Law, Video Games, Virtual Realities : Playing Law

This edited volume explores the intersection between the coded realm of the video game and the equally codified space of law through an insightful collection of critical readings.

Law is the ultimate multiplayer role-playing game. Involving a process of world-creation, law presents and codifies the parameters of licit and permitted behaviour, requiring individuals to engage their roles as a legal subject – the player-avatar of law – in order to be recognised, perform legal actions, activate rights or fulfil legal duties. Although traditional forms of law (copyright, property, privacy, freedom of expression) externally regulate the permissible content, form, dissemination, rights and behaviours of game designers, publishers, and players, this collection examines how players simulate, relate, and engage with environments and experiences shaped by legality in the realm of video game space.

Featuring critical readings of video games as a means of understanding law and justice, this book contributes to the developing field of cultural legal studies, but will also be of interest to other legal theorists, socio-legal scholars, and games theorists.

Dale Mitchell is a Lecturer in Law at the University of the Sunshine Coast, Australia.

Ashley Pearson is a Lecturer in Law at the University of the Sunshine Coast, Australia.

Timothy D. Peters is Associate Professor of Law at the University of the Sunshine Coast, Australia.