Understanding 'Sinai': Three Angles

(I wrote this to be transmitted on Twitter, so please forgive the lack of standards like transitions or rhetorical flourishes that are often just so much wordplay. Still, I felt this is substantive enough to be posted here for, perhaps, a different audience. - JA)

Last night on I dropped (on Twitter)  ‘three angles’ being used in my personal project on SPI’s Sinai (1973) but didn’t really explain them. I'm going to try to explain them in more detail now.

Chipping away at my SPI ‘Sinai’ project. Thinking 3 angles: immaterial labor, inward turn of narrative, and mimesis. pic.twitter.com/ORnIwhQ70M
— Jeremy Antley (@jsantley) April 27, 2015

First: specificity. Only looking at modern turn in hex-and-counter wargames, when they focused on contemporary or future-based conflicts. 'Sinai' is among the first (to my knowledge), mass-produced commercial wargames in this trend.

Second: Immaterial labor via Dyer-Witheford/de Peuter's 'Games of Empire'. How are manual wargames same/different from the biomachines comprising virtual games analyzed in 'Games of Empire'? How does Sinai, produced at the beginnings of neoliberal ideological ascendency in the 1970's, reflect these, then, nascent ideals in its production and actual play? What were the latent networks of immaterial labor surrounding both the play and modification of Sinai?

Third: inward turn of narrative. How does Sinai, as a representative of early 1970's wargame design, fit into the centuries trend of inward narrative development most commonly examined in literature? Given the healthy community of players and the wealth of variations/additions created for the game, what does this early example of a 'modern' hex-and-counter wargame have to offer with regards to study of play and narrative?

Fourth: mimesis. Looking at the culture of wargame copies, from acquisition of 'unpunched' copies to worn copies proudly burnished by experienced players. Yet beyond: idea of folkloric transfer of experience through touch and how Sinai, through powerful mimetic properties, reveals both the 'epistemic reservoir' and capacity for 'kaleidoscopic theatre' inherent in 'modern' wargames.

Gated Conversions

Shankly Gates at Anfield, Liverpool via Andy Nugent

I took a break from Twitter recently, partly because several family members shuffled in and out of my house over the last week and partly because I tried to focus my efforts towards completing a long overdue dissertation chapter.  But the allure of the infinite timeline proved difficult to resist and I decided to scan my Twitter lists the other day to see if anything interesting occurred during my absence.

Two words, sandwiched into one, kept appearing: GamerGate.

If you have any interest in video game culture, then you probably already know what I’m talking about.  In case you don’t know, here are some more detailed posts for your perusal:

On 'Gamers' and Identity

A Conversation about Concerns in Videogame Journalism

#gamergate as reaction

If pressed to summarize GamerGate in a sentence or two, here is what I would say: GamerGate is a belief, held by an indeterminate number, that collusion exists between games journalists and games developers and that this nexus is corrupting games, or at least moving them towards a trajectory abhorrent to self-defined ‘gamers’.  Yet to put the GamerGate controversy in such succinct terms suggests the movement possesses cohesion, which it certainly does not.  One has only to survey #GamerGate to see the variety of opinions expressed.  But a couple of developments caught my eye and seemed worthy of further exploration.  The first was the start, and subsequent termination, of an Indiegogo campaign to create a legal fund for exploring the potential abuses between Games journalists and developers.  The second was the posting of a Gamer Manifesto, anonymously written but edited by ‘Gamers’.  What these examples demonstrate is that there is a desire, on behalf of some, to begin formalizing and structuring relationships within so-called Gamer Culture.  It is, as Geertz would call it, an effort at ‘internal conversion’, an attempt to utilize rationalization as a defense against the intrusion of modern and post-modern critiques and ideals.

Last year, spurred by what is now a periodic outbreak of sexism/racism/transphobia from so-called ‘gamers’, Daniel Joseph wrote a post titled “Videogames are the gardens of the bourgeoisie" in which he argued that bourgeois values necessitated the creation of ‘spheres’ of activity separated from ‘real life’.  “Mass produced hobbies, mediated through gatekeepers like trade and enthusiast press is one reason why “games” became a private sphere,” Joseph concludes, later adding that this private nature conjures within individuals the need to protect games from the pressures of capitalism.  Using Joseph’s theme, I explored in my own post, “Games, Truth, and Defense of the Private”, the idea that the rise of bourgeois values correlated with the belief that games could become an arbiter of truth.

