Kolonizacje leśnego grajobrazu. Szkic o lasach w polskich grach wideo z perspektywy studiów postkolonialnych
Colonization of the Forest Gamespace: An Essay about Forests in Polish Video Games from the Perspective of Postcolonial Studies

Summary/Abstract: The article presents an analysis of forest gamespaces in selected Polish video games. Referring to research in the field of postcolonial studies, the author shows how colonial patterns are preserved or deconstructed in designing the relationship between the player’s avatar and forest spaces. She examines relationships between characters and forest gamespaces in contexts such as colonization (Edward Said, Tomasz Z. Majkowski, Shoshana Magnet), hybrid iden- tity (Souvik Mukherjee), and diaspora (Homi K. Bhabha, Krzysztof Loska). Very often, game creators – consciously or unconsciously – replicate colonial patterns by depicting the relationship between space and figures. Despite this, some Polish video games challenge this paradigm by de- constructing it in both their narrative and gameplay me- chanics. Two examples of such games are Zaginięcie Ethana Cartera [The Vanishing of Ethan Carter] (2014) and Werewolf: The Apocalypse – Heart of the Forest (2020).

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