Gerald A. Voorhees - Dungeons, Dragons, and Digital Denizens: The Digital Role-Playing Game

Approaches to Digital Game Studies

Volume 1

Series Review Board
(Alphabetically)

Mia Consalvo, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

James Paul Gee, Arizona State University

Helen Kennedy, University of the West of England

Frans Myr, University of Tampere

Toby Miller, University of California, Riverside

Torill Mortensen, IT University Copenhagen

Lisa Nakamura, University of Illinois

Gareth Schott, University of Waikato

Mark J. P. Wolf, Concordia University

Series Editors

Gerald Voorhees, Oregon State University

Josh Call, Grand View University

Katie Whitlock, California State University, Chico

Dungeons, Dragons, and Digital Denizens

The Digital Role-Playing Game

EDITED BY

GERALD VOORHEES,

JOSH CALL, AND

KATIE WHITLOCK

The Continuum International Publishing Group

80 Maiden Lane, New York, NY 10038

The Tower Building, 11 York Road, London SE1 7NX

www.continuumbooks.com

Gerald Voorhees, Josh Call, and Katie Whitlock, 2012

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the written permission of the publishers.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Dungeons, dragons, and digital denizens : the digital role-playing game / edited by Gerald Voorhees, Josh Call and Katie Whitlock.

p. cm.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN-13: 978-1-4411-9189-2 (hardcover : alk. paper)

ISBN-10: 1-4411-9189-5 (hardcover : alk. paper)

ISBN-13: 978-1-4411-9518-0 (pbk. : alk. paper)

ISBN-10: 1-4411-9518-1 (pbk. : alk. paper)

1. Fantasy games. 2. Electronic games. 3. Role playing. 4. Games. 5. Role playing. 6. Fantasy games. I. Voorhees, Gerald. II. Call, Josh. III. Whitlock, Katie.

GV1469.6.D86 2012

793.93--dc23

2011037483

ISBN: 978-1-4411-3892-7

Typeset by Fakenham Prepress Solutions, Fakenham, Norfolk NR21 8NN

Contents

L ike most collaborative works, this book is a product of the open sharing of insight, fearless pursuit of curiosity, and bold willingness to engage with, and embrace as essential, the differences of perspective, approach, and opinion that brought together the editors. The contributors, intrepid and earnest, assembled their own voices, as well as those from the disciplines in which they are located, together in a chorus more profound than any one register could aspire to. The Series Review Board (Mia Consalvo, Massachusetts Institute of Technology; James Paul Gee, Arizona State University; Helen Kennedy, University of the West of England; Frans Myr, University of Tampere; Toby Miller, University of California, Riverside; Torill Mortensen, IT University Copenhagen; Lisa Nakamura, University of Illinois; Gareth Schott, University of Waikato; Mark J. P. Wolf, Concordia University) helped shaped the content and coherence of this collection. Their intellectual labor and guidance was, and continues to be, an invaluable resource for the editors.

That said, this book was made possible by the work of many more people, most of whom are not credited elsewhere in this volume. Four anonymous reviewers gave this project the green light when it was little more than a well-conceived and researched proposal. They also raised questions about game studies, genre, and disciplinarity that have helped give shape to this series and volume. David Depew, Bruce Gronbeck, David Hingstman, and Robert Brooke provided some valuable insights about the process of putting together a scholarly anthology. Colleagues at High Point University, Grand View University and California State University, Chico offered moral and material support. Kim Nguyen sacrificed time and more interesting dialogue options to converse about the composition of this volume and provide scholarly perspective completely disinterested toward game studies. Nikki, Kairie, and Colin Call gave up valuable family time and willingly let the television be used for game research, while steadfastly remaining both encouraging and supportive. At Continuum, Katie Gallof has been a steadfast advocate of this project, shepherding the editors through the sometimes confounding process of publishing a scholarly anthology. Her patience, support, and interest have been invaluable.

T his book series, Approaches to Game Studies, is organized around two premises, one of which is widely accepted among games researchers while the second though not contentious is ambivalent enough to elude consensus.

The first, uncontroversial premise is that the study of digital games is an interdisciplinary endeavor that synthesizes theories and methods from a broad swath of the humanities but nevertheless benefits from multidisciplinary approaches that bring new perspectives to the table. Arguably, this is the founding premise of game studies as an academic discipline. In the inaugural issue of the journal Game Studies, Espen Aarseth notes both that we have all come to the field from somewhere else to make game studies the integrated discipline that it has become, and that existing fields should continue to study games as well. This interdisciplinarity is continually reaffirmed, most notably by Jesper Juul, Gonzalo Frasca, and Ian Bogost, who, respectively, convinced us that games are half-real hybrids of fiction and rules, reminded us that ludologists love stories too, and encouraged what may be the biggest paradigm shift in the field to date by blending the language and insight of informatics with humanistic methods.

This premise parallels, in some important regards, the process through which this project came into being. In 2007, we (Gerald, Katie, and Josh) were asked to serve as area chairs for the Game Studies area then called the Digital Games area of the Popular Culture Association/American Culture Association (hereafter, PCA/ACA). Being the geeky games people that we are, we all jumped at the opportunity. Usually, there are only one or two people chairing an area, but given that few academic organizations will ever turn away eager volunteer help, it was suggested that we co-chair the area along with Tony Avruch, making us the first four-person area chair team.

Our first priority was to grow the area. Our blue sky dream was to create a fixed and recognizable location for game studies scholarship in America that would invite the kind of serious work that we saw happening elsewhere in the world. Over the past four years, we have made steady progress on both fronts. The year before we took over from Nathan Garrelts, who was visionary to start the Video Game Studies area in 2003, the Digital Games area featured eight panels consisting of twenty-eight presenters. At the April 2011 conference in San Antonio, Texas, the Game Studies area featured twelve panels consisting of forty-eight unique presentations. This is relatively modest growth over a four-year period and it parallels the growth of the field in general, but it also reflects our concerted effort to invite scholars from our respective disciplinary homes to join in an interdisciplinary conversation. In the past few years, several disciplinary organizations, including the Society for Cinema and Media Studies and the International Communication Association, have organized interest group and areas devoted to digital games, but the Game Studies area of the PCA/ACA has the most enduring footprint of any North American academic organization that gives serious attention to the social and cultural impact of games and gaming. Building from the same legacy that helped germinate Garrelts two anthologies one on players (2005) and one focused on the