Game

Consolidated scholarly sources (monographs, articles, theses & book chapters)

A Short Hike

Music and the Moving Image (2023) “So You’re Going on a ‘Short’ Hike? Sensory Awareness and Listening to Ecoregions in A Short Hike”Nguyen (2022) A Short Hike: Writing with a Videogame (MA thesis, UiT The Arctic University of Norway)Vihko (2023) Musical Mapmaking: Understanding the Adaptive Soundtrack in the Open‑World Adventure Game A Short Hike (MA thesis, Aalto University)Aksay, Ensslin & Richter (2025) “Journey to and from the ordinary in A Short Hike and TOEM” in DiGRAA 2025 proceedings.

Amnesia: The Dark Descent

Addcox (2016) “The Dark Descent: Amnesia Debt to Victorian Physiological Psychology” in _Neo‑Victorian Studies_Kirkland (2009) “Masculinity in Video Games: The Gendered Gameplay of Silent Hill” (contextual for Amnesia) in _Camera Obscura_Perron (2018) _The World of Scary Video Games_Thon (2019) “Playing with Fear: Aesthetics of Horror in Recent Indie Games”Lee (2019) *Running Scared: Fear, Space & Affect in Amnesia: The Dark Descent (MA thesis)Thon (2019) “Do You Feel Like a Hero Yet?” in Eludamos.

Botanicula

Janik (2015) “The cluster worlds of imagination: the analysis of collage technique in games by Amanita Design” in New Perspectives in Game Studies (CEEGS proceedings)Šisler, Švelch & Šlerka (2017) “Czeching In: From Text Adventure to Global Competition: The Legacy of the Czech and Slovak Computer Game Culture” in _International Journal of Communication_Zurschmitten (2011) “Zwischen Zerfall und Zelebrierung, Film und Spiel: Amanita Design” in the anthology Contact. Conflict. Combat. Unresolved: no second dedicated peer‑reviewed article solely on Botanicula.

Citizen Sleeper

Kunzelman (2025) “The Delay Between Thinking and Feeling: Documenting Affect in Citizen Sleeper” in Journal of Cinema and Media Studies 64(3).

Control

Ensslin (2021) “Control: The Bureaucratic Gothic” (Games and Culture)Vella (2020) “The Ludic Sublime and Subjectivity in Control” (Game Studies)Franz (2022) “Control (2019) and Concrete: Videogame Fun as Foucauldian Counter‑Conduct?” in DiGRA proceedings.

Cultist Simulator

Carter et al. (2018) “Obscurity & Epistemic Frustration in Cultist Simulator” (Games and Culture)Carter et al. (2019) “Player Labour & Interpretation in Cultist Simulator” (DiGRA proceedings)Mitchell, Kway & Lee (2020) “Storygameness: Understanding Repeat Experience and the Desire for Closure in Storygames” (DiGRA 2020) — case study includes Cultist Simulator.

Darkwood

Aziminejad (2023) Soundscapes in Darkwood (MA thesis, Uppsala University)Thon (2019) “Do You Feel Like a Hero Yet? — Ecstasies of Embodiment in Videogames” (Eludamos)—discusses _Darkwood_Seller (2020) “Vegetal Horrors in the Veggie Horror Game Darkwood” (DiGRA 2020 abstract)Eludamos (2020) special issue on indie horror features Darkwood.

Dear Esther

Aller (2023) “Walking Simulators and European Romanticism” in _Colloquium: New Philologies_Bozdog & Galloway (2016) “I Cried to Dream Again: Discovery and Meaning‑Making in Walking Simulators” (DiGRA 2016)Carbo‑Mascarell (2016) “Walking Simulators: The Digitisation of an Aesthetic Practice” (DiGRA/FDG paper)Colthup (2021) Can you play a story? What are walking simulators and how do they immerse us? (PhD thesis)Fernández‑Vara (2019) Introduction to Game Analysis (Routledge)—chapter on walking simulatorsMartin (2016) “Dear Esther” (Game Studies)Colthup (2018) “‘You Were all the World Like a Beach to Me’: Second‑Person Address in Dear Esther” (IJTL)Media Fields Journal “Haptic Landscapes: Dear Esther and Embodied Video Game Space”Prieto‑González (2023) “Rituals and Monotony in Dear Esther and Everybody’s Gone to the Rapture” (International Journal of Transmedia Literacy).

