Debugging Game History

Essays discuss the terminology etymology and history of key terms offering a foundation for critical historical studies of games.Even as the field of game studies has flourished critical historical studies of games have lagged behind other areas of research. Histories have generally been fact-by-fact chronicles; fundamental terms of game design and development technology and play have rarely been examined in the context of their historical etymological and conceptual underpinnings. This volume attempts to “debug” the flawed historiography of video games. It offers original essays on key concepts in game studies arranged as in a lexicon—from “Amusement Arcade” to “Embodiment” and “Game Art” to “Simulation” and “World Building.” Written by scholars and practitioners from a variety of disciplines including game development curatorship media archaeology cultural studies and technology studies the essays offer a series of distinctive critical “takes” on historical topics. The majority of essays look at game history from the outside in; some take deep dives into the histories of play and simulation to provide context for the development of electronic and digital games; others take on such technological components of games as code and audio. Not all essays are history or historical etymology—there is an analysis of game design and a discussion of intellectual property—but they nonetheless raise questions for historians to consider. Taken together the essays offer a foundation for the emerging study of game history.  ContributorsMarcelo Aranda Brooke Belisle Caetlin Benson-Allott Stephanie Boluk Jennifer deWinter J. P. Dyson Kate Edwards Mary Flanagan Jacob Gaboury William Gibbons Raiford Guins Erkki Huhtamo Don Ihde Jon Ippolito Katherine Isbister Mikael Jakobsson Steven E. Jones Jesper Juul Eric Kaltman Matthew G. Kirschenbaum Carly A. Kocurek Peter Krapp Patrick LeMieux Henry Lowood Esther MacCallum-Stewart Ken S. McAllister Nick Monfort David Myers James Newman Jenna Ng Michael Nitsche Laine Nooney Hector Postigo Jas Purewal Reneé H. Reynolds Judd Ethan Ruggill Marie-Laure Ryan Katie Salen Tekinbas Anastasia Salter Mark Sample Bobby Schweizer John Sharp Miguel Sicart Rebecca Elisabeth Skinner Melanie Swalwell David Thomas Samuel Tobin Emma Witkowski Mark J.P. Wolf