Is Science a Game?

If the goal of school is to learn, school isn't a game. But if the goal of school is to get a high score on a test, or raise the rankings of your university, or beat the competition to get into med school, then school looks an awful lot like a game, with winning more important than learning.Ethan Hutt joins me to discuss the idea of school as a game, and how we can reduce the distance between learning and scoring.Check out Ethan's book (co-authored with Jack Schneider) here: https://www.offthemarkbook.com/

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

This episode is co-hosted by David Hall, PhD Candidate in ECL at UNC. David and I are joined by Rachael Hutchinson, Professor in Japanese Studies and Game Studies at the University of Delaware, to discuss what it means to play and research Japanese video games from a non-Japanese perspective. Navigating topics such as the deployment of aesthetic forms and grammars, regionally and linguistically specific jokes, and references to Japanese history and art within video games, we consider the importance of recognizing how these games play with their cultural context and the challenges that face researchers outside that context in identifying when they do so.

Sociologist Donald MacKenzie joins me to discuss his recent article in the London Review of Books, "Hey Big Spender: What Your Smartphone Knows About You."Game Studies rarely focuses on phone games - but billions of people are playing them. And they are mostly free. So getting you to pay for them is another game entirely.https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v46/n16/donald-mackenzie/hey-big-spender

Game designer Bryan Bornmueller joins me to discuss his new game The Fellowship of the Ring: The Trick Taking Game. This game pushes narratology and ludology together in a way I had never seen before: an adaptation of a story in which trick-taking (the abstract mechanic from bridge, spades, and hearts) captures the soul of a literary work. Bryan and I discuss how he took these two incredibly popular yet disparate things and combined them into one narrative game.As of publishing, I believe this game is in print. You can find it here: https://store.asmodee.com/products/the-fellowship-of-the-ring-trick-taking-game

Simon Parkin, host of the podcast My Perfect Console and contributing writer (mostly on video games) to The New Yorker, joins Plumbing Game Studies to talk about his recent NYTimes article on modern video games. (Paywalls on both articles - no paywall on My Perfect Console though!)Simon and I discuss the difference between modern video games and the console games of the previous decades, especially the relationship between art, commerce, and addiction.