archaeogaming
Poll: The Archaeology of [video game type]
I’ve started my PhD in archaeogaming at the University of York (UK). One of the things I want to do (okay five things) is to conduct five case studies of […]
I’ve started my PhD in archaeogaming at the University of York (UK). One of the things I want to do (okay five things) is to conduct five case studies of the archaeology of different types of video games. There are over 30 general game types to choose from, and I want the case studies to come from a diverse variety of kinds of games. If you’d like to help, please take the one-question poll, which should take less than five minutes to complete. This will help me determine which types of games to study in-depth archaeologically for the PhD.
[UPDATE Feb. 7, 2017]: To try to make the above a little clearer, I am personally interested in studying video games archaeologically. I consider video games to be both archaeological artifacts AND sites. Listen to my podcast (15 mins.) to learn more about that crazy idea. My hypothesis is that one can use archaeological tools/methods to understand video games archaeologically, conducting fieldwork, and even “excavation”, as well as surveys, landscape archaeology, and more. These methods and tools should be applicable to any game of any genre. So I am picking a few genres and one game per each genre to test that hypothesis. Maybe the hypothesis is correct, maybe not. At the end of the day, I’ll have a better idea about what archaeological tools and methods work in the game-space, and what don’t, and I might even be able to create some new tools/methods for conducting archaeological investigations into virtual spaces.
Thank you!
—Andrew Reinhard, Archaeogaming
Archaeogaming
Archaeogaming is a collective of gamers who are interested in applying archaeological methods while exploring game-worlds. We are interested in the evolution of gaming worlds and in the use of archaeology while in-game. Archaeogaming was founded by Andrew Reinhard on June 9, 2013.
Archaeogaming 
I don’t follow. How does this archaeogaming work?
I am treating video games as archaeological sites as well as artifacts and am applying real-world archaeological tools and methods to them (and creating new tools for understanding games archaeologically). For the case studies, I want to select one game from each of five categories to see/prove that archaeology is scalable across a wide swath of games (just as archaeology is conducted in various environments).
That sounds very progressive.
This is great. I really love what your doing, especially the study you did on No Man’ Sky. I have some questioned I’d like to ask you about it, but I won’t do that here. So you have a publicly listed e-mail you wouldn’t mind me sending them to? I’m going to participate in the poll you have one this page when I get home tonight.
Good luck on your PhD. I look forward to your future archeogaming discoveries!
Cheers
Thanks, Daniel. NMS questions can go to nmsarchaeology@gmail.com. We’re still plugging away there, although the siren’s song of Elite Dangerous is strong….
Thanks for responding with the e-mail info. I will definitely be sending you guys something very soon.