In the fall of 2015, our research team at Concordia University began studying a subgenre of multiplayer Minecraft gameplay called “The Hunger Games.” This practice uses Minecraft as a platform for competitive deathmatch mini-games which, through thematic trappings, pay homage to Suzanne Collins’ novels and the films based on them.
Our research began with an effort to map out the procedural rhetoric of Minecraft Hunger Games, identifying its key features as well as its major variants. Our second task was experimentation: what happens if we change up some of the essential characteristics of Minecraft Hunger Games that we identified? How much can we change before we get something that can no longer reasonably be called Hunger Games? In particular, we had an eye towards creating “critical mods” of the Hunger Games concept to be tested by sociology students in Professor Bart Simon’s introductory sociology course. We aimed to see if we could adapt the Hunger Games to enable students to interrogate a range of questions with sociological themes, like class structure or resource scarcity. To what extent would the genre enable this kind of use, while still remaining Hunger Games at its core?
These pages document our research process, findings, and design products.
Our project was carried out at the Technoculture, Art, and Games (TAG) research centre at Concordia University (Montréal, Canada), and was made possible by funding from the Interactive and Multi-Modal Experience Research Syndicate (IMMERSe).
Research Blog
In addition to the final written report and Minecraft map prototypes (available below), the research team also wrote several analytical blog articles over the course of the project. These are available at AmpLab.ca.
Research Team
| Team Leader | Contributors | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nic Watson | Saeed Afzal | Tom LeCercle | ||
| Brent Calvelage | Michael Li | |||
| Supervisors | Patrick Grace | Meghan Overbury | ||
| Prof. Darren Wershler, Concordia University | Gersande La Flèche | |||
| Prof. Bart Simon, Concordia University | Marie-Christine Lavoie |
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Contact
Please direct inquiries to Nic Watson, n.watson@concordia.ca
Copyright Disclaimer
Written contents of this website are the property of their respective authors. Screenshot files and Minecraft map designs are provided under a Creative Commons BY-NC-SA 4.0 license. The contents of certain screenshots may be subject to ownership claims by other entities; consequently, additional restrictions may apply to their re-use or redistribution. Individuals or organizations re-using or redistributing said content are responsible for ensuring that their use is consistent with all applicable copyright laws and license restrictions.
Last updated: 2017-06-30