What is (Dutch) Game Research? – Part 1
Is there a specific Dutch identity to the game research conducted in the Netherland? Or at the UU? Part 1 of a series of articles exploring this key question.
Meet the Makers: Roos Groothuizen
The Transmission in Motion research group is organizing another Meet the Maker event, this time focusing on media artist Roos Groothuizen who works primarily with playful media.
Article: Digital literacy games: a systematic literature review
Frontiers in Communication journal has published the open access article “Digital literacy games: a systematic literature review”, authored by the team behind the Digital Literacy Games KIEM GO-CI grant project, a collaboration between Erasmus University and Utrecht University.
Research Projects
>> All Research ProjectsComenius - Fostering an Open Mind
Making Game Studies’ Research Practical with Discursive Game Design
Co-creation of games, participatory design, open dialogue, and social perspective-taking currently lie at the centre of game research at Utrecht University. All these practices are characteristic of Discursive Game Design (DGD), a method that highlights the processes underlying practice-based game research, rather than a final "fixed" product.
- Education, News:
Open Mind game challenges to look further
- Events, Insights, News:
Taking Perspectives with Game Design: Teachers wanted for pilot!
ANTICIPLAY
Take a course, build a video game, change the world
Heads up UU students! Ever wondered what it would be like to build a video game to change the world? We have a few late registration spots left in our BSc course ‘The Sustainability Game’! This course is open to all 2nd and 3rd year Utrecht University students who have some previous interest and background
Shape2Gether - Erasmus+
Shape2gether: Sharing our knowledge about discursive game design
Last November Aengus, Isabel and Mick visited two conferences to share some of the outcomes of the Erasmus+ hape2gether project with a broader audience.
- Education, Events:
Shape2Gether: Experiencing the Bochum Summer School
- Events:
Shape2Gether – Time for Workshops
Virtual Reality as Empathy Machine
CFP: “VR as Empathy Machine: Media, Migration and the Humanitarian Predicament”
Book Title: Beyond the Empathy Machine: Critical Perspectives on Virtual Reality Editors: Professor Sandra Ponzanesi (s.ponzanesi@uu.nl), Dr. Jenny Andrine Madsen Evang (j.a.m.evang@uu.nl), Dr. Wouter Oomen (w.a.oomen@uu.nl), Laurence Herfs (l.l.herfs@uu.nl), and Lisa Burghardt (l.burghardt@uu.nl) Over the last decade or so, Virtual Reality (VR) has been honed as a new frontier in social tech. From Chris Milk and Gabo
- Events:
Week of the Game @ Utrecht University
- Education, Events, Publications:
History of Game Research at Utrecht University
Themes
>> All ThemesSocial Games and Play
Publication: Belongingness and Resistance in Platformed Play: Feminist Agency among Female Gamers in China
A new special issue of the Gamevironments journal on 'Beyond Play' was recently published and in it we find a contribution by UU PhD candidate Weijie Huang together with Payal Arora and Maya Yerkes.
Play Research
New minor “Games and Play in a Changing Society” open for registration
The new curriculum, which replaces the previous minor “Game Studies’, is a transdisciplinary collaboration between the Department of Media & Cultures studies (MCW), the Copernicus Institute of Sustainable Development and the Department of Information and Computing Sciences and enables students to analyze games and play in contemporary culture and to creatively apply them to address societal challenges.
- Insights, News:
Pinball Research at School
- Events:
Game Research @Dutch DiGRA 2024 Symposium
Games Beyond Entertainment
ASS POWER: Gaming at the Theatre
A review of Patrick Blenkarn and Milton Lim's 8 hour revolutionary donkey epic that sits between theatre and videogames. A collective gaming experience that will have you braying heeeee-haaaww while you contemplate issues of labor, automation, violence, and the good life.
- In the media, News:
Games-related treasures from De Schatkamer
- Insights:
Designing Social Interactions
Game Design
Making Game Studies’ Research Practical with Discursive Game Design
Co-creation of games, participatory design, open dialogue, and social perspective-taking currently lie at the centre of game research at Utrecht University. All these practices are characteristic of Discursive Game Design (DGD), a method that highlights the processes underlying practice-based game research, rather than a final "fixed" product.
- In the media, News:
All Will Rise – crowdfunding campaign now live!
- Education, Events:
Hybrid Franchise Hacking Workshop (Gamelab x Man Met)
Disciplines
>> All DisciplinesMedia and Culture Studies
Publication: Belongingness and Resistance in Platformed Play: Feminist Agency among Female Gamers in China
A new special issue of the Gamevironments journal on 'Beyond Play' was recently published and in it we find a contribution by UU PhD candidate Weijie Huang together with Payal Arora and Maya Yerkes.
Sociology
Book: Toys and Communication
A new edited volume has been published by Palgrave Macmillen titled Toys and Communication and edited by Luísa Magalhães and Jeffrey Goldstein.
Computer Sciences
New minor “Games and Play in a Changing Society” open for registration
The new curriculum, which replaces the previous minor “Game Studies’, is a transdisciplinary collaboration between the Department of Media & Cultures studies (MCW), the Copernicus Institute of Sustainable Development and the Department of Information and Computing Sciences and enables students to analyze games and play in contemporary culture and to creatively apply them to address societal challenges.
- Education, News:
Open Mind game challenges to look further
- Events, Insights, News:
Dutch DiGRA Symposium 2025: Futures for Game and Play Research.
Geosciences
Shape2gether: Sharing our knowledge about discursive game design
Last November Aengus, Isabel and Mick visited two conferences to share some of the outcomes of the Erasmus+ hape2gether project with a broader audience.
- Events, Insights, News:
Dutch DiGRA Symposium 2025: Futures for Game and Play Research.
- Education, Events:
Shape2Gether: Experiencing the Bochum Summer School