Call for Papers: Mythological Game Studies Conference
Online, 22-23 May 2025
Dr. Alexander Vandewalle (Ghent University) and Dr. Maciej Paprocki (University of Wrocław)
For around twenty years, scholars from the fields of history, archaeology, ancient world studies, classical reception and more have turned their attention to the realm of video games. In this timespan, there has been a large amount of articles, monographs, and edited collections that focus on how history is represented and simulated in games, but the same cannot be said for the reception of mythology in these titles. Various studies – usually in the form of book chapters and, more rarely, journal articles – have certainly investigated the proliferation of mythological characters and narratives in games (e.g., Lowe, 2009; McMenomy, 2015; Chmielewska, 2016; Gordon, 2017; Beaumont, 2020; Paprocki, 2020; Clare, 2020; Clare, 2021; Beal, 2022; Beydler, 2022; Jones, 2022; Chaudhury & Chaudhuri, 2023; Cameron, 2024; Vandewalle, 2024), yet to this day, there are no volumes or monographs centered exclusively on mythological video games. This is surprising, especially given the incredible acclaim and success that mythological titles, such as God of War (2018, Santa Monica Studios), Hades (2020, Supergiant Games), or Black Myth: Wukong (2024, Game Science) have received in recent years. This two-day online conference called Mythological Game Studies aspires to be a first step in that direction, and to offer a broad and comprehensive platform for such inquiries.
We use the term ‘mythological game studies’ to describe the attention concerned specifically with ‘mythological video games’, which we understand – in an adaptation of the definition of historical video games by Chapman et al. (2017) – as those games that in some way represent myth, mythology, or mythologies or relate to discourses about it. This broad definition not only includes the study of the reception of mythology in games, but also the study of games as/through myths, and how games convey “myths of the present” – approaches which have respectively been called “mytholudics” (Ford, 2022) and “ludomythologies” (e.g., Planells de la Maza & Navarro-Remesal, 2022). To be sure, we do not see mythological game studies as antithetical to historical game studies; rather, we consider it a necessary complement to it, and think this conference is a required intervention to start addressing currently understudied aspects of popular culture. In addition, we believe that this conference is the appropriate scholarly response to games’ seemingly rising interest in a diversity of world mythologies, illustrated by mythological indie titles such as Tales of Kenzera: Zau (2024, Surgent Studios), REKA (2024, Emberstorm Entertainment), Mythwrecked: Ambrosia Island (2024, Polygon Treehouse), or Toroa: Skycall (forthc., Atawhai Interactive).
The Mythological Game Studies conference will take place online over the span of two days. We aim to accommodate a variety of timezones. In addition to individual 20-minute paper submissions, one section of the conference will consist of a special workshop on emergent methodologies of mythological game studies, using Stray Gods: The Roleplaying Musical (2023, Summerfall Studios) as a case study. This section will include rapid, 5-to-7-minute presentations – coalescing into a roundtable discussion – to showcase the breadth of potential methodological approaches towards mythological games. We are also open to receiving proposals for panel discussions, roundtables, live play, or interviews.
Possible topics for individual paper submissions include, but are not restricted to:
- Definitions of myth, mythology, and mythologies in video games
- Methodologies for studying mythological games
- Mythology and, or versus, fantasy in the popular imagination
- Reception, adaptation, or translation of mythological traditions in or to video games
- Diversity regarding gender, sexuality, race, disabilities, and more
- Mythological crossovers in games
- Cultural heritage, identity, and regional game studies
- Paratexts and communities
- Audience experiences of mythological games
- Interview studies of the developers of mythological games
- Mythological video games in relation to mythology reception in other media; that is, what makes mythological game studies distinct?
While most attention in the field of mythological games has currently focused on Greco-Roman mythology, we encourage presenters to cast their gaze to a wide, multicultural and international sample of mythological traditions (e.g., Egyptian, Norse, Celtic, Mesopotamian, Chinese, Japanese, Slavic, African, Mesoamerican, Polynesian, and more). While our primary focus lies with video games, we are also open to papers on analog titles.
