A quick reminder that updates from us will be slow from here on out. We are unsure as to the future direction of the GI at this time, but we appreciate your support and patience at this time. Thank you.❤️‍🩹

It's podcast day!🎙️ ❤️‍🩹 Today, we're releasing the last episode of the GI Podcast for the foreseeable future. Our back catalogue will remain up on all major podcast platforms for you to enjoy. Catch episode 57: Discovering Rhetorical Figures with Citizen Science! open.spotify.com/episode/3Pcm...

The GI is undergoing changes. The budget cuts and hiring freeze have a direct impact on the level of our staffing and the services we provide. This will impact all our activities starting May 1 2025. uwaterloo.ca/games-instit...

Sad news. My first published piece of writing was at FPS. They were incredibly helpful in guiding me through the process and turning my essay into the best possible version it could be. Vanity link: www.firstpersonscholar.com/folk-music-r...

Sad to hear that First Person Scholar is ending. I had the honor of being EIC during my time as a PhD student at UW and it was an invaluable experience for my career. There is an absolute wealth of games studies knowledge on that site worth checking out. It will remain free to access.

First Person Scholar, the middle-state publication supported and published by the GI, is taking an indefinite hiatus due to a lack of resources. This includes funding cuts to the GI, but also a lack of game studies graduate students with enough funding to allow them time to work on FPS. #uwaterloo

🎉 New podcast episode! 🎉 👾 This week co-hosts Toben Racicot and S. Heeg sit down with postdoctoral researcher Dr. Eugene Kukshinov to discuss his interest in games, his research into social virtual reality, and how he fits into the world of human computer interaction as a media psychologist.

Emily Grace Buck has joined us for the LAST keynote address of #ICGAN2025 for her talk “I’m Batman: Centering Player Agency in Beloved IP.” #ICGAN25 #uwaterloo #thegamesinstitute #interdisciplinaryresearch #researchimpact

Check out the in-person crowd from Waterloo for Emily Grace Buck’s keynote address “I’m Batman: Centering Player Agency in Beloved IP”for #ICGAN2025! Including a very special visit from University of Waterloo’s own Charmaine Dean! #uwaterloo #thegamesinstitute #interidisciplinaryresearch

Double conference day! This morning I gave a keynote at #icgan2025; this evening, doing demos at #hri2025.

Hanine El Mir is closing out as the final panelist of #ICGAN2025 with her presentation “Role-Played Identities: Adapting the Tools to Forge Our Narratives” and we’re happy she could join us!

Having a blast at #ICGaN2025!

For our very final presenter of #ICGAN2025 we have Hanine El Mir with her look into role playing with the presentation “Role-Played Identities: Adapting the Tools to Forge Our Narratives.” #ICGAN2025 #ICGAN25 #uwaterloo #thegamesinstitute #researchimpact #interdisciplinaryresearch

Next up in Session 31 “Role-Playing, Reminiscence, Representation, and Romance” is Morgan Pearce with “Writing History in Pentiment: Medieval Manuscripts, Historical Accuracy, and the Politics of Representation.” #ICGAN2025 #uwaterloo #thegamesinstitute #researchimpact #interdisciplinaryresearch

Starting out last panel of #ICGAN2025 is Christine Tomlinson for “Playing for Love: Experiences with Romance in Video Game Narrative Design.” #ICGAN2025 #ICGAN25 #uwaterloo #thegamesinstitute #researchimpact #interdisciplinaryresearch

Rounding out Session 30 on “Preservation and Transformation” are Aleksander Franiczek and Cristiano Politowski with their presentation “Adapting to a Generational Leap: Mixed-Methods Analysis of Dragon Quest’s Evolution from NEW to SNES.” #ICGAN2025 #uwaterloo #thegamesinstitute #researchimpact

Next up for Session 30 is Liv Cadwallader for “Compilations of the Imagination: The Mock Compilation Form and Imagined development Histories in UFO 50 and Sonic Dreams Collection.” #ICGAN2025 #ICGAN25 #uwaterloo #thegamesinstitute #researchimpact #interdisciplinaryresearch

Up next in session 30 “Preservation and Transformation” is Andrew Bailey with his examination of the game Celeste in “Celeste 64: Open-Source Demaking as Self-Adaptive Design Practice.” #ICGAN2025 #ICGAN25 #uwaterloo #thegamesinstitute #researchimpact #interdisciplinaryresearch

For our penultimate session of #ICGAN2025, we have Alan Galey with his presentation “The Stories that (Digital) Artifacts Tell: Video Game Historiography and the Idea of the Edition.” #ICGAN25 #uwaterloo #thegamesinstitute #researchimpact #interdisciplinaryresearch

