『전지적 독자 시점』의 게임적 리얼리즘

초록

This study aimed to examine the significance of the emergence of web novels as a new narrative form and the epistemological transformation it has brought about by analyzing SingShong's web novel Omniscient Reader's Viewpoint through Hiroki Azuma's theory of Gamelike realism. In today's digital media environment, narrative can no longer be regarded as a linear form, but has transformed into an “assemblage” that develops multiple stories in multi-layered and parallel structures. Web novels represent this transformation as a new narrative form that emerged under different media conditions from the reading conditions based on silent reading in modern novels. Hiroki Azuma's Gamelike realism serves as a theory that captures narrative changes appearing in post-capitalist society, centering on the dual structure of character narrative and player narrative. Character narrative refers to the narrative consumption tendency in otaku culture where “characters take precedence over stories,” indicating how characters exist independently beyond the boundaries of specific stories and expand into various secondary creations. Player narrative refers to how players have secured a homogeneous status with characters within texts due to the rise of digital games. The most prominent feature of Omniscient Reader's Viewpoint is the comprehensive introduction of multi-round structures and regression narratives. Yu Junghyeok's 1,863rd regression, Kim Dokja's "Fourth Wall" skill, and the meta-narrative circular structure they create narratively embody the core mechanisms of Gamelike realism: reset and branching. Particularly, Kim Dokja's dual identity as the “oldest dream” who serves as the creative source of all worldlines while simultaneously acting as a character within those worldlines fundamentally subverts the boundaries between creator and creation, cause and effect. Omniscient Reader's Viewpoint performs meta-narrative experiments that fundamentally reconstruct the relationship between reader, text, and author, beyond merely borrowing gaming settings. Kim Dokja's cyclical transformation from reader to character to creator, and Han Sooyoung's paradoxical relationship as an author who simultaneously writes to save readers, dissolves traditional boundaries between creation and reception. This mutually causal-creative structure can be evaluated as a literary embodiment of transformed subjectivity and reality perception in the postmodern era. In conclusion, the meta-narrative project of Omniscient Reader's Viewpoint is closely coordinated with the media characteristics of web novels, presenting new forms of literary subjectivity while dismantling boundaries between reality and fiction, character and player, creator and recipient.

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