Magic Circle (virtual worlds)

In games and digital media, the "magic circle" is the space in which the normal rules and reality of the world are suspended and replaced by the artificial reality of a game world. As noted by Edward Castronova in Synthetic Worlds: The Business and Culture of Online Games, the boundary delineating this space "can be considered a shield of sorts, protecting the fantasy world from the outside world." Instead of being impenetrable, however, an examination of contemporary virtual worlds reveals that the magic circle is actually quite porous. More directly, there appears to be a relationship between virtual worlds and the outside world. Even though virtual worlds display a range of attributes that are unique to their realm, they also exhibit characteristics deriving from the outside world. Castronova uses the term "synthetic world" because a synthetic world "cannot be sealed completely; people are crossing it all the time in both directions, carrying their behavioral assumptions and attitudes with them." As this suggests, elements of synthetic worlds are being evaluated in terms of their importance in the outside world. These newly established values, subsequently, gain significance on both sides of the membrane. Thus, it becomes difficult to determine the meaning of the word "virtual." As stated by Castronova, the "allegedly 'virtual' is blending so smoothly into the allegedly 'real' as to make the distinction increasingly difficult to see."

As noted by Eva Nieuwdorp, the term magic circle was "coined by Dutch historian Johan Huizinga (1872–1945)." In Homo Ludens: A Study of the Play-Element in Culture, Huizinga wrote:

All play moves and has its being within a play-ground marked off beforehand either materially or ideally, deliberately or as a matter of course. Just as there is no formal difference between play and ritual, so the 'consecrated spot' cannot be formally distinguished from the play-ground. The arena, the card-table, the magic circle, the temple, the stage, the screen, the tennis court, the court of justice, etc, are all in form and function play-grounds, i.e. forbidden spots, isolated, hedged round, hallowed, within which special rules obtain. All are temporary worlds within the ordinary world, dedicated to the performance of an act apart.

Huizinga's concept was "picked up and applied to digital games" by Katie Salen and Eric Zimmerman in Rules of Play: Game Design Fundamentals. Salen and Zimmerman note that even though "the magic circle is merely one of the examples in Huizinga's list of 'play-grounds,' the term is used ... [by him] as short-hand for the idea of a special place in time and space created by a game." In more detail, they describe:

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