Document Type
Article
Publication Date
2020
DOI
10.7557/23.6360
Publication Title
Eludamos: Journal for Computer Game Culture
Volume
11
Issue
1
Pages
145–159
Abstract
Though no field or discipline’s historical vector presents itself as a strictly linear building of knowledge, the historical trajectory of Game Studies is problematic: certainly not linear, yet also not even multiplicious or rhizomatic. Instead, we are cyclical. Past debates often re-emerge, zombie-like, muttering the same arguments, often encased in binaries as endemic to our field as they are to the objects we study: unbridgeable disagreements on fundamental concepts; incompatible ontologies and epistemologies; incommensurability writ large. We view this as a chronic issue which has of late culminated in a crisis, exacerbated by changing institutional prerogatives championing multidisciplinary approaches and demands for “public impact”. This article takes a metaphysical approach, performing a meta-review to search for the root cause of our field’s cyclical nature. We identify and explore a key issue, namely our continuing status as pre-paradigmatic field, and ask questions designed to provoke ways forward, to provide more inflection points and fewer endless loops.
Original Publication Citation
Ouellette, M., & Conway, S. (2021). The game studies crisis: What are the rules of play?. Eludamos: Journal for Computer Game Culture, 11(1), 145–159. https://doi.org/10.7557/23.6360
Repository Citation
Ouellette, Marc A. and Conway, Steven, "The Game Studies Crisis: What Are the Rules of Play?" (2020). English Faculty Publications. 200.
https://digitalcommons.odu.edu/english_fac_pubs/200
Comments
Copyright © by Marc Ouellette and Steven Conway
Included with kind permission from the author(s).