https://gamestudies.org The international journal of computer game research Stefano Gualeni https://gamestudies.org/2601/articles/gualeni This article is about how games engage the dead, from honoring them to commodifying them. It focuses on the understudied genre of “dead pool games,” tracing its history and addressing ethical concerns, and provides a detailed analysis of Fantamorto to show how these games treat death and suffering as ludic resources. Christopher Lukman https://gamestudies.org/2601/articles/lukman This article elucidates the form of play through a comparison to the form of music. After drawing from some concepts from musical from analysis, it analyzes the gameplay of OlliOlli World to suggest a formal analysis of action games, revolving around the development of movement in virtual space. Liam Mullally https://gamestudies.org/2601/articles/mullally This article explores the intervention of idle games into idle (non-productive) time. Such games mobilise a durational mechanics -- a play with time -- disrupting free and work time alike. Some idle games render idle time productive via monetization, removing its radical character; others affirm long, anti-productive idle durations. Vladimir Rizov https://gamestudies.org/2601/articles/rizov This article argues that videogames are necessary objects of ideological critique. Drawing on Althusser and Jameson, it proposes the concept of the “ludic unconscious,” where gameplay mechanics and narrative intersect. Through an analysis of Watch Dogs 2, it examines surveillance, ideology, technology, race and the military-industrial complex. Maxim Tvorun-Dunn https://gamestudies.org/2601/articles/tvorundunn This article examines Ville Kallio's 2021 game Cruelty Squad as a ludic representation of the "schizophrenic" perception articulated in Deleuze and Guattari's Anti-Oedipus.