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GLOBAL CONRAD? THE SIMULATION OF COLONIAL ENTREPRENEURSHIP IN VIDEO GAME ADAPTATIONS OF HEART OF DARKNESS
Abstract
The historical practice of modern colonialism is strongly connected to the entrepreneurial culture of the 19th century. The colonial ideal of the civilizing mission was to be achieved with the help of colonial agents with entrepreneurial spirit whose capitalist enterprises would bring progress and prosperity to the exotic pre-modern cultural spaces of Africa. In this context of optimism with respect to entrepreneurship, capitalism, and colonization, Joseph Conrad’s late Victorian novel, Heart of Darkness, conveys a harsh critique of 19th-century colonial practices with focus on the Congo Free State. Despite the local focus of the novel, its narrative has evinced remarkable adaptability at the beginning of the 21st century. In the context of globalisation and the digital revolution, Heart of Darkness has become a source text for many popular video games that have adapted Marlow’s experience on the Congo to the contemporary cultural climate. By relying on recent developments in adaptation studies and video game cultural studies, in particular the emerging understanding of video games as procedural adaptations, my paper analyses the manner in which action-adventure video games, particularly shooters, appropriate Conrad’s work in order to criticize contemporary neo-colonial power relations, and the neoliberal myth of the entrepreneur. My analysis considers the video games F.E.A.R. (Monolith, 2005), Spec Ops – The Line (2K Games, 2012), and Alien: Isolation (Creative Assembly, 2014).
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