Rethinking Affective Game Epistemologies

Affective gaming - or gameplay that is influenced by a player's emotional state - is a research domain at the intersection of HCI and affective computing; yet the field has stagnated over the years since its inception back in the early 1980s. In RAGE, I will revitalize the field of affective gaming by addressing foundational epistemic problems that are contributing to this stagnation. RAGE’s research
objectives tackle explicating unclear and hidden assumptions and value sets in this space, and the practical tensions that exist in terms of implementation. I analyze the field through both a theoretical lens in the first year, and moving to a practical implementation of affective games in the second. In this project, I will transfer my knowledge in designing and creating affective games for the implementation aspects of RAGE while Prof. Elisa Mekler (ITU Copenhagen, Denmark) will support the theory aspects. With this fundamentally
interdisciplinary project, I will collaborate with and connect many research groups and labs at ITU from different disciplines, including the Center for Digital Play, the Affective Interactions and Relations (AIR) lab, and the Interaction design (IxD) lab. Collaboration within this interdisciplinary team and broadening my research portfolio to include theoretical and critical research will allow me to shape a research vision and establish myself as a key researcher of affective gaming within the EU, in service of my eventual goal to lead my own research group within the EU.