The Aesthetics of Games

British Society of Aesthetics Conference – The Aesthetics of Games

7-9 September 2026

University of Manchester, UK

Over the past two decades, games - both digital and non-digital - have become increasingly prominent within philosophy. As well as receiving attention from aestheticians, games have been examined in ethics, philosophy of action, metaphysics, philosophy of mind, and social philosophy, prompting questions about: agency; responsibility; rule-following; normativity; meaning; responsibility for in-game actions; the organisation of rule-governed activity; the phenomenology of skilled performance, and the ontological status of fictional and virtual entities. At the same time, game studies has developed a rich interdisciplinary body of research addressing narrative, space, identity, labour, and politics.

This conference aims to bring other philosophical discussions about games into sustained contact with aesthetics, to furnish a more comprehensive picture of what kinds of aesthetic categories, evaluative standards, and conceptual tools are needed to understand the experiences games generate. At the same time, it seeks to explore what pressure games place on familiar distinctions within aesthetics (e.g., between object and experience, form and performance, or representation and action), and to clarify what is at stake in treating games as aesthetically significant.

Topics could include, but are not limited to:

- Games as objects of aesthetic evaluation, e.g.: How do traditional concepts such as unity, coherence, and form apply to interactive media? How does the relation between ludic and narrative structures shape aesthetic experience? Should games be understood as artworks, practices, performances, or hybrids thereof? What does this imply for aesthetic judgement?

- Narrative, fiction, and counterfactual structure, e.g.: Do non-linear narrative forms require attention to different standards of evaluation? What is the aesthetic significance of alternative narrative paths? How do modes of play relate to the exploration of counterfactuals? How might interactive fiction rethink familiar narrative conventions from literature and film?

- Aesthetics of space and environment, e.g.: How should we distinguish space as an aesthetically active dimension of games from space as a neutral backdrop for action? How do spatial composition, atmosphere, and environmental design structure perception, movement, and affect? How can phenomenology, architecture, or theories of place enable us to analyse game environments as aesthetic constructs? How should narrativity be understood in environmental storytelling?

- Action, performance, and play, e.g.: How does aesthetic value emerge not only from designed forms but from enacted play? Can the exercise of player agency usefully be understood as a form of aesthetic, or artistic, performance? What is the significance of improvisation, failure, and skill? What are the possible roles of teamwork and coordination in shaping evaluative ideals such as 'beautiful play'?

- Formal and procedural aesthetics, e.g.: What constitutes aesthetic engagement with rules, systems, and procedures, and is this a crucial part of the aesthetic experience of games? What does it mean for rule systems to be elegant? What is the aesthetic experience of mastering complex mechanics, or of navigating repetition and looping? How can opacity of rules or absence of rules be deployed as aesthetic strategies?

- Ethical, social, and political dimensions of game aesthetics, e.g.: How do social and material factors shape aesthetic experience and evaluation? Under what circumstances does a game express a moral perspective on the actions it allows as part of engagement? How do cultural and historical framings of games and play impact on how games should be understood as aesthetic objects? How do games, and the contexts in which they are played, navigate questions about who is represented and who participates? What counts as an ethical transgression in gameplay?

Full programme

Monday 7th September

10.00-11.00

Arrival and coffee

Arthur Lewis Boardroom, Arthur Lewis Building

11.10-12.10

Luca Marchetti (University of Genova)

Virtual Reality and Other Minds

John Casken Theatre, Martin Harris Building

12.15-13.15

Goran Vranešević (University of Ljubljana)

The Hollow Foundation: Imagination and the Inaccessible Game Space

John Casken Theatre

13.15-14.30

Lunch Break

14.30-15.50

Emily Ryall (University of Gloucestershire)

Workshop: Playing With Being: The Game of Ontological Fragments

Room 2.05, Williamson Building

15.55-16.55

Christina Stimson (Kyushu Institute of Technology) & Rebecca Raper (Cranfield University)

Do Video Games Add to Fiction’s Capacity to Exercise Our ‘Moral Imagination’?

John Casken Theatre

 

Tuesday 8th September

10.00-11.00

Jaakko Stenros (Tampere University)

Playing a World into Being: Aesthetics between Play, Game, and Performance

John Casken Theatre

11.05-12.05

Tom Baker (University of St Andrews)

Agency, Moral Learning and TTRPGs

John Casken Theatre

12.15-13.15

Lunch Break

13.15-14.15

Craig Bourne (Independent) & Emily Caddick Bourne (University of Manchester)

Deserving to Be (Un)Lucky

John Casken Theatre

14.20-15.20

Aaron Suduiko (University of Southern California)

‘Ought’ Without ‘Can’: Hopelessness and Faith in Video Games

John Casken Theatre

15.30-16.30

Benjamin Eneman (University of Texas)

Playing Tragic Games with Nietzsche and Schopenhauer

John Casken Theatre

 

Wednesday 9th September

09.15-10.30

Breakfast, with a tribute to aesthetician and philosopher of games Grant Tavinor, from Pru Steinerts and colleagues (Lincoln University)

Arthur Lewis Boardroom

10.30-11.30

Daniel Vella (University of Malta)

Games and the Beautiful: On Play and Ecstase in Kant, Schiller, Sartre and Fink

John Casken Theatre

11.35-12.35

Kumru Akdoğan (University of Manchester)

From Gameplay to Harmony: Video Games as Art Objects

John Casken Theatre

12.45-13.45

Alex Fisher (University of Leeds)

QAnon, Crosswords, and Knowledge-Based Videogames: The Aesthetics of Inquiry

John Casken Theatre

To register to attend the conference, or for any questions, please send an email to [email protected] and/or [email protected]. Registration is free and refreshments will provided each day. When registering, please include a note of any dietary requirements. Please also let us know about any accessibility requirements you would like us to be aware of, which we will aim to accommodate wherever possible.

We hope to see you there!