Playing at Leadership: Games, Gaming, & Leadership Studies
"Reality, unlike games, is broken." – Jane McGonigal
So I know I don’t post here a lot anymore, but today’s level of ridiculous is just that, so I feel like this is worth posting. Even if GamerGate ended back in 2016, more or less, as Breitbart writers and … Read More »
Today I finally got a chance to look over the ESA demographics report for 2015, and noticed that–quite to my surprise–the percentage of women gamers has actually gone down for the first time in many, many years. In 2014, the … Read More »
Like many other feminist scholars in games, when I saw the photos of the go-go dancers at a Microsoft after-party (thrown following a “Women in Gaming Luncheon”) I rolled my eyes, sighed, and thought “of course they did.” It’s a … Read More »
This semester has been kicking my a** in terms of work and grading and committee meetings, so I have been horribly remiss about keeping this blog up to date on other things (like TLF and NPC Gamer), much less containing … Read More »
There are two things I frequently see in arguments against diversity in games (and other media, but especially in games) which are worth noting because of the spectacular way in which they completely miss the ideological boat about which the … Read More »
In my other life (the one where I’m a Shakespeare scholar), I’ve been doing research on early modern witchcraft, and–this week–on the witch-hunts which ran roughshod over Europe during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. In the process, I came to … Read More »
This year (2016) has essentially started out like a sucker punch for those of us who are fans of pop culture. This week has seen the deaths of two of the men whose work in pop culture was formative for … Read More »
Over the years, the gaming phenomenon known as the Penny Arcade Expo–PAX–has become increasingly popular. Now, there are five PAXes: PAX Prime, PAX East, PAX South, PAX Dev, and PAX Aus. I have been to PAX East several times over … Read More »
So as last week’s SXSW “scandal” unfolded, I had a few thoughts about it. As it kept unfolding, I had a few more. They’re over on TLF.
It’s October of 2015, we’re starting to wind down the year (amid pumpkin spice EVERYTHING), and this is something I’ve been contemplating for a couple of months now. It’s something I think has a lot of potential, and it’s something … Read More »
Most gamers are more than familiar with the concept of DLC, or Down-Loadable Content. DLC is a thing that more and more games have, sometimes in the form of “add-on” content such as new weapon sets, alternate clothing sets, or … Read More »
A few days back, Brianna Wu and Ellen McGrody published a piece on The Mary Sue which argues that Samus Aran is a trans woman, and it has since spawned any number of rants, thinkpieces, and toxic screeds which either … Read More »
It’s 2015. Two years ago, Chris Ferguson spearheaded a movement among game developers and academics calling for the APA (that’s the American Psychological Association) to review its statement (from 2000) that violent videogames were a cause of increased aggression in … Read More »
This post is going to address the question of ethics in games writing. Really address it, though, not sealion my way around true problems by waving flags or pointing fingers. This is a problem that isn’t specific to games journalism, … Read More »
Last year, I was lucky enough to be a call-in guest on the Kojo Nnamdi Show on WAMU out of DC, talking about diversity in games. Yesterday, I got to do it again, but since it’s summer, I was able … Read More »