Glitching Objects as Temporal Mediators: Hyperobject Temporality in NORCO

Abstract

This paper examines how glitching objects in narrative games mediate hyperobject temporality, environmental forces such as petrochemical contamination that exceed human comprehension through vast spatial and temporal distribution. By examining four mundane objects in NORCO (Geography of Robots, 2022), the study shows how malfunction enables players to experience slow violence (Nixon) that resists direct representation. Drawing on Morton's hyperobjects, Brown's thing theory, Ingold's materials ecology, Shklovsky's defamiliarisation, and Fisher's weird and eerie, the analysis shows that glitching objects produce "troubling pleasures": experiences that are simultaneously destabilising, as uncertainty persists, and engaging, as interpretive labour yields productive meaning-making. In NORCO, glitching objects make pervasive environmental violence tangible through persistent malfunction. These troubling pleasures illustrate how games can mediate the temporal experience of environmental forces, supporting prolonged engagement with complex temporalities and enabling players to explore collapsed futures without reducing crises to solvable mechanics.