‘Playing the Classics: Constructing a Digital Game Adaptation Database’

Abstract

Due in no small part to the proliferation of accessible game design software, digital crowd-funding infrastructure, and academic programs in game studies, the amount of video games based upon works of ‘classic’ literature and drama has grown exponentially in the last few decades. In order to help scholars and educators get a foothold in the world of video game adaptations, the ‘Remixing the Classics’ scholarly network initiated a Video Game Adaptation Database in the summer of 2022. This companion piece to the database will help orient the uninitiated by explaining the project’s origin, methodology, and organisational criteria, as well as provide an introduction to some of the formal, generic, intertextual, and accessibility concerns involved in studying game adaptations. Along the way, it aims to introduce readers to a variety of game adaptations both in and outside of the database, including Walden, a game (USC Game Innovation Lab 2017), Elsinore (Golden Glitch 2019), and Toho’s infamous Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1988). VITA: John Sanders is a Visiting Assistant Professor of English and the Humanities at Reed College, where he teaches classes on literature, new media, and classical Hollywood genre film. His current research involves theorising an approach to studying digital and analog game adaptations as intertextual systems of experience. His work has appeared in journals such as gamevironments and First-Person Scholar as well as in presentations at the Society for Cinema and Media Studies conference, the Literature/Film Association conference, and PAX East. Outside of academia, John has worked as a curriculum designer, site director, and instructor for local summer enrichment programs. John currently splits his time between Portland and his partner’s home in Denville, New Jersey, which they share with their three dogs: Neo, Henry, and Mr. Darcy.