Here to teach #ICGAN2025 all about data visualization is Arden Song with her presentation “Adapting the Worldbuilding Gameplay of Minecraft into Date Visualizations.” #ICGAN25 #uwaterloo #thegamesinstitute #researchimpact #interdisciplinaryresearch #datavisualization #minecraft

Next in Session #29 is Haoran Chang shares ideas through the work "Reconsidering Adapting Eastern Practices in Mindfulness and Meditation Games: Pursuing A New Game Design Framework in Chinese Daoist Practice and Philosophy"  #uwaterloo #thegamesinstitute #ICGAN25 #ICGAN2025 #gameadaptation

Jules Patalita is presenting all about roleplay and roleplaying games in his presentation “The Critical Role of Digital Media in Teching how to Roleplay.” #ICGAN2025 #ICGAN25 #uwaterloo #thegamesinstitute #researchimpact #interdisciplinaryresearch

Further in Session #29: Adapting the Classics, Abhik Maiti discusses exciting topic on "Ludic Shakespeare: Interactivity, Agency, and Adaptation in Shakespearean Gaming".  #uwaterloo #thegamesinstitute #ICGAN25 #ICGAN2025 #researchimpact #interdisciplinaryresearch

Welcoming you to Session #29:Adapting the Classics with our first speaker Huajing Pan with her work "Game Adaptation of Allan Poe's Novels: from Literature to Video Game"  #uwaterloo #thegamesinstitute #ICGAN25 #ICGAN2025 #researchimpact #interdisciplinaryresearch #adaptation

Starting session 28 “Learning Through Play” are Christopher Jeansonne and Christopher Althoff with their look into gameful learning with the presentation “Gamefully Adapative Strategies in the Adaptations Classroom.” #ICGAN2025 #ICGAN25 #uwaterloo #thegamesinstitute #researchipmact

Curious to learn more about the demos that were exhibited at #ICGAN2025? Wonder no more! We have their extended abstracts posted on our website AND available in the Gather.town space for conference participants to view and play with.

Closing out our morning session is Erick Verran with his presentation “The Detective in the Furnace: Belief and Fictional Illegibility” which focuses on such games like Disco Elysium and Freedom! #ICGAN2025 #ICGAN25 #uwaterloo #thegamesinstitute #researchimpact #interdisciplinaryresearch

Gregory Blomquist is up next with his presentation “Shadowing the Shadow Broker: Transmedia Detectives and Media Heterarchy in Mass Effect” which continues a trend in #ICGAN2025 by referencing media scholar Henry Jenkins! #uwaterloo #thegamesinstitute #researchimpact #interdisciplinaryresearch

Continuing the morning session “Belief in the Empowered Player” is Ricardo Martins with “The Player is Dead, Long live the… What was that again? - memory and death in video game design.” #ICGAN2025 #ICGAN25 #uwaterloo #thegamesinstitute #researchimpact #interdisciplinaryresearch

Take a look at this peak of Alexander Hurezeanu’s presentation “Apocalypse and Utopia: Transculturalizing Eastern European Fallout Mods” from yesterday’s session “Cultural Heritage.” #ICGAN2025 #ICGAN25 #uwaterloo #thegamesinstitute #researchimpact #interdisciplinaryresearch

Check out this snapshot from yesterday’s presentation by Sid Heeg on “Recreating the Myth of the Family Farm: Stardew Valley’s Adaptation of the Idyllic Farm Landscape”! #ICGAN2025 #ICGAN25 #thegamesinstitute #uwaterloo #researchimpact #interdisciplinaryresearch

It’s the final day of #ICGAN2025! And kicking off our first session of the day is Imke Alenka Harbig and Keshia Harshina presenting “For Empowerment’s Sake: Rethinking Video Game Adapations for Real-Life Experiences.” #ICGAN25 #thegamesinstitute #uwaterloo #researchimpact #interdisciplinaryresearch

Capping off the presentations in Melbourne for #ICGaN25 is Session 25, aptly named “Making Sense of It All”. To learn more about these presentations and the people behind them, check out the extended abstracts on our website! #ICGAN2025 #thegamesinstitute #uwaterloo #researchimpact

We’re looking back on the presentations given on Day 3 of #ICGaN25 in Melbourne! Day 3 kicked off with “Monstrous Narratives: Adapting Ghosts, Death, Myths and Animals in Game Storytelling”. Interested in learning more? Check out the extended abstracts on our website! #ICGAN2025 #thegamesinstitute

Joining us from Melbourne, where she is a Senior HCI Lecturer, we’re excited to sit down and listen to Dr. Melissa J. Rogerson talk to us about “The Boundaries of Hybridity” in our third keynote! #uwaterloo #thegamesinstitute #ICGAN25 #ICGAN2025 #researchimpact #interdisciplinaryresearch

So glad for the opportunity to showcase the driving questions, theory, and background to my dissertation today!

