Lecture by Florent Maurin: ‘When video games reflect the real world’

extrait jeux video

WED 28 OCT 2026 — 4.00pm
A talk organised as part of the educational programme, open to the public. Florent Maurin is a graduate of the Lille School of Journalism.

Over the course of its 60-year history, the video game has explored countless directions. It has forged its own vocabulary (gameplay, playtests, balancing…), given rise to a multitude of genres, and ventured into sports arenas, battlefields and fantasy worlds. But despite this diversity, they most often remain firmly rooted in the realm of the imagination. They offer ‘power fantasies’ that promise players the chance to become stronger, to overcome obstacles and, for the duration of a game, to enter a world where regaining control of events finally seems possible. 

The ‘games of reality’ modestly set out to challenge this perspective. Based on the premise that there is no subject that cannot become the subject of a game, they explore the relationships between play and reality, between fiction and simulation, and between documentary and ‘fun’.

In this talk, Florent Maurin presents the five projects developed by The Pixel Hunt, ranging from ‘Enterre-moi, mon amour’ – which tells the story of a young Syrian woman’s exile – to ‘Ithaca’, a role-playing game in the form of a road trip dedicated to climate resistance. He discusses his design methodology, analyses the studio’s creative processes and explores how audiences respond to these unidentified playful creations.

Biography

Florent Maurin is a graduate of the Lille School of Journalism. After 10 years working in children’s publishing at Bayard (Okapi, J’aime Lire, then Bayam, the group’s digital platform), he has been running The Pixel Hunt since January 2013, a production studio specialising in ‘real-world games’ – video games inspired by the world around us. The Pixel Hunt has produced or co-produced several projects for Lemonde.fr, Radio France, France Télévisions and ARTE, as well as the narrative games “Enterre-moi, mon Amour”, “Inua, A Story in Ice and Time”, “The Wreck” and “Wednesdays”. Florent also teaches game design, narrative design and new forms of storytelling.

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