But now, a year later and with the rise of GamerGate, I wonder if we are witnessing something new, something that goes beyond the need to wall off games from the public.  Videogames may be the gardens of the bourgeoisie, but what GamerGate reveals is that some feel compelled to venture out of their gardens and establish, in the public sphere, a nascent, rationalized belief in what games should be and how relationships around those games should be structured.

Clifford Geertz

Geertz observed what he termed ‘internal conversion’ in Balinese religious ideals during the 1950’s, that is the process by which the traditional Balinese faith sought to take on elements of the Weberian ‘rationalization’ inherent in the established religions of Christianity or Islam and begin codifying their own belief as a defense against the intrusion of said established religions.  In doing so they introduced a ‘distance’ that demanded greater and more concrete articulation of the sustaining links between belief and practitioner.  Problems of meaning, which before addressed issues in a fragmentary manner, become “conceptualized as universal and inherent qualities of human existence.”  What is good?  What is evil?  Geertz suggests that these broad questions subsume narrower concerns inherent to the pre-rational conversion (such as ‘How do I uncover a witch?) and in doing so bring forth the “radically disquieting suggestions” of the broad questions to the fore.  This, in turn, demands that answers be brought forth in a form equal to the “sweeping, universal, and conclusive manner” the broad questions introduced.

Of course, there are inherent issues for any culture engaging in such an ‘internal conversion’, or ‘rationalization’, of their beliefs.  A brief selection from a larger article on Mari peasants in 19th century Russia highlights these issues:

From "Big Candles and 'Internal Conversion': The Mari Animist Reformation and Its Russian Appropriations" by Paul Werth in Of Religion and Empire: Missions, Conversion, and Tolerance in Tsarist Russia

What interests me here is the idea that in borrowing the “idiom of religion employed by official Russia” the Mari both utilized a colonizing discourse inherent within that religion and fell victim to its conceptual modes.  In trying to assert their unique belief they ended up assuming viewpoints that integrated them into the colonizing discourse they tried to fight.

GamerGate appears to be following the same path, at least with regards to the two examples, that of the Indiegogo campaign and the Gamers Manifesto, mentioned above.  By utilizing the colonizing discourse inherent in games to provide a Weberian rationalized view of what Gaming culture should be, a culture which is replete with contributions by misogynistic and paternalistic forces, the advocates of GamerGate can’t help but fall into the same conceptual modes that underlie such a discourse.  These modes no longer address fragmentary concerns, like those that prompted Daniel and myself to write blog posts last year, but rather attempt to bring together universal and inherent qualities of Games into focus so that the problems those qualities bring to light can be addressed.

The rallying cry for supporters of GamerGate is that of ‘corruption’ brought about by the perceived collusion between games journalists and developers.  Corruption is a handy conceptual mode to base the rationalization of Gamer culture, at least from the view of GamerGate supporters, because it does away with all the messy fragmentation of previous complaints (Feminism is ruining games!  Transgendered people are ruining games!  Fake Gamer Girls are ruining games!) and, instead, suggests that the larger problem stems from a collected erosion of Gaming ethics.

This is, essentially, what the Indiegogo campaign to establish a ‘Lawyers Against Gaming Corruption’ legal fund for investigatory purposes holds as central to its existence.  By asserting a juridicial solution to the corruption issue, the ‘Lawyers Against Gaming Corruption’ wish to utilize one of the most pervasive patriarchal institutions available to find and perhaps punish the ‘true’ offenders.  In an example that could have been taken straight from Girard, ‘Lawyers Against Gaming Corruption’ offered GamerGate supporters a rationalized process for finding the scapegoat that will absolve them all from the corruptive influence of gaming today and restore the supposed community to its more pristine state.  Instead of having to answer critiques leveled at gaming culture as a whole, the ‘Lawyers Against Gaming Corruption’ offer a way to funnel anxieties prompted by these critiques into the far more defensible position of identifying and fighting corruption.

This logic becomes especially insidious when the corrupting forces are linked to those who raised the critiques in the first place, thus making attacks on female writers, for example, both a natural extension of the corruption ideal and capitulation to the patriarchal conceptional modes built into the colonizing discourse surrounding games.  In trying to defend gamer culture from critiques of patriarchy or misogyny under the larger guise of corruption, the creators and supporters of ‘Lawyers Against Gaming Corruption are utilizing the very same justifications patriarchy and misogyny embody.

