The Way of the Gun

I want to argue that a structure of generic coherence and diversity crystallised during the formative years of 1993 – 2003, unified by the distinctive traits of the subjective camera-gun. The aesthetic history of the genre follows two main trends. The first-person action-adventure as it was initially defined by Wolfenstein 3-D (1992) and Doom (1993) has developed towards a story-based, realistic, linear and cinematic adventure. This new dominant form has in part incorporated the arcade-action excesses of the early pioneers of the genre. On the other hand, the emergence of the tactical and squad-based FPS represents a radical departure from the genre’s action-adventure roots. The FPS-adventure and the tactical FPS can be described and analysed through a number of general binary oppositions.