After the Jump: An SLSA Exchange on Platforming Games

Abstract

In this collaborative discussion, the three authors interrogate their investments in platforming games, a long-standing genre of video games. Connecting personal and biographical reflections on childhood play to their academic trajectories, the authors reflect on the wider meanings of the genre to players. Several critical themes emerge around the genre’s pleasures, spatial structure, cartoonish style, experiential immediacy, nostalgia, and social functions.