The Top Journals for Video Game Research

It seems like there were not many journals devoted specifically to video game studies not so long ago. Now there are several. Here is a list of journals for videogame and gaming research, with indications as to whether they are print or online, and brief descriptions from their websites. Drop me a note if I missed one or if a new one starts up.

–+–

Computer Game Education Review

Type: Online

Note: Initial publication is set for 2010.

CGER is a peer-reviewed, annual, aca­d­e­mic pub­li­ca­tion address­ing issues that con­cern the teach­ing of game design and devel­op­ment. These include, but are not lim­ited to, cur­ricu­lum orga­ni­za­tion, teach­ing method­olo­gies (e.g., con­cep­tual vs. exem­plary), assess­ment tools and tech­niques, game gen­res and clas­si­fi­ca­tions, soci­etal impact, eco­nomic and com­mer­cial issues, legal aspects, and approaches to stu­dent eval­u­a­tion that are of inter­est to fac­ulty and insti­tu­tions involved in the edu­ca­tion and train­ing of future game developers.

–+–

ELUDAMOS, Journal for Computer Game Culture

Type: Online

ELUDAMOS is an international, multi-disciplined, biannual e-journal that publishes peer-reviewed articles that theoretically and/or empirically deal with digital games in their manifold appearances and their sociocultural-historical contexts. ELUDAMOS positions itself as a publication that fundamentally transgresses disciplinary boundaries. The aim is to join questions about and approaches to computer games from decidedly heterogeneous scientific contexts (for example cultural studies, media studies, (art) history, sociology, (social) psychology, and semiotics) and, thus, to advance the interdisciplinary discourse on digital games. This approach does not exclude questions about the distinct features of digital games a an aesthetic and cultural form of articulation, on the contrary, the issue is to distinguish their media specific characteristics as well as their similarity to other forms of aesthetic and cultural practice. That way, the editors would like to contribute to the lasting distinction of international game studies as an academic discipline.

–+–

Game Studies, the International Journal of Computer Game Research

Type: Online

Our Mission – To explore the rich cultural genre of games; to give scholars a peer-reviewed forum for their ideas and theories; to provide an academic channel for the ongoing discussions on games and gaming.

Game Studies is a crossdisciplinary journal dedicated to games research, web-published several times a year at www.gamestudies.org.

Our primary focus is aesthetic, cultural and communicative aspects of computer games, but any previously unpublished article focused on games and gaming is welcome. Proposed articles should be jargon-free, and should attempt to shed new light on games, rather than simply use games as metaphor or illustration of some other theory or phenomenon.

–+–

Games and Culture, A Journal of Interactive Media

Type: Print

Games and Culture: A Journal of Interactive Media is a new, quarterly international journal that publishes innovative theoretical and empirical research about games and culture within interactive media. The journal serves as a premiere outlet for ground-breaking work in the field of game studies.

Games and Culture’s scope includes the socio-cultural, political, and economic dimensions of gaming from a wide variety of perspectives, including textual analysis, political economy, cultural studies, ethnography, critical race studies, gender studies, media studies, public policy, international relations, and communication studies. Other arenas include the following:

• Issues of gaming culture related to race, class, gender, and sexuality
• Issues of game development
• Textual and cultural analysis of games as artifacts
• Issues of political economy and public policy in both US and international arenas

Of primary importance will be bridging the gap between games studies scholarship in the United States and in Europe.

One of the primary goals of the journal is to foster dialogue among the academic, design, development, and research communities that will influence both game design and research about games within various public contexts.  A second goal is to examine how gaming and interactive media are being used outside of entertainment, including in education, for the purposes of training, for military simulation, and for political action.

Games and Culture: A Journal of Interactive Media invites academics, designers and developers, and researchers interested in the growing field of game studies to submit articles, reviews, or special issues proposals to the editor.  Games and Culture is an interdisciplinary publication, and therefore it welcomes submissions by those working in fields such as Communication, Anthropology, Computer Science, English, Sociology, Media Studies, Cinema/Television Studies, Education, Art History, and Visual Arts.

–+–

International Journal of Computer Games Technology

Type: Print

The overall aim of the International Journal of Computer Games Technology is to bring together both the research and development aspects of games technology covering the whole range of entertainment computing and interactive digital media. The focus will be on three research and development frontiers: first, to expand the technology frontier in terms of both hardware and software for games, second, to validate innovative procedures including algorithms and architectures for games, and finally, to explore novel applications of games technology both for entertainment and serious games.

