This interesting book discusses why, as an activity, topic and metaphor, play and game have become an integral part of modern life. Empirically exemplary and theoretically grounded, this book discusses the developments and expansions in gaming, from easily accessible casual games to the galaxy-spanning gaming worlds of Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Games (MMORPGs). It shows how gaming has become a focal point of the entertainment industry, marked by boundless professionalization and monetization, especially in the realm of sports, and how games become global platforms for social networks, where players from all over the world meet in digital sandboxes. The combination of the virtual and the ludic creates hyperreal spaces in which people try out new forms of interaction, cooperation, and even brainstorming. The authors ask if this behavior has become the new way of life and the new normal, and if this heralds the ludic century. They take readers on a journey to understandthe dynamics of today's gaming society, and base their observations and analyses on an original theory of play, which, in contrast to social normalcy, revolves around the allure and threats of the unexpected.

This book is of interest to students and researchers of social science and communication studies, especially those working on the interface of AI and society. This book is a translation of an original German edition. The translation was done with the help of artificial intelligence (machine translation by the service DeepL.com). A subsequent human revision was done primarily in terms of content, so that the book will read stylistically differently from a conventional translation.

Autorentext

Fabian Arlt M.A. studied media management and is doing his doctorate in social and business communication at the University of the Arts in Berlin. Hans-Jürgen Arlt Prof. Dr. is a social scientist and publicist, he teaches at the Institute for Theory and Practice of Communication at the University of the Arts in Berlin.