Fukasaku Kinji and Kojima Hideo Replay Hiroshima: Atomic Imagery and Cross-Media Memory

Hutchinson, Rachael

doi:10.1080/10371397.2019.1614882

Cited by 3 publications

(3 citation statements)

References 16 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…The visual iconography of its cast of characters, for example, draws from sources as diverse as Michael Cimino's The Deer Hunter , Stanley Kubrick's Full Metal Jacket , and John Carpenter's Escape from New York (Noon and Dyer‐Witherford 69). By contrast, another reason for Metal Gear's success is its narrative engagement not just with other artifacts of popular culture, but also historical events like the Cold War and the bombing of Hiroshima during World War II, an event which served as “a critical and symbolic backdrop” for the plot of the first Metal Gear Solid (Hutchinson 170). At first glance, this abundance of references may seem overwhelming and distracting to an audience.…”

Section: Tactical Ideological Operationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Playing with Phantoms: Decoding the Ludic Language of Metal Gear Solid V

Billingsley¹

2022

The J of Popular Culture

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Section: Tactical Ideological Operationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Playing with Phantoms: Decoding the Ludic Language of Metal Gear Solid V

Billingsley¹

2022

The J of Popular Culture

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

“…In fact, many high-ranking employees are known for exercising a high amount of creative control over their projects and have been elevated to a type of "auteur" status within the industry. Rachael Hutchinson (2019a) contends that Hideo Kojima is one such example of a video game "auteur" and, as a result, it is necessary and beneficial to consider his personal influence over the games and narratives that he creates. Given Mikami's favorable placement within the current discursive practices around video game authorship that favors well-known and marketable creators, it is reasonable to refer to him as an author of video games.…”

Section: Defining Authorshipmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Additionally, Bogost frames procedural rhetoric as a practice of authoring arguments through computational processes. Hutchinson (2019a) provides an example of how this is implemented through an analysis of the role of the bombing of Hiroshima in the works of Hideo Kojima. She notes that Kojima makes use of "a particular vision of history to create, in turn, a particular document, or record of that history" (p. 17).…”

Section: Defining Authorshipmentioning

confidence: 99%

“The Father of Survival Horror”: Shinji Mikami, Procedural Rhetoric, and the Collective/Cultural Memory of the Atomic Bombs

Scheiding¹

2019

loading

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Video game “authors” use procedural rhetoric to make specific arguments within the narratives of their games. As a result, they, either purposefully or incidentally, contribute to the creation and maintenance of collective/cultural memory. This process can be identified within the directorial works of Shinji Mikami that include a set of similar general themes. Though the settings of these games differ, they include several related plot elements. These include: 1) depictions of physical and emotional trauma, 2) the large-scale destruction of cities, and 3) distrust of those in power. This paper argues that Mikami, through processes of procedural rhetoric/ authorship, can be understood as an “author” of video games that fall into the larger tradition of war and atomic bomb memory in Japan. (Also known as hibakusha (bomb-affected persons) literature). As a result, his games can be understood as a part of Japan’s larger collective/cultural memory practices surrounding the atomic bombings of Hiroshima (6 August 1945) and Nagasaki (9 August 1945). In the case of Mikami, the narratives of his games follow what Akiko Hashimoto labels as the “Long Defeat”, in which Japanese collective/cultural memory struggles to cope with the cultural trauma of the Pacific War (1931-1945). To illustrate this argument the paper engages in a close reading of Mikami’s Resident Evil, Dino Crisis, Resident Evil 4, Vanquish and The Evil Within and identifies tropes that are common to Japanese war memory and hibakusha literature.

show abstract

Ruptures of design: Trophies, live service games and anti-nuclear metacommentary in Metal Gear Solid V

Scheiding,

Staines

2024

Journal of Gaming &Amp; Virtual Worlds

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain (MGSV) allowed players to build and/or disarm nuclear devices as a part of its live service base-building gameplay with the intention of mimicking the real-world difficulties of nuclear disarmament. Building and disarming nuclear devices in the game was further encouraged by developers through the design of two PlayStation trophies along with the promise of a secret cut-scene if players managed to eradicate all nuclear weapons on their online server. However, due to an alleged programming error it became impossible for players to actually achieve this goal. This article examines the design of the aforementioned trophies and their relationship with in-game nuclear disarmament, highlighting the larger significance of the trophy design and how the metacommentary (i.e., anti-nuclear narrative) of MGSV was undermined by metagaming practices (i.e., unlocking trophies, optimizing gameplay) and a live service business model focused on player retention and profit.

show abstract

Fukasaku Kinji and Kojima Hideo Replay Hiroshima: Atomic Imagery and Cross-Media Memory

Cited by 3 publications

References 16 publications

Playing with Phantoms: Decoding the Ludic Language of Metal Gear Solid V

Playing with Phantoms: Decoding the Ludic Language of Metal Gear Solid V

“The Father of Survival Horror”: Shinji Mikami, Procedural Rhetoric, and the Collective/Cultural Memory of the Atomic Bombs

Ruptures of design: Trophies, live service games and anti-nuclear metacommentary in Metal Gear Solid V

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About