[game_edu] CFP's

[S. Gold]

Under the Mask: Perspectives on the Gamer

Research Institute for Media Art and Design
University of Bedfordshire
Luton
June 7th 2008

Which ever title you select, ‘Consumer’, ‘Audience’,‘Receiver’, Player’,
‘Operator’, or ‘Gamer’, the fundamental issues remain the same in
videogames: who and what is the Operator? What role do Gamers play within
their communities or within their cultures? How do Players situate
themselves in a competitive or casual environment and make sense of the game
in light of genre, reception and history? How is the game used, culturally,
socially and psychologically?

This conference aims to address the issues that surround the Player of
videogames as contributor and consumer of specific cultures, not only
through presentation and discussion, but also through actively engaging with
games and Gamers. The President of DiGRA, Professor Tanya Krzywinska, will
provide the keynote.

A number of Professional Gamers are attending the conference to demonstrate
their expertise and share their experiences, whilst throughout the day
competitions will be held on the various formats available, with a variety
of game hardware and software prizes on offer. In creating such an
environment, the organizers hope that the participants will able to explore
the sociological, psychological, and ludological issues in a game-playing
context.
These include:

•    What takes place between Player and screen?
•    Do original control interfaces (Guitar Hero, Dance Dance Revolution,
Nintendo Wii, mobile games et cetera) adjust social behaviour?
•    Does genre affect social participation and reception and in particular
the positioning of the Operator?
•    What role does gender play in multiplayer gaming?
•    Are there consequences of play for Gamers, psychologically and
socially? 

Also of interest is the notion of the ‘fan’ in games: fiction, art,
walkthroughs, and game interpretations -
what do these communities have to say on the place of the Player within
their communal/cultural hierarchy?

Call for papers:

•    New methodologies or adapted methodologies for studying the Gamer;
•    Case studies of Players interacting with novel control interfaces;
•    Case studies of Players in social settings;
•    Case studies of the relationship between gender and games;
•    Case studies of Players in competitive/professional settings;
•    Approaches to gamers and gamers in the light of Psychoanalysis and
Analytical Psychology;
•    Studies on Methodologies for genre;
•    The role of competition and casual and or social gaming within game
culture and
•    Fan fiction and Fan Art.

Topics may include: sport simulations, racing games, first-person shooters,
performance games (Dance, Dance Revolution, Guitar Hero etc), mobile games,
original control hardware, sociological methodologies (adapted and new),
audience reception, gender studies, psychoanalysis/analytical psychology,
behavioural case studies, professional gaming, competitive gaming, social
gaming, ‘girl’ games, game art, fan fiction, fan art, and so on.

Abstracts of 250 words, accompanied by contact details and a brief biography
to be received by the 30th of
March to: gamer at beds.ac.uk

Conference proceedings for ‘Under the Mask:
Perspectives on the Gamer’ are currently being considered, with a selection
of British publishers showing strong interest in using the conference to
instigate a bi-annual journal focusing upon the question of the ‘Gamer’.

'Convergence: the International Journal of Research into New Media
Technologies' welcomes submissions of full papers on games and gamers from
conference participants. The next submissions deadline for an open issue of
the journal is the 30th of November 2008. See
http://www.beds.ac.uk/convergence

Conference Organizers

Prof Luke Hockley
Dr Gavin Stewart
Steven Conway

Contact Details
C/o Dr Gavin Stewart
Rm C101?School of Media, Art & Design?
University of Bedfordshire?
Park Square?
Luton 
LU1 3JU

For further information, please go to:
http://www.beds.ac.uk/research/rimad/underthemask


********************************************************************
***             Mobile Gaming '08                 ***
***       Workshop @ Informatik 2008 in Munich        ***
***     http://sam.iai.uni-bonn.de/mobile-gaming/       ***
********************************************************************


OVERVIEW

Mobile Games rely on physical movement of players in a world that weaves the
real environment and  virtual dimensions together. They combine two gaming
traditions in a novel way, which have been mutual exclusive till now:
outdoor games and computer games.

Game design is facing new challenges. Currently only few games exploit the
potential, which is offered by  augmented and mixed
reality, global networking, location-awareness and sensors. Theory and
methodology to  survey mobile gaming experiences are far from maturity.  The
question is, how to understand mobility and physical movement within mixed
game worlds? How to study gaming experiences of mobile players, who are
moving independently through urban space? What are the roles of the player's
community and its culture for  playing games?

