Adventures in fantasy Australia: Australian settings, international video games

Australian settings in video games form an international dialogue. In a global medium where a game's content does not necessarily reflect its place of production, games with Australian settings have often originated from other countries. This article examines ways that video games have used Australian signifiers, particularly native animals, in settings that can be read as fantasy versions of Australia. The article expands discourse about representations of Australia by demonstrating how these worlds both exemplify games' distinctiveness and are part of a cultural landscape that includes film and television. The games Kangaroo (Sun Electronics, 1982, Japan) and Crash Bandicoot (Naughty Dog, 1996–, USA) situate Australian animals in settings that are presented as exotic for international audiences. Yet game worlds can also invoke legacies of inequities such as colonisation. In this context, Australian games have a capacity to challenge foreign perspectives and to expand ways of imagining Australia. Ty the Tasmanian Tiger (Krome Studios, 2002–) achieved international success by emphasising Australian elements and fuelled a diversification of dialogue among local developers. Australian games' capacity to invent new ways of using local settings is exemplified by fantasy versions of Australia in Innchanted (DragonBear Studios, 2023) and Webbed (Sbug Games, 2021).