LudoScience

Opening of the LUDOSCIENCE Collection on HAL Sciences (Blog post)

We are pleased to announce the launch of the Ludoscience collection on the #HAL database: https://hal.science/LUDOSCIENCE    This collection brings together all the publications posted on HAL concerning studies on games, serious games, video games, gamification, games, play, etc. We encourage authors to submit books, articles, dissertations, posters, videos, podcasts and games. Many thanks to sebastien mazzarese for putting together this fine collection, which we hope wi [...]

Keywords : Serious Game, Database, Research, Collection, Game studies, Gamification, Video game, Scientific studies

---

Understanding the Language of Game Studies: Beyond the Dichotomy of "game" and "play" (Broacasting our studies)

English-speaking literature currently dominates game and play studies. French-speaking researchers must necessarily read and write in English to study them. In the first chapter of such an approach, it is often mentioned that "play" refers to activity and "game" to the artefact. But there are subtleties that quickly undermine such a dichotomy. In this article, we propose a correspondence table between 18 items to help French-speaking researchers better understand English [...]

Keywords : game studies, game, play, activity, artefact, gameplay, translation

---

Design of serious gaming devices and experiences (Broacasting our studies)

Abstract : This thesis begins by questioning the legitimacy and durability of the serious game. For this, we propose to explore both Serious Game and Serious Play. Indeed, the association of Game Studies and Play Studies is, in our opinion, a complementary and necessary approach to hope to conduct such analysis. These aspects specified, this thesis explores the possibility of using game to assign to it utilitarian objectives. The concepts of Serious Gaming, Serious Game design, Gamification [...]

Keywords : Gamification, Game Based Learning, Serious Game, Serious Gaming, Serious Play, Serious Playing, Ludopedagogy, Ungamification

---

Supporting Collaborative Serious Game Studies Online (Broacasting our studies)

AbstractWhile a lot of papers have argued for the educational potential of serious games, the field is still young and methods and tools are needed in order to support effective and efficient design. The SG Studies Database is an instrument devised to allow sharing structured information about SGs. This information can be used by scholars and practitioners also to perform comparative analysis and identify components and modules that could be used in different games. The SG Studies database, whic [...]

Keywords : Personal Computing, Computers and Education, User Interfaces and Human Computer Interaction, Image Processing and Computer Vision, Artificial Intelligence (incl. Robotics), Software Engineering

---

Serious Gaming, Serious Modding and Serious Diverting? Are You Serious?! (Broacasting our studies)

In French-speaking research, the expression ‘serious gaming’ is used in English in order to refer to the practice of diverting videogames aimed at three new, functional purposes: the diffusion of message(s), training and data collection. ‘Serious games’ are thus distinguished from ‘serious gaming’: while the end result may appear similar (combining games with educational purposes), serious gaming applies new functions a posteriori. To highlig [...]

Keywords : Serious Gaming, Serious Game, Serious Modding, Serious Diverting

---

Viable Health Games: Elements for Success (Broacasting our studies)

The main purpose of this study is to identify the elements of children's health games that have a positive impact on children’s health. The investigation is done by evaluating previous health game studies concentrating on children and five health affairs (such as asthma, cancer, diabetes, nutrition and obesity). In order to do so, firstly the topic of children’s health games is explained through its roots, as it is an interdisciplinary topic pertinent with many other fields. For [...]

Keywords : Health games, Children

---

How geek kids get geek jobs: a cross-generational inquiry into digital play and young adults' careers in IT (Broacasting our studies)

From programming ‗home-brew‘ games, to modifying the content of existing commercial titles, digital gaming can be regarded as a potential gateway into more serious uses of computers; welcoming some while repelling others. The socio-demographic makeup of computer science, games development and related areas of work are of interest to feminist scholars of culture. In light of skills shortages, industry is also interested in increasing women and ethnic minorities‘ participation in [...]

Keywords : Games

---

User-Generated Video Gaming: Little Big Planet and Participatory Cultures in Italy (Broacasting our studies)

Digital technology users are growingly involved in what has been described as convergence culture or participatory cultures. In this context, a major role is played by user-generated content. This article focuses on the participatory practices related to Little Big Planet (LBP) 1, a PlayStation platform video game that encourages users to create and share their own gaming levels. Our theoretical framework refers both to convergence culture and to a specific perspective of game studies that focus [...]

Keywords : User-generated video gaming, Participatory cultures, PlayStation Network, Little Big Planet

---

The Game Design Reader - A Rules of Play Anthology (Book reference)

With nearly 1000 pages, this heavy book was baked for you by two of best videogames researchers. I gathers many articles that anyone serious about the study of games must (or at least should) have read. The articles gathers are quite different, ranging from scientific essays about the definition of videogames (Huinzingua, Caillois, Suits, etc.) to players gaming diaries and professional game developers postmortems (Valve Software on how they created Half-Life, Lucasart on their pioneering MMO &q [...]

Keywords : research, game studies, history, definition

---

Half-Real - Videogames between Real Rules and Fictional Worlds (Book reference)

A great videogame analysis book written by one of the founders of the scientific study of games: the ludology. In this book, Jesper Juul explores the connections between videogames and fictional worlds, and he highlights the special features of videogames when it comes to "tell stories." The first part of the book features an essay about the definitions of "games" and "video games" which were heavily quoted (both endorsed or criticized) by most of the following scie [...]

Keywords : ludology, game studies, fiction, definition

---