EXPLORING VIDEOGAMES FROM AN ISLAMIC ETHICAL PERSPECTIVE: DESIGN, PRODUCTION, AND PLAY

Abstract

ABSTRACT With over two billion players worldwide, video games have emerged as the most prominent entertainment tool, providing a satisfactory pastime for people across several demographics. On the positive side, some games have been hailed as tools for improving neurocognitive capacities and learning pro-social behaviours. Conversely, there are well-grounded speculations about certain games’ tendency to increase anti-social behaviours, such as aggression. Ethicists have also been preoccupied with moral issues inherent in certain videogames, particularly those that mirror real-world vices such as murder, rape, and general violence. For over two decades, they have debated the moral value of immoral in-game simulations. So far, this moral debate has been approached from utilitarian, deontological, and virtue ethics perspectives. However, a holistic examination of the discourse from the Islamic perspective is still missing. Against this background, this study reapproaches the debate from Islamic ethics’ multidimensional moral framework, drawing on interdisciplinary data to examine Islamic moral principles that might apply to designing, producing and playing videogames, especially those with ethical content. The study finds that the fiqhī ethical vantage to videogames revolves mainly around representation, design and risk-benefit analysis. On the other hand, the Sufi-philosophical viewpoint problematises immoral in-game simulations for their insalutary effects on the soul and character perfection. Consequently, the study recommends regulations for videogame design and use for optimum psychophysical, social and moral well-being.

Date of Award	2025
Original language	American English
Awarding Institution	HBKU College of Islamic Studies