Call for Papers

Meta: The 20th Annual Tampere University Game Research Lab Spring Seminar
Tampere, Finland
May 7-8, 2024
https://springseminar.org/2024-call-for-papers

Submission deadline for extended abstracts: February 2, 2024

To limit one’s sense of games to abstract sets of rules is to ignore the central importance of how they are played by specific people in specific contexts. André Philidor’s 1749 claim that ‘pawns are the soul of chess’ and the strategy this implied changed how the game of chess was played. In the late 1980’s Jan Boklöv and others transformed the game of ski jumping by introducing the V-style. In both cases the rules stayed the same, while the metagame shifted. Many popular games, like poker, are driven by the interplay of ‘meta’ elements, like bluffing, which are neither properly inside nor outside the game itself. There can be no game without metagame.

In a wider sense, metagaming can refer to activities such as training, studying the opponent, shifting strategies, optimising performance, theorycrafting, buying game pieces, time-outs, trash talking, caring for one’s equipment, and so on. The evolution of metagaming practices can also impact a game’s rules; digital games that are updated regularly are changed by the designers in reaction to shifting dominant play styles, to upsell new expansions, and to keep the game fresh. Indeed, metagaming is so central to digital games that Stephanie Boluk and Patrick LeMieux have questioned in their book Metagaming if video games are games at all, or just means of producing more metagames.

The word meta, a prefix from Greek, is also used to denote self-referentiality. In Lana Wachowski’s The Matrix Resurrections (2021), the events of the original Matrix films are the basis of a popular video game series. In this sense, we can also think of metagames as games about games, or cast our net more widely and consider the metagame’s ‘about itself-ness’, its self-reflexivity. In this seminar, we invite scholars to ponder, among other things, how the knowledge that one is playing a game impacts a game, and how this can be accounted for by designers.

In another light, metagame is a concept which has roots in many different fields, from game theory and Nigel Howard’s work on political behaviour to Richard Garfield’s work on game design, reminding us that game studies as a field is young and built with tools and concepts borrowed and stolen from other realms. Indeed, this academic game of delimiting disciplines and staking claims on knowledge can itself be approached as a game. Through what moves was the current idea of game studies constructed? Does the present conceptualisation of what is and is not ‘game studies’ serve us well? What, in this context, is the significance of emerging subfields (e.g. queer game studies, analog game studies, Black game studies) which formally name even more specific areas of research? Do we need meta game studies, and what might that be? Ten years ago, our theme was ‘Critical Evaluation of Game Studies’; a decade later, this seminar is in a way an opportunity for meta-reflections on that earlier theme.

These are just some potential dimensions and questions related to myriad ways games, game studies, and the many faces of ‘meta’ come together. We also endorse creative and playful interpretations of the theme. As this is the 20th spring seminar, one could even ‘go meta’ and analyse the event itself.

With all that in mind, the list of possible topics includes but is not limited to:

• Metagaming aspects of different types of games
• Historical developments of metagaming
• How does the self-reflexivity of meta question hegemonic play ideals like absorption, immersion, and flow?
• Intersection, overlap, and slippage between games and everyday life
• Elements outside the game that influence the metagame
• Physical gaming environments as metagames
• Formal and critical accounts of metagaming
• How to study metagaming
• Design and production of metagames
• Metagame industries
• Meta of game studies
• Gaming academia
• Disciplinarity of game studies; rules, metarules, alternate histories, etc.

SEMINAR INFORMATION

Meta is the 20th annual spring seminar organised by the Tampere University Game Research Lab. The seminar emphasises work-in-progress submissions, and we strongly encourage submitting late-breaking results, working papers, as well as submissions from graduate and PhD students. The purpose of the seminar is to have peer-to-peer discussions and thereby provide support in refining and improving research work in this area. The seminar is organised in collaboration with the Centre of Excellence in Game Culture Studies.

The papers to be presented will be chosen based on extended abstract review. Full papers are distributed prior to the event to all participants, in order to facilitate discussion. There will be two invited expert commentators to provide feedback on the papers.

The seminar is potentially looking into partnering with a publisher so that the best papers would be invited to be further developed into publication. In the past, we have collaborated with e.g. Analog Game Studies, Games and Culture, International Journal of Role-Playing, Journal of Gaming & Virtual Worlds, Simulation & Gaming, and ToDiGRA journals.

The seminar will be held at Tampere University, Finland, on 7–8 May 2024. The event is free of charge.

SUBMISSION GUIDELINES

The papers will be selected for presentation based on extended abstracts of 500–1000 words (plus references). Abstracts should be delivered in PDF format. Full paper guidelines will be provided with the notification of acceptance.

Our aim is that all participants can familiarise themselves with the papers in advance. Therefore, the maximum length for a full paper is 5000 words (plus references). The seminar presentations should encourage discussion, instead of repeating the information presented in the papers. Every paper will be presented for 10 minutes and discussed for 20 minutes.

Submissions should be sent through this form: https://forms.gle/YDbobW8epHy4R36H7

All information will be updated on the seminar website: https://springseminar.org

Organisers can be contacted at: gamestudiesseminar@gmail.com

IMPORTANT DATES

• Abstract deadline: 2 February 2024
• Notification of acceptance: 23 February 2024
• Full paper deadline: 19 April 2024
• Seminar dates: 7–8 May 2024

ORGANISING TEAM

Usva Friman, Rainforest Scully-Blaker, Mark Maletska, Leland Masek, Jaakko Stenros, Frans Mäyrä, & Olli Sotamaa