(readings either have links to open resources or the GC library proxy, or they are in the Library section of our Commons Group in .pdf.
8/29 Introduction, requirements, assignments (remote/async)
- Commons onboarding
- Review of course themes and assignment structure
- self-introductions via Padlet: completion will constitute "attendence" so please respond in this space by the end of the week.
9/5 What is Play? A brief intro to “play theory”
readings/in class
- Ian Bogost, from Play Anything (2016), ch1
- Johan Huizinga, from Homo Ludens (1938)
- Roger Caillois, from Man, Play, and Games (1958)
- Lewis Carroll, Alice in Wonderland (get as far as you can, but lower priority than the above: feel free to grab a free open-source edition like Project Gutenberg's for convenience.
work due
- Blog Post #1: Apply one or more of the theorizations of play that we've read to a game or other instance of play in your life. You might consider how play practices inscribe a "magic circle" that seems to exist outside of ordinary time and space per Huizinga, you might explore the structuralist divisions of Caillois's work to specify the particular balance of play modes in your example, or you might consider more holistically, per Bogost's work, how play enhances, or might enhance, aspects of your life. Posts should be 500-800 words and fairly informal but should reference (a) specific reading/s.
9/12 Play theory II
readings/in class:
- From Upton, The Aesthetics of Play
- Zimmerman’s “Manifesto for a Ludic Century”
- Finish Alice
- Organize Group Project
work due:
9/19 Magical Play: play as (re)enchantment
readings/in class:
- Murray, from Hamlet on the Holodeck
- examples (and note changes from original schedule):
- Serge Bouchardon, et al. Loss of Control
- Montfort and Strickland, The Sea and Spar Between: I highly recommend that you peruse the heavily annotated code for the project here as well.
- Browse the many examples of enchanting play devised by the Surrealists (including Caillois) in the interwar period and come prepared to talk about one of them (and/or demonstrate it) with peers. The entire volume is in our LIBRARY under "Gooding," the editor.
work due:
- Presentation #1
9/26 Magical Play II
readings/in class:
- McGonigal, from Reality is Broken (Intro + ch. 7)
- Bogost, "The Squalid Grace of Flappy Bird"
- examples:
- Pippin Barr: The Nothings Suite and, if you appreciate the strange sensibility, check out b r 3, a "gallery" of artists' depictions of water using the minimalist bitsy game engine
- Larsen, The Pines at Walden Pond
- note: until several hours before class time, I'd not realized that Larsen had moved the project to her personal domain since August! So sorry, but the link works now.
- Shelley Jackson, Snow
- note: need Instagram account. I understand if that's a bridge too far!
work due:
- Presentation #2
10/10 Managerial Play: play as discipline
readings/in class:
- Whitson, "Foucault's Fitbit: Governance and Gamification"
- Wark, "Losing is Fun"
- optional:
- Walz and Detterding, from The Gameful World
- Bogost, "Why Gamification is Bullshit"
work due:
- Presentation #3
- Group Project #1 due, including blog post #2: reflection on Group Project. See Project page for prompt.
10/17 Managerial Play II
readings/in class:
- Sicart, “Playing The Good Life”
-
Zuboff, from The Age of Surveillance Capitalism
- examples: Pippin Barr, Let's Play-Ancient Greek Punishment-UI Edition and It Is As If You Were Doing Work
work due:
- Blog post #3: Explore a "gamified" or otherwise disciplined/administered online environment and describe as thickly as possible the various ways the interface disciplines users (in the Foucaultian terms of Whitmore), affords expressive or appropriative pursuit of the "good life" (Sicart), or engages in extraction of "behavioral surplus" (Zuboff). What are the pleasures and pitfalls of this modality of "gameful work/life"? Possible examples: Ed Tech platforms like Code Academy, Khan Academy, or Duolingo, shopping interfaces, or the classic "surveillance capitalist" examples of Zuboff's discourse, like Google/Pokemon Go, Facebook/Meta, etc.
- Presentation #4
10/24 Rhetorical Play: play as persuasion
readings/in class:
- Bogost, from Persuasive Games
- Hayles, from Electronic Literature
- examples
- Sarah Gailey, Stet
- Shelley Jackson, Wunderkammer
- Priscilla Snow, the relief of impact
- Quinn, Lindsey, Shankler, Depression Quest
work due:
- Blog post #4: open prompt. Write about any of the pieces from this or last week…
- Presentation #5
10/31 Rhetorical Play II
readings/in class:
- Sutton-Smith, from The Ambiguity of Play
- Montfort, from Twisty Little Passages
- optional but interesting: Jagoda, from Experimental Games (in EXTRA+USEFUL)
- examples
- noodle around in Adventure/Colossal Cave per Montfort's reading
- Uncle Buddy’s Funhouse1990s Mac hypercard fiction
- this site gives some useful context and another instance of the novel via emulation
- Sample, 10 lost boys
- You are Jeff Bezos (in Dropbox > games)
- Nicky Case’s games
- Destory History
work due:
- Presentation #6
11/7 Radical Play: play as resistance/subversion
readings/in class:
- Flanagan, from Critical Play (intro + Ch. 6, "Locative Games")
- examples:
- Montfort and Gillespie’s 2002 (2002)
- Zolf, Human Resources
- Goldsmith, (Day) and No Such Thing as Writer’s Block
- Sample, Ring Log
work due:
- Proposal for Final Project Due
- Presentation #7
11/14 --Radical Play II-- [canceled due to Prof illness]
11/21 Radical Play II:
readings/in class:
- Boluk+LeMieux, from Metagaming
- Samuels and McGann, "Deformance and Interpretation"
- examples:
- Metagames from Lemieux/Boluk's experimentation: poke around!
- Ivanhoe examples:
- note: "reading" the games is a bit hard to do. To get some sense of the way the play unfolds in a given game, scroll to the end and read to the top. You might also explore the character sheets, the splash pages, the "journal" entries, etc.
work due:
- Presentation #8
12/5 Guest Speakers: Joshua Pulsifer and Benjamin Warfield, ZIPIT! Games
readings/in class:
- Anable, "Introduction" to Playing With Feelings (2018)
- Henry Jenkins, "Game Design as Narrative Architecture"]
- OPTIONAL: episode of Games Studies Study Buddies podcast on Mukerjee's 2015 book, Video Games and Storytelling
stuff to play with:
- ZIPIT! demo, "The Wide Sky is Running Out of Catfish!" [requires download + Windows]
- for those without Windows, see the high points via YouTube
work due:
- optional submission of draft or intro or piece of final project due
12/12 Wrapping up
work due:
- Wrap-up and reflection
- Brief presentations (3 mins) on final projects
- Final projects due on 12/19
