Project description
Who gets to be real in virtual worlds
Digital games promise immersion, but whose reality are they simulating? From ancient cities in Assassin’s Creed to war zones in VR shooters, games claim authenticity. However, they often sideline peripheral places and marginalised voices. The ERC-funded GAMEINDEX project digs deeper, tracing how realism is built through indexicality. It will use real-world elements like motion-captured actors and 3D-scanned landmarks. Through on-site ethnography, game analysis, and media discourse, GAMEINDEX explores who gets digitised and why. Overall, the project will show how production choices shape what players see. The goal is a new theory of representation that exposes hidden biases and inspires developers to craft fairer and more inclusive virtual worlds rooted in reality.
Objective
Many contemporary digital games and VR experiences – including the Assassin’s Creed series of historical games – claim to provide realistic representations of places or people. But how is this realism achieved and which places and people get included?
To answer this question, GAMEINDEX focuses on indexical representations – traces of real-life objects or people in the simulated worlds of digital games and VR. Such indices include 3D scans of buildings or the likenesses and performances of actors who provide motion capture data. GAMEINDEX will investigate indexical representation in digital games and VR using the following methods: 1) ethnographic on-site research of indexical techniques, such as motion capture and photogrammetry, 2) qualitative analyses of selected games that represent peripheral locations or groups of people, 3) analysis of the public discourse about indexical techniques. In the final step, the project will synthesize empirical findings into a theory that will chart the relationships between production practices, game content, and public discourse, elucidating political and aesthetic dimensions of indexicality.
Due to the pressures to succeed on the globalized market, games have underrepresented and misrepresented peripheral locations and underprivileged groups of people. So far, studies of representation in games have focused on tropes and stereotypes within the games’ content. Thanks to its focus on indexicality, GAMEINDEX will provide a breakthrough in the study of media representations by transcending close readings and content analysis and studying how representation arises in the production process. The resulting theory will serve as a tool for critique, helping us understand how real locations and people are being exploited and reconfigured into entertainment products. At the same time, it will provide inspiration for developers to create more diverse and just representations of real-world phenomena.
Keywords
Project’s keywords as indicated by the project coordinator. Not to be confused with the EuroSciVoc taxonomy (Fields of science)
Project’s keywords as indicated by the project coordinator. Not to be confused with the EuroSciVoc taxonomy (Fields of science)
Programme(s)
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
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HORIZON.1.1 - European Research Council (ERC)
MAIN PROGRAMME
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Topic(s)
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Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.
Funding Scheme
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
HORIZON-ERC - HORIZON ERC Grants
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Call for proposal
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
(opens in new window) ERC-2024-COG
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Net EU financial contribution. The sum of money that the participant receives, deducted by the EU contribution to its linked third party. It considers the distribution of the EU financial contribution between direct beneficiaries of the project and other types of participants, like third-party participants.
116 36 Praha 1
Czechia
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