Edited by: Paolo Ruffino
The edited collection maps the current trajectories of independent game development, at a time when game makers engage with videogame production in a myriad of different ways, ranging from full-time employment to brief and casual investments of time and resources.
The book focuses on four key thematic areas (cultures, networks, techniques and politics), which open up questions surrounding gender inclusivity, creative freedom, funding and publishing strategies, labour, precarity, and social practices taking place in the new contexts of production of the videogame industry. The collection includes a section of geographically specific case studies, with contributions from Latin America, Finland, Australia, United States and the United Kingdom. A final afterword by Bart Simon from Concordia University makes the point on what ‘indie game studies’ have achieved so far, and points at future challenges.
It has been a great pleasure and honour to be responsible for the curation of this collection. It has given me the opportunity to work with some of the most brilliant authors who have been researching videogame production over the past 10-15 years. I would like to thank the authors for their invaluable contribution, and Routledge for their support throughout the publication.
I hope that the book will be useful for scholars, researchers and students interested in independent videogames and game production studies. Please feel free to get in touch if you have any questions about the publication.
For more information:
https://www.routledge.com/Independent-Videogames-Cultures-Networks-Techniques-And-Politics/Ruffino/p/book/9780367336202
Table of Contents
1. After Independence
Paolo Ruffino (University of Liverpool, UK)
Part I: Cultures
2. Decoding and Recoding Game Jams and Independent Game-making Spaces for Diversity and Inclusion
Aphra Kerr (Maynooth University, Ireland)
3. Queering Indie: How LGBTQ Experiences Challenge Dominant Narratives of Independent Games
Bonnie Ruberg (University of California Irvine, USA)
4. Virtually Indie: On the Characteristics of Independent Game Development for Virtual Reality Headsets
Paweł Grabarczyk (IT University of Copenhagen, Denmark)
Part II: Networks
5. Network or Die? What Social Networking Analysis Can Tell Us About Indie Game Development
Pierson Browne and Jennifer Whitson (University of Waterloo, Canada)
6. Strange Bedfellows: Indie Games and Academia
Celia Pearce (Northeastern University, USA)
Part III: Techniques
7. The Conditions of Videogame Production: The Nature and Stakes of Creative Freedom in Stiegler’s Philosophy of Technicity
Patrick Crogan (University of the West of England, UK)
8. Boutique Indie: Annapurna Interactive and Contemporary Independent Game Development
Felan Parker (University of Toronto, Canada)
9. Game Production Studies: Studio Studies Theory, Method and Practice
Casey O’Donnell (Michigan State University, USA)
Part IV: Politics
10. Game Workers Unite: Unionization Among Independent Developers
Jamie Woodcock (The Open University, UK)
11. Playing with Risk: Political-Economy, Independent Games, and the Precarity of Development in Crowded Commercial Markets
Nadav Lipkin (La Roche University, USA)
Part V: Local Indie Game Studies
12. Playful Peripheries: The Consolidation of Independent Game Production in Latin America
Orlando Guevara-Villalobos (University of Costa Rica)
13. The Melbourne Indie Game Scenes: Value Regimes in Localized Game Development
Brendan Keogh (Queensland University of Technology, Australia)
14. Modes of Independence in the Finnish Game Development Scene
Olli Sotamaa (Tampere University, Finland)
15. The Rebels Across the Street: IndiE3 and the Strategic Geography of Indie Game Promotion
John Vanderhoef (California State University, Dominguez Hills, USA)
16. Freedom from the Industry Standard: Student Working Imaginaries and Independence in Games Higher Education
Alison Harvey (York University, Canada)
17. Afterword: The Cultural Conditions of Being Indie
Bart Simon (Concordia University, Canada)