Development and design of mobile games are challenging us with core issues
of ubiquitous computing, the complexity of mobile, distributed systems, the
particular dynamics of game situations and the changing contexts,  the
diversity of actors, using the technology, and the issues of interaction
beyond the desk, encompassing the  player¹s body, multiple human senses and
diverse usage  modes. The diversification of hard- and software leads to
additional challenges regarding interoperability and calls for flexible
frameworks supporting the integration.

This workshop aims to increase the perception of mobile gaming as a rich
domain for research in many directions in the German-speaking science and
market area. We invite researchers and developers to exchange their
experiences, identify urging research issues and to look for ways how to
exploit and enhance the basic conditions for research in this domain.


TOPICS OF INTEREST

We invite technical papers and position statements
to be submitted to the workshop. The workshop
topics include, but are not limited to:

Experience and design of mobile games:
€ mobile gaming experience and gaming activities
€ physical movement in mixed reality settings and embodied interaction
€ mobile games in everyday life: the magic circle of play and its
spatial, temporal and social expansions
€ reinterpretation of traditional games as digital mobile games
€ mobile edutainment - the didactical potential of mobile games
€ serious games: teaching complex processes based on pervasive technology
€ mobile gaming as testbed for business cases

Technical challenges of mobile games:
€ augmented and mixed reality in mobile games
€ gaming context: predictable and unforeseeable context dimensions
€ user interfaces for mobile games
€ graspable interaction: sensors and actors in mobile games
€ technologies for location-awareness and positioning
€ recording and replayability of mobile games
€ supporting the large variety of hard- and software systems: problems and
solutions
€ using technological limitations creatively



DATES AND DEADLINES

Paper submission: April 28, 2008
Notification of authors: June 2, 2008
Camera ready version due: July 1, 2008
Workshop Mobile Gaming '08: September 9, 2008

FORM OF SUBMISSION

The workshop aims to offer a forum for presentation and  discussion of new
research results. It focuses on mobile games and further applications with a
playful character. Location, other context, and mobility of users should be
basic design aspects of the considered applications.

Submissions might be written in German or English and should not exceed six
pages. Format must obey the LNI standard. Details about LNI as well as
templates for Word and LaTex are available on the workshop's website.

Since printing will be black and white authors should be careful when using
colored images or diagrams.


PUBLICATION

Accepted papers will be included in the Workshop Proceedings of Informatik
2008. The proceedings will be published by the Gesellschaft für Informatik
(GI).


ORGANIZERS

The workshop is jointly organized by:
Pascal Bihler, Universität Bonn
Barbara Grüter, Hochschule Bremen
Irma Lindt, Fraunhofer FIT, St. Augustin
Holger Mügge, Universität Bonn


PROGRAM COMMITTEE

€ Linda Breitlauch, MediaDesign Hochschule Düsseldorf
€ Wolfgang Broll, Fraunhofer FIT, St. Augustin
€ Armin B. Cremers, Universität Bonn
€ Jürgen Fritz, Fachhochschule Köln
€ Julian Kücklich, University of Ulster
€ Peter Möckel, Deutsche Telekom Laboratories, Berlin
€ Stefan Müller, Universität Koblenz
€ Albrecht Schmidt, Universität Duisburg-Essen
€ Clemens Türck, Ravensburger Spieleverlag, Ravensburg
€ Steffen Walz, ETH Zürich


CONTACT DETAILS

Workshop web page: http://sam.iai.uni-bonn.de/mobile-gaming Please contact
the organizer Pascal Bihler, email: bihler at iai.uni-
bonn.de

------------------------------------------------------------------------
------------------
Prof. Dr. Barbara M. Grüter
grueter at informatik.hs-bremen.de

Hochschule Bremen University of Applied Sciences
Center for Informatics and Media Technology
Flughafenallee 10, Raum 219, D-28199 Bremen
Fon: +49-4 21-59 05-5486, Fax: +49-4 21-59 05-5484
-- 
Susan Gold
goldfile at gmail.com

³In a completely sane world, madness is the only freedom!² - J. G. Ballard

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://seven.pairlist.net/pipermail/game_edu/attachments/20080305/131e67d5/attachment.html>