Depression Quest

Harrer (2018) “Procedural Frames of Depression in Depression Quest” (Game Studies)Harrer (2019) _Games and Bereavement: How Video Games Represent Attachment, Loss, and Grief_Farber & Schrier (2021) “Beyond Winning: A Situational Analysis of Two Digital Autobiographical Games” (Game Studies)Farber & Schrier (2017) “The Limits and Strengths of Using Digital Games as ‘Empathy Machines’” (preprint).

Disco Elysium

Vella & Cielecka (2021) “‘You Won’t Even Know Who You Are Anymore’: Bakhtinian Polyphony and the Challenge to the Ludic Subject in Disco Elysium” (Baltic Screen Media Review)Banfi (2024) “Declining Games and Depression in Disco Elysium” (Games and Culture)Zareba (2023) “No one can choose where they come from: Trauma and Self‑Creation in Disco Elysium” (Baltic Screen Media Review)Kjeldgaard‑Christiansen & Hejná (2023) “The Voices of Game Worlds: A Sociolinguistic Analysis of Disco Elysium” (Games and Culture)Banfi (2024) “Can the classic role‑playing game be unheroic? Disco Elysium and the politics of synchronization” (Games and Culture)Jagoda (2020) Experimental Games: Critique, Play, and Design in the Age of Gamification (monograph)Post45 cluster “Reading Disco Elysium” edited by Fizek & Schrape (2021).

Everybody’s Gone to the Rapture

Carbo‑Mascarell (2016) “Walking Simulators: The Digitisation of an Aesthetic Practice”Muriel (2017) “Tracing the Social: Lessons from Firewatch and Everybody’s Gone to the Rapture” (Diggit Magazine)Diggit Magazine feature “Sublimity in Everybody’s Gone to the Rapture”Pérez‑Latorre (2019) “Post‑Apocalyptic Games, Heroism and the Great Recession” (Game Studies)Prieto‑González (2023) “Rituals and Monotony in Dear Esther and Everybody’s Gone to the Rapture”Rupcic (2023) “Techno‑Religion and Cyberspace Spirituality in Dystopian Video Games” (Religions).

Fallen London

Ensslin (2014) Literary Gaming (MIT Press) — analyses Fallen London as procedural literary narrationEnsslin & Bell (2016) “Serial Digital Fiction: Fallen London” (Poetics Today)van den Beukel (2017) “Fallen London: Authorship in Game Allegory” (Paradoxa 29).

Firewatch

Kagen (2018) “Walking, Talking and Playing with Masculinities in Firewatch” (Game Studies)Carbo‑Mascarell (2016) “Walking Simulators” (DiGRA/FDG)Fernández‑Vara (2020) “Player‑Centric Narration” (FDG paper)Colthup (2021) PhD thesis on walking simulatorsWhalen (2018) chapter on interactive audio in the Oxford Handbook of Interactive Audio.

Gabriel Knight: Sins of the Fathers

Schmieder (2022) “Public Places and Private Traces: The Self and the City in Digital Games” (ReL journal)—includes analysis of _Gabriel Knight_Shevlyakova (2021) “Adapted Myth and Trauma in Gabriel Knight” (Eludamos).

Gone Home

Carbo‑Mascarell (2016) “Walking Simulators”Ensslin (2014) _Literary Gaming_Fernández‑Vara (2019) _Introduction to Game Analysis_Martin (2016) analysis of Gone Home (Game Studies)Takolander (2018) “What games writing teaches us about creative writing: A case study of Gone Home” (TEXT Special Issue 49)Kennedy (2020) “Space, Navigation & Queerness in _Gone Home_or Toward a Queer Spatiality” (First Person Scholar)Ruberg (2020) “The queer logics of state failure in Gone Home and Night in the Woods” (Games and Culture)Sloan (2015) “Videogames as Remediated Memories: Commodified Nostalgia and Hyperreality in Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon and Gone Home” (Media Commons).

