自由的去處：以女性玩家開放世界經驗探討遊戲之空間生產

Abstract

遊戲何以成為去處？去處代表著那裡有空間，且有人出於某種需求而前往。而這種空間向度的權力，卻又是女性在現實中相對缺乏的，那麼在遊戲中擁有一個去處，是否對女性來說有不同的意義或特別重要？抱持著這樣的核心發問，本文講述了遊戲、空間、女性三者的交織關係，以及交織之下的作用結果。從遊戲作為空間這一概念出發，選定開放世界遊戲為主要田野範疇，並以開放性與世界性兩大面向分析此類遊戲的空間架構，指出開放世界的意象性其實指向虛擬與現實社會的聯繫。次之，以酷兒現象學視角切入審視女性玩家與開放世界的互動模式，探討鬆綁的機制如何賦予玩家自由的揮灑空間。女性玩家可能順流或傾斜於遊戲空間產生的序線：順流時，開放世界提供時空縱深與彈性，以及物質的豐厚和密度來映射、安撫來自現實的創傷或恐懼；而當她們游離於引導性的序線之外時，這種偏斜則產生一股抵抗性的力量。本文將這種非主流、歪斜卻隱含反抗力量的遊戲傾向稱之為酷玩法，並以此回顧既有玩家動機分類研究，從中辨識出女性玩家的特殊性。最後討論酷玩法如何生產空間，整理出面向三種不同議題的空間生產，以此重新審視虛擬與現實之間的關係。本文認為，當代電玩遊戲之作為社會空間，並非只是絕對的空間寓言模型與虛擬化的社群兩者的並置，遊戲空間本身即包含當代社會關係並與之互構。時空縱深、豐厚物質性，以及可以舒展虛擬身體的自由機制，加上女性玩家的特質和情感植入茁壯，遊戲成為了去處。這個過程體現了女性玩家對現實的反抗並產生反彈的力量，讓我們從這裡找到重新邁向現實的動力。

What makes video games a place to go? A place to go means a location where there is a set space and where people can go for their specific needs. This kind of spatial power is something which women lack in reality, and so does having a place to go within a video game have a different meaning or particular importance for women? Through this core question, in this article we will discuss the interweaving relationships between video games, space, and women, and the effects of their interrelated roles. Beginning by examining the concept of space in video games, we have selected open world games as the main field area and have analyzed the construction of the space in these games in terms of their openness and worldness, noting that the imaginative nature of open world games actually points towards a connection between the virtual and the real world.Secondly, we have examined the modes of interaction between female gamers and open worlds through the lens of queer phenomenology, exploring how the lax rules provide players with the freedom to explore the space without restraints. Female gamers may flow towards or become oblique to the life line generated by the game space. When flowing towards, the open world provides spatial and temporal depth and flexibility, as well as an abundance of materials and a density to the world map. This may lead to the soothing of traumas and fears from one’s reality. When gamers stray from the game’s life line, this divergence creates a resistive force. In this article, we call such an alternative, skewed, yet implicitly resistive gaming tendency queer gameplay, and in doing so, we review existing research into the classification of gamer intentions, from which we can identify the specific characteristics of female gamers.Finally, we discuss how queer gameplay produces space, and we organize the production of space in relation to three different topics in order to re-examine the relationship between the virtual and the real. In this article, we argue that contemporary video games as a social space is not just the juxtaposition of absolute spatial allegorical models and virtual communities, but that games themselves contain modern social relations and constructs their relations. The spatial and temporal depth, the rich materiality, and the freedom to extend one’s virtual body, coupled with the characteristics of female gamers and the strong emotions they implant into their gameplay, all combine to make video games a place to go. This process reflects the power of female gamers to rebel and fight back against reality, and then find the impetus to once again move from the game back to reality.