–+–

International Journal of Gaming and Computer-Mediated Simulations

Type: Print

The International Journal of Gaming and Computer-Mediated Simulations (IJGCMS) is a peer-reviewed, international journal devoted to the theoretical and empirical understanding of electronic games and computer-mediated simulations. The journal is interdisciplinary in nature; it publishes research from fields and disciplines that share the goal of improving the foundational knowledge base of games and simulations. The journal publishes critical theoretical manuscripts as well as qualitative and quantitative research studies, meta-analyses, and methodologically-sound case studies. The journal also includes book reviews to keep readers on the forefront of this continuously evolving field. Occasional special issues from the journal provide deeper investigation into areas of interest within either gaming or simulations.

–+–

Journal of Virtual Worlds Research

Type: Online

The Virtual Worlds Institute based in Austin, Texas, USA is a not-for-profit research organization dedicated to:

* The promotion and publication of leading research

* Direct research and innovation in the fields of virtual worlds, 3d internet, immersive interfaces and the singularity

* Developing a commercialization channel for researchers to take their ideas from the laboratory to the marketplace

The Virtual Worlds Institute is looking for, on an on-going basis: research, development, commercialization and funding collaborators and partnerships.

–+–

Simulation & Gaming, An International Journal of Theory, Practice and Research

Type: Print

For more than three and a half decades, Simulation & Gaming: An International Journal of Theory, Practice and Research has served as a leading international forum for the exploration and development of simulation/gaming methodologies used in education, training, consultation, and research. It appraises academic and applied issues in the expanding fields of simulation, computer- and internet-mediated simulation, virtual reality, educational games, video games, industrial simulators, active and experiential learning, case studies, and related methodologies.

The broad scope and interdisciplinary nature of Simulation & Gaming are demonstrated by the wide variety of interests and disciplines of its readers and contributors, who practice in areas such as: business, cognition, communication, decision making, psychology, economics, education, educational technologies, engineering, entrepreneurship, environmental issues, human resources, international studies, language training, learning theory, management, marketing, medicine, multiculturalism, , negotiation, organization studies, peace and conflict studies, policy and planning, political science, project management, sociology, teamwork, technology, and research methodology.

–+–

Finally, there are several journals that regularly touch on video game research while not devoted exclusively to the topic. A great example is the International Journal of Roleplaying. Video game research continues to be published in several venues besides the ones listed here.

The Chasm Between Educational and Commercial Games

Elaine Alhadeff and I have been talking via e-mail to Jeremy Pesner, a recent Computer Science grad from Dickinson College who has been working on educational games that focus on the human immune system. Pesner served as co-author on a paper presented at the ACM Southeast Regional Conference last year. He presented with Patrick Clements over at U. South Carolina on “an educational game that simulates the processes of human immune systems by using a ‘Tower defense’-type game.”

Pesner next will be contributing to a new chapter book edited by Patrick Felicia over at the Waterford Institute of Technology in Ireland. The Handbook of Research on Improving Learning and Motivation through Educational Games: Multidisciplinary Approaches is scheduled to be released in 2011. Pesner’s contribution will explore the “chasm” that has formed between commercial and educational games in terms of “enticing and appealing qualities” between the two genres.

This is a particularly juicy topic ripe for social science research, since it’s so fuzzy. What are the elements in commercial games making them so appealing? Conversely, what makes educational games so dull? How would we measure the difference? What can educational game makers learn from commercial game makers? I think I can speak for Elaine when I say both of us very much are looking forward to Dr. Felicia’s book and Pesner’s contribution.

References:
Clements, P., Pesner, J., & Shepherd, J. (2009). The teaching of immunology using educational gaming paradigms. Proceedings of the 47th Annual Southeast Regional Conference. [Online.] Available: http://portal.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=1566474

Study: Reaction Times Lowered Via Video Games

The folks over at Rochester have another study published on the benefits of playing action video games. Dr. Daphne Bavelier and C. Shawn Green have published in the past on the improved visual plasticity action video game players gain, and evidence of improved eyesight from playing. This article, with lead writer Matthew Dye, focuses on increased mental processing which apparently does not adversely affect accuracy.

