The Bad Games Panel

The document, titled "The Bad Games Panel," is a set of three panel presentations from a game studies gathering that explores whether poorly made video games can still be enjoyed and valued. Its central question is whether the appreciation strategies developed for "bad" cinema, namely paracinema (Sconce) and camp (Sontag), can be transferred to games. The panelists argue that such appreciation, which they term paragaming, is possible despite games demanding more concrete effort from players than film does, and despite the contested status of games as a legitimate medium.

The first panelist identifies two barriers to paragaming: the physical and interactive effort games require, which makes broken interfaces or excessive difficulty a genuine obstacle, and the lack of an authoritative taste canon for games comparable to those in film. The panelist suggests that players can accept such flaws as an added challenge, and that a minor canon of acclaimed games such as BioShock, Shadow of the Colossus, and World of Warcraft provides a reference point against which "bad" games can be enjoyed. The second panelist argues that games with flawed writing, acting, or production value can function as "paracinematic proxies," offering the pleasures of badness alongside solid gameplay, with Resident Evil and House of the Dead: Overkill cited as examples. This panelist contends that single-player identification with an avatar turns flaws into frustration, whereas the enjoyment of bad games is more distinctly derisive than the affectionate tone of camp.

The third panelist proposes that playing bad games in social settings reshapes the player-avatar relationship, since shared control diminishes identification and transforms the experience into an interactive performance. Across the three contributions, the document positions the study of bad games as a means of understanding the taste cultures that audiences already inhabit.