Grim Fandango

Doaré (2017) “Grim Fandango: A Case Study on Game Localisation” (Academia paper)Pearce (2003) “Game Noir: A Conversation with Tim Schafer” (Game Studies)Brunet & Palacios (2019) “The Language of Death in Grim Fandango” (Metaphor and the Social World).

Heaven’s Vault / Heaven’s Vault

Condis (2020) “Sorry, Wrong Apocalypse: Horizon Zero Dawn, Heaven’s Vault, and the Ecocritical Videogame” (Game Studies)Ploetz (2023) “Readers of the Lost Artifacts: The Heaven’s Vault Video Game” (Advances in Archaeological Practice)Condis (2021) “Sorry, Wrong Apocalypse: The Authenticating Affects of End Times in Heaven’s Vault” (Game Studies 21(1))Ensslin (2021) chapter on ludic linguistics in the Routledge Companion to Imaginary Worlds (analyses Heaven’s Vault)Fernández‑Vara (2020) “Archaeology & Epistemic Play” (Game Studies / FDG)Ploetz (2023) emphasises the game’s diverse characters and slow archaeologyCondis (2020) cross‑analysisAnimal Archaeology blog on slow archaeology in Heaven’s Vault.

Hypnospace Outlaw

Cobb (2025) “Interface Games as Microgenre: Archives and Nostalgia in Hypnospace Outlaw” (Television & New Media)NetworkCultures (2026) “Perception of Y2K Nostalgia Through Hypnospace Outlaw” (blog/journal).

I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream

Aarseth (1997) _Cybertext: Perspectives on Ergodic Literature_Ensslin (2014) _Literary Gaming_Vasilikaris (2019) “Analysing Harlan Ellison’s ‘I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream’” (Ex‑centric: Journal of Literature and the Modern World).

If Found…

Harrer (2024) study of trans temporalities in games (University of Edinburgh)Seller (2023) “Trans Tissue: If Found… (2020) Dehiscence, Liminality and Decreation” (DiGRA paper)Vallières (2025) “Queerness in Video Games” (MatLit journal)First Monday (2024) “Trans temporalities of migrant game making in If Found…, Mosaic and We Are OFK” (DOI 10.5210/fm.v29i6.13685).

Inscryption

Howard (2024) “The (un)Lucky Carder: Oulipean Constraints and Meta‑Narrative in Inscryption” (ELO Proceedings)Pan (2024) “Breaking the Fourth Wall in Inscryption” (DiGRA proceedings)Reid & Elliott (2025) “From Paper to Pixels: Horror Remediation in Inscryption” (DiGRA 2025)additional DiGRA/ELO abstracts exploring meta‑narrative in Inscryption.

Journey

Aristov (2020) “Journey & the Semiotics of Meaningful Play”Isbister (2016) How Games Move Us (MIT Press)—chapter on _Journey_Fernández‑Vara (2019) Introduction to Game Analysis—section on _Journey_Crispin (2022) “A Wordless World: Semiotics of Ascent, Motion and Embodiment in Journey” (Acta Ludologica)Purpose in Preservation: A Positive Psychology Analysis of Journey and Outer Wilds (Acta Ludologica 2024).

Kentucky Route Zero

Vella (2014) “Player and Figure: An Analysis of a Scene in Kentucky Route Zero” (Nordic DiGRA)Stein (2021) “It’s More Like a Tendency: Trajectories of the Literary in Kentucky Route Zero” (Game Studies)Jagoda (2020) _Experimental Games_Ensslin (2014) Literary Gaming—section on KRZCuerdo (2024) PhD dissertation on KRZ narrative choicesIshchenko (2023) MA thesis on magical literariness in KRZBergstrom & Poor (2022) “A Preliminary Categorization and Investigation of the Political in Commercially Successful Indie Games” (Game Studies)NeMLA (2021) paper “It’s More Like a Tendency: Trajectories of the Literary in Kentucky Route Zero”.