This becomes even more noticeable upon examination of the Gamer Manifesto, posted to Pastebin on 2 September 2014.  Even though it purports to extol virtues of harmony and inclusion, the manifesto nonetheless offers up a tiered, almost caste like structuring of Gaming culture:

“There are three parts to this industry that we feel must be addressed for the general health of video games as a whole: the role of the consumer, the developer and the supplier. This trifecta makes up the core of the industry and thus each piece must be improved for games to continue to evolve.”

At the core of this conceptualization, however, is one ‘truth’; that games “should be about the enjoyment of the player.”

The Manifesto states that gamers should add to the future of gaming, not demonize its past.  That Developers, while recognizing that misrepresentation and under-representation of certain populations is a real problem, should not be required to change their own game’s vision and idea.  That Suppliers, which is an unusual term for journalists or critics, should not be pressured by outside influences to “change their opinion to fit an overarching agenda.”  In short, the Gamer Manifesto outlines a structural basis for how gamer culture as a whole should proceed and operate, all while articulating the need to avoid outside pressures that, as the Manifesto explains, are related to the corrupting influences in gaming today:

“It has been said that gamer culture is in the throes of death. This isn’t true. It has merely grown impatient as a wall of both divisiveness and radical ideologies have kept it from progressing further. 

This article, this gamer manifesto has been made with the desire to break down that wall. It is both our branch of peace to those who believe we mean only harm and a battering ram to those who think we will simply comply with how corrupted video game culture has become.”

For the writers and editors of the Gamer Manifesto, seclusion in their walled off, bourgeois gardens no longer provides adequate protection from what were once fragmentary issues now brought together under the aegis of corruption.  Instead they must enter the public sphere and begin the process of 'internal conversion', of providing rationalized interpretations of gamer culture that both promotes distance between gamers and their games while also allowing structural links to surmount the distance, such as the concept of ethics or corruption above, so that the relationship between games and gamers can be harmonious and free from 'divisiveness and radical ideologies."

One important feature for Geertz and his notion of 'internal conversion' is that it is not a totalizing event, nor does it necessarily involve all the members of the cultural group in question.  Therefore we can look at the disparate nature of GamerGate yet still understand some of the larger forces feeding the movement and its expressions.  That the 'Lawyers Against Gaming Corruption' and the Gamer Manifesto are not representative of the whole of gaming culture is obvious.  Yet the fact that these two examples not only put forth a sophisticated response but also attempted to outline and address what is perceived to be the larger illness of gaming is worth noting.  What will happen from here on out is anybody's guess, but it is entirely possible that we are witnessing a decided shift in the evolving articulation of gaming culture.

Ladders, Builders, and the AHA

'Ladder to Somewhere' by Corey Templeton

If you've ever watched Chappelle Show, then you probably know the series of skits titled, 'When Keeping it Real Goes Wrong'. If you're an academic historian, or a graduate student in history, then you've probably read the recent AHA recommendation to have institutions embargo completed dissertations from digital release for up to six years. There's been a lot of responses, both pro and con, about the issue, but for me all I can think is that the AHA might be the most recent candidate for another episode of 'When Keeping it Real Goes Wrong'.

Why do I feel this way? A few reasons below:

1. I have no doubt that the AHA, in its own mind, has the best interest of junior scholars in focus when they grapple with and think about policies to pursue in protecting nascent scholar's interests. Junior scholars represent the future of the profession, and it makes absolute sense for the AHA to deal with professional issues in a way that makes life for junior scholars better, not worse.
2. That being said, I also have no doubt that the committee behind the 'Embargo' policy tried to 'Keep it Real' by framing their appeal as a means to protect future junior scholars' access to monograph publishing. But in many ways, trying to equate protection of junior scholars through tacit support of a notion that accessibility is detrimental to their career is where 'Keeping it Real Goes Wrong'. 
3. One word never mentioned in either the AHA proposal, or William Cronon's recent support of this proposal, is prestige- and if you are talking about monograph publishing being related to tenure or advancement in the profession without also acknowledging the linkage this process has to prestige, then you're missing a very crucial part of the entire process. 

