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Games & Architecture

"With games, learning is the drug. Boredom is the opposite." (Raph Koster, Game Designer)

In recent years, computer based games have increasingly entered the public consciousness, and a variety of scholarly and popular publications have offered information on the history, design and aesthetics of computer games. But one central aspect is never taken into account: the spaces (and space-times) of the games themselves. This lacuna is all the more remarkable when we consider that virtually all computer games take place in spaces. Players enter simulated spatial realities as well as fantastical spaces, photo-realistic representations of space as well as abstract ones. Today already, both architectural firms and universities exploit game techniques as well as game technologies in the framework of their designs, or intervene in architecture as well as in the urban realm with the assistance of games.

There are many aspects that suggest how productive it might be for architects to try to come to terms with computer games. We will try and find practical answers as a result of this module.