Here’s the abstract:

In many everyday situations, speed is of the essence. However, fast decisions typically mean more mistakes. To this day, it remains unknown whether reaction times can be reduced with appropriate training, within one individual, across a range of tasks, and without compromising accuracy. Here we review evidence that the very act of playing action video games significantly reduces reaction times without sacrificing accuracy. Critically, this increase in speed is observed across various tasks beyond game situations. Video gaming may therefore provide an efficient training regimen to induce a general speeding of perceptual reaction times without decreases in accuracy of performance.

References:
Dye, M.W.G., Green, C.S., & Bavelier, D. (2009, December). Increasing speed of processing with action video games. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 18(6). 321-326.

Five Video Games for ESL and Language Development

Kathy Sargent, outgoing editor for TechEdge, (who is a great editor and has done a remarkable job over the years as Director of Communications for TCEA) recently accepted my article on “Virtual ESL” for the next issue. This post expands on the article with games suitable for ESL and the ongoing development of English skills. Certain video games are particularly well-suited to language acquisition and development, a point I made here a couple years ago. There is a heavy dollop of personal opinion in the assertions below, and I welcome dissenting views. Some of these suggestions are relatively expensive, some are free, and all but one are available online.

1. Second Life
   Second Life has a long history of educational adaptation, and the idea of using the environment for ESL purposes was adopted early. Like many efforts with no external motivations however, some formal ESL initiatives have fizzled over time. One still going strong is the Second Life English Community. Founder Kip Boahn had a nice article profiling his work in Forbes a while back. Players from almost 100 different countries regularly gather for such online ESL activities as phonetic treasure hunts through SLEC.

   The global reach, open nature, and ease of use offered by SL, (not to mention the fact it’s free), have helped academics around the world key in to the platform for language training. Since avatars can type or talk over a simple computer connection, engaging native speakers in an interesting 3D environment that is not overly taxing to most hardware results in an ideal environment for language learning.
   -+-

2. World of Warcraft.
   Of the millions of players frequenting the popular MMORPG, you might be surprised to learn there are some engaged in educational activities amidst all that medieval fantasy action. The most famous group devoted to exploring pedagogy in WoW is the guild Cognitive Dissonance, run by Lucas Gillespie and Peggy Sheehy. Lucas’ blog EduRealms follows his educational efforts in the game.

   It is very easy to start up groups and guilds in WoW, and while Asian gold farmers have annoyed North American players in the past, Dr. Edd Schneider over at SUNY-Potsdam gained considerable attention in 2007 for suggesting WoW was a promising platform for ESL in Asia, provided stateside supervised guidance was included.
   -+-

3. My Word Coach
   Although available for the Wii, the DS version of My Word Coach offers players an easier time writing, with its included stylus and touch screen. Plus, the “DS factor” makes it more portable and affordable for classroom or after-school use. It’s not promoted as an ESL product, but the vocabulary training couched in a gaming environment works just as well for non-native speakers.
   -+-
4. Webkinz
   The popular children’s game tied to collectible plush dolls offers a restricted communications feature. “Kinz chat” uses basic sentence elements for players to communicate. While Webkinz probably is not suitable to older ESL students, for the younger crowd it offers a fun and relatively painless way to introduce English. It’s also offered in 12 other languages, so gamers can play in their native tongue as well as the Queen’s.
   -+-
5. Whyville
   Whyville is the free online world designed for children learning, and it has an impressive pedigree with corporate and government sponsorship stretching back several years. Although its strengths lie in STEM games and activities, one of the key features of Whyville appealing to teachers is the sanitized chat feature where cursing is automatically edited out.

In the process of investigating the many mini-games out there, a couple of nifty titles rose to the top. The advantages to using online mini-games for ESL include the fact that teacher supervision is not as heavily needed as it is for the above examples. On the other hand, mini-games typically focus on a much narrower skill set, and kids may tire of them quickly.

A couple of my favorites in the mini-game category included Word Frog, which is a neat way to drill antonyms and such, ala Number Crunchers. I also enjoyed Grammar Ninja,which drills identifying parts of speech in a playful way.

