Master's thesis of Design: Screening Embodiment: Let’s play video and observable play experiences

Let’s Play videos are the practice whereby a videogame player records their experience to share with a future audience. They are an emergent form of cultural activity that has been relatively overlooked within the field of game studies. This thesis seeks to ask: how can access to videogame play moments (and performativity) provide insights into the understanding the dynamics of videogame play experience? This thesis approaches Let’s Play videos as a way in which to expand our understandings of videogame research. To this end, this thesis explores how footage of videogame play experiences-as-experienced offers access to specific play experiences and, in turn, how play can take on various forms of embodiment, gestures, affect and performance.