![]() Through a close reading of a hidden scene in Final Fantasy 7 (1997), I argue that Easter eggs in video games are effective tools for representing queer marginality and silence but that they are also silencing tools themselves, as they fall victim to the rigid heteronormative hierarchy of the gaming industry. In this paper, I argue that while many of these queer Easter eggs offer reparative opportunities for reading queerness into outwardly “straight” games, the fundamental positionality of an Easter egg and the continued repetition of this position does more to hierarchically structure queerness into spaces considered secret, noncanonical, and zany. They are also among the earliest spaces in which queer experiences are represented in mass-market games. Yet Easter eggs are more than innocuous community-building tools. Gaming fandoms often discuss “Easter eggs” as objects of intrigue in art and fiction, since finding an Easter egg demonstrates unique and interesting knowledge to video gaming’s historically insider culture. Queer Easter Eggs and their Hierarchies of Play by Eric Andrew James Abstract
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