Rethinking creativity through digital games. When gamers go “crazy”

Abstract

This paper inquires into the creativity involved in uncommon and apparently nonsensical ways of playing digital games. Starting from the observation that most videogames present features which are at the opposite of “free imaginative play” typically associated with creativity, we use semiotics to examine the emergence of creative play in such games. We do so by looking at the conditions of possibility for a divergent enunciation to appear from strict structures of expression and from consolidated practices.  First, we emphasize how this form of creativity is part of the very development of play. Then we move to games and examine six different types of creative play, considered both “crazy” and “ingenious” by the gaming community. This examination shows the strong presence of creativity in such games, the rational and encyclopedic thinking behind it, its connotation as madness in relation to existing norms, and how the enunciative divergence of games allows for uncommon play to creatively emerge from within the expressive system itself as a consequence of a possibilistic attitude toward rules, uses and meanings. In the conclusions, we emphasize both the social and academic potential of philosophical explorations of technology and point to future research using games in the contemporary debate on the creativity of AI.