Instrumental Pleasures: Game Informer and the Masculinist Review Discourse of Fantasy Game Magic

This paper examines how reviews in the American mass-market magazine Game Informer framed the pleasures of magic systems in fantasy games between 1991 and 2011. Drawing on close reading and thematic discourse analysis of reviews from this period, the author argues that the magazine's emphasis on particular features of ludic magic privileged instrumental orientations to play, which carry historically masculinized associations. The study situates print game journalism as a significant site of gaming cultural production during the 1990s and 2000s, when magazines shaped both purchasing decisions and collective notions of what counted as enjoyable.

Across two decades, reviewers repeatedly praised magic systems through five recurring themes: destruction, spectacle, choice, creativity, and mastery. Destruction was valued for magic's responsiveness and capacity to overwhelm enemies, while spectacle was prized as audiovisual reward that communicated a spell's force and scale. Choice was celebrated through comprehensive spell lists and build options, creativity through combinatorial experimentation, and mastery through systems that rewarded players for internalizing their mechanics. The paper frames these pleasures through Taylor's concept of instrumental play, defined by efficiency, goal orientation, and system understanding.

The analysis reports that by 2012 Game Informer's readership was predominantly young and male, with a media kit citing 84% male readers and a median age of 27. Because instrumental rationality has been historically gendered as masculine, the author contends that the magazine's repeated valorization of instrumental engagement amounted to a gendered script of enjoyment. The study acknowledges that instrumental play is not inherently masculine and that women also pursue system mastery, positioning its claim as narrower and focused on the imagined reader implied by review discourse.