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Building on the methodological frameworks established by critical information researchers like Safiya Noble, Tarleton Gillespie, and Nick Seaver, this essay argues that we do not need to reverse engineer the \u201cblack box\u201d to understand its impacts because they can be found through qualitative methodologies instead. This essay rejects the \u201cblack box\u201d as an epistemic premise upon which critical algorithmic literacies can be built by using discourse analysis to observe how the unknowable language of the algorithm is deployed discursively within gamer communities to establish and maintain patriarchal power. This essay shows how the \u201cblack box\u201d is used by fan communities to advance a patriarchal understanding of what we term paradigms of \u201cbalance\u201d and \u201crealism\u201d in game design. <\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.1177\/1461444819900508","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2020,1,22]],"date-time":"2020-01-22T08:55:12Z","timestamp":1579683312000},"page":"159-174","update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1177\/sage-journals-update-policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":4,"title":["A cultural approach to algorithmic bias in games"],"prefix":"10.1177","volume":"23","author":[{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0003-2631-7420","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Aaron","family":"Trammell","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Informatics, University of California Irvine, USA"}]},{"given":"Amanda LL","family":"Cullen","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Informatics, University of California Irvine, USA"}]}],"member":"179","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2020,1,22]]},"reference":[{"key":"bibr1-1461444819900508","unstructured":"BigPig (2018). 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