I've seen the responses, on Twitter and in the comments field for both the AHA announcement and Cronon's support piece, and they essentially fall into two camps. The first camp, what I would term the 'Ladder' group, may feel that the entire publishing system is misguided or essentially enforcing a protectionist scheme on academic work, but they are on the ladder of either a tenure track job or current book deal. (Or they are of a group that hopes to one day be on the ladder) A lot of them sympathize with issues in the system, but for them to get ahead they have to follow the current system's rules- they have to climb the ladder. Why? Because in order to get promotion at a Division I school or seek recognition by their older, tenured peers who often sit on Tenure and Promotion Committees, they feel they have to publish a book.

The second camp, what I would term the 'Builder' group, feel that new digital paradigms are providing increased opportunities for scholars to share their works with wider audiences and this means that several cherished notions of 'scholarly work' need to be rebuilt, or remodeled, in order to accommodate the profession to changing standards. Some of the 'builders' have tenure, while others do not. Some of them are in the academy, others are not. Many of them have personal academic blogs, or perform work that is very public in its outreach and scope. Why? Because for them, the idea that one's work should be hidden behind paywalls, or made to be consumed by only a small subset of the academy, is anathema to their desire to build new structures. For the builders, publishing a book is okay- but so is sharing your work online. They see OA ideals as a blueprint for what their building should look like, what the future of a digital profession could look like.

But- and this alters what I said above- there is also an amorphous third camp, those who are feeling out whether they should be on the ladder or helping the builders. Some of them want to be in the academy, and that means they need to start climbing the ladder. Some of them want to build a new academy, and that means eschewing the ladder not because it is bad but because it takes energy away from building. There's even a fourth camp, those with tenure- but they are largely immune to the direct implications of this debate, even though their voices carry weight for how those implications play out.

What every camp is concerned about, except for those who already have it, is prestige. The ladder folks want to climb towards it. The builder folks want to build new conceptions of it. The rest of us are wondering if we can ever have it at all.

My sympathies lie with the builder group, because I come from a niche area of history that the ladder does not often reach. I study Russian history, and my dissertation focuses on Old Believers. In my department, many, many students enter to study American history. A smaller subset come to study Western European history. An even smaller subset, far smaller than the other groups, come to study East Europe/Russian/African/Asian history. Although I have not made efforts to shop it, I'm under no illusions that publishers are clamoring to take my dissertation manuscript and shepherd it through to monograph form. I'm not Robert Crummey, or Roy Robson. I'm just Jeremy Antley, a guy who is tackling a small portion of the work those two, comparative giants also discuss. (If you don't know who I'm talking about, then I've sort of made my point already) What publisher wants to invest 20k or more in a book that, literally, a few dozen will find serious interest, with the added possibility that a few hundred more might have casual interest, in reading?

I don't have a track record. I don't have enough prestige to get noticed by large publishers right off the bat. I'm not attending Yale, or Columbia, or Harvard, or Princeton. I'm a product of a less prestigious state school, which I think is a fine institutions with good quality professors in a variety of fields. While I have no doubt that I can climb the tenure ladder of academia if given the chance, I also know that those kind of opportunities, especially in my chosen field of Russian history, are few and far between- especially if I'm competing against other candidates from top flight institutions. If I don't have sufficient personal prestige when applying for jobs, those jobs will default to looking at the prestige of my institution or the prestige of those under which I've studied. There's a little joke I tell folks who ask me what I study- I tell them it's 'Russia+', as in 'Russia + American History' or 'Russia + Women's Studies' or 'Russia + Insert Field Here'. For me to have a realistic chance of getting a tenure track job, I can't just be a Russia guy. I have to build a broader base. As Kurtis Blow once said, 'these are the breaks.'

Here's another rub; I also tackle the subject of games in an academic way. While some have given me praise for the work I do, I've also had some measure of scorn applied as well. Trust me, I would love to write a paper concerned with the intersection of history and games like Twilight Struggle, 1989, and Andean Abyss. But the momentum isn't there yet- the ladder just does not extend that far.

