Game Studies Review
By Alex Layne
Game Studies ReviewAug 11, 2021
Review of Keogh and Hardwick's "Creative, Technical, Entrepreneurial: Formative Tensions in Game Development Higher Education."
Brendan Keogh and Taylor Hardwick. (2023). “Creative, Technical, Entrepreneurial: Formative Tensions in Game Development Higher Education.” Games and Culture.
Review of Fois's “But First, Let’s Jam: A New Materialist Twist on the Ontology of Play.”
Loretta Fois (2022). “But First, Let’s Jam: A New Materialist Twist on the Ontology of Play.” American Journal of Play 14.3.
Review of Anderson and Cullen's "Failing to See a Difference: Closing a Gender Gap in a Challenging Video Game"
Anderson, C. and A. Cullen. 2023. Failing to See a Difference: Closing a Gender Gap in a Challenging Video Game. Games and Culture 0(0) (online early access)
Review of Eco by Strange Loop Games
Check out our latest review, this time of a game called Eco by Strange Loop Games. Eco is an online multiplayer collaborative game which casts players as citizens grappling with ethical, technological, civic, economic, and cultural tensions.
Picture courtesy of Toast Machine. Toast built this public art installation from different materials, each representing one member of our neighborhood. The installation signifies each of our unique skills and tastes being weaved together to create a strong, intertwined community.
Review of Larreina-Morales's "How Accessible is this Video Game? An Analysis Tool in Two Steps"
Larreina-Morales, M. E. (2023). How Accessible is This Video Game? An Analysis Tool in Two Steps. Games and Culture, 0(0). https://doi.org/10.1177/15554120231154710
TBT: Review of "Perspectives of Computer Game Philology" by Julian Kucklich
Julian Kucklich. (2003). "Perspectives in Computer Game Philology." Game Studies 3.1 https://gamestudies.org/0301/kucklich/
Review of Kelly, Easpaig, and Castillo's "You Game Like a Girl: Perceptions of Gender and Competence in Gamings"
Danielle Kelly, Brona Nic Giolla Easpaig, Paola Castillo. (2023). “‘You Game Like a Girl’: Perceptions of Gender and Competence in Gaming.” Games and Culture 18(1): 62-78.
Review of "Platform-produced Heteronormativity: A Content Analysis of Adult Video Games on Patreon" by Lankoski, Apperley, and Harviainen
Lankoski, P., Apperley, T., & Harviainen, J. T. (2023). Platform-produced Heteronormativity: A Content Analysis of Adult Videogames on Patreon. Games and Culture, 18(1), 102–123. https://doi.org/10.1177/15554120221084453
Review of Fontolan, Malazita, and da Costa's "Language, Identity, and Games: Discussing the Role of Players in Videogame Localization"
Marina Fontolan, James Wilson Malazita, Janaina Pamplona da Costa. (2022). Language, Identity and Games: Discussing the Role of Players in Videogame Localization. Game Studies 22(3).
Review of Kelly Bergstrom's "Ignoring the Blood on the Tracks: Exits and Departures from Game Studies:"
Bergstrom, Kelly. “Ignoring the blood on the tracks: exits and departures from game studies.” Critical Studies in Media Communication 39:3.
Listen to our review of one of the most thought-provoking and generative articles we have reviewed so far (and one of Alex's personal favorites): Kelly Bergstrom's "Ignoring the Blood on the Tracks: Exits and Departures from Game Studies." It's worth a listen and a read.
Review of Aaron Trammell's "Decolonizing Play"
Aaron Trammell (2022) Decolonizing play, Critical Studies in Media Communication, 39:3, 239-246, DOI: 10.1080/15295036.2022.2080844
Review of Alexandrina Agloro's "Another World is Possible: Building Games for Just Futures"
Agloro, Alexandrina. (2022). Another World is Possible: Building Games for Just Futures. Critical Studies in Media Communication, 39:2, 165-172
Review of "The Future of Media Studies is Game Studies" by Shira Chess and Mia Consalvo
This perspicacious editor's intro to a special issue fills Cody and I with questions, hope, and visions of the future.
Chess, S. and Consalvo, M. (2022). The future of media studies is game studies. Critical Studies in Media Communication.
Review of Treacherous Play by Marcus Carter
Alex read the book, Cody didn't. Listen in as he asks all the questions you have about the awesome book, Treacherous Play, by Marcus Carter.
