Category: readings

New Journal: GAME – The Italian Journal of Game Studies

And here is the inaugural issue of GAME – The Italian Journal of Game Studies. This one is part English, part Italian.

G|A|M|E – n. 1/2012

Index

vol. 1, 2012 – Journal: ALL OF US, PLAYERS

vol. 2, 2012 – Critical Notes

Get your Theory Fix: Eludamos Vol 6, No 1

Eludamos Vol 6, No 1 (2012)

Table of Contents

Perspectives

Guest Editorial Preface. Applied Playfulness – 5th Vienna Games Conference (FROG11) HTML PDF
Konstantin Mitgutsch, Jeffrey Wimmer, Herbert Rosenstingl 1-4
Playing for Plot in the Lost and Portal Franchises HTML
PDF
Jason Mittell 5-13
Objects of Desire – A Reading of the Reward System in World of Warcraft HTML PDF
Lasse Juel Larsen 15-24
What Makes an MMORPG Leader? A Social Cognitive Theory-Based Approach to Understanding the Formation of Leadership Capabilities in Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Games HTML PDF
Andrew Ee, Hichang Cho 25-37
Designing a Game for Playful Communication within Families HTML
PDF
Ida Marie Toft, Amani Naseem 39-52
Teaching Serious Issues through Player Engagement in an Interactive Experiential Learning Scenario HTML PDF
Henrik Schoenau-Fog 53-70
Urban Games to Design the Augmented City HTML
PDF
Vanessa De Luca, Maresa Bertolo 71-83
Designscape – A Suggested Game Design Prototyping Process Tool HTML
PDF
Jon Manker 85-98

Articles

Skin Games: Fragrant Play, Scented Media and the Stench of Digital Games HTML PDF
Simon Niedenthal 101-131
Geocaching: Interactive Communication Instruments Around the Game HTML PDF
Pirita Johanna Ihamäki 133-
152
The Professional Identity of Gameworkers Revisited. A Qualitative Inquiry on the Case Study of German Professionals HTML PDF
Jeffrey Wimmer, Tatiana Sitnikova 153-169

Reviews

The Winding Road to Discovery: A Review of Gaming Matters: Gaming Matters: Art, Science, Magic, and the Computer Game Medium HTML PDF
Virginia F. Holmes 173-17

On Zero-Player Games

Zero-Player Games. Or: What We Talk about When We Talk about Players is a paper I co-wrote with Staffan Björk for the Philosophy of Computer Games Conference in Madrid earlier this year (Staffan’s idea).

Zero-Player Games is one of my more philosophical papers, and deals with the topic of games without players. This is obviously something of a contradiction in terms, but the paper works by looking at interesting edge cases of what we consider to be a game.

It turns out that each of the edge cases we examine (such as Conway’s Game of Life or StatBuilder) tells us something fundamental about both games and players. In other words: by removing players from the equation, we show what was removed.

The paper thereby also questions seemingly “player-centric” theories of games: it is not uncommon to hear theorists claim that games are  nothing by themselves, but only come into being when played. We show that such arguments overlook the fact that players have preferences about which games they prefer to play.

Here is the abstract:

Do games need people? If so, what is it that makes people important to games? It can seem self-evident that games are artifacts designed to be used by players, but in this paper we will discuss the paradoxical idea of zero-player games. We do not wish to argue against the study of players, but we believe that many common conceptions of players are too vague to be useful. Based on the examination of zero-player games, we provide five subcomponents to help in the understanding of the player concept. Expressed as questions, these are: Is this a human player? Does the player have agency? Does the player play over time? Does the player appear to have intentionality? Does the player exhibit aesthetic preferences?

Read the paper here: http://www.jesperjuul.net/text/zeroplayergames/

 

PS. For more reading, here are all the papers from the Philosophy of Computer Games conference 2012 (scroll down).

Well Played: Volume 1 Number 3

Well Played: volume 1 number 3
Drew Davidson et al. 2012

 

Time Tech and Tales: The fall and rise of the popularity of narration in games seen through Monkey Island 2 and Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney
Emmanuel Eytan

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Queue’d Up: The Functioning of Randomized Groups in World of Warcraft
Charles Ecenbarger II

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EUROPA UNIVERSALIS II: Conquest, trading, diplomacy from the Middle Ages to Napoleon
Simon Egenfeldt-Nielsen

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Deus Ex Ludos: Representation, Agency, and Ethics in Deus Ex: Invisible War
Joseph Hogle

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Playing as a Woman as a Woman as if a Man
Gabriela T. Richard

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Get it here.

New issue of Loading: Spring 2012

The Canadian Game Studies Association has just published the Spring 2012 issue of their Loading … Journal.