So, for me, any policy that endorses a view of hiding my work just so it will be more attractive to publishers feels a bit absurd. If I had a firm grasp on the ladder, perhaps I would feel differently. But I don't, and I don't see many willing to extend that ladder for someone they don't know who researches in fields not widely accessible or even considered legitimate at all. That's why I sympathize with the builders, because I've achieved a modicum of success in following their path. My two published articles, one on History embracing games and the other on Textual Dualism in Russian history, both came about because I was willing to publish early versions of my thoughts in blog form. I received feedback from these public outings that, in turn, helped shape my larger, revised arguments that were peer reviewed and published in journals embracing an open access ethic. I've been able to attend conferences outside the strict purview of History because others read my publicly shared work and thought it worth supporting. I've been given the opportunity to write for Play the Past and have essays published on The New Inquiry website because my work was open and accessible.

I built my reputation in public view, because to do so in private would have given me none of the opportunities above. I'm a builder because that's the only way someone like me can gain an audience and, subsequently, gain prestige.

I could have hidden my work, could have silently chipped away at it until it was fully baked and ready to be consumed. I could have done all of this in the hopes that the final unveiling would grant me the prestige I rightfully believe should be awarded. I could have outstretched my hands in the hopes that when I opened my eyes the ladder would be there for the climbing. Maybe that's the best way to keep it real. But my gut tells me that if I did those things, my keeping it real would go wrong.

As a final note, in what has been an already rambling post, I want to say that just because I'm for the builders doesn't mean I'm against those who climb the ladder. I don't want to force my ideas on anybody. To be fair, this is an extremely tough time for academics and it's hard to tell someone to suffer for principles I believe in that may cost them a job, especially if that person has a family or other obligations they need to support. Everything I've said above is, in the words of Royal Tenenbaum, 'just one man's opinion'.

I think Dan Cohen is right in that what people are reacting to is the fact that the AHA made their policy with little discussion involved. Now we are discussing it, and that's definitely when keeping it real can't go wrong.

These Games are a Riot

"When does a crowd become a riot?" asks Ronald Paulson in his essay-lecture The Art of Riot in England and America, to which the answer is "When it gets out of control." What appears, on face, to be a cheeky answer to what many would assume is a rhetorical question actually brings about a complex field of interactions and expectations on behalf of those who would analyze riots and their articulations in life and art. Paulson's essay focuses on depictions of riot as found on engravings and in literature from the 18th century onward in both English and American culture. Over the course of his 121 page analysis he outlines a 'taxonomy of riot', an attempt to balance what we know about real riots against various artists' representations of those riots, that takes at its core three elements: actual riots, fictive riots, and the aesthetics of riot.

Taking a cue from E.P. Thompson, Paulson seeks to "outline the myths of the insurgents' (the 'radicals') imagination- the formal structures that shaped 'riots', in particular traditional forms of 'crowd ritual'." As an event, riots are both festive and seditious. They are defined in relation to the in-place social order, symbolized in our modern era by the presence of police. Yet the most important aspect of the riot is its affective/effective impact, a subjective measurement that depends wholly on the presence of aesthetics in relation to spectators- both those depicted in the artist's rendition and the outside viewer gazing upon the artist's rendition. The presence of the spectator is crucial for Paulson, who defines aesthetics as the philosophy of spectatorship. After all, a riot would have little impact were it not for the affective power (as opposed to its often diminished effective impact) it holds over those who are witness to its events.

Paulson's work raises interesting questions when extended beyond the engravings and novels covered by his essay. What happens to his analysis when the taxonomy of riot shifts to the medium of games?

That's a question I would like to address now, using three examples that span analog and digital mediums: Brian Train's Battle for Seattle board game, as well as Rockstar's State of Emergency and 2K Games' Spec Ops: The Line video games. What makes these artistic depictions of riot intriguing is how they take the spectator of the player and transform that player into a participant of the riot with a viewpoint that is, nonetheless, wholly defined by the aesthetically influenced spectator experience. The player literally controls an event that is the antithesis of a controlled state.

These ludic depictions also shift the interpretation of riot beyond Paulson's investigation on how festive and seditious acts depicted representation, or the relation of the individual to society as a whole. With the emergence of ludic riots, the interpretation now centers on concerns of a post-Cold War society in which new questions are raised regarding the re-articulation of liberalism and the relation of society to the individual. This seeming reversal (because ludic models are hardly reactionary in their approach) of riotous depiction in our current era still, nonetheless, draws upon the rich history and legacy of riot as encountered in the Western tradition.

