Videogame meet philosophers

[TheFrighter]

I recently discovered Ollivier Pourriol, a smart french philosopher that use popular movies and tv-series to explain the ideas of the main philosopher such as Spinoza, Leibniz, Cartesio and others.

Some of his videos (in french, sorry) can be found here:   http://www.cinephilo.fr/regarder/studio-philo-special-series

Sure the same operation could be done with videogames! But I'm not so deep in philosophy...

I think that Friedrich Nietzsche' ideas ( the Ãœbermensch, the eternal return, will to power) can be easily found in a lot of games, so let's skip him.

What videogames you would use to explain the philosophy of Zoroastro, L e F. Socini, Saint-Simon, Pirrone, Pelagio, Luis de Molina, Averroé, Fichte, Schelling or others you know?

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[KyriakosCH]

Well, it can be done re some types of philosophy. For example idealism (up to solipsism). I am sure some games have that (a rather crude version of idealism can be seen in the first half of the True Detective series1).

[Danvzare]

Isn't philosophy just about asking questions?
If so, then wouldn't this constitute as video game philosophy: "Why do we always play to win?" "What would happen if a game was made to make losing more engaging than winning?" "Why do people who hate grinding, participate in it anyway?"

[TheFrighter]

Not only. Philosophers have to give, if not an answer, almost a logic or the instruments to satisfy the questions.

Ok, let's put in another way: on what philosophy is based a game like Harvester?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G-OZisUSfQQ

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[KyriakosCH]

Fatalism

<Harvester guy kills a number of random people>
<Sheriff tells him that it's ok, he can go this time, and consider it as his "get out of jail free" card>

[TheFrighter]

Fatalism. Another point for Nietzche. 

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[KyriakosCH]

I think it is potentially a good idea to make use of the specific abilities the medium gives you; in the case of a game, it isn't a story but something the player does stuff in. So you can play with that: do the player's actions really mean anything? You can easily give the sense they do (player needs a key to open a door, so if they find a key they did something of note), but later on it may be revealed that it didn't matter. Maybe the door can be walked through anyway; you just never tried

There was something similar in a game: there was a gap in a high bridge. So the player would jump so as not to fall. Sadly the jump never was quite enough; you still would fall. But if you didn't jump at all... you somehow didn't fall and just passed the bridge

[TheFrighter]

So the most important thing (in videogames) is the action?  Seems Kant to me (freedom of action)...

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[ollj]

https://www.youtube.com/user/thugnotes
tackles noninteractive media with philosopical emythology
https://www.youtube.com/user/ExtraCreditz
tackles interactive media often more philosophically literate