Volume 1, Issue 1March 2023Current Issue
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editorial
Inaugural Editorial: A Lighthouse for Games and Playable Media
In games and playable media, almost nothing is as it was at the turn of the millennium. Digital and analog games have exploded in reach, diversity, and relevance. Digital platforms and globalisation have shifted and fragmented their centres of gravity and ...
research-article
A Manifesto for More Productive Psychological Games Research
Despite enormous resource investment, researchers lack consensus on seemingly simple questions about how video games affect players. Topics such as violent games and aggression, playtime and wellbeing, and more are characterized by deeply divided opinions ...
research-article
Teaching Environmentally Conscious Game Design: Lessons and Challenges
A growing number of game design and development programs in higher education are beginning to incorporate environmental considerations into their curricula. This aligns with the broader push for more responsible and environmentally conscious practices in ...
research-article
The Many Faces of Monetisation: Understanding the Diversity and Extremity of Player Spending in Mobile Games via Massive-scale Transactional Analysis
- David Zendle,
- Catherine Flick,
- Sebastian Deterding,
- Joe Cutting,
- Elena Gordon-Petrovskaya,
- Anders Drachen
With the rise of microtransactions, particularly in the mobile games industry, there has been ongoing concern that games reliant on these obtain substantial revenue from a small proportion of heavily involved individuals, to an extent that may be ...
SECTION: Game Futures
editorial
Games Futures I
Games Futures collect short opinion pieces by industry and research veterans and new voices envisioning possible and desirable futures and needs for games and playable media. This inaugural series features eight of over thirty pieces.
opinion
editorial
opinion
A Design Practice for Social Systems
On grim winter days it is easy to feel that we live in a predatory digital ecology intentionally designed to foster negative emotions. We prime players with mechanisms that actively generate social comparison, fear of missing out, loneliness, anxiety, and ...
editorial
Social Impact Games, a Probable Future Illuminated by Looking Back
Social Impact Games are created to address varied societal challenges. Future innovations in social impact game design are likely to come through the researchers and practitioners that not only make such games, but shape the way we design, develop, employ,...
opinion
From Online World to Metaverse: The Future of Online Games and Games Research
The history of virtual worlds to date suggests possible ways a future metaverse might develop, and what new games research it might enable.
opinion
3D Audio: The Next Step in Realism for Gaming: Benefits and pitfalls of 3D audio in games from a creative content and technical implementation point of view
When using 3D audio in games, the goal should be to create an immersive, believable auditory experience. To achieve this on the technical side of things, game developers must combine the appropriate hardware with sophisticated software algorithms and ...