The author questions the apparent democratizing potential of machinima, arguing that this form of expression is limited both in terms of production (creators) and consumption (audience). To make his point, he examines Alex Chan’s The French Democracy, a popular machinima that fictionally reconstructed the Parisian riots of 2005, concluding that this film is an anomaly if compared to the larger machinima production. Moreover, Chan’s point of view, while representative of the marginalized Parisian suburban dwellers vilified during the riots, does not represent all the members of that subaltern group. The author concludes that similar limitations affect other machinima productions.
Bogost, I. ( 2007) Persuasive Games: The Expressive Power of Videogames. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
2.
Fox, S. and Vitak, J. ( 2008) ‘Degrees of Access (May 2008 Data)’, Pew Internet & American Life Project. URL (consulted Jan. 2010): http://www.pewinternet.org/Presentations/2008/Degrees-of-Access-(May-2008-data).aspx
3.
Gee, J. ( 2004) What Video Games Have to Teach Us About Learning and Literacy . New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
4.
Gee, J. ( 2007) Good Videogames + Good Learning: Collected Essays on Videogames, Learning and Literacy. New York: Peter Lang.
5.
Jenkins, H. ( 2006) Convergence Culture: Where Old and New Media Collide. New York: New York University Press.
6.
Jones, R. ( 2006) ‘From Shooting Monsters to Shooting Movies: Machinima and the Transformative Play of Videogame Fan Culture’, in K. Hellekson and K. Busse (eds) Fan Fiction and Fan Communities in the Age of the Internet. Jefferson, NC: McFarland .
7.
Jones, R. ( 2008) ‘Saving Worlds with Videogame Activism’, in R. Ferdig (ed.) Handbook of Research on Effective Electronic Gaming in Education. Hershey, PA : Information Science Reference.
8.
Lowood, H. ( 2007) ‘High-Performance Play: The Making of Machinima’ , in A. Clarke and G. Mitchell (eds) Videogames and Art: Intersections and Interactions. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
9.
Lowood, H. ( 2008) ‘Found Technology: Players as Innovators in the Making of Machinima’, in T. McPherson (ed.) Digital Youth, Innovation, and the Unexpected. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
10.
Salen, K. and Zimmerman, E. ( 2004) Rules of Play: Game Design Fundamentals. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
