The Praised, The Loved, The Deplored, The Forgotten : A View into the Wide History of Finnish Games

The history of Finnish games is diverse. It consists not only of commercially successful digital games or board game classics that have knit together generations. Finnish game history is multifaceted both in terms of technologies and execution, as well as content and impact. The reception of games varies: some are highly praised, others become dearly loved, some are deplored and many will simply become forgotten. A game is a versatile format for a variety of works, by different creators and for different types of players.Games are valuable fixtures of cultural histories around the globe. Finnish games are in a precious role in the cultural heritage of Finland. This book offers only a small sample of games. The idea for the book was conceived during an exhibition organised in a local museum during the Nordic DiGRA 2012 conference, Tampere Finland. Four researchers and roughly 20 students joined efforts to build an exhibition to introduce foreign visitors to local games. Game developers, journalists, historians and collectors lent a helping hand in putting everything together. The multiform exhibition reflected the different backgrounds of the members of the team – we ended up opening a diverse view towards Finnish games. Although the exhibition was open only for a short time, the success surpassed all expectations. The work conducted for the exhibition has been updated for this book, and it has served as a basis for the Finnish Museum of Games opened in 2016. Game history is common knowledge, but not always easy to access. It is time to put more effort in recording the history for future generations as well as to trace the paths already forgotten. Games cannot, however, be understood simply by reading – they must be experienced. Hopefully this book will show a guiding light towards understanding games in a wider spectrum and bring everyone closer to the actual experiences

Ylistetyt, rakastetut, paheksutut, unohdetut : Avauksia suomalaisen pelihistorian laajaan kirjoon

Suomalainen pelihistoria on laaja ja kirjava. Se ei koostu ainoastaan kaupallisesti menestyneistä digipeleistä tai sukupolvia yhdistäneistä lautapeliklassikoista – se on monimuotoinen niin teknologioiden, toteuttamistapojen, sisältöjen kuin yhteiskunnallisen vaikutuksenkin suhteen. Peli on monipuolinen muoto erilaisille teoksille, erilaisilta tekijöiltä, erilaisille pelaajille. Pelit ovat tärkeä osa suomalaista kulttuurihistoriaa. Jotkut peleistä saavat osakseen ylistystä, toisista tulee rakastettuja, osa aiheuttaa paheksuntaa ja moni jää unholaan. Tämä kirja esittelee suomalaisesta pelihistoriasta vain pienen osan. Idea kirjasta sai alkunsa Mediamuseo Rupriikissa järjestetystä näyttelystä vuonna 2012. Rakensimme neljän tutkijan ja noin kahdenkymmenen opiskelijan voimin näyttelyä kansainvälisen pelitutkimuskonferenssin Nordic DiGRAn yhteyteen. Halusimme esitellä suomalaisia ja paikallisia peliteoksia ulkomaalaisille vierailijoille. Mukana auttamassa oli myös pelintekijöitä, journalisteja, historioitsijoita sekä keräilijöitä. Työskentelytiimin erilaisten taustojen ansiosta näyttelyn kokonaisuus rakentui monimuotoiseksi. Lyhyestä näyttelystä tuli odotettua suurempi menestys, sen työtä on päivitetty tähän kirjaan ja se on toiminut pohjana vuonna 2016 perustetulle Suomen pelimuseolle. Pelihistoria on yleissivistystä ja jokaisen tulisi tuntea omansa. On aika tallentaa historiaa jälkipolville sekä jäljittää jo unohtuneita polkuja. Pelit eivät kuitenkaan avaudu lukemalla – ne avautuvat kokemusten kautta. Toivottavasti tämä kirja valaisee uria uusiin elämyksiin ja nostaa muistoja keskusteltaviksi

