Daniel Muriel

“René Magritte, a Belgian surrealist painter, is the author of the popular painting La Trahison des Images (‘The Treachery of Images’), which depicts a pipe. Below the pipe, Magritte wrote the following sentence: ‘Ceci n’est pas une pipe’ (‘This is not a pipe’). What Magritte seems to be trying to convey is that this in not a pipe, but rather a painting of a pipe; the word ‘pipe’ is not a pipe either. The x on the map does not (usually) refer to a real x on the ground, and even if it does, the x on the map is not the x on the ground. It is a re-presentation. And this re-presentation is not what is re-presented, the signifier is not the signified, and the map is not the territory. …However, if it is possible to affirm within a video game that ‘this is not a video game’, it is because video games are also representations of reality (or experiences of reality as we saw in Chapter 4), and that affirmation allows the game to refer to ‘real life’ as the opposite to a game, a fantasy, or a fiction.”
― Daniel Muriel, Video Games as Culture

“At a sociopolitical level, video game culture shows us that agency is part of both emancipatory and alienating practices. The notion of agency is strongly influenced by the hegemonic political rationalities of neoliberalism, as we saw in the way that video game culture fosters the idea of free, active, and powerful individuals who are held responsible for their own actions and self-government (this is reflected in wider society in those individuals who are responsible for their own safety, well-being, and education). However, precisely using the same forces that power neoliberalism as a hegemonic set of rationalities, video game culture also shows us that agency can be articulated in more collaborative and participatory ways.”
― Daniel Muriel, Video Games as Culture