As for the game/story issue, as you mentioned, we’re all busy, but I’ll contact you offline about it.

Apologies if I stepped on any toes with my attempt at jouissance.

Eyejinx.

See you at GDC in March?

I have no doubt that in the near future most professional developers (and a great many others besides) will have had training in the academy; nor do I doubt that academics have a great deal to offer to our understandings of the field; in fact, the reason why I came here in the first place was precisely to listen and to learn from the discussions you and your colleagues have been having. I am grateful to people like yourself who take the time to advance these debates and bring rigorously developed insights to them, as well as to our host Dr. Juul (and others) for publicizing and disseminating the themes of these conversations, and to folks like (soon to be Dr., no doubt) Salisbury for providing access to the fruits of his labors through links and electronic publications to those of us who would not otherwise have access to them.

My only reservation, the only point of skepticism I have tried to raise, is that in trying to formulate ways for academics to improve game development, some thought be given to the proper forms–the strengths and weaknesses of the academic endeavor–in consideration of which, it may be less important to talk at the industry, and more important to talk with us.

It is my hope, perhaps vain, that the value of this exchange might lie on both sides. Perhaps one day there will be a conference on what game developers can offer to improve the process of academic game studies.

Eyejinx.

–Why, yes; ever since Aristotle’s Poetics, and very much also today. Stephen King dedicated one of his books to his college teacher, the English Professor AND poet Burton Hatlen. In short, the direct feedback loop between literature and academic theory/criticism is rich and strong –an excellent role model; names like Umberto Eco, J.P. Sartre, Tolkien, David Lodge and Iris Murdoch is just the tip of the iceberg. Then we have famous examples of literary authors who also contribute to theory: E.M. Forster, T.S. Eliot, Virginia Woolf, Coleridge… and, oh, yes, Wordsworth.

I very much appreciate healthy skepticism towards academia from the industry (it keeps us honest), but if 2000 years of literary history can tell us anything, it is that you can’t keep theory and practice separate. 10-20 years from now, it is a safe bet that most professional game developers will have been educated by game schools and programs, where they hopefully will have had time to play around with concepts and ideas that make them better at what they do. There will always be a natural tension between those who do and those who teach, but we are certainly talking, and some of us have been doing it for several years now. So let’s not worry! The main problem seems to be that both groups are extremely busy.

During the meeting at ITU there was talk of (let’s see if I remember this correctly) research for design, research into design, and research by design. Where research for design, is seeking knowledge which might have implications in designed artifacts, but not necessarily in their method of construction (into design), or how different designs might be implemented (by design).
Most industries have received advice on their practices from knowledge generated through explicit research (use manufacturing, software engineering, or research itself as good examples), and the practices of practitioners in pretty much every sphere of human activity have been studied somewhere, including the arts.
In terms of what is possible, the creation of examples and prototypes is a common activity in many domains. One might write short stories to explore literary structures say, or build model boats to explore hydrodynamics. Lessons learned from these models can then inform the creation of the articles in question.

I interpret Eyejinx’s reservations regarding design research to be focused on research ‘for design’. I also see his reservations as being based on 2 more assumptions. The first is that ‘academic’ research is synonymous with ‘creating critical theory’, as one might in literature. The second assumption is that academically derived knowledge is usually too formal to be of direct benefit to practitioners.
With respect to this first assumption, I would argue that it depends on what articles you read. There are indeed papers which carry the critical traditions of other apparently related fields into the study of games, but this is not the only research direction. Considering the second possible assumption, this may be that academics write up their work for academic audiences, and practitioners are unwilling to read work in this style, or unable to see the implications of such work. In other domains knowledge is often presented in more structured and targeted ways, while the practitioners are trained to interpret this knowledge to some degree of practical success. For example, architects rely on many theories which may have been academically derived, regarding such things as the way individuals interact with the spaces they construct, the aesthetics of different forms, the properties of the materials used in the building’s construction, and the scheduling of work during construction.

Essentially I’m proposing that in saying, “this value belongs to the critics and the students, not the developers”, is short-sighted, but in order for this attitude to be dislodged the academic community need to demonstrate where the knowledge they acquire may be of use.

I think the line between criticism as an academic function and the craft of developing games is one that is seductive to cross. After all, if one can appreciate what makes good games work as such, then why could that knowledge not be applied in turn to making better games? However, the analysis of “texts” and their production are separate disciplines and no amount of theoretical knowledge of game development is necessarily going to help you to make an actual “good game”–much less a good commercial game involving all the complexities that come with that level of work. As a commercial game designer, I am constantly confronted with people both inside and outside the industry who think that their experience playing games enables them to make design judgments. However, while lots of people have really good ideas, very few people actually understand how to make ideas into workable designs.

So, I don’t think that this is really about applied vs. pure research, since game development is much more of a craft than a science; if I am out of date on that and people are actually talking about applied humanities, then please forgive me for my ignorance. It has been some years since I lived within the ivory tower.

While I think it’s laudable of academics to support all forms of game development, including indie, open source, “diy”, hobbyist, mod, and commercial, and while these no doubt provide a variety of interesting variations for research and criticism, I do think there is something suspect in using the commercial, recognizable titles to draw attention and then focusing on non-commercial gaming. I may be pissing territorially, but it feels a bit like a bait-and-switch to wave the GTA3 flag, for example, and then talk about design issues and processes that apply to interactive fiction. If you want to talk about commercial game development, I think you need to talk to commercial game developers, and if you want to talk craft, you have to get off the hobby horse of theory and deal with the practicalities of commercial game development.

Which is not to say that I’m anti-theory; in fact, I have spent more than a few years of my life blissfully engaged with classical and contemporary critical thought. I’m all for academics and critics engaging with games from the critical/theoretical perspective; however, I also believe that there are limits to the applicability of that framework.

My, now I’ve nattered on for far too long. My apologies. Fundamentally, I believe in the value and importance of pure research; I’m just inclined to think that this value belongs to the critics and the students, not the developers. I may be crazy, but I don’t think that Wordsworth would have benefitted the least bit from reading Derrida, regardless of how fertile deconstructionists have found his work.

Eyejinx.

By the way, by “game development” do you mean only commercial development, or all forms of game development, including indie or open source development, experimental game development, avant garde/artistic game development, etc.? It seems to me that academic game research has a special responsibility to support non-commercial game development, and to try to push the field in directions the industry can’t go. I would also contend that the industry doesn’t always know what it needs, and that long-term, pure research could be one crucial way of finding out.

It is always wonderful when commercial developers say they find academic research useful, but it would be even more wonderful if they can see the value and importance of pure research. Luckily, but not surprisingly, quite a few do.

As a designer working on commercial titles and lapsed academic, I find the question of how academic research can contribute to the field an interesting one. However, I believe there are several different goals being pursued under the one rubric. I wonder if it would be valuable to separate out:

Game research for game development
Game research for academic professionalization
Game research for cultural intervention
etc.

Frasca’s framework, for example, seems to apply to the latter two categories but not the first. Kelly’s comments seem to touch on all three, but not all are applicable in all areas. (I use “seem” to acknowledge that these are third-hand readings of second-hand accounts and so may not have any valuable relation to the primary arguments.)

This is one of the reasons why I find the involvement (or lack of involvement) of commercial game designers in these types of events important. If the goal is to provide academic credentials or cultural interventions, then there’s certainly no need for those “in the trenches” to be present; if anything, that might be counter-productive. But insofar as the conversation reaches toward the notion of academics being a useful resource to the development of what “electronic games” means in the mainstream context, it seems like a fundamental need would be to have the perspective of those making such games.

That may just be my own bias, however.

Eyejinx.