The Game Culture Reader

The Game Culture Reader
Author: Jason Thompson
Publisher: Cambridge Scholars Publishing
Total Pages: 285
Release: 2014-07-18
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 1443864374

In The Game Culture Reader, editors Jason C. Thompson and Marc A. Ouellette propose that Game Studies—that peculiar multi-, inter-, and trans-disciplinary field wherein international researchers from such diverse areas as rhetoric, computer science, literary studies, culture studies, psychology, media studies and so on come together to study the production, distribution, and consumption of games—has reached an unproductive stasis. Its scholarship remains either divided (as in the narratologists versus ludologists debate) or indecisive (as in its frequently apolitical stances on play and fandom). Thompson and Ouellette firmly hold that scholarship should be distinguished from the repetitively reductive commonplaces of violence, sexism, and addiction. In other words, beyond the headline-friendly modern topoi that now dominate the discourse of Game Studies, what issues, approaches, and insights are being, if not erased, then displaced? This volume gathers together a host of scholars from different countries, institutions, disciplines, departments, and ranks, in order to present original and evocative scholarship on digital game culture. Collectively, the contributors reject the commonplaces that have come to define digital games as apolitical or as somehow outside of the imbricated processes of cultural production that govern the medium itself. As an alternative, they offer essays that explore video game theory, ludic spaces and temporalities, and video game rhetorics. Importantly, the authors emphasize throughout that digital games should be understood on their own terms: literally, this assertion necessitates the serious reconsideration of terms borrowed from other academic disciplines; figuratively, the claim embeds the embrace of game play in the continuing investigation of digital games as cultural forms. Put another way, by questioning the received wisdom that would consign digital games to irrelevant spheres of harmless child’s play or of invidious mass entertainment, the authors productively engage with ludic ambiguities.

The Game Design Reader

The Game Design Reader
Author: Katie Salen Tekinbas
Publisher: MIT Press
Total Pages: 955
Release: 2005-11-23
Genre: Computers
ISBN: 0262195364

Classic and cutting-edge writings on games, spanning nearly 50 years of game analysis and criticism, by game designers, game journalists, game fans, folklorists, sociologists, and media theorists. The Game Design Reader is a one-of-a-kind collection on game design and criticism, from classic scholarly essays to cutting-edge case studies. A companion work to Katie Salen and Eric Zimmerman's textbook Rules of Play: Game Design Fundamentals, The Game Design Reader is a classroom sourcebook, a reference for working game developers, and a great read for game fans and players. Thirty-two essays by game designers, game critics, game fans, philosophers, anthropologists, media theorists, and others consider fundamental questions: What are games and how are they designed? How do games interact with culture at large? What critical approaches can game designers take to create game stories, game spaces, game communities, and new forms of play? Salen and Zimmerman have collected seminal writings that span 50 years to offer a stunning array of perspectives. Game journalists express the rhythms of game play, sociologists tackle topics such as role-playing in vast virtual worlds, players rant and rave, and game designers describe the sweat and tears of bringing a game to market. Each text acts as a springboard for discussion, a potential class assignment, and a source of inspiration. The book is organized around fourteen topics, from The Player Experience to The Game Design Process, from Games and Narrative to Cultural Representation. Each topic, introduced with a short essay by Salen and Zimmerman, covers ideas and research fundamental to the study of games, and points to relevant texts within the Reader. Visual essays between book sections act as counterpoint to the writings. Like Rules of Play, The Game Design Reader is an intelligent and playful book. An invaluable resource for professionals and a unique introduction for those new to the field, The Game Design Reader is essential reading for anyone who takes games seriously.

