The concept of magic circle: a critical reading

Observatorio (OBS*), 2009

Cybertext Database. Retrieved August 25th, 2008

2021

Games are often intended to draw us so completely into a fictional world that we forget that there is a world outside of the game, however, forgetting ourselves in a game means we must come back to ourselves at the end, begging the question: who were we when we were playing? The conventional wisdom of the magic circle (Huizinga 1949) suggests that we press pause on our real lives when we enter a game space. Identity permeability in games, or bleed, (Stark 2012) suggests that there is no such pause button; that players lend their agency and identity to an in-game role, where that agency and identity is altered by the gameplay such that when the players return to themselves they are in some way changed. Bleed occurs when in-game learning is so effective that players experience that learning across two realities, evoking a shift in world view. This is where educational environments become necessary; providing context and community as players learn to re-think their out-of-game reality ...

This chapter considers the process of online social identity construction and how it is presented in virtual worlds – environments that although carrying a solid heritage of the pure online interaction tools, such as chat rooms, are still organized around a very specific logic, portraying objectives and structural repetition dynamics inherent to the game as a system. We posit that the presence of what is called the ‘magic circle’ by Salen and Zimmerman (2004) exerts a mediating power, not only by circling, limiting the game environment, but specially by transforming social identities formations processes, attaching it not only to the dynamics built in by the contact with technology – in the form of computer-mediated communication – but also in particular to the dynamics imprinted by the game structure present in such worlds.

This paper proposes a critical discussion about the magic circle concept, through a debate with prior works on the issue, as those elaborated by Johan Huizinga and Katie Salen & Eric Zimmerman, as well as with cognitive psychology studies regarding attention. We shall argue that the magic circle, instead of separating fiction and reality, would work as a cognitive mediation structure with graded “boundaries”, which existence occurs in diverse forms, depending on variables like player immersion and attention. Thus, these boundaries get defined and “solid” as the immersive process is developed and one reality seems to change into another: as the player “gets into the looking glass”.

2008

This text compares the special characteristics of the game space in computer-generated environments with that in non-computerized playing-situations. Herewith, the concept of the magic circle as a deliberately delineated playing sphere with specific rules to be upheld by the players, is challenged. Yet, computer games also provide a virtual playing environment containing the rules of the game as well as the various action possibilities. But both the hardware and software facilitate the player's actions rather than constraining them. This makes computer games fundamentally different: in contrast to traditional game spaces or limits, the computer-generated environment does not rely on the awareness of the player in upholding these rules.-Thus, there is no magic circle. In this paper, I compare the special relationship of the game space in computer-generated environments with that in non-computerized playing situations. Herewith, the transference of the so-called magic circle of traditional games to computer games is challenged. The computer game is a very complex phenomenon. Like its neighboring media, such as television and cinema, it is a combination of cultural expression and technological innovation. It not only opens the field to narrative and art, but also includes the vast area of sport. This makes it even more difficult to grasp. Therefore, it is essential to focus on a specific type of game or specific aspects of the computer game in order to provide a valid argument for my premise. As the possibility to play a diverse number of games without depending on a human opponent is a crucial characteristic of computer games, I

2008

The concept of the magic circle suggests that the experience of play is separated from reality. However, in order to interact with a game's rule system, the player has to make meaningful interpretations of its representations -and representations are never neutral. Games with political content refer in their representations explicitly to social discourses. Cues within their representational layers provoke the player to link the experience of play to mental concepts of reality. Can games have political meanings? Most players are well aware that a game is not to be confused with reality, but is a discrete sphere, cut off from the ordinary world, governed by its own rules. Since Johan Huizinga (1955), this phenomenon is commonly known as the magic circle, a concept often taken up by ludological thinkers like or . However, if games shall be meaningful, the player has to relate the playing experience to the subjective construction of reality. This paper proposes that games can offer cues within their representations in order to encourage the player to refer to knowledge of the real world. In doing so, these games incite the player to mentally move back and forth between the magic circle and the outside world. It is not the concern of this paper to offer empirical evidence about the psychological effects of video games, but to construct a perspective in order to be able to investigate the immanent structures of games that shape the process of meaning making. The paper starts with a discussion about the importance of interpretation in play. In the second part, a model is suggested that illustrates the several layers of a game, which can contain information

Religions, 2018

Abstract: The question, the Fragestellung, which drives this paper is, can football video-games be analyzed from a religious perspective? We can answer positively, at least, provisionally. First, in order to demonstrate our approach, we will take into account the different conceptions on play drawn along sociological theories. Second, we will analyze Francis M. Cornford’s contribution to the already forgotten but essential work by Jane Ellen Harrison, Themis: The Social Origins of the Greek Religion, in which he established an elective affinity between the origin of the Olympic Games and the annual ritual dedicated to the Daimon-God Dionysus, in which he was elected the best Kouros (Young hero-King) of the year. At the very beginning, play, ritual, and competitive games (helped by self-reflexivity as well as collective reflexivity) were united, and that constellation is still there in modern times with the creation of modern sport. Third, in modern advanced societies the football game-sport creates meaning, and succeeded throughout two main processes such as the sportification and progressive rationalization of violence. Fourth, we built an ideal type of two competing strategies, in which created a new type of hero, the sports hero, the modern celebrity. Finally, fifth, we analyze how in our digitalized societies the football videogames are a sort of play on the play of which comes out a religious transcendence associated with it, “Throughout the videogame I become myself in my idol”. We explain this comparing two ideal types, the Dionysian- Messi versus the Apollonian-Ronaldo.

2008

In a common description, to play a game is to step inside a concrete or metaphorical magic circle where special rules apply. In video game studies, this description has received an inordinate amount of criticism which the paper argues has two primary sources: 1. a misreading of the basic concept of the magic circle and 2. a somewhat rushed application of traditional theoretical concerns onto games.

2011