Cringeplay and Gamer-Body: a Shift in the Normative Grammar of Gameplay

Abstract

The concept of ‘cringe’ proves difficult to define unambiguously, as it is a synthetic phenomenon that is simultaneously on the edge of ethics and aesthetics. ‘To cringe’ means “to experience discomfort and dislike because of the behaviour of another”, only in this case the Other is the gamer-body of the player, who is groping new spaces of his or her own gamerhood and identity. This category describes well the specificity of the gamer-body of the 2000s, when some players discovered various flash projects. ‘Cringeplay’ is a particular construction of games and the affect of playing them. Such games involve a marginalised aspect of real life. Cringeplay is associated with the violation of the normative grammar of gameplay, the functioning of the gamer-body and the practices of abusive game design. The uncomfortableness of playing such games converges with the experience of pornographic erotic games. Flash games are an understudied layer of game culture. They are of serious importance for the subsequent development of mobile gameplay and the indie scene. They are usually culturally understood as ‘gimmick’ (in Russian 2000s slang «prikol»), or mini-games with simple gameplay, relatives of casual gameplay before the era of mobile gaming. Almost never considered in the context of the global or even local history of gaming, most of these games were free-to-play and anonymous, and sometimes controversial. Flash games represent an important milestone in the history of gamification. Their study, among other things, has media archaeological value. Much of what was was gamer-body of the 2000s has now shifted to the zone of the marginal and almost unknown/forgotten (e.g. Java games), and sometimes the new indie. Cringeplay is a unique form that reflects the mental and aesthetic characteristics of the 2000s gamer-body.