Scholars At Play

A feed drop from Derek' new pod, 2 Player Theory. Check it out below: https://twoplayertheory.podbean.com/

Subscribe to Two Player Theory! https://twoplayertheory.podbean.com/

Feed Drop!! In this new podcast, Derek, Zach, and friends talk through games and media, together. Subscribe to Two Player Theory Podbean: https://www.podbean.com/pu/pbblog-n3ieq-11a3b2e Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0e6LX1a3MmR7nJkza5Pi49?si=1e7648dd3ca74a92 In this first episode, we talk about Zelda's newest open-world game, Tears of the Kingdom, and what it's themes and narrative mean f...

Derek and Kyle sit down to talk about Derek's recently-completed dissertation "The Work of Nonfiction: Simulator Games in Germany." Derek talks about the history of simulator games, the specific simulators he studies, and what we can learn from games all about machines and work. Timestamps 0:00 - Intro 4:11 - Theory, text, and context in research 8:30 - Origins of the project and how it developed,...

Subscribe to Dodging Hollow on Soundcloud: https://soundcloud.com/dodging-hollow Edited intro music is "Day Bird" by Broke for Free, Creative Commons by attribution. Check out their music here: https://freemusicarchive.org/music/Broke_For_Free/Directionless_EP

The scholars may be physically distant, but that won't stop them from talking about all their quarantine gaming! Join us for an EXTRA long "What's In You System" where we talk about how our gaming has changed during the ongoing pandemic. ----------- Games Discussed: Final Fantasy Tactics, Final Fantasy VII Remake, Animal Crossing, Link Between Worlds, Euro Truck Simulator 2, Deep Space D6 --------...

-------------- Terrell leads Kyle and Derek on an exploration of the politics of failure and FromSoftware's Bloodborne (2015). They reflect on their own experiences with this challenging game and discuss how the game intersects with narratives of success and failure from different perspectives. Is the imperative to "git gud," common among hardcore fans of FromSoftware's games, an exclusionary, boo...

-------------- Derek, Kyle, Curtis, and Sabeen have a conversation about the opportunities and challenges in using digital games to teach history. This episode was recorded live at "Learning at Play," a 1-day symposium on games for learning and social change which took place at Vanderbilt on 8 November 2019. For more on the event, see: https://cft.vanderbilt.edu/play/ -------------- Objects Discus...

Episode 14 - Metagaming -------------- Derek, Kyle, and Terrell finally get it together and have a long, winding conversation about Dr. Stephanie Boluk and Dr. Patrick LeMieux's book "Metagaming" and the kinds of games we like to play with games. -------------- Objects Discussed Texts: - "Metagaming: Playing, Competing, Spectating, Cheating, Trading, Making, and Breaking Videogames (Stephanie Bolu...

In a special episode, Derek sits down with Pascal Wagner (Language At Play, Polyneux, GAIN Magazin) to talk about their experiences at A MAZE 2019, an independent festival for games that happens every year in Berlin. They talk about the great games and talks they saw, as well as some games they had some more critical reactions to. See below for a more detailed list of what they talked about, and w...

The Scholars are back! After traveling through time and space, Derek has finally reunited with his stateside counterparts, Kyle and Terrell, to catch up and see "What's In Your System?" We talk about what we've been playing over the last few months, especially Heat Signature, Castlevania (the games and the show), the diverging narratives of Warhammer, the (divisive) idea of proxies in Warhammer an...

Content Warning: discussions of sexual abuse and assault -------------- Sabeen Ahmed returns to join us for an important discussion about the way Persona 5 handles sexual assault, abuse, and power, and how it feels to play Persona 5 in the middle of the #MeToo movement in the U.S. -------------- Objects Discussed Texts: - Against Interpretation (Susan Sontag, 1966) - The Predator and the Jokester...

