The End

The End:

Pac-Man and the Inherent Violence of Gaming

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Pac-Man, the arcade video game and source of the background image of this page is based on the most simple story of seduction. In this game, the virtual prosthesis through which the player vicariously navigates the series of varied and increasingly difficult labyrinths produced by his or her mastery of the previous game segments is reduced symbolically to little more than a self- propelled mouth. The body and all of its confusing and diverting signs has been stripped and has been metonymically exchanged for the act of consuming. What does the "pac-man" consume? Namely, "power pills," various fruits, and the ghosts that would otherwise consumer him. The primary concept underlying the game consuming / being consumed. 

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Because of the "pill"-eating objective of the game, Pac-Man has been colloquially associated with the underground drug scenes of many cultures.

(see image source here: www.ecn.org/livello57/ street2002/pages/PACMAN.htm)

ANNOTATIONS:

"Endgame" is a term used in chess to identify play that occurs after most of the pieces have been removed from the board. See Samuel Becket's Endgame

Endings, borders of demarcation, limits . . . in the case of scholarly discourse, the end is where conclusions are supposed to take place, summaries, wrap ups, and last words. However, scholarship in this medium lacks the finality of the last page. Each segment acts as a thresholdinto other worlds of thought.