We thus welcome three types of submissions: (1) 300-word abstracts for 20-minute presentations; (2) 200-word abstracts for rapid 5-to-7-minute presentations for the methodological workshop (Stray Gods); (3) 300-word proposals for roundtables, discussions, or other events. Aspiring presenters are invited to send their submission, in English, to both alexander.vandewalle@ugent.be and maciej.w.paprocki@gmail.com before 2 February 2025. Presenters can apply for more than one type of submission. We are actively exploring publication opportunities for presented papers after the conference, most likely in the form of an edited volume. Please indicate in your submission if you would also like your paper to be considered for post-conference publication.
References
Beal, S. (2022). Senua’s psychosis and the stigma of mental health. In J. Draycott (Ed.), Women in Historical and Archaeological Video Games (pp. 171–193). Bloomsbury Academic.
Beaumont, A. (2020). ‘Through a glass, partly’ Reflections of Hercules in Video Games: the Mythodiegesis of Depictions of Hercules in Video Games, and Their Groundings in Medium and Textual Requirements and Contexts. In A. J. L. Blanshard & E. Stafford (Eds.), The Modern Hercules. Images of the Hero from the Nineteenth to the Early Twenty-First Century (pp. 567–587). Brill.
Beydler, K. (2022). Reception and Representation of Graeco-Roman Goddesses in Smite: Battleground of the Gods. In J. Draycott & K. Cook (Eds.), Women in Classical Video Games (pp. 116–127). Bloomsbury Academic.
Cameron, H. (2024). Escaping Hades: Playing with Classical Reception. In A. Bakogianni & L. Unceta Gómez (Eds.), Classical Reception. New Challenges in a Changing World (pp. 357–382). De Gruyter.
Chapman, A., Foka, A., & Westin, J. (2017). Introduction: what is historical game studies? Rethinking History, 21(3), 358–371. https://doi.org/10.1080/13642529.2016.1256638
Chaudhury, A., & Chaudhuri, A. (2023). How Not to Play an Indian Mythic: Raji: A Modern Fantasy. CyberOrient, 17(1), pp. 38–69.
https://cyberorient.net/2023/12/22/how-not-to-play-an-indian-mythicraji-a-modern-fantasy/
Chmielewska, S. (2016). C://Hercules in Computer Games/A Heroic Evolution. In K. Dominas, E. Wesołowska, & B. Trocha (Eds.), Antiquity in Popular Literature and Culture (pp. 171–191). Cambridge Scholars Press.
Clare, R. (2020). Postcolonial Play in Ancient World Computer Role-Playing Games. In C. Rollinger (Ed.), Classical Antiquity in Video Games. Playing with the Ancient World (pp. 141–155). Bloomsbury Academic.
Clare, R. (2021). Ancient Greece and Rome in Videogames. Representation, Play, Transmedia. Bloomsbury Academic.
Ford, D. (2022). Mytholudics. Understanding Games as/through Myth [Doctoral dissertation]. IT University of Copenhagen.
Gordon, J. (2017). When Superman smote Zeus: analysing violent deicide in popular culture. Classical Receptions Journal, 9(2), pp. 211–236. https://doi.org/10.1093/crj/clw008
Jones, K. (2022). Good Riddance: Refiguring Eurydice in Supergiant’s Hades. In J. Draycott & K. Cook (Eds.), Women in Classical Video Games (pp. 103–115). Bloomsbury Academic.
Lowe, D. (2009). Playing with Antiquity: Videogame Receptions of the Classical World. In D. Lowe & K. Shahabudin (Eds.), Classics for All: Reworking Antiquity in Mass Culture (pp. 64–90). Cambridge Scholars Press.
McMenomy, M. (2015). Reading the Fiction of Video Games. In L. Maurice (Ed.), The Reception of Ancient Greece and Rome in Children’s Literature (pp. 105–138). Brill.
Paprocki, M. (2020). Mortal Immortals: Deicide of Greek Gods in Apotheon and Its Role in the Greek Mythic Storyworld. In C. Rollinger (Ed.), Classical Antiquity in Video Games. Playing with the Ancient World (pp. 193–204). Bloomsbury Academic.
Planells de la Maza, A. J., & Navarro-Remesal, V. (2022). Hybrid ludomythologies: Mythanalysis, tradition, and contemporaneity in Death Stranding. FDG ‘22: Proceedings of the 17th International Conference of the Foundations of Digital Games (pp. 1–4). ACM.
Vandewalle, A. (2024). Video Games as Mythology Museums? Mythographical Story Collections in Games. International Journal of the Classical Tradition, 31(1), 90–112. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12138-023-00646-w
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