Godwired offers an engaging exploration of religious practice in the digital age. It considers how virtual experiences, like stories, games and rituals, are forms of world-building or "cosmos construction" that serve as a means of making sense of our own world. Such creative and interactive activity is, arguably, patently religious. This book examines: the nature of sacred space in virtual contexts technology as a vehicle for sacred texts who we are when we go online what rituals have in common with games and how they work online what happens to community when people worship online how religious "worlds" and virtual "worlds" nurture similar desires. Rachel Wagner suggests that whilst our engagement with virtual reality can be viewed as a form of religious activity, today's virtual religion marks a radical departure from traditional religious practice - it is ephemeral, transient, rapid, disposable, hyper-individualized, hybrid, and in an ongoing state of flux.

The video-game is among the most prominent media of the explosion of apocalyptic popular culture in the twenty-first century. Apocalyptic video games are a global phenomenon, international in their scope and democratic in their appeal. This book will be the first volume dedicated to the subject of apocalyptic video games. Its two dozen invited contributions address the subject comprehensively, from game design to player experience, and from the perspective of content, theme, sound, ludic textures, and social function. The volume offers scholars, students, and general readers a thorough discussion of one of the most fascinating illustrations of "apocalyptic" in the popular imagination and novel insights into an important facet of contemporary digital culture. Special Feature: The volume concludes with a curated Q&A with game designers on the concept and construction of “apocalyptic” game worlds.