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“You Must Defeat Shen Long To Stand A Chance”: Street Fighter, Race, Play, and Player

Ware, Nicholas R.
http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=bgsu1277062605

Abstract Details

2010, Master of Arts (MA), Bowling Green State University, Popular Culture.
The “fighting game,” a video game genre that pits a player’s character against a computer or second player’s character in a tournament-style fighting match, was established as a viable and popular genre with the video game Street Fighter II in 1991. That game established most of the conventions of the genre that are still in use today, including the tendency to have multiple characters coming from a variety of world locations as the central figures of the game’s narrative. Street Fighter II, subtitled The World Warriors, and the series it spawned, which includes over 25 titles in less than 20 years, can be used as an effective example in which to delve into the meaning of playing video games. In this study, I plan to use the Street Fighter series as a site to investigate four different aspects of gaming and games. First, what does it mean to play a game? How is this different from consuming other media and how does the Street Fighter series in particular organize play? Second, from where do the images and narratives of race in Street Fighter come? What does the media history of Street Fighter tell us about how Street Fighter considers and creates racial discourse? Third, what complications arrive when these images and stories become playable within a game? What role does the player have in shaping game ideology, and what role do games have in shaping player ideology? Lastly, what do the players themselves have to say about their experiences with Street Fighter, and how do those responses better illuminate our understanding of race and play? By combining all four aspects, this project seeks to understand Street Fighter in order to understand larger concepts of race, play, and player.
Jeremy Wallach, PhD (Committee Chair)
Kristen Rudisill, PhD (Committee Member)
162 p.
American Studies; Communication; Cultural Anthropology; Mass Media
game studies; video games; Street Fighter; race; prowess; gamers; games literacy

Recommended Citations

Citations

  • Ware, N. R. (2010). “You Must Defeat Shen Long To Stand A Chance”: Street Fighter, Race, Play, and Player [Master's thesis, Bowling Green State University]. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=bgsu1277062605

    APA Style (7th edition)

  • Ware, Nicholas. “You Must Defeat Shen Long To Stand A Chance”: Street Fighter, Race, Play, and Player. 2010. Bowling Green State University, Master's thesis. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center, http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=bgsu1277062605.

    MLA Style (8th edition)

  • Ware, Nicholas. "“You Must Defeat Shen Long To Stand A Chance”: Street Fighter, Race, Play, and Player." Master's thesis, Bowling Green State University, 2010. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=bgsu1277062605

    Chicago Manual of Style (17th edition)

bgsu1277062605
8,052
© 2010, all rights reserved.
This open access ETD is published by Bowling Green State University and OhioLINK.