Crime Does Play: Detective Fiction in Video Games

This book presents the first major collection on the intersection of videogames and detective fiction, bringing insights on a variety of topics from a range of leading scholars in this exciting, emerging field.

Although known primarily as a literary genre, detective fiction thrives in contemporary forms of media, such as videogames, where designers experiment with a variety of mechanics and formats. While detective fiction has a rich history in literature, much less has been written about detective fiction in videogames and this is one of the primary objectives of this book.

Each chapter places detective fiction into dialogue with videogames, covering a variety of topics from remediation and adaptation, participatory culture and transmedia storytelling, transcultural exchange—especially between the Anglo-American and Japanese games industries—and the well observed tension between gameplay and story, known as the ludology/narratology debate.

The book takes an experimental and interdisciplinary approach, and by borrowing insights from each field, this fusion sheds new light on the fields of narratology and game design more broadly. As the dominant popular culture of our age, videogames are also uniquely positioned to explore the reasons behind the renaissance of detective fiction in contemporary culture, placing the genre into the wider socio-political landscape.