On the left, a scene from the upcoming game RIOT. On the right, 'The Zenith of French Glory' by James Gillray

Paulson notes that whereas pre-18th century depictions of riot generally used scenes from the Passion narrative of the Bible, the rise of Humanism/Enlightenment ideals transformed depictions of riot into "a form of burlesque that repeated the Passion as farce." After the French Revolution, when the potential transformation of riot into revolution was fully realized, depictions of riot carried with them this psychic weight of revolutionary memory. It became harder to depict popular violence in a positive light after the events of late 18th century France (a sentiment Paulson attributes to Ian Haywood's Bloody Romanticism) because "the pleasure and festive air of riot is evacuated in revolution, which is without ambivalence."

Ludic riots continue this tradition, utilizing forms that vacillate between actual and fictive depictions placed on the border of what we might call burlesque interpretations. Their representations are often filled with 'revolutionary memory', meaning that the player frequently engages in action that goes beyond limited expressions of pleasure and festive sedition found in riots, moving, instead, towards a more forceful expression of violence that is 'without ambivalence.' All the games examined here begin in riot but either progress towards or allow the player to engage in something much more deadly.

Let's begin with Brian Train's 2000 release of Battle for Seattle. Dedicated to 'the violins in the streets', Train's ludic riot is actually a representation of a real riot that occurred in Seattle during the 1999 World Trade Organization meeting held there. Two players take on either the role of the 'Authority' (representing the Seattle Police Department, Washington State Troopers, or the National Guard) or the 'Protester Factions' (representing a loose coalition of Anarchists, Environmentalists, Radicals, Liberals, Organized Labor, and Yahoos). The goal of the game is to for each side to gain enough points on the 'Exposure Index', representing favorable publicity and image leverage, to qualify for a win.

There is a limited combat system, in which the Authority player can attempt to disperse or arrest protesting groups or crowds. The protester faction can counter-attack, potentially forcing Authority units to be returned to the 'force pool'. Only the Authority player can 'escalate' the conflict, which allows the Protester player the option of building 'barricades' and the Authority player the option to call in additional police units and utilize 'special munitions', like tear gas or rubber bullets.

From an aesthetic viewpoint, Battle of Seattle gives both players a clear sense of order and the breakdown of that order through the unified blue of the Authority pieces versus the multi-hued and diverse Protester factions. The map, which utilizes a point-to-point system, emphasizes some spaces over others. For example, the Protester gains more 'exposure' by having units occupy the Convention Center rather than the adjacent Seattle University space. This designation that some spaces are more valuable than others also reinforces the notion of spectatorship; one's exposure is increased if actions take place in noted areas, as opposed to nearby, but less important, areas considered distant from the real center of action- the WTO talks being held downtown.

Conversely, the Authority player must battle to keep its exposure from decreasing by losing 'control' of the situation either through Protestor 'victories' or through excessive use of force via 'special munitions' use/calling in state troopers and national guard units. The ability of the Authority player to engage in 'escalation' hints towards an acknowledgement of 'revolutionary memory'- after all, the Authority player will only escalate the conflict in an attempt to forestall a complete breakdown of control which could allow for far more dangerous situation to develop. (One of the higher levels of victory for the Protester details a situation in which WTO delegates run scared in the streets) Regardless of which side the player is on, their ability to win is directly indexed to the opinion of 'spectatorship' represented by the 'Exposure Index'.

So far, Battle of Seattle demonstrates several degrees of continuity with the sort of riots examined in Paulson's essay. However, one clear difference is that the players of this ludic riot go beyond mere spectators- they become active participants in this fictive depiction of an actual riot. The presence of the WTO as the catalyst for the riot depicted also shifts the question of what the riot represents. Unlike the previous two centuries, this riot is not a question of an individual's place in relation to the state, rather it's about an individual's place in relation to supra-national forces, represented by the WTO, which have called into question the role of liberalism in the post-Cold War world order. All of the various Protester factions see in the WTO personification of agendas that seek to reshape their oft marginalized role in the larger liberal conception of society. This theme of the riot as a means to question and re-evaluate the terms of liberalism continually resurfaces in the other games examined here.

Yet it should also be noted that Battle of Seattle maintains the festive and seditious air particular to the composition of riot. In the designer notes, Brian Train states that, "although this game attempts to model some of what happened in Seattle, it is also partially a SATIRE on the events, perhaps best displayed by the irreverence of the Random Events Table." This irreverence can be seen clearly through use of the Goofy holding an M-16 graphic used to denote National Guard Units, or the 'Coffee Break'/'Hey Beavis…' events found on the aforementioned Random Events Table. Even though the design carries strong connotations of rising violent potential, the entire game is cloaked in burlesque swatches that continually remind the players that this is a construct primarily centered on abstracted spectatorship. Violent outbreaks are always on the horizon, yet never amount to an actual spilling of blood.

