Paper Short Abstract:

In this presentation we will explore the practice of doing ludic ethnography with the help of a card deck, conceptualized as a tool supporting fieldwork on environmental and social sustainability of video game development. Our research is conducted within the Horizon Europe project STRATEGIES (Sustainable Transition for Europe’s Game Industries).

Paper Abstract:

Our research focuses on the socio-cultural and environmental implications of video game development. We are specifically interested in how European game studios navigate the map of relations between games and the natural environment and how they address the environmental and human cost of making games.

In our ethnographic fieldwork we are using a dedicated card deck “Game Studios vs Climate Crisis”, designed by Trevin York as a tool to be used in collaborative settings of “miniature ethnographic engagement” (York 2022). Such a method allows to incorporate cooperation directly into the research process - not only within the fieldwork but also during interpretation and meaning-making (Campbell & Lassiter 2010). Both game and ethnography deploy similar strategies of discovery - puzzle solving and making sense of unfamiliar logics and experimentation with an open-ended approach allowing for serendipity. We hope that the deck can help us curate “re-enactments” (Dippel 2022) of key problems, and better cater to “situated knowledges” (Harraway 1988) emerging from this ludic “kindred practice” (Taylor 2022). In this ludic set-up, the ethnographer does not enter the field as the instance from above but becomes part of the playing situation.

This presentation will comprise two parts - in the opening act we will introduce the card deck and provide insights from the playing field. In the second part, we will discuss the dynamics of using the ludic ethnographic method.