Plumbing Game Studies

Donald MacKenzie rejoins the show to talk about his book An Engine, Not a Camera, which is about how financial models aren't designed to reflect the world economy, like a camera, but drive the world economy, like an engine. This means that a large part of economics is driven by trading that resembles a Reiner Knizia or 18XX game. It also means that trading and gambling can be pretty hard to differentiate.You can read more about Donald's book here: https://mitpress.mit.edu/9780262633673/an-engine-not-a-camera/

Ian Bogost joins me to discuss The Small Stuff, his book about finding gratification in physical things. We discuss his road from game studies to gratification, the place for gratification in games, and how something as small as pushing a button or cradling a joystick can make us happy.

Today I'm joined by two social scientists to address the question: is science a game? Michael Penkler, Stefan Sulzenbacher, and Stephan Voss recently published an article on this topic: Playing science: representing and doing research in board games. After a brief discussion of the way that philosophers have considered science a game, the article looks at 3 board games that simulate science.Michael and Stefan join me to discuss their article, and what looking at science as a game can teach us about how science works.Here's a link to the article: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/09505431.2026.2630948

Molly Worthen joins me to discuss her recent NYTimes article "You Can't Game Your Way to a Real Education," which argues that the gamification of classroom learning stems from a fundamental misunderstanding of how students learn. We discuss the broader adoption of tech in classrooms, the way that standardized testing can be thought of as a game, the danger of frictionless edutainment games, and the place for games in real learning.You can read the article here (behind a paywall): https://www.nytimes.com/2026/04/19/opinion/schools-edtech-laptops-games-learning.htmlMolly's website is here: https://mollyworthen.com/

Lex Play, a video game YouTube streamer, joins me to discuss her specialty: cozy games. We quickly figure out that cozy games are less about winning and more about creating, a trend that Lex identifies as having started with MineCraft. Lex also tells us how being a video game streamer creates real communities, both online and off-line.You can find Lex on YouTube here: https://www.youtube.com/c/LexPlayy