Adarna: Remediating Philippine Source Texts Through Video Games

• Main Author: Gungab, Philip Adrian L.
• Format: text
• Published: Animo Repository 2023
• Subjects: Philippine source texts; video games; storytelling; remediation; media convergence; Digital Humanities; Film and Media Studies; Game Design; Interactive Arts
• Online Access: https://animorepository.dlsu.edu.ph/akda/vol3/iss2/6; https://animorepository.dlsu.edu.ph/context/akda/article/1056/viewcontent/5_Gungab.pdf
• Institution: De La Salle University

This paper will explore the possibilities of using video games as a means of remediating Philippine source texts. This begins by defining Philippine Source texts based on Dr. Joyce Arriola’s book Pelikulang Komiks: Toward a Theory of Filipino Film Adaptation (2019) and understanding how remediation changes perception of the material through concepts defined in Jay Bolter and Richard Grusin’s book, Remediation (2000). Video games will later be explored as a form of new media in the 21st century, and how media convergence and globalization has brought it to its current state. This paper will then analyze Adarna (2015), a video game adaptation of the corrido Ibong Adarna created by Senshi.labs, and how remediating the source text allowed the game developers to further develop the world of the corrido and its main characters, making it a prime example of the possibilities of video game storytelling in Philippine source texts.