The Legend of Zelda and Philosophy: I Link Therefore I Am

421 Pages·2008·1.85 MB·English

by  Luke Cuddy

Table of Contents
Popular Culture and Philosophy Series Editor: George A. Reisch
Title Page
Acknowledgements
Setting Up the Game
Level 1 - Emotion, Experience, and Thought
Chapter 1 - Why Do We Care Whether Link Saves the Princess?
Do You Really Believe that Zelda Kills Ganondorf?
But It All Seems So Real . . .
Think about Link’s Grandmother
Let’s Pretend We Want to Kill Ganondorf
Problems with Pretending
Why Are We Scared of Gohma?
A Multi-Level Mind
Evaluating Zelda
Chapter 2 - Look Before You Warp
Environmental Presence
From Spaces of Flows, Back to Spaces of Places
Warping as Annihilation of Space and Time
Warping and Abstract Map Space
Game versus Place
Chapter 3 - Legend and Logic: Critical Thinking in the Gaming and Real Worlds
Adventures in Argumentation
More Hy-Rules of Reasoning
Even Ganon Needs to Put Forward Good Arguments
Farore, Four Swords, and Fallacies
End Game
Level 2 - Dodongo and Death
Chapter 4 - Link’s Search for Meaning
Finding the Triforce in a Hostile Universe
Life of Link: Boy Becomes Man
Link as Landscaper
Why I Can Play Zelda for Four Hours Straight
Chapter 5 - The Hero with a Thousand Hearts: Death in Zelda
A Hero in Limbo
The Order of the Triforce
The Humanity of the Bosses
The Kingdom Goes On, and On, and On . . .
Game Over
Level 3 - Don’t Get Manhandled by Manhandla—or . . . Mind-
handled?
Chapter 6 - Slave Morality and Master Swords: Ludus and Paidia in Zelda
The Avatar: Link Says “. . .”
Good by Default
“Being” Link
Modes of Play: Ludus and Paidia
Observe, Play As, Play With
Masters of Paidia, Slaves of Ludus
Can We Play Beyond Good and Evil?
Chapter 7 - Shape Shifting and Time Traveling: Link’s Identity Issues
Numerical Identity: The people believed that the Hero of Time
would again come ...
Physical Continuity Accounts: What’s all the matter? Y’all lookin’
to start ...
Psychological Accounts: The memory of the kingdom vanished, but
its legend ...
Solutions to the Problem: The youth whose destiny it is to lead
Hyrule to the ...
Level 4 - The CDi Games Don’t Count! Timelines and Miyamoto
Chapter 8 - The Hero of Timelines
Debating Chronologies: The Hero(es) of Time
Understanding Evidence: Opening the Treasure Chest
Socially Constructing Knowledge: The “Legendary” Zelda
Putting Together the Triforce
Chapter 9 - Linking to the Past: Zelda Is a Communication Game
Why Should We Think the Zelda Games Can Be Linked Anyway?
Enter Hermeneutics: Parts and Wholes
Underdetermination
The Trouble with Simplicity
Communities Shape the Perception of Simplicity
Zelda Is a Communication Game!?
Level 5 - Time and Space in Hyrule
Chapter 10 - Three Days in Termina: Zelda and Temporality
Eternal Recurrence—It’s a Long Three Days
Why Eternal Means You
Putting That Ocarina to Good Use
Can I Keep This Cool Stuff?
The Material Value of Time: Why Time Is Money
An Uncanny Sense of Time
The Triforce Holds a Prosperous Future
Chapter 11 - Constructing NESpace in Zelda
Hyrule . . . Where?
Physical Space and Logical Space
Things and Conditions
Objects
Characters
Items
Three Ways of Building Virtual Space in Zelda
The Level
The Map of Hyrule
Hyrule Regained
Level 6 - Treasures of the Hyrulopolis
Chapter 12 - Zelda as Art
Games and Paintings
Games and Zelda
The Blue Candle Not the Red: Games in a New Light
Features of Hyrule
Zelda and the Aesthetic Experience
A Win for Zelda?
Chapter 13 - Hyrule’s Green and Pleasant Land: The Minish Cap as Utopian
Ideal
The Order of Utopia
A Platonic Relationship
Hyrulopolis
The Nature of Utopia
The Spirit of Utopia
The Gateway to Utopia
Paradise Found
Level 7 - You are Nearing the End of Your Quest . . . Grumble,
Grumble . . .
Chapter 14 - I Am Link’s Transcendental Will: Freedom from Hyrule to Earth
The Adventure of Will
Will’s Awakening
The Schopenhauerian Console
Maya’s Mask
Twilight Will
A Link to the Present
Chapter 15 - Zeldathustra
The Returning Legend
The Necessity of Looped Time
The After-Worldly
Will-to-Triforce
Will You Say Yes?
Level 8 - The Triforce—Need I Say More?
Chapter 16 - A Link to The Triforce: Miyamoto, Lacan, and You
The Miyamoto Framework
Egos, Dyads, and the Social Symbolic
Intransitive Relationships in Game Designs
Breaking Down the Triforce
The Triforce of Courage
The Triforce of Power
The Triforce of Wisdom
The Golden Power
Chapter 17 - The Triforce and the Doctrine of the Mean
The Good Will and the Triforce of Power
The Ring of Gyges
The Doctrine of the Mean
The Lesson and Legacy of Din, Nayru, and Farore
Level 9 - Don’t Patra-nize Me!
Chapter 18 - How Can There Be Evil in Hyrule?
The Adventure Begins . . .
The Logical Problem of Evil
The Evidential Problem of Evil
Theodicy on Death Mountain
Rescuing Princess Zelda
Chapter 19 - The Legend of Feminism
The Women of Zelda
The Mythology of Woman
Zelda and Reality
Chapter 20 - Getting to Know the World Next Door
Heroes of Hyrule
Index
Copyright Page
Popular Culture and Philosophy® Series Editor: George A. Reisch
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