Designing “Game Idea Generation” Games

This paper introduces brainstorming games developed for the use of game designers. Three games designed especially for generating new game ideas were developed in the GameSpace project, which studies methods for design and evaluation of casual mobile multiplayer games. GameSpace idea generation games have been developed through an iterative process in collaboration with the end users: game industry professionals. According to our workshop experiences and tentative results from a pilot study, idea generation games can be successful devices for the creative work of game designers. Game- based idea generation techniques provide an easily facilitated, focused yet playful setting for coming up with new ideas. However, our experiences indicate that idea generation games feature special challenges that must be taken into consideration when designing such games

"An Adapt-or-Die Type of Situation": Perception, Adoption, and Use of Text-To-Image-Generation AI by Game Industry Professionals

Text-to-image generation (TTIG) models, a recent addition to creative AI, can generate images based on a text description. These models have begun to rival the work of professional creatives, and sparked discussions on the future of creative work, loss of jobs, and copyright issues, amongst other important implications. To support the sustainable adoption of TTIG, we must provide rich, reliable and transparent insights into how professionals perceive, adopt and use TTIG. Crucially though, the public debate is shallow, narrow and lacking transparency, while academic work has focused on studying the use of TTIG in a general artist population, but not on the perceptions and attitudes of professionals in a specific industry. In this paper, we contribute a qualitative, exploratory interview study on TTIG in the Finnish videogame industry. Through a Template Analysis on semi-structured interviews with 14 game professionals, we reveal 12 overarching themes, structured into 49 sub-themes on professionals' perception, adoption and use of TTIG systems in games industry practice. Experiencing (yet another) change of roles and creative processes, our participants' reflections can inform discussions within the industry, be used by policymakers to inform urgently needed legislation, and support researchers in games, HCI and AI to support the sustainable, professional use of TTIG to benefit people and games as cultural artefacts.Comment: 32 pages (incl. appendix), 3 figures, 4 tables. Coding template (31 pages, 10 tables), study invitations (email, social media) and pre-study survey provided as supplementary (ancillary) material. Accepted with minor revisions at ACM CHI Play 202

The History of Quantum Games

In this paper, we explore the historical development of playable quantum physics related games (\textit{\textbf{quantum games}}). For the purpose of this examination, we have collected over 260 quantum games ranging from commercial games, applied and serious games, and games that have been developed at quantum themed game jams and educational courses. We provide an overview of the journey of quantum games across three dimensions: \textit{the perceivable dimension of quantum physics, the dimension of scientific purposes, and the dimension of quantum technologies}. We then further reflect on the definition of quantum games and its implications. While motivations behind developing quantum games have typically been educational or academic, themes related to quantum physics have begun to be more broadly utilised across a range of commercial games. In addition, as the availability of quantum computer hardware has grown, entirely new variants of quantum games have emerged to take advantage of these machines' inherent capabilities, \textit{quantum computer games}Comment: 8 pages, from which 1.5 pages of references, 11 figures, one table, presented in the IEEE Conference on Games 202

Hybrid Playful Experiences : Playing between Material and Digital - Hybridex Project, Final Report

Some of the future’s most important product innovations will be made at the borderline of physical and immaterial realities. New technologies enable development where immaterial products become materialized in novel ways, while material products and environment will be augmented with digital services. In this evolution immaterial, digital services will form multifaceted value networks with material products. The creative and playful design solutions and user cultures will form the basis for the utilization of these novel potentials in design of innovative and engaging experiences

Two Decades of Game Jams

In less than a year's time, March 2022 will mark the twentieth anniversary of the first documented game jam, the Indie Game Jam, which took place in Oakland, California in 2002. Initially, game jams were widely seen as frivolous activities. Since then, they have taken the world by storm. Game jams have not only become part of the day-to-day process of many game developers, but jams are also used for activist purposes, for learning and teaching, as part of the experience economy, for making commercial prototypes that gamers can vote on, and more. Beyond surveying game jams and the relevant published scientific literature from the last two decades, this paper has several additional contributions. It builds a history of game jams, and proposes two different taxonomies of game jams - a historical and a categorical. In addition, it discusses the definition of game jam and identifies the most active research areas within the game jam community such as the interplay and development with local communities, the study and analysis of game jammers and organisers, and works that bring a critical look on game jams