A Game Within a Bio-Object(s): Redefining a Moment of the Gameplay

Key insights

7 takeaways

01
Posthumanist theory, drawing on Bryant and Latour's actor-network framing, treats humans as one actor among many in a relational network rather than the privileged center, and this paper applies that lens to video games.
02
The player is framed as a co-creator of game reality alongside the software, with meaning produced performatively through the interaction rather than dictated by the game's narrative.
03
Tadeusz Kantor's concept of the 'bio-object' (the actor and stage object fused into a unity held together by constant rivalry) is proposed as a theoretical tool for understanding the player-game relationship.
04
The player-game bond is characterized as a dualistic power struggle: it is unstable, and this instability generates new meanings and a space of multiple possibilities above the narrative.
05
Glitches are highlighted as moments when the game's medium becomes visible, breaking the illusion of fiction and temporarily removing the player's advantage, which prompts subversive resistance strategies to regain control.
06
The planned analysis covers three issues: traces of past player activity in game space, hidden game agency behind apparent player choices at binding plot decisions, and the instability of actor connections illustrated through case studies.
07
The paper is a conference presentation (DiGRA/FDG 2015-era proceedings) with no quantitative data, market figures, or empirical sample; its claims are conceptual and theoretical, supported by case studies described but not reported.

Summary

This paper, presented at the 1st International Joint Conference of DiGRA and FDG, argues that video games can be productively analyzed through a posthumanist lens that abandons the privileged position of the human player. Drawing on Levi R. Bryant's flat ontology, Bruno Latour's Actor-Network Theory, and Tadeusz Kantor's concept of the bio-object, the author proposes that the player and the game are entangled co-creators of meaning rather than a dominant subject acting upon a passive system. The central premise is that the relationship between player and game is dynamic, marked by a continuous power struggle that produces new meanings within the space of gameplay.

The theoretical core rests on Kantor's notion of the bio-object, a stage relationship in which the actor and the object animate one another while remaining in constant rivalry. The author maps this dualism onto the player-game relation, suggesting that the symbolic bond formed during play generates a space of multiple possibilities that extends beyond narrative. The analysis is conceptual and qualitative rather than empirical, relying on theoretical synthesis and illustrative case studies rather than survey data or sample-based methodology.

The proposed analysis is organized around three issues. The first examines traces of player activity left in game environments, such as spectral images of past playthroughs, as evidence of mutual influence between player and system. The second considers how the game's agency is often concealed behind player choices, particularly during consequential plot decisions. The third focuses on instability and rivalry, with glitches serving as a central example: when a glitch exposes the medium, the illusion of fiction collapses and the player temporarily loses control. The author argues that such moments prompt subversive player strategies aimed at reclaiming a central creative position, even within virtual worlds. The paper frames these phenomena as a foundation for future case-based investigation of immersion-breaking behaviors and player resistance.