For our final presentation in Session 22 "The Table-Top Power Hour," we have "Worlds of Waste - Magic: The Gathering’s Delocalization out of Brazilian Portuguese” by Guilherme Da Silva Braga. #ICGAN2025 #ICGAN25 #uwaterloo #thegamesinstitute #researchimpact #interdisciplinaryresearch

Our final presenter in our World Spaces session, Zishu Ning is capping off an awesome set of presentations with their talk on Reimagining UI Screens as Paratextual Narrative Spaces! #uwaterloo #thegamesinstitute #ICGAN25 #ICGAN2025 #researchimpact #interdisciplinaryresearch

Next up in Session 22 "The Table-Top Power Hour" is Hanna Dodd with his presentation "Sentiment Analysis of Tabletop Role-Playing Games.” #ICGAN2025 #ICGAN25 #uwaterloo #thegamesinstitute #researchimpact #interdisciplinaryresearch

As we continue learning about World Spaces in Session 23, our third presenter Julie Niu is now exploring Cities of Interaction: The Urban Logic of Competitive FPS Maps! #uwaterloo #thegamesinstitute #ICGAN25 #ICGAN2025 #researchimpact #interdisciplinaryresearch

Next up in Session 22 "The Table-Top Power Hour" is Giuseppe Femia with his presentation "Results and Findings of Neurodivergent TTRPG Design Workshop.” #icgan2025 #icgan25 #uwaterloo #thegamesinstitute #researchimpact #interdisciplinaryresearch

Next up in our The World-Space session, we have “Comparative Analysis of Narrative and Environmental Storytelling in Elden Ring and Black Myth: Wukong” by Yuyan Wang #uwaterloo #thegamesinstitute #ICGAN25 #ICGAN2025 #researchimpact #interdisciplinaryresearch

Next up in our The World-Space session, we have “Spatial Interactivity and Narrative Adaptation: A Case of Batman: Arkham Series (2009-)” by Jingqi Zhu. #uwaterloo #thegamesinstitute #ICGAN25 #ICGAN2025 #researchimpact #interdisciplinaryresearch

Kicking off Session 22 "The Table-Top Power Hour" is Brian McKenzie with his presentation "Does Gramsci Have a Stat Block? Adapting Critical Theory to Dungeons & Dragons Content." #icgan2025 #icgan25 #uwaterloo #thegamesinstitute #researchimpact #interdisciplinaryresearch

Closing out Session 20 are Laura Wallace Jarvis and Chris McNab, representing the work they're doing with Veen Wong, Jim Wallace, and Cayley MacArthur for the presentation "Bold Sky: An Interdisciplinary Approach to Game Design for Intimate Partner Violence Prevention." #ICGAN2025 #ICGAN25

For our final presentation in the Theories and Frameworks Session, we have “TLDR: A Taxonomy for Adaptive Narrative Design in MMORPG Based on Player Engagement” by Derrick Wang, Hilda Hadan, & Lennart Nacke #uwaterloo #thegamesinstitute #ICGAN25 #ICGAN2025 #researchimpact #interdisciplinaryresearch

Next up in the Theories and Frameworks Session, we have Geneva Smith speaking about “‘It’s Dangerous to Go Alone, Take This!’: Adapting a Model of Player Experience For Interactive Digital Narratives” #uwaterloo #thegamesinstitute #ICGAN25 #ICGAN2025 #researchimpact #interdisciplinaryresearch

Next up in Session 20 is Elif Memis with her presentation "Learning with Video Games: The Relationship Between Voting Behavior and Civics Games." #icgan2025 #icgan25 #uwaterloo #thegamesinstitute #researchimpact #interdisicplinaryresearch

Following Jenn Rickert is Janaki Riji Nair with her presentation "Intuition vs. Deliberation: Understanding Players’ Appreciation of Interactive Video Game Narratives with Moral Intuition Conflicts. She is presenting on behalf of her and Nicholas Bowman. #icgan25 #thegamesinstitute #uwaterloo

Rounding out Day 2 of #ICGaN25 was Session 18: “Visions of the Past and Future”, an exploration of dystopias and the mythological past. Learn more about these presentations and the people behind them on out website! #ICGAN2025 #thegamesinstitute #uwaterloo #researchimpact