Venues for Ludoliteracy: Arcades, Game Cafés, and Street Pirates

Abstract

This chapter presents a review of popular platforms and spaces for gameplay in the global South. My research method in this chapter is closest to digital ethnography, informed by site visits and other online visual and textual documentation. I also discuss experimental gaming venues in India, Senegal, and Kenya that attempt to overcome obstacles to accessibility. I reflect on a lack of gender diversity observable in many global public play spaces. The mobile platform is approached as one of the more recently viable and gender diverse platforms for gaming in the global South. The chapter closes with a presentation of Southern players’ and game pirates’ defense of their ethics on online gaming forums.