Things change decidedly once you start playing State of Emergency. Released in 2002, State of Emergency contains the relatively simple plot whereby the player represents a member of an underground organization bent on the destruction of the 'American Trade Organization' (a rather thinly veiled reference to the World Trade Organization), another supra-national group that ostensibly controls America and that sets off the action of the game by declaring a 'state of emergency' in response to escalating riots against ATO authority. Constructed as an 'arcade'-type game, the player is given a set amount of time to run around various levels and inflict the most amount of damage via destruction of property and elimination of police forces sent out by the ATO. Different weapons, ranging from baseball bats to rocket launchers, are scattered throughout the level, the acquisition of which greatly increases the player capacity to deal out destructive damage. There is no goal other than to rack up points for a high score, and the entire game is depicted in rather cartoony elements with the figures and weapons used taking on exaggerated appearances.

There is a clear attempt by the creators of State of Emergency to have their game also play off of the WTO riots in Seattle. As such, several elements found in Battle for Seattle carry over here. There is the question of an individual's relation to the ATO, and the use of cartoonish animations and over-the-top voice overs (throughout the game, an announcer spouts out phrases like 'Smash the Corporation!' or declares opportunities like 'Smash windows for bonus score!') give the game a festive and seditious burlesque air. (Consider that the first level puts the player in a shopping mall, full of 'innocent' people running around, which could be seen as a farcical take on the bizarre scenes of when shoppers race through a store during Christmas sales) Yet the deadly seriousness ATO police forces utilize in their hunting down of the player place this game almost beyond burlesque and into the territory of true revolution. Were it not for the fact that the core design elements of State of Emergency center on the arcade aesthetic, which emphasizes action over narrative, the earnestness of the situation could be seen as a tete-a-tete in which the player explores the potential ramification of the ATO's influence on the reshaping of liberal ideals.

Spectatorship takes on new meaning when one combines the riot atmosphere with arcade gameplay found in State of Emergency. Beyond the numerous 'spectators' that constantly run around the game universe, the one-upmanship and competitive aspect involved in attaining high scores means that State of Emergency could potentially have several player-spectators waiting in line for their turn to participate in the rioting. The inherent nature of the arcade style means that part of the enjoyment comes from playing against others, and in this way one can say that State of Emergency actually emphasizes the role of the spectator in its fictive display of riot. Unlike Battle for Seattle, the bulk of spectator influence is sourced in real life and not abstracted, giving State of Emergency greater access to the affective impact the real Seattle riots brought about.

But what about the issue of revolutionary memory and the stain popular violence carries in our modern milieu? Paulson, again taking a cue from Ian Haywood, states that after the French Revolution, artistic depictions of riot dealt with this stain by allegorically shifting the context of riot to that of natural catastrophes. The fear of riot was displaced by aesthetizing it into an earthquake, or flood, or fire. By evoking a deliberate cartoonish style, State of Emergency finds a way to aesthetize its depiction of riot in a way that neutralizes the violent impulses made manifest. This cartoonish aesthetic can also be tied to what Paulson identifies as a "schematic version of (Edmund) Burke's sublime" found in many articulations of the aesthetized 'nature' riot (often containing a spectator within the scene who is safe from the tremendous event),

"…which leaves the viewer outside the picture as secure as the observer within, a mere mediator of the human effects of the natural catastrophe. Burke's 'delight' and 'terror' refer not to the terrified victim, but to the safe spectator who can identify with the source of danger, sublimating terror into delight." (74)

While State of Emergency uses arcade aesthetics to facilitate this sublimation of terror into delight, Spec Ops: The Line (from 2012) utilizes different allegorical techniques to twist this delight back into terror. While the previous two games discussed above featured already developed riots containing large numbers of participants, Spec Ops: The Line is unique in that it features a developing riot of just three people. In a remarkable analysis, titled Killing is Harmless, Brendan Keogh (@BRKeogh) explores how this game situated in the shooter genre actually pushes the genre forward by bringing the central actor into greater focus- the player:

