Digital games and moral packaging: The impacts of in-game decisions on public pedagogical deliberation

Abstract

This article examines the impact of the use of moral game designs in mainstream games upon public discourse. Rather than interviewing players about their moral experiences after gameplay, this article reads moral engagement through the pedagogical lens of Freire: that moral engagement must be measured through pedagogical action in the public sphere. Through discourse analysis, this article examines the presence and quality of moral deliberation and pedagogical action in online message boards surrounding three morally charged games: Mass Effect 3, Modern Warfare 2 and Civilization V. In the cases examined, players rarely adopted the ‘moral point of view’ or engaged in public pedagogy, opting instead to frame moral scenarios as ‘play’. A notable exception occurs when the content of the moral scenarios has already been explicitly framed in the public sphere as a matter for public moral debate.