The International Journal of Computer Game Research

Our Mission - To explore the rich cultural genre of games; to give scholars a peer-reviewed forum for their ideas and theories; to provide an academic channel for the ongoing discussions on games and gaming.

Game Studies is a non-profit, open-access, crossdisciplinary journal dedicated to games research, web-published several times a year at www.gamestudies.org.

Our primary focus is aesthetic, cultural and communicative aspects of computer games, but any previously unpublished article focused on games and gaming is welcome. Proposed articles should be jargon-free, and should attempt to shed new light on games, rather than simply use games as metaphor or illustration of some other theory or phenomenon.



Game Studies is published with the support of:

The Swedish Research Council (Vetenskapsrådet)

The Joint Committee for Nordic Research Councils for the Humanities and the Social Sciences

Blekinge Institute of Technology

IT University of Copenhagen

Lund University

If you would like to make a donation to the Game Studies Foundation, which is a non-profit foundation established for the purpose of ensuring continuous publication of Game Studies, please contact the Editor-in-Chief or send an email to: foundation at gamestudies dot org
Playing with the Dead: Dead Pools and the case of Fantamorto

by Stefano Gualeni

This article is about how games engage the dead, from honoring them to commodifying them. It focuses on the understudied genre of “dead pool games,” tracing its history and addressing ethical concerns, and provides a detailed analysis of Fantamorto to show how these games treat death and suffering as ludic resources. [more]
What is the Form of Play? Ludic Form and the Development of Movement in Virtual Space

by Christopher Lukman

This article elucidates the form of play through a comparison to the form of music. After drawing from some concepts from musical from analysis, it analyzes the gameplay of OlliOlli World to suggest a formal analysis of action games, revolving around the development of movement in virtual space. [more]
Wasting Time: Human Idleness and Durational Mechanics in Idle Games

by Liam Mullally

This article explores the intervention of idle games into idle (non-productive) time. Such games mobilise a durational mechanics -- a play with time -- disrupting free and work time alike. Some idle games render idle time productive via monetization, removing its radical character; others affirm long, anti-productive idle durations. [more]
The Ludic Unconscious: Towards a Symptomatic Reading of Play and Narrative in Watch Dogs 2

by Vladimir Rizov

This article argues that videogames are necessary objects of ideological critique. Drawing on Althusser and Jameson, it proposes the concept of the “ludic unconscious,” where gameplay mechanics and narrative intersect. Through Watch Dogs 2, it analyzes surveillance, ideology, technology, race and the military- industrial complex. [more]
Neoliberal Space and Deleuzian Perception: The Schizophrenic Gaze of Cruelty Squad

by Maxim Tvorun-Dunn

This article examines Ville Kallio's 2021 game Cruelty Squad as a ludic representation of the "schizophrenic" perception articulated in Deleuze and Guattari's Anti-Oedipus. [more]

 

©2001 - 2026 Game Studies Copyright for articles published in this journal is retained by the journal, except for the right to republish in printed paper publications, which belongs to the authors, but with first publication rights granted to the journal. By virtue of their appearance in this open access journal, articles are free to use, with proper attribution, in educational and other non-commercial settings.