ABSTRACT
This chapter introduces the cultural model of dis/ability within critical disability studies. It argues how dis/ability is represented within different games by analysing audio-visual, narrative, ludic and simulation levels. The disregard towards dis/ability within the digital game industry can be traced back to the ableist hegemony. While in the game industry dis/ability mostly is no outspoken issue, there is one realm of game development where dis/ability is made relevant explicitly – human health and wellbeing. Within digital games different forms of dis/ability are produced, although most of these representations rely on the medical model. Digital games take part in the flexible normalism when they represent certain people with disability as normal – people who would be available as labour force. On the ludic level, we can analyse what the goal of a game is and what is expected from the player. Damage in most games is calculated as a subtraction from the value determined by health.