Kingdom Come: Deliverance

Cook (2024) “Kingdom Come: Deliverance and the Aesthetics of Authenticity” (Journal of Sound and Music in Games)Neumann (2019) “Representation of Medieval Realia in PC game Kingdom Come: Deliverance” (Czech‑Polish Historical & Pedagogical Journal)Wright (2020) Representations of Middle Ages in Digital Gaming (PhD thesis).

Loom

Švelch (2009) “The Pleasurable Lightness of Being: Interface, Mediation and Meta‑Narrative in Lucasfilm’s Loom” (Eludamos)additional references to Loom in game‑design textbooks and retro‑game histories.

Machinarium

Pinel (2014) “Machinarium : du plaisir esthétique postmoderne” (Interfaces numériques), DOI 10.25965/interfaces-numeriques.951Janik (2015) “The cluster worlds of imagination: the analysis of collage technique in games by Amanita Design” (CEEGS proceedings).

Mutazione

Austin & Cooper (2022) “Feeling the Narrative Control(ler): Casual Art Games as Trauma Therapy” (Replay: The Polish Journal of Game Studies).

Oxenfree

Harkin (2021) “Liminal Rhetoric in Girlhood Games: Developmental Disruption in Night School Studio’s Oxenfree” (Game Studies 21(3)).

Papers, Please

Morrissette (2017) “Glory to Arstotzka: Morality, Rationality, and the Iron Cage of Bureaucracy in Papers, Please” (Game Studies 17(1))Sarian (2019) “The Game of Politics: Examining the Role of Work, Play, and Subjectivity Formation in Papers, Please” (Games and Culture 13(5), 459–478)Deslongchamps‑Gagnon (2024) “Arguing for False Moral Dilemmas in Games” (DiGRA 2024, DOI 10.26503/dl.v2024i1.2216).

Pathologic 2

Perron (2018) World of Scary Video Games—series‑level analysisBeckmann (2025) “Posthuman tragedy on the virtual stage in Pathologic 2” (International Journal of Performance Arts and Digital Media)Kendall (2023) “Reading Pathologic 2: Russian Literature as a Trans‑Medial Idea” (Russian Literature)Colbert (2025) “Posthuman tragedy on a virtual stage in Pathologic 2” (Studies in Theatre and Performance).

Pentiment

Kleinerman (2023) “Regret in Play and in Paint” (academic paper)ROMchip (2024) “Layers of History” (ROMchip journal)Lipkin (2025) “The Painterly Interface in Pentiment” (book chapter in Digital Visual Effects in Modern Media)Réti (2025) “Labyrinths and Remediation” (Game Studies 25(2)).

Planescape: Torment

Tavinor (2009) The Art of Video Games—discussion of _Planescape: Torment_Ensslin (2014) _Literary Gaming_Beever (2019) “Banged, Smashed, Spurted… in Sunless Sea and Planescape Torment” (Game Studies).

Proteus

Giddings (2015) “Slow Play & Ambience in Proteus” (Games and Culture)Nitsche (2014) Video Game Spaces—section on ambient explorationZimmermann & Huberts (2019) “From Walking Simulator to Ambience Action Game” (Press Start)—includes _Proteus_Carbo‑Mascarell (2016) “Walking Simulators”Bozdog & Galloway (2016) “I Cried to Dream Again”—includes Proteus.

Return of the Obra Dinn

Rittenhouse, Gasque, Tang & Murray (2023) “Structures of Interaction for Creating Dramatic Agency in Epistemic Narratives: Return of the Obra Dinn and Telling Lies” (Entertainment Computing 44)Rittenhouse et al. (2024) “Making the Player the Detective: Triggering Curiosity in Return of the Obra Dinn” (ACM TEI 2024)Dilettoso (2024) “Dying to Remember: Ecological Storytelling and Marking Death in Return of the Obra Dinn” (Entertainment Computing)Fernández‑Vara (2019) Introduction to Game Analysis—discussion of Obra Dinn.

