Players’ Realm: Studies on the Culture of Videogames and Gaming
A gaming research volume edited by Patrick Williams and Jonas Heide Smith

The Players’ Realm anthology was published in March 2007 by McFarland Press.

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Every year in this millennium, the video and computer game industry has generated billions of dollars in annual retail sales. Social tension within game worlds is drawing headlines in major newspapers and economists and lawyers are deeply engaged in debates over virtual economies and the legal status of game worlds. Yet, to date very few research volumes have focused explicitly on the social aspects of gaming.

We have put together an edited volume of academic work that investigates video gaming cultures from a series of inter-related perspectives.

The book is a collection of original research that investigates the relationship between games, players, and larger social processes. Chapters vary across social science disciplines, but share a common emphasis on the cultural aspects of gaming.

Please address inquiries to Patrick Williams (subzon@uga.edu) or Jonas Heide Smith (smith@itu.dk)

PRELIMINARY TABLE OF CONTENTS

Introduction to the edited volume (J. Patrick Williams, Jonas Heide Smith)

Section 1: Social Engineering and Authorship

Who Governs the Gamers? Political Power in Large Game Worlds (Jonas Heide Smith, Ph.D., IT University of Copenhagen, Denmark)

The Player’s Journey (Mirjam Eladhari, Ph.D. Candidate, Gotland University, Sweden)

Systems of Justice in MOOs, MUCKs, and MUSHs (Mel White, M.A. University of North Texas, U.S.A.)

Section 2: Ideologies and Discourses

The Rhetorics of Video and Computer Game Research (Lars Konzack, Ph.D. Aalborg University, Denmark)

From Margin to Center: Biographies of Technicity and the Construction of Hegemonic Games Culture (Jon Dovey, Ph.D., University of Bristol, U.K. & Helen W. Kennedy, Ph.D., University of the West of England, U.K.)

Terms of Service, Terms of Play in Children’s Online Gaming (Sara M. Grimes, Simon Fraser University, Canada)

From The Green Berets to America’s Army: Video-games as a Vehicle for Political Propaganda (Aaron Delwiche, Ph.D., Trinity University, U.S.A.)

Ghost Recon—Island Thunder: Cuba in the Virtual Battlescape (Rafael Miguel Montes, St. Thomas University)

Section 3: Games and Players

From Dollhouse to Metaverse: What Happened When The Sims Went Online (Mia Consalvo, Ph.D., Ohio University, U.S.A.)

Console Wars: Console and Computer Games (Laurie Taylor, Ph.D. Candidate, University of Florida , U.S.A.)

Desire for Commodities and Fantastic Consumption in Digital Games (Mike Molesworth and Janice Denegri-Knott, Bournemouth University , U.K.)

Section 4: Cultures and Communities

Narrative Power in Virtual Worlds: The Story of Cybertown (Nadezhda Kaneva, Ph.D. candidate, University of Colorado, Boulder, U.S.A.)

Mutual Fantasy Online: Playing with People (Torill Mortensen, D.Art., Department of Media Studies, Volda University College , Norway)

Mapping independent game design (Jason Wilson, Ph.D. Candidate, Griffith University , Australia)

Interactive Fiction: The Social Construction of Narrative-based Communities (Dan Keller, M.A., Department of English, University of Louisville , U.S.A.)