The Game Grid

Conference to be held in Athens, Greece, on April 6th-9th 2011. From the call: "Accepted papers will have a clear focus on philosophy and philosophical issues in relation to computer games. They will also attempt to use specific examples rather than merely invoke "computer games" in general terms. The over-arching theme of the conference is Player Identity. Papers are encouraged to explore one of the following topics and invited speakers will focus on this area. On the other hand, this is not the sole domain the conference will cover and submissions dealing with other relevant aspects of game philosophy are also welcome."

The lovely folks at the National Endowment of the Arts, the US government body that awards grants to arts institutions and individual artists, have just expanded the categories of art it considers to include "media platforms such as... digital games", along with other Internet-driven mediums. As one of the country's most prominent arts organizations (taxpayer-funded, no less), this represents a huge milestone in the mainstream acknowledgement of games and other interactive media as art. It's part of the Arts in Media awards, with grants ranging from $10,000 to $200,000, with an application deadline of September 1. (Go here for all the details.)

Article by Chris Chesher analyzing player relationships to console games; key term/concept is "glaze", which results from combining (theoretically) "gaze" and "glance" as modalities for relating to cinema and tv screens...

For more on ten Bosch and Miegakure, see last summer's feature on Kotaku.

"Ian Bogost, an associate professor in Georgia Tech's School of Literature, Communication and Culture who studies video games, puts it simply: "If you want to study things, you have to have them."

Marc ten Bosch's upcoming platform puzzler, Miegakure, will require the player to operate in four dimensions. In this post, he explains the difference between attempting to rotate a 3D object vs. a 4D object. Examples of code included.

Hugh Pickens writes "Portland, Oregon will be the first city to use IBM's new software called Systems Dynamics for Smarter Cities, containing 3,000 equations which collectively seek to model cities' emergent behavior and help them figure out how policy can affect the lives of their citizens. The pro...

CastleVille may be the newest "Ville" game in Zynga's lineup, but it is a game all its own, thanks to its living world and MMORPG (massive multiplayer online role playing game) elements. The game, which is making its debut Friday on Facebook, brings many of the traditional elements that have turned FarmVille and CityVille into multi-billion dollar successes, including city building, exploration, self expression and playing with friends. However, the game also boasts some gaming aspects that have popularized MMORGPs such as World of Warcraft, including player customization, an enhanced reputation system and a trade system that will roll out in the coming weeks.

"The future of games culture: I can see a time where we sell tickets to stories, ones that are told through the written word, film, games and theatre to various degrees. I would love to be in a violent shipwreck as part of an immersive experience and then go home and play a survival horror game continuing that story."

Transmogrification isn't just for making your character pretty or wearing old sets. Where's the fun in that? There are thousands of pieces to choose from for your look, and there's no reason you can't make it a distinctive one -- paying homage to video games or popular comics is just as much fun as being pretty.

Upcoming colloquium by the good folks at Washington. From the CFP: Send a brief abstract or rationale (500 words or less) for your presentation to critgame@uw.edu by 5 PM on Friday, April 6, 2012. Colloquium sessions will be roundtable, discussion format organized around short programs (6-8 "lightning" talk presenters) or long programs (1-3 presenters or extended performance or demonstration). Short program presentations should be less than 5 minutes to allow for question and answer and conversation. These should not be conference paper style presentations, but rather provide introductions, provocations, or focused interventions into your work, your project, or your idea.

"Games provide a framework for bringing together the strengths of computers and humans. The results in this week's paper show that gaming, science and computation can be combined to make advances that were not possible before."

Microsoft today embraced the gamification trend by introducing a new plug-in for its Visual Studio development program that will let software developers unlock achievements, receive badges and work their way up a leaderboard based on the code they write.

"Think gamification is amateur and doesn't belong in the workplace? You might be surprised to find some recent reports and analysts will disagree. "

Mark Sample writes: "The Jewel of the Valleys, a Civil War-based alternate reality game that will launch in May. Hosted by the National Civil War Museum in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, The Jewel of the Valleys seeks to link history and technology." He's got some good questions at the end of the post. Will be interesting to see how it plays out.

I'm quickly building up systemic resistance to the word 'gamification'. Nonetheless, this is a quick and interesting postmortem from Danc, who helped turn learning MS Office into a game.

"This acknowledges that film, TV and games can stand side by side and be independently recognized," said Steve Schnur, Worldwide Executive, Music, Electronic Arts. "Hopefully, this will create an even playing field when people vote next year. I expect there to be a tidal wave of submissions from the game industry."