A Multimodal Approach to Video Games and the Player Experience

A Multimodal Approach to Video Games and the Player Experience
Author: Weimin Toh
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 241
Release: 2018-10-10
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 135118475X

This volume puts forth an original theoretical framework, the ludonarrative model, for studying video games which foregrounds the empirical study of the player experience. The book provides a comprehensive introduction to and description of the model, which draws on theoretical frameworks from multimodal discourse analysis, game studies, and social semiotics, and its development out of participant observation and qualitative interviews from the empirical study of a group of players. The volume then applies this approach to shed light on how players’ experiences in a game influence how they understand and make use of game components in order to progress its narrative. The book concludes with a frame by frame analysis of a popular game to demonstrate the model’s principles in action and its subsequent broader applicability to analyzing video game interaction and design. Offering a new way forward for video game research, this volume is key reading for students and scholars in multimodality, discourse analysis, game studies, interactive storytelling, and new media.

The Games: A Global History of the Olympics

The Games: A Global History of the Olympics
Author: David Goldblatt
Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
Total Pages: 755
Release: 2016-07-26
Genre: Sports & Recreation
ISBN: 0393254119

“A people’s history of the Olympics.”—New York Times Book Review A Boston Globe Best Book of the Year A Kirkus Reviews Best Nonfiction Book of the Year The Games is best-selling sportswriter David Goldblatt’s sweeping, definitive history of the modern Olympics. Goldblatt brilliantly traces their history from the reinvention of the Games in Athens in 1896 to Rio in 2016, revealing how the Olympics developed into a global colossus and highlighting how they have been buffeted by (and affected by) domestic and international conflicts. Along the way, Goldblatt reveals the origins of beloved Olympic traditions (winners’ medals, the torch relay, the eternal flame) and popular events (gymnastics, alpine skiing, the marathon). And he delivers memorable portraits of Olympic icons from Jesse Owens to Nadia Comaneci, the Dream Team to Usain Bolt.

The Game Localization Handbook

The Game Localization Handbook
Author: Heather Maxwell Chandler
Publisher: Jones & Bartlett Publishers
Total Pages: 387
Release: 2011-05-03
Genre: Computers
ISBN: 144969053X

Part of the New Foundations of Game Development Series! As games become more popular in international markets, developers and publishers are looking for ways to quickly localize their games in order to capitalize on these markets. Authored by two internationally known experts in game localization, The Game Localization Handbook, Second Edition provides information on how to localize software for games, whether they are developed for the PC, console, or other platforms. It includes advice, interviews, and case studies from industry professionals, as well as practical information on pre-production, production, translation, and testing of localized SKUs. Written for producers, translators, development personnel, studio management, publishers, students, and anyone involved directly or indirectly with the production of localized games, this single-reference handbook provides insightful guidelines to all the tasks involved for planning and executing successful localizations.

Learning and Education Games: Volume Two: Bringing Games into Educational Contexts

Learning and Education Games: Volume Two: Bringing Games into Educational Contexts
Author: Karen Schrier Shaenfeld
Publisher: Lulu.com
Total Pages: 281
Release: 2016
Genre: Education
ISBN: 1329703561

The Learning, Education & Games book series is perfect for any educator or developer seeking an introduction to research-driven best practices for using and designing games for learning.This volume, Bringing Games into Educational Contexts, delves into thechallenges of creating games and implementing them in educational settings. This book covers relevant issues such as gamification, curriculum development, using games to support ASD (autism spectrum disorder) students, choosing games for the classroom and library, homeschooling and gameschooling, working with parents and policymakers, and choosing tools for educational game development. Learning, Education & Games: Bringing Games into Educational Contexts is the second in a serieswritten and edited bymembers of the Learning, Education, and Games (LEG) special interestgroup of the IGDA (International Game Developers Association)."

Ethics and Game Design: Teaching Values through Play

Ethics and Game Design: Teaching Values through Play
Author: Schrier, Karen
Publisher: IGI Global
Total Pages: 395
Release: 2010-02-28
Genre: Education
ISBN: 1615208461

"This book addressing an emerging field of study, ethics and gamesand answers how we can better design and use games to foster ethical thinking and discourse in classrooms"--Provided by publisher.

