Visual Paradoxes in Video Games: Spatial Reconstructions and Geometric Analysis

Abstract

The relationship between representation and the object represented is not unique since a plane figure can refer to an infinite number of spatial counterparts. In particular situations, this indeterminateness can generate optical illusions and visual paradoxes. This work analyses precisely those video games that exploit these paradoxes. As in an Escher-like environment, the spaces proposed in these applications confound visual perception, forcing the user to act according to unusual logic. In fact, the process of projecting a three-dimensional object onto a two-dimensional plane depends strictly on the centre of projection. This characteristic was used in the twentieth century to design impossible three-dimensional figures. These structures, while existing only in the two-dimensional world, were implemented in some types of video games that, using graphical expedients, made the surfaces possible to travel virtually. This study categorizes these video games based on the projective method used and a schematization of the type of recurring paradoxical environments.