Choosing Games for Study

Why is it important to justify the choice of game being used as an example in a scholarly article or for the purposes of study? In the early days of games studies there seemed little call for careful scrutiny of one's game choices. We studied what we had handy and wrote about the games we were already playing. However, if we want to make the case that the game in question is good by some measure (however we decide to define “good”) then we really should have some evidence to back this up. When a single game or a small number of games are chosen as the subject(s) of study they form part of the bounded system that is the case being examined, and also forms part of what makes the case of special interest (Stake, 1995). If we are proposing the use of a game in the classroom or the study of some specific game to learn something applicable to our agenda whether that agenda is to examine the educational potential of the game or to learn something else about the game that may inform other instruction, then as academics we have a responsibility to explain why that game is suitable for our purpose.

• ranking and choosing games for study (from my thesis)

• Katrin Becker, How Do Researchers Choose Commercial Games for Study?, Future Play 2009 @ GDC Canada Vancouver, BC May 12-13, 2009 slideshare slides
• (released July 2008) Katrin Becker and J.R.Parker, On Choosing Games And What Counts as a “Good” Game, Book Chapter, in Handbook of Research on Effective Electronic Gaming in Education edited by Richard Ferdig, Information Science Reference, IGI GLobal Publishing