Aesthetics, Video Games and Play by Shelby Moser

This course takes a broad look at several ways video games can teach us about issues in aesthetics. We begin with a focus on the value of play and a distinction between play and gameplay. We can make use of this distinction to emphasize the importance of rules in games and to communicate fundamental concepts in ontology and its fundamental role in art and aesthetics. A distinction between play and gameplay also allows us to consider the different mental states of those who play games and a further distinction between games and the performing arts. Next, this course considers more serious games or games that aim to do more than merely entertain. Such games allow students to draw ethical conclusions and perhaps make broader applications to ordinary life. Of course, video games often have aesthetic value so games can be an excellent resource for discussions about genre, standard formal features, and their unique metaphysical structure. Unlike traditional works of art, most video games do not have fixed outcomes, they can have many different outcomes. Not only does this grant players agency, it has the potential to entangle the roles of players and character identities. This course concludes by considering that games might be best understood through a process-oriented model of art rather than traditional object-oriented models.

BIO: Shelby Moser is an Assistant Professor (Lecturer) in the Division of Games and an Adjunct Professor in the Department of Philosophy at the University of Utah. She’s an analytic Philosopher of Art & Games with a specific focus on the ontology of interactivity and rules, the meaningfulness of play in social contexts, and, the aesthetics of games. Her publications include “On Regarding Digital Art”, (Routledge 2023), “The Philosophy of Digital Art”, (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy Revised 2023), and “Videogame Ontology, Constitutive Rules, and Algorithms” (Routledge 2018). Shelby also has a background in the history and philosophy of the fine arts focusing on the challenges digital art imposes on museum-driven practices.