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Atari to Zelda : Japan’s videogames in global contexts
Consalvo M., The MIT Press, Cambridge, MA, 2016. 272 pp. Type: Book (978-0-262034-39-5)
Date Reviewed: Apr 13 2017

It is becoming increasingly important for researchers to critically engage with video games since they are widely believed to be the fastest-growing form of media over the coming years. One facet of this engagement is attempting to understand how game developers, publishers, and players view games at a cultural level. Important questions arise when video games are thought about at a cultural level, questions such as whether a game is imbued with aspects of the culture within which it was created, and whether those aspects are seen as positives or negatives when the game is seen by someone from a different culture. To the general reader, such questions might not seem important; however, these questions are essential in helping us to understand how media is developed, used, and understood within a global market. This in turn helps us to understand further what is meant by national identity within an increasingly cosmopolitan landscape.

In Atari to Zelda: Japan’s videogames in global contexts, Mia Consalvo seeks to understand what it means for a game to be Japanese, something that she refers to as the “Japaneseness” of particular games. In so doing, she attempts to grapple with some of the questions outlined above.

The book is split into seven main chapters, each of which tackles the question of Japaneseness from a different perspective. Each chapter draws on the author’s own research (both theoretical and empirical) and since there is little development of argument over the course of the book, each chapter could be read in isolation with little to no back-referencing required. The chapters cover topics such as game localization, read-only memory (ROM) hacking (the process of altering a computer game’s original executable files), Japanese role-playing games (JRPGs), as well as critical analysis and understanding of Japanese games themselves. Each chapter is engaging and readable, perhaps with the exception of chapter 1, which I personally found quite slow and difficult to read. This is a slight shame as it is the opening chapter; but, as previously mentioned, the chapter could be skipped without detracting too much from the overall argument of the book.

It is fascinating, and oftentimes challenging, to read about the cultural heritage of computer games and whether or not this heritage is seen as a selling point or a stumbling block. I found Consalvo’s discussion of the Japanese console industry in chapter 6 particularly engaging. It is perhaps in this chapter that the differences between West and East are most pronounced. It is interesting to see the difference between Eastern and Western players so clearly pronounced in the way in which they interact with computer games. Japanese consumers are far more likely to use handheld systems than their Western counterparts. As well as this, the expected “style” that the games take is vastly different when comparing Japanese and Western audiences. I would have liked Consalvo to go deeper into these ideas and confront the reasons why these differences might exist. However, I do realize that answering such profound questions may lie well outside the scope of such a book.

My only slight criticism of Consalvo’s excellent book would be that some of the conclusions ending each chapter, and indeed parts of the conclusions ending the book, could have been slightly more succinct and compelling. As many of the chapters contain lots of detail and multiple threads of argument, I was therefore left looking to the conclusions to help bring the threads together and solidify my understanding of the theme of the chapter. Unfortunately, sometimes the conclusions are little more than restating what has been covered in the chapter as opposed to drawing the ideas together to form a concluding argument.

The book does not contain a set bibliography; instead, references are interwoven with notes and appear at the end of the book. Each chapter has an ample number of references and these will certainly help the reader to find out more about particular key topics and points of discussion. The index of the book is excellent and I was able to use it while writing this review to look up particular sections and discussions.

Although this book will find its primary audience among those who have a prior interest in game studies, this is in no way a specialist work. It could be read easily by anyone who has an interest in computer games or cultural studies. Consalvo does an excellent job in making the book interesting by interspersing the theoretical aspects of the text with interesting concrete examples. Perhaps the highest praise that I can give to this book is that it has piqued my interest in the area and I have begun reading more on the cultural dimension of media, ideas, and computer games. Some of the books that would complement Atari to Zelda are included as references at the end of this review [1,2,3].

Reviewer:  Harry Strange Review #: CR145194 (1706-0367)
1) Morley, D.; Robins, K. Spaces of identity: global media, electronic landscapes and cultural boundaries. Routledge, New York, NY, 1995.
2) Sheff, D. Game over: how Nintendo conquered the world. Random House, New York, NY, 1993.
3) Kohler, C. Power up: how Japanese video games gave the world an extra life. Dover Publications, Mineola, NY, 2016.
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