For a while now I have been blogging specifically about WoW related topics, going into details, news and other current events in the WoW community – and by doing so also directing the blog towards a WoW playing audience. While I still enjoy ranting in writing about the things I see, experience and discuss with other WoW players – I recognize that I have strafed away from my intial goal for this blog; discussing academic approaches to computer gaming with a wider audience.

This insight have been dawning on me for a while, but got confirmed properly today when a old friend approached me on Facebook. During our catching up commented that she had been browsing my blog – but even with the aid of others, were not able to decipher it or understand what I was writing about. With that comment I realized that the failboat had been filled and had set sail for fail.

So, with that in mind I will return to more general discussion about digital games and gaming culture. This semester I have been lecturing about new ICTs (including games) and I’ll draw upon some of the points I have been making there to showcase research on computer games, and my take on it.

Of course, I can’t claim to be an expert in anything related to computer games, but after a few years dabbling with Game Studies related work – I wont be clueless. F.ex. I wont be have my own research on “computer game addiction”, but will have read enough about it to express an informed opinion.

With that in mind I’ll start off by tackling some of the big controversies surrounding games; are computer games culture? Does it cause violent behaviour? Are computer games addictive? And why don’t girls play computer games? Or do they? Based on a series of lectures I’m doing this semester I’ll present some bite sized perspectives into these rather big and intangible questions. Further more I’ll start presenting some initial data that I have been gathering as my own analysis slowly moves forward. This include some recent (and rather tasty) interview with raiders in casual, hardcore and proper progression guilds (including players from Ensidia). Are there traits that is recognizable across the board? What are the differences? What does it take to get a world first? What do people do to combine raiding with a busy everyday life?

In short: Stay tuned!