Updates (28 Nov. 2011)

We can now announce the conference keynote names, plus names of the paper theme chairs (below):

• Nick Montfort is associate professor of digital media at MIT and president of the Electronic Literature Organization. He develops text generators and interactive fiction and has participated in dozens of literary and academic collaborations. Montfort co-edited The New Media Reader and The Electronic Literature Collection Volume 1 and wrote Twisty Little Passages: An Approach to Interactive Fiction, Racing the Beam: The Atari Video Computer System (with Ian Bogost), and Riddle & Bind. His next book, 10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10, is a collaboration with nine other authors about a one-line Commodore 64 BASIC program.
• Kristine Jørgensen is associate professor in media studies at the University of Bergen. She has published articles on game sound, the user interface in games, the player role, games research methods, the Norwegian game industry, and game narratives. She is the author of A Comprehensive Study of Sound in Computer Games, and is currently writing a book on game user interfaces.
• Espen Aarseth is principal researcher at the Center for Computer Games Research, IT University of Copenhagen, and adjunct professor at the Department of Media and Communication, University of Oslo. He is also co-founding Editor-in-Chief of the journal Game Studies, founder of the Digital Arts and Culture conference series, and co-founder of the Philosophy of Computer Games conference series, and author of Cybertext: Perspectives on Ergodic Literature (Johns Hopkins UP 1997), a comparative media theory of games and other aesthetic forms.

Overview

The study of games, players and related phenomena has expanded strongly both in its academic as well as in geographical range during the last decade. The DiGRA Nordic 2012 conference aims bring together Nordic and non-Nordic games researchers to discuss the cultural and social context of games and play from multiple perspectives, including reflections of local and global in game cultures. Year 2012 is the tenth anniversary of the Tampere Computer Games and Digital Cultures (CGDC 2002) conference, providing also an opportunity to reflect on the last decade of developments in Nordic game studies, as well as its wider international scope. The conference will be open to themes related to non-digital, as well as digital games and their different forms of play.

Suggested themes and theme chairs

The conference has dedicated Theme Chairs who head the selection submissions as the meta-reviewers for the key themes in the conference:

• local/global in game cultures (Chair: Thorsten Quandt)
• historical perspectives into digital gaming (Chair: Melanie Swalwell)
• social player studies (Chair: Torill Mortensen)
• games industry (Chair: Mirva Peltoniemi)
• design of games (Chair: Annika Waern)
• gamification and gameful design (Chair: Sebastian Deterling)
• gambling vs. gaming studies (Chair: Pauliina Raento) – Note: there will be also special program on this theme, with a separate call of its own!
• games as art (Chair: Simon Niedenthal)
• critical approaches to game studies (Chair: Jonas Linderoth)
• games as media and communication (Chair: Marko Siitonen)
• other (the conference submissions are not limited to the above themes)

Submission format and review process

The conference accepts full paper submissions, which will be handled in anonymous peer review. There are Theme Chairs who oversee the reviews in specific paper categories. There will be online publication of accepted papers in the DiGRA Digital Library. The conference submission format will be same as in DiGRA 2011 – you can download the paper template from here: http://gamesconference.hku.nl/howtosubmit.php. The maximum length is 7000 words, including references, notes etc.

Organisers

The conference will be hosted jointly by the Finnish DiGRA chapter, coordinated by Dr Olli Sotamaa and the Creation of Game Cultures research project, coordinated by professor Frans Mäyrä. Assisted by the review board and local organising team, the main organisers are:

• Review Chair: professor Raine Koskimaa
• Program Chair: professor Jaakko Suominen
• Local Chair: professor Frans Mäyrä

Venue

The conference will take place in Tampere, Finland, and will be jointly hosted by Universities of Tampere, Jyväskylä and Turku. The modern facilities of the new Technopolis building and the University of Tampere campus provide the venue for plenary keynote sessions and paper sessions in parallel rooms. There will be also social and other program available during the event.

Dates

• deadline for full papers, panels and alternative forms: 13 February 2012
• authors are informed of review: 2 April 2012
• final paper submission deadline: 7 May 2012
• conference dates: 6-8 June 2012

Contact details

You can find more, up-to-date information in later in this website. The email contact address for the organising team is: digranordic2012 [at] gmail.com. For more information about other Nordic DiGRA activities, go to: http://www.nordic-digra.org/

Welcome to Tampere!