Global weirding and dark seasonality in video games

Abstract

Taking inspiration from literary studies, this article examines how the seasonal mode has been taken up in video games by exploring, first, how seasonality impacts gameplay practices which are sensitive to spikes in temperature, and second, by analyzing an emergent trend in popular game design that points to a growing engagement with climate change. This trend, which this article dubs “dark seasonality,” describes the increased thematization of unseasonal and dangerous weather in popular media, reflecting anxieties and concerns about the climate crisis. Rather than engage with extreme weather as a singular, spectacular occurrence, dark seasonality portrays extreme weather events to fall within new seasonal norms, dictating different styles of gameplay that are more cautious, more focused on the long term, and more attentive to environmental uncertainties. In this way, dark seasonality offers players a space to familiarize themselves with tumultuous weather-worlds, whose disturbed seasonal rhythms echo the more protracted ones felt around the globe.