Games At Work

Games At Work
Author: Mauricio Goldstein
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
Total Pages: 254
Release: 2009-04-20
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 0470262001

AS LONG AS PEOPLE HAVE WORKED together, they have engaged in political games. Motivated by short-term gains promotions, funding for a project, budget increases, status with the boss people misuse their time and energy. Today, when many organizations are fighting for their lives and scarce resources there is increased stress and anxiety, and employees are engaging in games more intensely than ever before. Organizational experts Mauricio Goldstein and Philip Read argue that office games those manipulative behaviors that distract employees from achieving their mission are both conscious and unconscious. They can and should be effectively minimized. In Games at Work, the authors offer tools to diagnose the most common games that people play and outline a three-step process to effectively deal with them. Some of the games they explore include: GOTCHA: identifying and communicating others' mistakes in an effort to win points from higher-ups GOSSIP: engaging in the classic rumor mill to gain political advantage SANDBAGGING: purposely low-balling sales forecasts as a negotiating ploy GRAY ZONE: deliberately fostering ambiguity or lack of clarity about who should do what to avoid accountability Filled with real-world, entertaining examples of games in action, Games at Work is an invaluable resource for managers and all professionals who want to substitute straight talk for games in their organizations and boost productivity, commitment, innovation, and ultimately the bottom line.

Olympic Legacies: Intended and Unintended

Olympic Legacies: Intended and Unintended
Author: J A Mangan
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 314
Release: 2013-10-18
Genre: Sports & Recreation
ISBN: 1317966619

For more than a century, the Olympics have been the modern world's most significant sporting event. Indeed, they deserve much credit for globalizing sport beyond the boundaries of the Anglo-American universe, where it originated, into broader global realms. By the 1930s, the Olympics had become a global mega-event that occupied the attention of the media, the interest of the public and the energies of nation-states. Since then, projected by television, funded by global capital and fattened by the desires of nations to garner international prestige, the Olympics have grown to gargantuan dimensions. In the course of its epic history, the Olympics have left numerous legacies, from unforgettable feats to monumental stadiums, from shining triumphs to searing tragedies, from the dazzling debuts on the world's stage of new cities and nations to notorious campaigns of national propaganda. The Olympics represent an essential component of modern global history. The Olympic movement itself has, since the 1990s, recognized and sought to shape its numerous legacies with mixed success as this book makes clear. It offers ground-breaking analyses of the power of Olympic legacies, positive and negative, and surveys the subject from Athens in 1896 to Beijing in 2008, and indeed beyond. This book was published as a special issue of the International Journal of the History of Sport.

The Spirit of the Game

The Spirit of the Game
Author: Mihir Bose
Publisher: Constable
Total Pages: 377
Release: 2012-01-19
Genre: Sports & Recreation
ISBN: 184901826X

The spirit of the game was first nurtured on the playing fields of the English public school, and in the pages of Tom Brown's Schooldays- this Corinthian spirit was then exported around the world. The competitive spirit, the importance of fairness, the nobility of the gifted amateur seemed to sum up everything that was good about Britishness and the games they played. Today, sport is dominated by corruption, money, celebrity and players who are willing to dive in the box if it wins them a penalty. Yet, we still believe and talk about the game as if it had a higher moral purpose. Since the age of Thomas Arnold, Sport has been used to glorify dictatorships and was at the heart of cold war diplomacy. Prime Ministers, princes and presidents will do whatever they can to ensure that their country holds a major sporting tournament. Nelson Mandela saw the victory of the Rugby World Cup as essential to his hopes for the Rainbow Nation. Mihir Bose has lived his life around sport and in this book he tells the story of how Sport has lost its original spirit and how it has emerged in the 20th century to become the most powerful political tool in the world. With examples and stories from around the world including how the sport-hating Thomas Arnold become an icon; how a German manufacturer gave Jessie Owens a pair of shoes at the Berlin games of 1936 and went on to dominate the world of sport; how India stole cricket from the ICC; how an Essex car dealer become the most powerful man in Formula 1; and who really sold football out. Praise for Mihir Bose: 'Mihir Bose is India's CLR James.' Simon Barnes, The Times. 'Mihir's insider knowledge is unsurpassed' David Welch. 'His Olympic contacts are second to none. He knows everybody.' Sue Mott.