A thread on ZEN AND SLOW GAMES (MIT Press, 2026)

If you have a US mailing address, you can buy the book today with a hefty 30% discount! www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/798035... Use the code MITP30 for 30€ today (20/1). After that, READMIT20 will get you 20%. mitpress.mit.edu/discount-cod...

Slowness and reflectiveness have always been part of the video game medium. In "Zen and Slow Games," Víctor Navarro-Remesal challenges the dominant discourse by delving into the reflective modes of playfulness in video games. Available #OpenAccess: bit.ly/3Lh2r22 @vthewanderer.bsky.social

Veo que ya está disponible la charla que dimos Beatriz Pérez Zapata y yo en el último Bilbao International Games Conference (BIG), "Enseñar Historia del videojuego en tiempos de economía de la atención". Esperamos que os guste. www.youtube.com/watch?v=BPV1...

Here’s a friendly reminder about the conference we are running at the ITU in May: playingfutures.today Deadline for abstracts is February 16th, and the conference will take place May 20th to 22nd in Copenhagen. Look at our call for papers for more details: playingfutures.today/call-for-pap...

Our game is for Mario Party fans, algorithm please find them! Our game is for Boomerang Fu fans, algorithm please find them! Our game is for Party Animals fans, algorithm please find them! Our game is for Lego Party fans, algorithm please find them!

friends! acquaintances! help! i'm looking to hire a game designer (living in the Netherlands) to help build games in The Hidden Folks Universe, starting with a sequel to the indie hit game Hidden Folks. know someone who's a good fit? pls forward this, ty! hiddenfolks.com/job-opening/...

Making games is a LOT easier than getting eyeballs on them, lemme tell ya! Speaking of... our weird bird deckbuilder has a great new free playtest build out: 🦜 Daily flights! 🦩 Tutorial! 🦚 2 playstyles! 🦆 So… many… birds!!! Join us! Or tell a friend! store.steampowered.com/app/3473440/...

For my english-reading friends: if you want to know more about the really excellent programs for using games as part of civic literacy that Lucas Ramada is running in Barcelona, check this out! The booklet is available in English, and I think it's a must for library folks.

Hey! Que por fin se ha publicado en tres lenguas (Cat/Cas/ En) el nuevo librito de Ficció en Joc, el programa de mediación con juegos en bibliotecas públicas de la diputación de Barcelona. www.diba.cat/ca/web/bibli...

Compren este libro / Buy this book

Some good contenders for ‘father of indie games’ (‘indie’ as we understand it today, in its various senses) - Cly5m (seiklus) - Derek Yu (eternal daughter) - Charles Tumino (destruction carnival) - Kenta Cho (gunroar) - Jeff Minter (space giraffe) - Mark Overmars (game maker) - Jun’ya Ōta (touhou)

The Center for Digital Play (digitalplay.itu.dk) has a YouTube channel, and we've just published a ton of content! Seth Giddings (@sethgiddings.bsky.social) on Postdigital Playthings: www.youtube.com/watch?v=wAjE...

Stealworkers

I’m very excited to share my latest article, “Premiers to Pixels: The Discourse of Cinema Envy in 1990s Videogame Magazines”, now published in the Hollywood and Games special issue of Convergence, edited by Helen Stuckey and Angela Ndalianis. Open access: journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...

can't stop watching this clip of a tesla Optimus teleoperator taking his headset off before properly logging out the robot

En Octubre tuve la suerte y el honor de dar la charla inaugural en DIGRA España 2025 (y además en mi tierra!). Los vídeos de la conferencia están aquí: tv.uvigo.es/series/68fb2... Mi charla inaugural, que es una ficción especulativa sobre game studies año 2251, está aquí: tv.uvigo.es/video/68ff8e...

The Nobel Prize committee should announce the World Cup winner tomorrow

Please buy this game, support a good game studio, and show those moralist platforms that what games can do goes beyond their dulled understanding.

The Center for Digital Play at the IT University of Copenhagen is organizing a new conference: Playing Futures. The conference will take place from May 20th to 22nd at the IT University of Copenhagen. You can read more about it here: playingfutures.today

🚨 Creator Day is LIVE! 🚨 For the next 24 hours we are waiving our platform fee! Creators will get the most they can from each transaction. Support your favorite developers and check out over 15,000 projects participating in our Black Friday sale itch.io

Does anyone happen to have a copy of any of the games I've listed on my website as "released but no longer hosted"? (the bottom 14 www.smestorp.com)

CFP for a special issue of Eludamos. What are antifascist games? Proposal deadline is December 19. eludamos.org/index.php/el...

"Det er måske det mest indviklede og massive kulturprojekt nogensinde." ITU-professor @miguelsicart.bsky.social har talt med spilmediet Arkaden om det længe ventede spil Grand Theft Auto VI, der er omgæret af forventninger, mystik og kritik 👇 #dkgame #spildebat #dkkultur arkaden.dk/features/for...

Friends! On November 26th at 16:00, in Auditorium 3 at the ITU, we are hosting a talk by Dom Ford. The talk is titled Mytholudics. You can read about it here: digitalplay.itu.dk/event/dom-fo...