Astronomical Science Learning Through WJU’s Selene Videogame

I’ve had a pleasant e-mail conversation with Dr. Debbie Denise Reese over at Wheeling Jesuit University in West Virginia concerning the Selene Project, a multi-million dollar NASA and National Science Foundation funded learning project designed to teach students lunar science through a remarkable videogame.

Dr. Reese is the senior educational researcher at the Center for Educational Technologies at WJU, which started CyGaMEs, or Cyberlearning through Game-based Metaphor Enhanced Learning Objects, in 2006. Selene is a CyGaMEs videogame seeking to instruct students through the construction of virtual moons, learning a number of science-based standards and a few things about making videogames along the way.

The amazing work on Selene includes ample classroom materials. It is clear education was the primary focus of the videogame, and federal standards as well as state standards for Texas and Illinois are included in the accompanying online materials. The STEM focus is strong, and data points collected from embedded assessments allow for promising research material to be expounded upon in future papers.

The main Selene site is here, the CyGaMEs site is here, and the Center for Educational Technologies site is here. A recent radio feature and news article from West Virginia Public Broadcasting on the Selene Project is here.

References
Brown, K. (2009, November 27). Videogame research at WJU brings lunar science to life. [Online.] Retrieved December 1, 2009 from http://www.wvpubcast.org/newsarticle.aspx?id=12175

Study Indicates Pricing and Social Features Contribute to a Video Game’s Popularity

The gaming press is buzzing about a study presented by Russell Beale and Matthew Bond over at University of Birmingham, UK at the recent Human-Computer Interaction Conference (HCI 2009). Beale and Bond studied game rankings on popular sites, and discovered (rather surprisingly, according to press on the topic) that plot and graphics were less important to consumers than social aspects and price of a game. Thus, a sub-$10.00 game that features heavy social interaction with other players would be more likely to score higher reviews on ranking sites than a more expensive and less social game with better graphics and story line.

References:
Plot and graphics not paramount in videogame success. (2009, September 12). New Scientist. [Online.] Available: http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20327255.500-plot-and-graphics-not-paramount-in-videogame-success.html?DCMP=OTC-rss&nsref=online-news

Introducing Astropolis: The Video Game Suite Designed to Help Study Autism

Matthew Belmonte over at Cornell is leading a team that has designed a suite of video games specifically to study autism. The game suite, called Astropolis, has all the adventure and science fiction elements so popular with young boys. It was developed and research is ongoing thanks to funding in part by the National Science Foundation, the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, and Autism Speaks.

Aimed at children ages 10-15 diagnosed autistic, the games contain activities allowing researchers to test differing hypotheses within the framework of autism research. A past problem with autism research is that it often takes place strictly in lab environments, outside of natural settings for the subjects. Belmonte hopes these video games will provide immersive environments that will yield richer information than traditional lab settings.

Another benefit promoting natural environments: the games capture information while the subjects play that can be retrieved later. Thus, subjects can install the game suite on laptops taken home and played in familiar surroundings, and info can be retrieved when the laptops return to the lab.

Belmonte also uses EEG measurements in lab settings with the subjects, a technique popularized by Mark Klinger at U. Alabama. (MRI scans are also popular measurement techniques to use on video game players.)

So far, Dr. Belmonte has released two research abstracts at conferences of the International Society of Autism Research, here and here. No doubt journal published, peer reviewed research is forthcoming.

Read the press release from Cornell here for much more information. Check out the Autism Collaborative Wiki here for notes on development and other background information.

Finally, since the software was developed with public grants, it is freely available as a download at AutismCollaborative.org.

References:
Professor uses video games to explore facets of autism. (October 13, 2009). [Online.] Available: http://www.physorg.com/news174650438.html

Online Poker Practice Helps Increase Real World Winnings

Can playing poker online increase skills when playing for real? One young man has personal anecdotal evidence that it does. In a local boy makes good story from the Bryan/College Station Eagle, Jordan Smith has just returned from the World Series of Poker in Las Vegas. He placed 10th, thus losing out for a chance at the final rounds for a share of the $27 million dollar jackpot. However, the college dropout and professional poker player did score almost a million dollars in winnings.

With very little outside help, Smith said, he improved his poker skills by practicing online.

“The more you play, the more you learn,” he said, adding that he had played more than a million hands online. “Playing online is not that different [from live games]; you just get a lot more hands in. When you’re playing live, you can only play one tournament and you can get about 20 to 30 hands in. But online, you can play eight tournaments at one time and play 60 to 100 hands in an hour. Online, you learn at a much faster rate, and you get to play more tournaments.”

