The Young Academics Workshop will take place again in the run-up to the Clash of Realities conference. As the continuation of last year’s workshop, it is still dedicated to the topic “Atmospheric Propositions: Creating And Thinking the Aesthetics of Playable Atmospheres”. However, this year the participants will receive support in fleshing out their ideas for the planned Young Academics anthology.
The workshop’s aim is to translate the study of atmospheres for game studies, game design and interactive media design (VR, AR etc.). It will bring back together the participants of the preceding edition, with the aim of jointly working on the publication of their papers. The participants will receive both peer and expert feedback on their contributions. The resulting publication will encompass a broad range of discussions related to atmospheres in digital and analogue games intended to strengthen the discourse of game studies regarding the valuable subject of atmospheres.
Therefore, this workshop will continue the work that has been started last year: to explore the uncharted lands of atmosphere in digital games. Atmosphere, as a term, is ever-present in non-academic discussions about digital games. It is commonly used in game marketing as a marker of excellency of a given game regarding its world-building or its immersive qualities. Moreover, classic games journalism refers to atmosphere as a feature of reviewed games and usually rewards games it deems especially atmospheric with higher scores than their less atmospheric competitors. Finally, players refer to atmosphere as a major influential factor of their experience, and treasure games that have the ability of evoking a specific, desired atmosphere.
The planned publication will accumulate the results of this two-part Young Academics Workshop 2020/2021 and the Young Academics Workshop 2019 and is scheduled to be released in 2022.
Guest Scholars
Federico Alvarez, Björn Bartholdy (CGL), Michael Debus, Sonia Fizek (CGL), Gundolf S. Freyermuth (CGL), Emmanuel Guardiola (CGL), Curtis Maughan, Dan Pinchbeck (The Chinese Room) tbc, Ulrike Hanstein (ifs).
Check out the program!