Abstract
Hockey video games highlight the ways in which the video game medium shapes and conditions the experience of producing and/or performing the sport “in real life.” Indeed, the accumulation of advanced statistics in and through the constant evaluation, measurement, and surveillance which are inherent to video games—and increasingly seen as foundational for sport—reveals important contradictions not only in the way the embodied sport is played and understood, but also in terms of the proofs of masculinity upon which the sport is built. It then becomes clear that the building of masculinity and the empowerment of the character become one and the same. The ludic function reinforces the cultural imperative and vice versa. Thus, our chapter prizes apart the conflation of masculinity with hockey while showing the ways that video game studies can contribute to existing disciplines.
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Notes
- 1.
Satire includes parody, not the other way around; hence, the specificity.
- 2.
The Corsi rating is a relatively simple of measure of the shot attempt differential that occurs when a given player is on the ice. The intent of those developing the statistic was to provide a means of measuring of puck possession and therefore dominance in a given game. However, it fails to account for the benefit or debit of teammates or the level of competition faced, among other criticisms.
- 3.
The Foucauldian definition of technology is very much rooted in the Heideggerian tradition, where technology (techné) is an epistemic tool—a standardised model for knowledge production, distribution, and reception.
- 4.
Indeed, it was the present authors’ previous works, particularly in the areas of gender, technology and video games that drew them to this topic and to contribute to a growing body of work that does examine gender as fluid rather than fixed. The volume to which this chapter contributes should be included in that process.
- 5.
Here it is worth noting one of the biggest trades in recent memory, that of Shea Weber going from Nashville to Montréal in return for P. K. Subban, The trade was controversial not only because of Subban’s popularity in Montréal, it also resulted in the firing of the Canadiens’ statistical analyst, who disagreed with the trade on the basis of the numbers (Engels 2016).
- 6.
Even early baseball simulations, on machines as primitive as a Commodore C64, included the option of having the computer play as both sides. Hockey games did not include this feature until recently. Early hockey games were simple adaptations of Pong styled games, and more closely resembled digital versions of air hockey.
- 7.
For example, in a photo essay celebrating New York Times photographer Barton Silverman’s pioneering techniques for capturing sporting events, Silverman reveals that his first attempts required wires frozen under the ice and large wooden boxes in the net (MacDonald 2012).
- 8.
Emails among NHL executives on the topic of player safety, including fighting, were subpoenaed as part of a lawsuit by former players. The former players allege that the league has disregarded player safety in favour of profits. The emails reveal executives not only referring to injured players as “soft,” but also saying that injured players should have been penalized for putting themselves in positions where they could be hurt—by illegal hits (AP 2016).
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Ouellette, M., Conway, S. (2018). He Scores Through a Screen: Mediating Masculinities Through Hockey Video Games. In: Taylor, N., Voorhees, G. (eds) Masculinities in Play. Palgrave Games in Context. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-90581-5_7
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