Today I talk with Agata Waszkiewicz, a doctoral candidate at Maria Curie-Skłodowska University in Lublin. We discuss the (non-)existence of the fourth wall in theatre, film, and digital games, and how it creates intimacy between player and avatar in the games Bury me my Love (The Pixel Hunt, 2019), and A Normal Lost Phone (Diane Landais, 2018). How do these games break the fourth wall exactly? Agata will tell you! Games: Dys4ia (Anna Anthropy 2012) Deadpool (Activision 2013) (standalone Deadpool game) Marvel vs Capcom 3: Fate of Two Worlds (Capcom 2011) Mystic Messenger (Cheritz, 2016) Pony Island 9Daniel Mullins Games, 2016) Tell me Why (DONTNOD Entertainment, 2020) The Hex (Daniel Mullins Games, 2018) Articles and Books: Conway, S. - A circular wall? Reformulating the fourth wall for videogames (2010) Jørgensen, K. - Game World Interfaces (2013) Waszkiewix, A. - TOGETHER THEY ARE TWOFOLD”: PLAYER-AVATAR RELATIONSHIP BEYOND THE FOURTH WALL (2020)

In this first episode of this podcast on mediated intimacies, I talk with Susana Tosca, associate professor at Roskilde University in Denmark. We talk about otome games, Japanese video games in which women can date a pool of handsome men. What are otome games exactly, and why do we play them, and how can we study them in the field of game studies? You'll find Susana's answers in this episode! Games: Angelique (Ruby Party, 1994) Hakuoki (Idea Factory, 2008) Psychedelica of the Black Butterfly (Idea Factory, 2018) Nine Hours, Nine Persons, Nine Doors (Chunsoft, 2010)    Shall We Date? series  Books and articles:  Reading the Romance (Radway, 1984) Transmedial worlds in everyday life (Tosca and Klastrup, 2019)  Appropriating the Shinsengumi: Hakuoki Fan Fiction as Transmedial/Transcultural Exploration (Tosca, 2021) Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema (Mulvey, 1975) --on the male gaze in cinema