised around fighting between terrorists and counter-terrorists. Its goals are disarming bombs or rescuing hostages, and all weaponry is modelled on existing arms. But total conversions of games can also produce a critical position, as seen in a number of so called game arts applications as in the case of nybble-engine-toolZ. By shooting anti-war emails to president@whitehouse.gov, action clearly expresses a sense of agency that transgresses the defined boundaries of a gaming environment. All these actions happen in 'the real world' and not in the 'sim' world of a game. All the outgoing signals are counted and transferred to other servers and this can be seen as an example of a public online demonstration tool. I would call this a 'Real Game'.
Author Bio
Margarete Jahrmann (A/CH) is an art whose Artistic work and research focus are codes, games, modification scenes and subcultures.
Her modding work was nominated for the Software Arts Award at the Transmediale 04 in Berlin and received at Prix Ars Electronica 03 the award of distinction. In 1996 she co-founded the art server www.konsum.net, focusing on network processes as arts material.
She is lecturing and publishing internationally, as in 2005 in Kunstforum International on games and arts and in the data browser issue Economising Culture, Autonomedia. In 2003 she co-published the Nybble-Engine magazine and DVD, in 2000 the book Intertwinedness, Reflecting the Culture of the net. 2001 she edited the book Artserver—Stargate to Netculture. Since 2001 Jahrmann is professor for mediapoiesis and gamearts at New Media Department, University of Art and Design Zurich.
Her collaborative projects under the label climax.at are exemplified in international workshops as well as exhibitions, as 2003 the Dutch Electronic Arts Show Rotterdam, in 2004 as the show Games, Computerspiele von Künstlerinnen in Dortmund or at Game.Arts in Völklingen or at the Armory Center for the Arts in Los Angeles or in 2005 in the MAF Bankog Media Arts Festival.