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A Techno-Semiotic Approach to Cheating in Computer Games

Or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Machine

University of the Arts, London, julian{at}kuecklich.de

This article is an attempt to understand cheating in digital games as a practice that highlights the machinicity of the process of digital gameplay. The significance of this endeavor lies in the fact that digital gameplay is often naturalized—by the digital games industry, by players, and by scholars in the burgeoning field of digital game studies—which leads to an obfuscation of the inherently cybernetic character of videogames. Cheating and other ``de-ludic'' practices can counteract this naturalization and reveal the process of ``becoming-machine'' that lies at the heart of digital gameplay.

Key Words: digital games • deus ex • cheating • semiotics • technicity

This version was published on April 1, 2009

Games and Culture, Vol. 4, No. 2, 158-169 (2009)
DOI: 10.1177/1555412008325486


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