It has been over a decade since contemporary Game Studies was launched. 2001 was famously declared as the “Year One” when the journal Game Studies was launched. Since then, DiGRA has formed, numerous conferences have appeared, journals have been launched, dissertations written and a new field has emerged. It is time to look back and evaluate. DEADLINE extended to February 17.
Researching games is no more questioned or even ridiculed as it perhaps once
was and the justifications for researching games that a few years ago were
necessary to include at the beginning of each paper, now seem unnecessary.
In the battle to establish game studies, what was learned? What went wrong?
What emerged as strengths and what was left by the wayside?
We invite you to look back and critically evaluate game studies, ludology
and the study of games and play.
The possible list of topics includes but is not limited to:
– Formation of Game Studies
– Game studies and the study of games
– Gaps in existing research, forgotten topics
– Research of games versus research of play, or players
– Canon of game studies
– Interdisciplinarity and formation of a distinctive field of learning
– Re-evaluations of classics
– Knowledge interests and games
– Methods in game studies
– What was the whole narratology/ludology debate, really
– Reviews of the usage and understanding of key terminology
– Institutions of game studies, e.g. journals, associations
– Review practices and standards in game studies
Critical Evaluation of Game Studies is the 10th annual spring seminar
organized by University of Tampere Game Research Lab. The seminar emphasises
work-in-progress submissions, and we strongly encourage submitting late
breaking results, working papers and submissions from graduate students. The
purpose of the seminar is to have peer-to-peer discussions and thereby
provide support in refining and improving research work in this area.
The papers to be presented will be chosen based on extended abstract review.
Full papers are distributed prior the event to all participants, in order to
facilitate discussion. The seminar is looking into partnering with a journal
so that the best papers would be invited to be further developed for
publication in a special journal issue. In the past we have collaborated
with Simulation & Gaming, International Journal of Role-Playing and ToDiGRA
journals.
The seminar will be chaired by Professor Frans Mäyrä (School of Information
Sciences, University of Tampere). The seminar will also feature two invited
paper commentators, to be confirmed later.
The seminar will be held in Tampere, Finland and will be free of charge; the
number of participants will be restricted.
Important Dates
Abstract Deadline: 10 February, 2014
Notification of Acceptance: 28 February, 2014
Full Paper deadline: 31 March, 2014
Seminar dates: 28-29 April, 2014
Submission Guidelines
The papers will be selected for presentation based on extended abstracts of
500-1000 words (plus references). Abstracts should be sent to
<gamestudiesseminar {at} gmail.com> as plain text only (no attachments).
Full paper guidelines will be provided with the notification of acceptance.
Our aim is that all participants can familiarize themselves with the papers
in advance. Therefore, the maximum length for a full paper is 5000 words
(plus references). The seminar presentations should encourage discussion,
instead of repeating the information presented in the papers. Every paper
will be presented for 10 minutes and discussed for 20 minutes.
Seminar website: http://evaluationofgamestudiesseminar.wordpress.com/
Organised by: http://gamelab.uta.fi
University of Tampere / SIS / Game Research Lab