Journal of Games Criticism

2023

  • BETWEEN A ROCK AND A HARD PLACE: GAMES COVERAGE AND ITS NETWORK OF AMBIVALENCES

    by Maxwell Foxman & David B. Nieborg First published January 2016. Download full article PDF here. Abstract It’s as tough a time as ever for game critics, who seem to be stuck between a rock and a hard place—an industry that acts as gatekeepers to most of the information they cover and an increasingly combative readership. Because of… Continue reading

  • UNDERSTANDING GAMES AND THE INDUSTRY THAT PRODUCES THEM: A REVIEW OF THE EDITED VOLUME THE VIDEO GAME INDUSTRY

    by Chris J. Young First published August 2015. Download full review PDF here. Peter Zackariasson & Timothy L. Wilson (Eds.). The Video Game Industry: Formation, Present State, and Future. New York: Routledge, 2012, 268 pp., ISBN NO.9780415896528 Published as part of Routledge Studies in Innovation, Organization and Technology (RIOT!), The Video Game Industry, edited by Peter Zackariasson and… Continue reading

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  • RED DEAD MASCULINITY: CONSTRUCTING A CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK FOR ANALYZING THE NARRATIVE AND MESSAGE FOUND IN VIDEO GAMES

    by Benjamin J. Triana First published August 2015. Download full article PDF here. Abstract Rockstar’s Red Dead Redemption video game exemplifies a complex narrative that combines a video game’s gameplay, story elements, and Western genre tropes. The narrative constructs a masculinity in opposition to social forces not only constructed in the video game world but also found in… Continue reading

  • A COUNTERREVOLUTION IN THE HANDS: THE CONSOLE CONTROLLER AS AN ERGONOMIC BRANDING MECHANISM

    by David Parisi First published, January 2015 Download full article PDF here. Abstract In this article, the author examines the tactile materiality of the videogame controller, reading its stability across multiple generations of game consoles as a strategy simultaneously intended (1) to maintain the ergonomic identification between the player/consumer and the console/brand and (2) to continue… Continue reading

  • GAME CRITICISM AS TANGENTIAL LEARNING FACILITATOR: THE CASE OF CRITICAL INTEL

    by Robert Rath First published January 2015. Download full article PDF here. Abstract Video games have enormous potential to encourage tangential learning, but there are several obstacles that mar this self-guided process. These include online misinformation, the lack of a learning structure, and a public who are poor at source criticism. Enter explanatory game criticism, a… Continue reading

  • WHAT MAKES GÊMU DIFFERENT? A LOOK AT THE DISTINCTIVE DESIGN TRAITS OF JAPANESE VIDEO GAMES AND THEIR PLACE IN THE JAPANESE MEDIA MIX

    by Victor Navarro-Remesal & Antonio Loriguillo-López First published January 2015. Download full PDF here. Abstract The popularity and influence enjoyed by Japanese video games is irrefutable. There is little doubt, for many scholars, that the Japanese video game industry has helped establish the standard procedures of production, distribution and localization for the global sector. However, beyond titles of… Continue reading

  • PASSION AS METHOD: SUBJECTIVITY IN VIDEO GAMES CRITICISM

    by Stephanie C. Jennings First published January 2015 Download full PDF here. Abstract Responding to a longstanding wariness of the subjectivity of the critic—both within game studies and humanities disciplines more broadly—this essay proposes an approach to games criticism in which the subjectivity of the critic is accepted as central, unavoidable, and necessary. It is built… Continue reading

  • ALL OF YOUR CO-WORKERS ARE GONE: STORY, SUBSTANCE, AND THE EMPATHIC PUZZLER

    by Michael James Heron & Pauline Helen Belford First published January 2015. Download full article PDF here. Abstract Narrative games such as The Walking Dead, Gone Home, Dear Esther, and The Stanley Parable are difficult to situate into the general framework of game genres that are popularly, albeit informally, understood by mainstream audiences. They are too unabashedly contrarian with reference to the generally… Continue reading

  • HERMENEUTICS AND LUDOCRITICISM

    by Veli-Matti Karhulahti First published January 2015. Download full article PDF. Abstract This article introduces the concept of ludocriticism as a practice for evaluating videogame artifacts. The primary method of this practice is hermeneutics. If the reader chooses to enter the main article, she or he will find out how the concept of hermeneutics has been previously used… Continue reading

  • REPLY TO J. KÖLLER

    First published June 2014. Full letter PDF here. Joe: We share the majority of your criticism of academia; we don’t think it’s worth the trouble for everyone. We’re witnessing a time in Western, first-world societies when there is a mass intelligentsia that has made the formal institutions of academia seem burdensome. We’re thinking of formal institutions like… Continue reading

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The Journal of Games Criticism is a non-profit, peer-reviewed game studies journal that strives to connect the conversations between traditional academics and popular game critics. The journal strives to be a producer of feed-forward approaches to video games criticism with a focus on influencing gamer culture, the design and writing of video games, and the social understanding video games and video game criticism.

ISSN: 2374-202X

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