Paolo Ruffino: Gaming the Post-Anthropocene

The Anthropocene, the geological epoch marked by human impact on the environment, is putting life itself at risk. This lecture examines some minimal and almost invisible moments in which players and game makers have responded to videogames that challenge the centrality of the human. It explores what videogame consumers can teach us about the time we have left on this planet, when both the real world and its simulations no longer function as expected. Gaming the Post-Anthropocene explores the value and meaning of leisure time when there is no time left.

Paolo Ruffino is a Senior Lecturer in Digital Curation and Computational Creativity at the department of Digital Humanities, King’s College London, UK. Ruffino has been investigating the independent production of videogames, labour unions in the videogame industry, and nonhuman and posthuman play in the digital age. He is the author of Future Gaming: Creative Interventions in Video Game Culture (Goldsmiths/MIT Press 2018), editor of Independent Videogames: Cultures, Networks, Techniques and Politics (Routledge, 2021) and author of articles for Games and Cultures; Convergence; Television and New Media; Critical Studies in Media Communication; and GAME The Italian Journal of Game Studies. He is also one of the four founding members of the artist group IOCOSE. Website: www.paoloruffino.com

The Virtual Realisms public lecture series critically investigates the evolving forms of reality created through algorithmic worldbuilding, where advanced digital technologies give rise to new and diverse interpretations of what is considered ‘real.’ As virtual spaces reach unprecedented levels of fidelity, this seemingly contradictory term suggests that, rather than a unified representation of our reality, we are now enmeshed within multiple new artificial realisms shaped by the proliferation of immersive technologies, CGI, and intelligent automation across all sectors. Spanning both technical and speculative practices, the series of lectures will explore how real-time virtual environments, and the technologies that underpin them, are redefining the logics of cultural production, creativity, and power in our increasingly rendered world.

Virtual Realisms is a monthly series of public lectures taking place throughout the 2024-25 academic year at the University of Westminster in London, UK. For more information about the series, please visit www.virtualrealisms.com.

Virtual Realisms is curated by Tadej Vindis, Lecturer in Creative Technologies, and Teodora Sinziana Alata, Lecturer in Creative Computing and Algorithmic Cultures, at the University of Westminster.

The series is organized as part of the Quintin Hogg Trust funded project, "Emerging Technologies and Advanced Technological Literacies for Creative Disciplines", led by Dr. Elizabeth Allen and Tadej Vindis, and is part of a wider CreaTech initiative of the College of Design, Creative and Digital Industries at the University of Westminster. Graphic design by Andrew Mallinson.

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