Read the entire story here.

References:
Jaramillo, E. (2009, July 26). CS man scores big in poker tourney. The Eagle, A9.

Top 10 Video Game Research Bibliographies

Had a nice conversation via e-mail with a fellow doc student on the East coast recently. The subject of a video game bibliography came up, thus this entry. The main criterion for inclusion: the bibliography is freely available online. If there is one out there I missed that should be included, please let me know.

Here they are in no particular order:

Digiplay Initiative
Jason Rutter and Jo Bryce at University of Central Lancashire, UK

Description: A dynamic online bibliography dedicated to research on video games. As of this writing, over 2,000 entries are included.

–+–

SAGE-BC
Developed by SAVIE, Inc. for the SAGE for Learning research network in British Columbia

Description: “The SAGE Repository is a knowledge base comprised of reading grids based on articles dealing with educational games, simulations and simulation games and of analytical grids based on existing games, simulations or simulation games… The Repository is built by and for the community of researchers, professionals and students interested in game, simulation and simulation game research.”

–+–

Parker/Becker Games Bibliography
J. R. Parker and Katrin Becker for IEEE Computer Society Task Force on Game Technologies (TFGT)

Description: This online bibliography is divided into publications appearing annually from before 1970 to 2007.

–+–

Syamsul’s Funology
Syamzai, a doc student in Malaysia

Description: Syamzai’s entire blog is devoted to serving as a bibliography for gaming research. For instance, the journal articles bibliography is here.

–+–

Virtual Worlds in Education
Sharon Stoerger at University of Indiana

Description: It’s Not Whether You Win or Lose, but How You Play the Game: The Role of Virtual Worlds in Education, Annotated Bibliography.

–+–

Games Bibliography
Bibliobouts Project at University of Michigan

Description: An annotated bibliography divided into different sections.

–+–

Video Game Bibliography for Rhetoric Teachers
Dept. of Rhetoric and Writing at University of Texas Austin

Description: “This bibliography aims to acquaint rhetoric instructors with articles and books on video games and pedagogy. It should provide a helpful resource to instructors who would like to incorporate video games or similar technology in their rhetoric classrooms.”

–+–

Bibliography of Network Games Research
Sheng-Wei (Kuan-Ta) Chen at Institute of Information Science in Taiwan

Description: “This list contains a number of network gaming related papers we came across.”

–+–

This Might Be a Game
Jane McGonigal’s Bibliography from her doctoral dissertation.

Description: “Her dissertation, ‘This Might Be a Game’, which she completed in 2006 [UC Berkley], focuses on the ways that alternate reality games influence and change the real world. Her dissertation received the international Leonardo Art + Technology Award for the most significant new media research filed in Fall 2006.”

–+–

Potential Positive Effects of Video Games, Merits Research
James Zimmer-Dauphinee at Georgia Southern University

Description: “There are obviously many differing views on the effects and uses of video games.  Unfortunately, these views are largely based on theories and ideas which may actually have no real basis in fact…”

–+–

Update:

As more become available, and I learn about them, I’ll include them here. This one is via Play Think Learn. Be sure and send me a link if there are other good ones out there.

InvestiGaming
Carrie Heeter and Brian Winn at Michigan State University

Description: A dynamic bibliography focusing on gender research in games.

Update:
Here’s a list of papers for online medical training via gaming technology from the Pulse!! project at TAMU-CC.

Blowing Up: Criticism of Video Game Violence Research

While browsing through Neuroanthropology.net’s blog entry entitled Gaming Roundup, which I found linked to my article Video Game Addiction: Fact or Fiction? under the addiction category, I came across an interesting article by Chris Lavigne entitled, Why Video Game Research is Flawed. Lavigne makes some interesting points, specifically about studies of violence in video games.

Lavigne’s first complaint is that researchers often do not fully understand the video games they use in their studies. Pointing to a Dutch study in the journal Aggressive Behavior that compared aggressiveness between a group playing Tekken with a group playing Crash Bandicoot 2, Lavigne points out the considerable differences between the two games. Interestingly, there is violence in the control group’s game, CB2, though it is milder than the experimental group’s game.