There’s no shortage of shooters that want to be about something. But very few shooters are brave enough to look in the mirror—or to force the player that enjoys shooters to look in the mirror—and question what they see. Not to pass judgment. Not to ask them to change their ways. Just to understand what is going on here. (4)

Spec Ops: The Line is a game that centers on three member of Delta Squad: Captain Martin Walker, Lieutenant Adams, and Sergeant Lugo. The player controls Walker, but the other two members accompany him through much of the story, acting as sources of additional firepower in conjunction with their role as a type of Greek chorus in questioning and reflecting on the transformations Walker undergoes as the drama progresses. Their mission- and by extension, the mission the player undertakes- is to enter the city of Dubai, wrecked by sandstorms of unimaginable intensity, and look for traces of the 33rd Battalion who entered Dubai six months ago and has not been heard from since. Yet, as Walker and his squad mates progress further into Dubai they concurrently move further away from their original mission. What begins as a search for survivors turns into a merciless quest to hunt down the commander of the 33rd- Colonel John Konrad.

What starts off as a controlled experience quickly descends into uncontrolled chaos. Delta Squad, and the player controlling them, slowly transform into a riotous presence in Dubai. Seemingly a force of counter-riot, or the restoration of order represented by their military/police function, Delta Squad begins by killing masked Arabic men in the opening chapters of the game, but then moves on in later parts to killing members of the 33rd, effectively making them not preservers of order but, rather, instigators of a riot that quickly becomes an uprising. Keogh observes this progression, and the impact it has on the narrative:

Of course, it is worth noting that while the enemies I face become less othered as the game proceeds, the Arabic people are never less othered themselves but merely replaced with more relatable Western enemies (more relatable to a Western audience, at least). On one hand, this is certainly problematic. Nothing that The Line does works to de-otherise Arabic people so dramatically othered in other shooters and media more broadly. But, on the other hand, by replacing them with US soldiers halfway through the game, The Line forces the player to realise they are—have always been— shooting humans. How many players draw that connection back to consider the ‘insurgents’ of the early levels as human, however, is questionable. (23)

As Walker becomes increasingly obsessed with finding Konrad, engaging in more atrocious acts along the way, his own body is transformed through injury, first with cuts and bruises and later with half his face becoming black and burned. The further Delta Squad travels into Dubai, the more their speech and reactions to events become strained and disjointed from their earlier, sanitized military speak. 'Fire on my target' and 'Moving to clear' become 'Got one' and, later, 'Got the fucker', the changes in audible speech and personal appearance an aesthetic effect meant to impress upon the player, the spectator, that Delta Squad is moving from the seditious and festive air inhabited by many shooters towards a more violent uprising that riotous behavior induces. Dubai might have been consumed by calamitous sandstorms, a clear parallel with the allegorical shifting of riot discussed earlier, but instead of sublimating terror into delight, the journey through Dubai reveals that this allegorical shift was only a cover for the real riot occurring through player action. The delight that Spec Ops: The Line is just another shooter transforms into terror as the game continually reminds the player that they are complicit in the plot unfolding, even if they have little choice in how that plot develops.

The setting of Dubai, and the use of American soldiers as primary actants, again demonstrates that the central issue of this particular riot relates to questioning the role of liberalism in a post-Cold War order. Being a location that symbolizes the intrusion and extension of Western capitalist ideals, having Spec Ops: The Line depict Dubai as laid low by both natural catastrophe and Western-sourced sociopathic motives calls into question the goals and expectations of liberalistic influence. To make matters worse, had the player and Walker, working in tandem, not entered Dubai and engaged in riotous behavior, some semblance of liberalistic good might have been salvaged. Yet once the player and Walker begin on their narrative path, the inevitable progression from order to riot to revolution must occur, moving the festivity of the shooter towards a situation that is without ambivalence.

Clearly, the depiction of riot has well-defined articulations in the medium of games. Many of the elements analyzed by Paulson- the aesthetics of riot and the presence of the spectator- are also utilized in ludic riots, although their ultimate goals and techniques used to achieve an aesthetic effect on the spectator differ from the engravings and even novels examined in The Art of Riot. While the games examined here are done so in a somewhat cursory fashion, there is a clear path here for others to pursue. The art of riot is alive an well in games, both analog and digital, and examination of how these riots are created and ludically depicted reveals something deeper about ourselves and our society.