Format
Day 1:Introduction to the field by the organizers and presentations of selected research papers.
Day2: Hands-on workshop exploring game design methods and their effect on the industry and research. The workshop will be
conducted by the organisers.
Participation to both sessions will be free of charge. A more detailed
call for participation will be sent out separately in early 2004.
Themes
Paper submissions are invited that focus on game design, with a specific emphasis on theoretical and methodological aspects of design and/or how to develop and inform design practices via research methods and results. Papers and case studies that bridge the theory and practice are especially welcome.
Possible topics include, but are not limited to:
*What is, and do we need, game design research? There already are
usability, interaction, graphic, audio, user interface and architecture
design fields. How is (or isn’t) game design different from these fields?
What is the relationship to general design research and studies?
*Roles of game design: in-game (game interaction, character, theme, audio-visuals, level, social interaction etc.) and out-game (package and marketing, communities, mods, skins, fan-sites etc.). Different design processes and roles for different types of games. One person with a
vision vs. collective design of the end product
*What is the impact of game design on areas that are not explicitly games, for example, work processes, management & simulation environments, education, recruitment and other media? How can game design inform other areas of design?
*Game design methods: Are there any? Do we need any? How do we validate them?
*How are design ideas/practices communicated and documented? How is
game design theory combined with the practical task of writing design
treatments and documents? What is the relationship of research to the
industry?
*Designing for different audiences: Do, for example, gender, cultural differences and age matter in game design? What are the social responsibilities of the designer?
*Paradigmatic implications of game design: Playing games is a profoundly human activity, yet the aspect of creating them has (almost) evaded serious discussions across disciplines. What can the impact of game design be for aesthetics, rhetorics, philosophy of mind, politics,
ethics, sociology etc.?
*Relation between game design research and game studies? How can the study of how gameS are designed and how games are played affect each other?
Organisers
Staffan Björk, Interactive Institute, Sweden
Aki Järvinen, Veikkaus, The Finnish National Lottery, Finland
Jussi Holopainen, Nokia Research Center, Finland
Steffen P. Walz, University for Art, Media and Design Zurich (HGKZ),
Switzerland
Espen Aarseth, IT-University of Copenhagen, Denmark
Submission details
As selected papers are going to be published as a special issue of
Game Studies (http://www.gamestudies.orghttp://www.gamestudies.org), please follow the format and style guidelines at: http://www.gamestudies.org/about_submissions.htmlhttp://www.gamestudies.org/about_submissions.html
The selection of papers will be based on peer-reviews.
Deadlines
16.2.2004: Paper submissions by e-mail to Jussi Holopainen
mailto:jussi.holopainen@nokia.comjussi.holopainen@nokia.com
15.3.2004: Notification of acceptance and revision requests.
12.4.2004: Revised papers by e-mail to organizers.
Publications
The selected papers are going to be published as a special issue of
Game Studies. Selected authors are also invited to publish their paper in a forthcoming book on game design research.
For further information please contact Jussi Holopainen mailto:jussi.holopainen@nokia.comjussi.holopainen@nokia.com