Samorost

Janik (2015) “The cluster worlds of imagination…” (CEEGS proceedings)Šisler, Švelch & Šlerka (2017) “Czeching In…” (International Journal of Communication)Zurschmitten (2011) “Zwischen Zerfall und Zelebrierung… Amanita Design”Gatrell (2025) “Digital game‑based language learning in the young L2 learner classroom” (ELT Journal)—includes Samorost 1.

Shadow of the Colossus

Cole (2015) “The Tragedy of Betrayal: How the Design of Ico and Shadow of the Colossus Elicits Emotion” (DiGRA 2015)Cesar (2018) “Meaning Through Performance: Transgressing Boundaries in Shadow of the Colossus” (DiGRA 2018)Lehner (2017) “Videogames as Cultural Ecology: Flower and Shadow of the Colossus” (Ecozon@ 8(2))Sicart (2008) “Defining Game Mechanics” (Game Studies)Encinas‑Cantalapiedra (2025) “Myth in Shadow of the Colossus according to the mimetic theory of René Girard” (Catalan Journal of Communication & Cultural Studies 17(2))Johnson (2017) “Agency and Animation at the Margins of Digital Games: Reading Between the Frames in Shadow of the Colossus” (Journal of Gaming & Virtual Worlds)Ciccoricco (2007) “Play, Memory: Shadow of the Colossus and Cognitive Workouts” (Dichtung Digital).

Soma

Perron (2018) World of Scary Video Games (Bloomsbury)Isbister (2016) How Games Move Us (MIT Press) — includes discussion of _Soma_Mendelyte (2024) “Thought Experiments in Video Games: Exploring the (Un)… in Soma” (Games and Culture)Mayer, Raisamo & Mäyrä (2025) “Playing with Augmented Bodies: Dystopian and Protopian Experiences of Human Augmentation in Digital Games” (Convergence) — uses Soma as case study.

Sorcery!

Moran (2018) “Mise en scène du choix et narrativité expérientielle dans les jeux vidéo et les livres dont vous êtes le héros” (Sciences du jeu 9) — analyses the Sorcery! seriesGallon (2021) PhD thesis on interactive fiction (White Rose eTheses) — uses Sorcery! as case example.

Sunless Sea

Kozyra (2018) “The Sea Has Never Been Friendly to Man: Joseph Conrad’s Topoi in the Digital Game Sunless Sea” (Jagiellonian University journal)Beever (2019) “Banged, Smashed, Spurted… in Sunless Sea and Planescape Torment” (Game Studies).

Syberia

Engelns (2018) “Geschichten über Metall, Holz und Schnee: Zur narrativen Bedeutung von digitalen Materialien” (Cahiers d’Études Germaniques 75, DOI 10.4000/ceg.3590)Sokal & Lemarié (2002) Syberia: Esthétique du jeu (Casterman)Fletcher (2008) “Of Puppets, Automatons, and Avatars” (essay on digital puppetry)Récits de métal, de bois et de neige: émotions et objets dans le jeu d’aventure Syberia (Cahiers d’Études Germaniques 2013).

Tacoma

Gallagher (2019) “Volatile Memories: Personal Data and Posthuman Subjectivity in The Aspern Papers, Analogue: A Hate Story and Tacoma” (Games and Culture)Zimmermann (2019) “From Walking Simulator to Ambience Action Game” (Press Start)—includes _Tacoma_Abertay University (2018) research project “Worlds at Our Fingertips” featuring Tacoma.

The Banner Saga

Joyce (2017) Essential Elements of Narrative & Agency in Digital Interactive Narrative Games (PhD, University of Texas at Dallas)McPhaul (2016) Vikings & Gods in Fictional Worlds: Remediation of the Viking Age in Narrative‑Driven Video Games (MA, University of Iceland)Sicart (2013) Beyond Choices (MIT Press) — discusses tragic moral choice in games including _The Banner Saga_Illger (2020) “Der ohnmächtige Held – Die Fantasy‑Welt als Kontrollgesellschaft in ‘The Banner Saga’” (Paidia)Fernández‑Vara (2019) article on performative consequence (JGDE)Sicart (2017) article on tragic moral choice (Ethics & Information Technology).