Inspired by some great discussion on Q-UP from @austinwalker.bsky.social, @notquitereal.bsky.social, @sylvibullet.bsky.social, @molleindustria.org and other folks, I wrote a short piece on the design inspiration for Q-UP and what developing the game meant to me stiknork.substack.com/p/qing-up-in...

Anybody can recommend a hosting service that runs on renewable energy; is outside of the US, the UK, or similar countries with a curious disregard for privacy; and it's affordable? I need to host a number of small things, mostly a static site and maybe some interactive-ish javascript things. Thanks!

new horror story about men, women, animals and appetites please read and repost medium.com/@leighalexan...

Friends! On November 19th at 16:00, in Auditorium 3 at the ITU, we are hosting a talk by Florence Smith Nicholls. The talk is titled How to be a video game archaeologist. You can read about it here: digitalplay.itu.dk/event/floren...

Friends! On November 11th at 16:00, in Auditorium 3 at the ITU, we are hosting a talk by Kevin Marín-Rubio. The talk is titled Play Utopia - Videogames for Critical Imagination in a Barcelona Youth Club. You can read about it here: digitalplay.itu.dk/event/kevin-...

For the past decade, I've been slowly cooking a small and humble book. Part (alternative) history, part analysis, and part social critique, this is a look at what games also are and have always been. ZEN AND SLOW GAMES Out 20/1/2026 by MIT Press mitpress.mit.edu/978026255356...

have you read my new story? 🔪 Part 2 releases next week medium.com/@leighalexan...

I’m going through airports all day and already running out of mobile data, so I’m missing all @roguelike.club. If you like games and play, don’t be like me! Tune in!

Recordatorio de que de hoy al viernes hay DiGRA España. Las charlas se pueden ver online: digraes2025.wordpress.com/programa/ Si andan por aquí, nos vemos! (Y sí, las charlas son en español. Como dijo Benito, you have now four months to learn it 😉

Just putting out into the aether that despite coming out in December 2024, Caves of Qud is eligible for a number of this year's awards that have November cutoffs, like the Game Awards

Amigos! La semana que viene estaré en Pontevedra participando en DiGRAES! (digraes2025.wordpress.com ). Tengo muchas ganas de conocer a más gente trabajando en game studies, y de presentar algo del trabajo nuevo que desarrollé durante mi año sabático. Nos vemos en Pontevedra la semana que viene!

Nuevo proyecto: los amigos de Arsgames me han invitado a reflexionar sobre derechos digitales y juego, y lo he hecho creado un jueguito (analógico y digital), y un ensayo. Lo podéis encontrar aquí: decidim.derechoaljuego.digital/processes/en... (english version follows)

Sending this #CfP out into the ether again #othernetworks Looking for #videogames #gamestudies #retrogames #artists #gamedev folks who would like to contribute a chapter for a book on "Games and Nostalgia for the Future" 📍 750 words abstract by Nov 3 Find the call and form here: shorturl.at/ValXq

2026 internships available in my team at The LEGO Group! Internships in Story, Ideation, Concept Model Design (ie, building with bricks), Prototyping (3D printing etc), Hardware (soldering and weird sensors!) Physical (springs and spinny things) Digital (code for doing stuff with bricks)

We made a new game. It’s called Q-UP. It’s a coin flipping eSport. There’s a free demo! store.steampowered.com/app/3730790/...

I'm starting a newsletter where I'll share my thoughts on game design and genre conventions, mostly from an ecocritical perspective. The first article, on why I think The Sims 2 makes for a great city building game, is up now: hugging-pixel-trees.ghost.io/levels-of-ab... #gamedesign #sims2

Currently liiiiiiive on Twitch playing @alphachar.bsky.social and @martinpi.bsky.social's Sparrow Warfare (badly) www.twitch.tv/yunitex

Dammit Zuckerberg! I thought I was the only one making ridiculous software!

After 4 years, Mind Diver @minddivergame.bsky.social , our deduction game set inside a mind, is launching in TWELVE DAYS! Each day before launch, I will share reflections about making and releasing a game in 2025! If you see this, plz repost, so I can join bsky for real 🙏 #gamedev #indiedev

We are making a game. It’s about rebellion. And birds.

Two of the best game makers out there are making a very cool game, and you should wishlist it and then buy it: store.steampowered.com/app/3473440/... (Sparrow Warfare, by Neon Aurelius)

New work! In Ridiculous Software, we want to make people feel better, one app at a time. That's why we've developed Chimney of Wisdom, our first mediation and breathing app. Control your breathing, and burn your worries away! Available on iOS right now: ridiculous.software/apps/chimney...

Time Flies, game of the year. Because existentialist poetry is actually really funny when it wants to. timeflies.buzz

As we all know the game industry is going through very turbulent times, unfortunately this has also affected several members of our collective. The silver lining is that one of the largest rooms in our coworking space in Berlin will be available from September 1st. More info in thread...

Another TV is Possible. Blippo+ arrives on Steam and Switch on September 23rd! Wishlist: blippo.plus/steam youtu.be/3f69DgOfBCU