 

Vol 6, No 9 (2012)

Table of Contents

Introduction

Editorial-Issue 9, Volume 6 PDF
Jerremie Clyde
Guest editor Jerremie Clyde introduces our Spring 2012 issue…

Dimensions of Design

Beyond the “Historical” Simulation: Using Theories of History to Inform Scholarly Game Design. PDF
Jerremie Clyde, Howard Hopkins, Glenn Wilkinson
The authors of this paper present a case for a gamic mode of history that focuses on the construction of the historical narrative via procedural…
Designing Digital Games to Teach Road Safety: A Study of Graduate Students’ Experiences PDF
Qing Li, Richard Tay, Robert Louis
In this paper, we present a framework for designing digital educational games to teach road safety rules specific to Alberta. The framework is…

Probes and Enquiries

Playing Attention: The Hermeneutic Problems of Reading Ico Closely PDF
Peter Douglas McDonald
This article argues that paying attention to the specifics of a videogame involves a difficult problem of interpreting the meaning of repeated…
The practical and theoretical implications of flow theory and intrinsic motivation in designing and implementing exergaming in the school environment PDF
Dwayne P Sheehan, Larry Katz
Helping children develop a positive attitude toward being active for life is a primary objective for physical educators. The cultivation of an…
A Comparison of Exergaming Interfaces for Use in Rehabilitation Programs and Research PDF
Kazumoto Tanaka, J.R. Parker, Graham Baradoy, Dwayne Sheehan, John R. Holash, Larry Katz
Exergames or active video games are video games with interfaces that require active involvement and the exertion of physical force by participants….

Reflection and Review

The Dreamcast, Console of the Avant-Garde PDF
Nick Montfort, Mia Consalvo
We argue that the Dreamcast hosted a remarkable amount of videogame development that went beyond the odd and unusual and is interesting considerd…
To Automaticity and Beyond: Narrative Interpretation in Game and Novel PDF
Margaret Mackey
Common wisdom often posits that game-playing is the enemy of reading, that it offers one of a plethora of “distractions” that seduce people…

Abstracts

Abstracts from the 2011 Exergaming Symposium, University of Calgary. PDF
Larry Katz, Jerremie Clyde
Recent work being conducted on exergaming in the field of Canadian game studies…

Well Played Journal volume 1 number 2

Drew Davidson has just posted volume 1, number 2 of the Well Played Journal.

BioShock and Portal: A Discussion of Poetics
Yotam Haimberg

We should be heroes… A case study of community building as a dominant strategy
Simon Egenfeldt-Nielsen

Cracking the Code: Untangling Game Structure, Properties and Player Experience
Elizabeth Goins

A Life in Baseball, Digital and Otherwise
Abraham Stein

Get the PDF here.

Gamestudies 11/03 is out

For your theoretical pleasure, here is the latest issue of Game Studies: Game Studies 2011-03.

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A Survey of First-person Shooters and their Avatars
by Michael Hitchens
A survey of over 550 first person shooters, The titles are compared by year of release, platform and game setting. Characteristics of avatars within the surveyed titles are also examined, including race, gender and background, and how these vary across platform and time. The analysis reveals definite trends, both historically and by platform…

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Against Procedurality
by Miguel Sicart
This article proposes a critical review of the literature on procedural rhetoric, from a game design perspective. The goal of the article is to show the limits of procedural rhetorics for the design and analysis of ethics and politics in games. The article will suggest that theories of play can be used to solve these theoretical flaws…

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The pastoral and the sublime in Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion
by Paul Martin
The landscape in Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion is seen here as a central aspect of the game’s theme of good versus evil. The analysis looks at the game’s distinction between the pastoral and the industrial realms and the way the player’s encounter with the landscape transforms over the course of the game from the sublime to the picturesque mode…

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Wrap Your Troubles in Dreams: Popular Music, Narrative, and Dystopia in Bioshock
by William Gibbons
The science-fiction world of the video game Bioshock (2K Games, 2007) presents a dystopian vision of mid-century America. The game explores the creation and ultimate destruction of the underwater city of Rapture, an Ayn-Rand-inspired capitalist Utopia. Though the game features an award-winning original score, its soundtrack also borrows…

The Well Played Journal, volume 1, issue 1

ETC Press has posted the first issue of the new Well Played Journal.

Here is issue 1, volume 1.

Minecraft, Beyond Construction and Survival
Sean C. Duncan

Architecture as teambuilding in Left 4 Dead 2
Matt Haselton

Afterland – From well theorized to well learned?
Konstantin Mitgutsch, Matthew Weise

Little Big Planet and Metal Gear Solid 4: Being Old Sack Snake
Caroline C. Williams