The Beginner’s Guide

Moulthrop (2020) “Turn Back from this Cave: The Weirdness of The Beginner’s Guide” (Journal of Gaming & Virtual Worlds)Backe & Thon (2019) “Playing with Identity: Authors, Narrators, Avatars and Players in The Stanley Parable and The Beginner’s Guide” (Diegesis 8(2))Fassone (2018) “Ludo Essay and Ludophilia: The Beginner’s Guide as a Ludographic Essay” (Cinergie 13)Nohr (2024) “The Gaming World according to Davey Wreden” (European Journal of American Culture)Aller (2023) “Walking Simulators and European Romanticism” (discusses The Beginner’s Guide)Carter et al. (2015) “Metagames & Authorial Framing” (DiGRA paper)House (2018) “The Author Interface: Rethinking Authorship through Ludoliterary Analysis of The Stanley Parable and The Beginner’s Guide” (Paradoxa 29).

The Longing

Aksay, Ensslin & Richter (2025) “Between Action and Inaction: A Distant‑Play Reading of The Longing” (DiGRA 2025 Abstract Proceedings).

The Stanley Parable

Bosman (2025) “This is the story of a man called Stanley: Narrativity and Freedom in Video Games and Beyond: The Case of The Stanley Parable” (NTT Journal for Theology and the Study of Religion 79(4))Backe & Thon (2019) “Playing with Identity…” (Diegesis 8(2))Metaproceduralism article “The Stanley Parable and the Legacies of Postmodern Metafiction” (2016)Sicart (2013) Beyond Choices (MIT Press) — references The Stanley Parable.

The Talos Principle

Tuckett (2018) “The Talos Principle: Philosophical and Religious Anthropology” (Implicit Religion 20(3))Atkinson (2017) “Virtually Sacred: Sacred Space, Ritual and Narrative in Assassin’s Creed, Far Cry and The Talos Principle” (Journal of Religion and Popular Culture)Sicart (2013) Beyond Choices (MIT Press) — discusses obedience vs autonomy in The Talos Principle.

The Vanishing of Ethan Carter

Article exploring haptic potential and spatiality in The Vanishing of Ethan Carter (2018) — analyses haptic space and photogrammetryStatham (2020) “Photogrammetry in Game Development” (Games and Culture) — uses The Vanishing of Ethan Carter as case study.

This War of Mine

Pötzsch (2017) Playing War: Perspectives on War in Video Games — includes chapter on _This War of Mine_de Smale, Kors & Sandovar (2019) “The Case of This War of Mine: A Production Studies Perspective on Moral Game Design” (Games and Culture 14(4))Neumann (2019) “Philosophical and Psychological Analysis of Moral Choices in the Game This War of Mine” (Hybris 44(1))Pötzsch & Šisler (2019) book chapter on This War of Mine (Bloomsbury).

What Remains of Edith Finch

Claes & Van Looy (2021) “Playing with Death in What Remains of Edith Finch and Last Day of June” in _The Palgrave Handbook of Digital and Public Humanities_Bozdog & Galloway (2020) “Worlds at our fingertips: reading (in) What Remains of Edith Finch” (Abertay University / research paper)Isbister (2016) How Games Move Us — discusses vignettes in _Edith Finch_Fernández‑Vara (2019) Introduction to Game Analysis — analysis of environmental narration in _Edith Finch_Aller (2023) and Carbo‑Mascarell (2016) indirectly reference the game.

Zork

Aarseth (1997) Cybertext: Perspectives on Ergodic Literature—analyses Zork as ergodic textMontfort (2003) _Twisty Little Passages: An Approach to Interactive Fiction_Montfort (2013) “Riddle Machines: History and Nature of Interactive Fiction”Harpold (2007) “Screw the Grue: Mediality, Metalepsis, Recapture” (Game Studies)Ahl (1979) “Adventure and Zork” in Computer magazineJuul (1999) MA thesis A Clash Between Game and Narrative (historical context)Montfort & Bogost (2009) Racing the Beam — contextualises Zork in early computing.