Free will is an interesting topic, but it can be a difficult one to wrap one’s mind around. Sometimes taking an esoteric idea like free will, and connecting it to something mundane, can help provide insight into the matter. In this paper, I suggest using an analogy between our decision making and the decision making process of characters in role…[Read more]

Roleplaying games have always leaned heavily on their literary sources. System mechanics and character creation options have been tooled toward evoking genre types and aesthetics ever since the first “Vancian wizard” memorised a spell before setting out to adventure.

Naturally, when RPGs turned toward the Gothic, they did the same thing: rif…[Read more]

This paper explores the transmission of Frankenstein’s Creature – or Monster – into tabletop and computer gaming. It briefly covers the ‘Flesh Golem’ archetype and Frankenstein-esque figures as encounters in Dungeons and Dragons – superficial imitations, influenced more by cinematic adaptations than the novel, and emphasising the ‘Monster’ readi…[Read more]

This paper seeks to explain why Bede’s Ecclesiastical History of the English People constitutes a valid historical work, rather than a religious text. It starts by addressing the nature of historical vs non-historical narrative, focusing on a concept of “genealogy of information.” It couples ideas from narrative theory, historiography, and…[Read more]

This paper charts the changing definition of ‘necromancy’ throughout Christian history, and explores the reasons why ‘dead-speaking’ becomes ‘black magic’ within medieval Christian discourses and later occult scholarship. The paper contends that the doctrines of Purgatory and intercession compromise Christianity’s relationship with the dead,…[Read more]

This presentation responds to Tanya Krzywinska’s 2015 paper ‘The Gamification of Gothic Coordinates in Videogames’, which discusses the awkwardness of the video game environment as a ‘space’ in which the Gothic narrative can unfold, and calls for more specific analysis of individual game texts to deepen our grasp of genre functions in gaming. K…[Read more]

The early 1990s saw a kind of crystallisation in gaming aesthetics, centred on games that either squinted towards Gothic or outright claimed a place in the culture and tradition: Warhammer 40,000 and Vampire: the Masquerade on the tabletop, Alone in the Dark and Wolfenstein on the PC. These games are genre-defining, persistent, and – to varying…[Read more]