Review of "'Never Battle Alone': Egirls and the Gender(ed) War on Video Game Live Streaming as 'Real' Work" by Christine H. Tran
Check out our review of the BRAND NEW article by Christine Tran on Egirls, gendered work, and livestreaming. This article opens up an exciting area in need of scholarly attention and investigation.
Tran, Christine H. (2022). “‘Never Battle Alone’: Egirls and the Gender(ed) War on Video Game Live Streaming as ‘Real’ Work.” Television & New Media 23(3)
Podcast mentioned in this episode: https://anchor.fm/techcommtalk/episodes/Social-justice-and-tech-comm--Part-2-Doing-social-justice-e1for29
Review of “There Is No Immersion: Critical Intervention through Hypermediacy in Metagames" by Sarah Thorne
Metagames, hypermediacy, and antagonistic narrators-- oh my! Listen in as Cody and I review a fabulous new article that deep dives into There Is No Game, a metagame that is both self-reflective and playful.
Thorne, Sarah. (2021). “There Is No Immersion: Critical Intervention through Hypermediacy in Metagames.” Eludamos: Journal for Computer Game Studies 12.1.
Review of "At a Glance: Teaching, Writing, Gaming" by Colby, Johnson, and Shultz Colby
Check out our super quick review for a super brief article.
Colby, Richard, Johnson, Matthew S.S., Shultz Colby, Rebekah. (2022) Colby, Richard, Johnson, Matthew S.S., Shultz Colby, Rebekah. (2022) At a Glance: Teaching, Writing, Gaming. Composition Studies 49.3.. Composition Studies 49.3.
Review of "Trans Game Studies" by Bo Ruberg
Bo Ruberg, “Trans Game Studies,” JCMS 61, no. 2 (Winter 2022): 200–205.
Review of "We Are the Champions? Performing whiteness in ASCENSION: DAMN OF CHAMPIONS" by Sabine Harrer
Harrer, S. (2021). We Are the Champions? Performing whiteness in ASCENSION: DAMN OF CHAMPIONS. Simulation & Gaming, 52(5), 533-553
Review of "Gamifying Contentious Politics: Gaming Capital and Playful Resistance" by Vincent Huang and Tingting Liu
This article taps into many areas of interest for game scholars and community members: disruptive gaming, playful resistance, games that subvert capitalism, and ways to spread and inspire political action. Listen in!
Huang, V. G., & Liu, T. (2022). Gamifying Contentious Politics: Gaming Capital and Playful Resistance. Games & Culture, 17(1), 26–46.
Review of "Open Video Game Development and Participatory Design" by Luke Thominet
Luke Thominet (2021) Open Video Game Development and Participatory Design, Technical Communication Quarterly, 30:4, 359-374, DOI:
10.1080/10572252.2020.1866679
Review of "White Protagonism and Imperial Pleasures in Game Design" by Meghna Jayanth
An absolutely mind-blowing talk by Meghna Jayanth. Read it, watch it, check it out now. The future of games may depend on it!
DiGRA India Conference 2021 Keynote #1: Meghna Jayanth
“White Protagonism and Imperial Pleasures in Game Design”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HsYN0H7Z1sc YT (1h18m) or read:
Review of "The Game of Video Game Objects: A Minimal Theory of when we see Pixels as Objects rather than Pictures" by Jesper Juul
Check out our review of an attempt at a practical ontology of objects in game worlds by Jesper Juul. Play the accompanying game first! https://www.jesperjuul.net/text/gameofobjects/
Juul, Jesper. “The Game of Video Game Objects: A Minimal Theory of When We See Pixels as Objects Rather than Pictures.” In Extended Abstracts of the 2021 Annual Symposium on Computer-Human Interaction in Play, 376–81. CHI PLAY ’21. New York, NY, USA: Association for Computing Machinery, 2021. https://doi.org/10.1145/3450337.3483449. https://www.jesperjuul.net/text/gameofobjects/essay.html
Review of "Exploring Hybrid Gaming Cultures through Black Cyberfeminism" by Kishonna L. Gray and Brigitte Perkins
Cody and Alex review a thought-provoking piece by Kishonna L. Gray and Brigitte Perkins on transformative games and Black cyberfeminism. This practical and theoretically-engaging work is exactly what you need to be reading.
