In A Feminist, Queer Adventure Line, Ashley P. Jones explores how digital games can facilitate acts of political play and initiate change in the real world. Online harassment campaigns such as GamerGate reveal how frequently hate speech is directed at creators and players who identify with feminism or queerness and their allies. Change driven specifically through feminist and queer gaming procedures and mechanics can offer opportunities to combat marginalization and toxicity within some gaming experiences.

To reveal the embedded ideologies within popular digital games, Jones focuses on the procedures and mechanics of embodiment, failure, queer futurity, and the comfort of feminist games. These interactive elements are essential aspects of the play space and narratives of digital games, both within gaming cultures and the real world, as they point toward accepting critical metagaming—a practice that encourages creators and players to think through, around, and within the games themselves.

Throughout this process, the personal act of play becomes a political act of engagement through game mechanics and players' interpretations of them. Digital gaming then functions as a form of political action. Topics discussed include how games and gaming culture can become more inclusive, ways games invite participation from diverse groups of players, and how game design influences ideological formations beyond the digital world. Jones illustrates these possibilities with playthroughs and case studies of popular games such as Hue, Life Is Strange 2, A Mortician's Tale, Outer Wilds, The Stanley Parable, Untitled Goose Game, and What Remains of Edith Finch.

Pushing the subversive potential of gaming in new directions, A Feminist, Queer Adventure Line demonstrates that play can be a tool for education and that games have the potential to promote positive acceptance of feminist and queer identities.

Pages: 180, Dimensions: 14x14cm