This special episode is a recording of a digital colloquium that took place on April 16th, 2018. Sponsored by the Robert Penn Warren Center for the Humanities and the Center for Digital Humanities at Vanderbilt University, and organized by the RPW Seminar "Taking Play Seriously," this panel featured games industry vet Bill Harms (Mafia III, Infamous), games critic Dante Douglas (Paste, Polygon, Wa...

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Ted Dawson joins Derek, Kyle and Terrell to talk about what "The Anthropocene" and "ecocriticism" are, why they matter, and what we need to do to save the world. Well, at least in "The Fate of the World." -------------- Objects Discussed Texts: - "The Climate of History: Four Theses" (Dipesh Chakrabarty, 2009) - "Greenshifting Game Studies" (Hans-Joachim Backe, 2014) - "Live in Your World, Play in...

-------------- -Tired: Scholars at Play- -Wired: HISTORIANS AT PLAY- -In this episode, Kyle takes over and forces Derek and Terrell to talk about history and strategy games again. Joined by special guest Henry Gorman, History PhD candidate and lover of Paradox games, the four talk through what it means for games to be historical or to represent history, the various ways we can approach historical...

-------------- -Tired: Scholars at Play- -Wired: HISTORIANS AT PLAY- -In this episode, Kyle takes over and forces Derek and Terrell to talk about history and strategy games again. Joined by special guest Henry Gorman, History PhD candidate and lover of Paradox games, the four talk through what it means for games to be historical or to represent history, the various ways we can approach historical...

In this episode of What's In Your System?, Derek, Kyle, and Terrell talk about the new (and old) games they've been playing in the new year.

In the second half of our game of the year podcast series, Kyle, Derek, and Terrell talk about their Greatest Escape, the most "2017" game, SAP's Game of the Year, games we would recommend to each other, and the best games we didn't play. Also, if you're curious about our personal Top 5 lists, check them out on our website! http://scholarsatplay.net/category/goty-2017/

In Part 1 of our Games of the Year podcast series, we talk about the games we thought had the Biggest Impact, our favorite moments in games, and we play another of Qyle's Qrazy Quizzes!

In this episode, we answer some questions from listeners! We talk about powerlessness in horror games, loot boxes, the lack of variety in big-budget games, and much more! Plus, Kyle quizzes us on our knowledge of Metacritic's ranking algorithm... err, I mean, the Games of the Year from 2014 - 2016, and reveals the secrets of 'stairs money!'

In this episode, Derek, Terrell, and Kyle talk about Supermassive Game's 2015 horror hit "Until Dawn" and work through its relationship with the tropes and language of cinematic horror, as well as the game's "Butterfly Effect" system. Note: this episode DEFINITELY contains spoilers. You have been warned. ---------- Objects Discussed Texts: - Espen Aarseth, Cybertext (1997) - Alexander Galloway, Ga...

In this extra-long, bonus, feature-length episode, special guest Sabeen Ahmed joins us for a discussion about how games intersect with contemporary political activism. We work through some of the regressive tendencies in modern gaming cultures, take up Bogost's idea of procedural rhetoric, and talk about how a few games from the recent #ResistJam might speak to our political moment and inform our...

---What's In Your System? (WIYS) - Friday, August 18th, 2017--- It's Friday and we're chilling not 10 feet away from Kyle's glorious stairs and sharing our thoughts about loot-crate logic in PUBG and the differences/similarities between Breath of the Wild and Horizon Zero Dawn. We also debate the pronunciation of "verisimilitude" and regretfully announce that the First Annual Scholars At Play Corn...

-------------- Objects Discussed Text: Introduction to “The Limits of Critique” (Rita Felski, 2015) Game: The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild (Nintendo, 2017) Video(s): “Breath of the Wild: The Best Game Ever” (YT: Cool Ghosts, 2017) https://youtu.be/ZLRedgWqejo “Stuff That Bugs Me About the Thing Everyone Likes Right Now” (YT: Super Bunnyhop, 2017) https://youtu.be/gNLMDWZY6_A --------------...