Gray, Kishonna L., Perkins, Brigitte. (2021). Exploring Hybrid Gaming Cultures through Black Cyberfeminism. Footnotes 49.4. (Magazine of the American Sociological Association).
https://www.asanet.org/exploring-hybrid-gaming-cultures-through-black-cyberfeminism
Review of "Gender Moderation and Moderating Gender: Sexual Content Policies in Twitch's Community Guidelines" by Andrew Zolides
Review of "Gender Moderation and Moderating Gender: Sexual Content Policies in Twitch's Community Guidelines" by Andrew Zolides. Zolides argues that Twitch's Community Guidelines reinforce the sexist ideological discourse within Twitch and the gaming community as well as emboldens those seeking to police women's bodies.
Zolides, A. (2021). Gender Moderation and Moderating Gender: Sexual Content Policies in Twitch’s Community Guidelines. New Media & Society, 23(10). 2999-3015
Review of "There and Back Again: Tolkein, Gamers, and the Remediation of Exclusion through Fantasy Media" by Emma Vossen
Listen in as Cody and Alex dive into one of their favorite articles to date. This is games scholarship at its absolute best--compelling, brilliant, relevant. As Cody says in the podcast, every sentence in this article is fire.
Vossen, E. (2021). There and Back Again: Tolkein, Gamers, and the Remediation of Exclusion through Fantasy Media. Feminist Media Histories 6.1.
Review of “Ludic Ethics: The Ethical Negotiations of Players in Online Multiplayer Games" by Sparrow, Gibbs, and Arnold
Cody and Alex review a brand new article!
Sparrow, Lucy A., Gibbs, Martin, and Arnold, Michael. (2021). “Ludic Ethics: The Ethical Negotiations of Players in Online Multiplayer Games.” Games and Culture 16(6).
"Designing for Disability: Evaluating the State of Accessibility Design in Video Games" by Mark Brown and Sky LaRell Anderson
Listen in as Alex and Cody discuss "Designing for Disability: Evaluating the State of Accessibility Design in Video Games" by Mark Brown and Sky LaRell Anderson. We also talk about an email we received from Miguel Sicart in response to our recent review of his article "Playthings." Drama? Listen to find out!
Brown, Mark and Anderson, Sky LaRell. (2021). Designing for Disability: Evaluating the State of Accessibility Design in Video Games. Games and Culture 16(6).
Interview with Kat Schrier
Listen in as Alex Interviews prolific professor, game designer, and author of We the Gamers: How Games Teach Ethics and Civics: https://global.oup.com/academic/product/we-the-gamers-9780190926113?lang=en&cc=us#
"Extracting the Pedagogy: Using Games as Texts in the Language Classroom" by Alex Hogue
Listen to Alex and Cody chat about "Extracting the Pedagogy: Using Games as Texts in the Language Classroom" by Alex Hogue. Published June 7, 2021 in Analog Game Studies: https://analoggamestudies.org/2021/06/extracting-the-pedagogy-using-games-as-texts-in-the-language-classroom/
“Grades on Games: Gaming Preferences and Weekly Studying on College GPAs” By Kelsey Prena and Andrew Weaver
Review of “Grades on Games: Gaming Preferences and Weekly Studying on College GPAs” By Kelsey Prena and Andrew Weaver
"Playthings" by Miguel Sicart
Review of "Playthings" by Miguel Sicart, published in Games and Culture May 18, 2021
"A Typology of Imperative Game Goals" by Debus Et. Al.
Debus, Michael S., Zagal, José P., Cardona-Rivera, Rogelio E. (2020). A Typology of Imperative Game Goals. Game Studies 20(3).
"Esports Research: A Literature Review" by Retiman Et. Al.
Esports Research: A Literature Review. Games and Culture 2020, Vol. 15(1) 32-50
by Jason G. Reitman, Maria J. Anderson-Coto, Minerva Wu, Je Seok Lee, and Constance Steinkuehler
"Replaying Video Game History as a Mixtape of Black Feminist Thought" with Samantha Blackmon
An interview with acclaimed Game Studies scholar Samantha Blackmon on her recent article with TreAndrea Russworm, "Replaying Video Game History as a Mixtape of Black Feminist Thought" published in Feminist Media Histories, Vol 6 N 1.
"Play Like a Feminist" by Shira Chess
Interview with Shira Chess, author of Play Like a Feminist, published in 2020. Part of the Playful Thinking series by MIT.
"The Right Way to Play a Game" by C. Thi Nguyen
Review of “The Right Way to Play a Game” by C. Thi Nguyen, published in Game Studies volume 19, issue 1 in May 2019
Episode Zero
This episode is a short bit of background on the podcast and the host.