Remediation and Games

 Remediation is the representation of one medium in another, as described by Bolter and Grusin. They argue that remediation is a defining characteristic of the new digital media. 


"What might seem at first to be an esoteric practice is so widespread that we can identify a spectrum of different ways in which digital media remediate their predecessors."

-Bolter & Grusin, Remediation: Understanding New Media (1999)

So how does new media 'remediate' the older media? 

Immediacy

• Media that aspires to a condition of transparency.
• The aim is to make the viewer forget that they are watching a movie for example, and ensures that the viewer is drawn into the experience.
• Examples: Virtual Reality, Photo-Realistic Images etc.

Hypermediacy

• Artefacts that are aware of, and wish to display, their own constructed nature.
• They constantly call attention to their own constructed nature all the time.
• Examples: WWW., Video Game HUDs etc.

Remediation can refer to all sorts of conventions. For example we find Aesthetic conventions being constantly used between many different media.

Photorealism is an example of 'immediacy', because it is not designed to preserve the medium of 'photography'.

Similarly, 'Hypermediacy', is not the aesthetic preserve of the world wide web, its conventions have been picked up by things such as magazines and television rolling news.

The rules that govern the 3D perspective of shapes on a flat surface were first worked out during the Renaissance. It takes time for a new medium to develop unique forms of content, it really isn't surprising that 'successful' media ends up being traded between different types of media. The original 'goal' of computer games was to render the text-based narratives of early games into visual 3D.

Remediation in Films and Games

Bittani (2003) claims there is a convergence taking place in the history of video gaming in film, there are now many films that remediate, comment on, quote and adapt video games on the big screen. These films have become a genre in their own right, which Bittanti calls Technoludic Films, which is a combination of the words Technology and Ludus (latin for play).

Technoludic Film as Commentary

Bittanti says that the video game is subordinate to the film; film is used to critique video games. Films can project societies deepest anxieties about the medium of video game, especially in relation to escapism and the removal of mind from 'reality'. Some such films are eXistenZ(1999), The Matrix Trilogy (1999-2003) and The Lawnmower Ma(1991).

Technoludic Film as Quotation

In this category video games are used in films for illustrative purposes, they are not necessarily the central theme of the film, but form part of the fictional world the film is trying to present. Some of these films are Blade Runner (1982), Clockers(1997) a more modern example of this would be Inception (2010).

Technoludic Film as Remediation(1) Adaptation

Brittanti uses remediation to refer directly to the adaptation of computer games as a source text for a film, not simply a theme. These are often adaptations or tie-ins of successful games, however the films have often been critiqued for the low quality of the scripting and acting. Films such as this are Super Mario Brothers (1993), Lara Croft: Tomb Raider(2001), Dead or Alive(2006) and DOOM(2005).

Technoludic Film as Remediation (2)

There is clearly as broader conception of remediation which is about the incorporation of aesthetic and narrative codes from one form of media to another. There are many films that embody some of the conventions in video games into their narratives and / or style. Films such as this are Groundhog Day (1993), Toy Story (1995), Run Lola Run (1998).