Saying the games differ “only on violent content” is false, but the assertion is typical of the kinds of mistakes researchers make when they’re studying videogames. Researchers often pair up completely unrelated games but act like they’re equivalents.

Studying aggression in video game players seems to be a common approach, since the methods of measuring aggression can be agreed upon by researchers (or at least there is a foundational set of measurements, which leads to de facto agreement). Lavigne is miffed, though, when games are used interchangeably in such studies.

Most researchers assume that video games are completely interchangeable with one another, a concept any gamer would find as ludicrous as the idea that all books are the same or all movies are basically identical. One study by two American media researchers acknowledged this limitation. In an article published in the Journal of Communication in 2007, James Ivory and Sriram Kalyanaraman carefully chose to contrast violent and non-violent games with very similar gameplay styles and presentations. Probably not coincidentally, their study found no significant differences in aggression levels between the players of the different games.

Lavigne points to a study that rated game violence subjectively by ranking weapon maneuvers in Mortal Kombat: Deadly Alliance as more violent. But, some of the most gruesome action in that game takes place bare-handed.

Another study found players of zombie-shooting game House of the Dead 2 were faster at identifying angry faces than players of a kayaking game. The study’s authors considered this evidence that violent games produce aggressive thinking. Gamers would point out that House of the Dead 2 is a reflex-oriented shooting game. Success in the game specifically relies on being able to quickly identify angry faces. Surely, that would have affected the study’s results.

Researchers also do not distinguish violence within context in a game. Violence in movies is generally understood in context, Lavigne asserts. We understand the violence in Saving Private Ryan is different than that in a horror flick. Video game researchers are guilty of lumping all violence in games together, regardless of context. Measurements of violence are also problematic. Since there is no standard, each video game must be subjected to an arbitrary measurement devised by authors of the study.

This last one is a valid complaint, as there are few standards of measurement for quantifying things like “levels of violence” or other intangibles within a game. Such measurements indeed are subjective. Often professors will enlist the help of students to go through a game and provide rankings. A thorough researcher may have many students provide rankings and average the results. In a perfect world, we would have a large population provide subjective rankings on an identical scale for several intangibles within all the popular titles. Then, researchers could draw upon the rankings, where individual biases have been averaged out, and everyone could agree with the premises ahead of time. Alas, such a huge time sink will likely never be practical, especially in the rapidly changing world of video games where titles rarely persist in popularity more than a few months.

Lavigne sums up by complaining about comparisons between graphically violent games and obscure titles, leading to questionable results in studies that are then cited in future studies and reported in the media as fact.

Many pick questionable games in their research as well, choosing titles with extreme levels of violence that were never particularly popular with gamers and contrasting them with amateurish, low-quality free games that no one’s ever heard of. And then these are supposed to represent all video games. These leaps of illogic make reading video game research like peering into a parallel universe, where everything may seem internally consistent, but nothing matches up with the real world.

Though raising many valid points, I suspect Lavigne is a little too worried about studies on violent video games. Video games are the new bugbear on the block, just as comic books were 50 years ago. There is concern this new media may be contributing to the delinquency of children, and this feeds a research frenzy centered around fuzzy measurements in the soft sciences.

Eventually, errors and false assumptions will be uncovered and rectified through repeated measurements and multiple studies. Over the years a consensus will build, be struck down, multiply into competing consensuses, argued over and hashed out in the leading journals, and eventually researchers will agree on some core issues. Or maybe not. They may agree to disagree on certain items. The point is, eventually they’ll come up with something useful. Maybe by that time there will be a new bugbear on the block and their attention may shift to it, whatever it is.

But such is research. If the research articles on video game violence are disconcerting, there are many more interesting articles on video games in education. Several young professors, even some in their 40s and 50s now, have grown up playing video games and understand their characteristics enough to come up with some interesting results.

It’s not worth getting upset every time the media trumpets the latest research article linking video games to violence or aggression. Rather, it’s more interesting to learn how video games are enhancing the education of students. Such articles won’t get as much sensational press as the ones linking video games to violence, but they are much more useful, informative, and fun to read.

References:
Lavigne, C. (2009, May 25). Why video game research is flawed. Maisonneuve. [Online.] Available: http://www.maisonneuve.org/pressroom/article/2009/may/25/why-video-game-research-is-flawed/