Something Wicked: The Macbeth Video Game

Something Wicked is a video game adaptation of the Norwegian invasion described in Act 1, Scene 2 of William Shakespeare’s Macbeth. The visuals and game mechanics of Something Wicked derive from the Bayeux Tapestry and Shakespeare’s text, an aesthetic argument that links this digital-age adaptation to the pre-digital storytelling of its source material.

A free PC download is here. Please contact Dr. Hunter for the password. A mobile version and an update for Mac are in development.

Something Wicked’s theoretical component is the peer-reviewed article “Enactive spectatorship, critical making, and dramaturgical analysis: building Something Wicked, the Macbeth video game,” published in International Journal of Performance Arts and Digital Media. Readers without institutional access to the journal or ILL are invited to contact the lab for a PDF.

Something Wicked was supported by a Segal Design Fellowship and a crowd-funding campaign. The game was featured in the exhibition PLAY UP!: Queens, Pixel Monsters and Dragon Slayers at the Museum of Applied Arts in Cologne, Germany. Click here for our part of the exhibition catalogue.