Judgment

The Playable Magic Mountain: Sanatorium Space, Ludic Intertextuality and Frozen Civilisation in Genshin Impact

Genshin Impact functions as a sophisticated digital sanatorium, translating the literary themes of Thomas Mann’s The Magic Mountain into an interactive spatial system.

• The 'A Long Day in the Mountains' questline in Genshin Impact utilizes a four-stage architectural structure—Magic Mountain, Paradise, Hell, and Judgment—to transform abstract literary and philosophical concepts into playable spatial mechanics.
• The game represents 'frozen civilization' through the Temple of Space, where the player acts as an agent of 'ludic profanation' by repairing broken mechanisms and restoring movement to a world trapped in static, museumified preservation.
• The quest design treats memory as a tangible resource, requiring players to engage in 'memory sacrifice' to open paths, thereby framing the restoration of civilization as an incomplete process that necessitates personal loss.