Game analysis as a signature pedagogy of game studies

Teaching game studies has proven to be difficult. There is a marked difference between the fairly uniform professional and fan culture perception of games, and the scholarly perspective that most teachers will foster in a classroom setting. I argue that game analysis has the potential of being the signature pedagogy of game studies; that is, the practice through which students acquire theory in practical usage. However, in order to make this happen, we must develop the pedagogic aspect of game analysis, that is, we must understand how the skill is best acquired in an educational context. This paper is an attempt to critically examine the practices of teaching the skill of game analysis, a skill that is at the same time practically useful and conceptually difficult. Based on an online discussion with academic teachers involved in university level teaching in game studies, I discuss the methods that currently are in use and evaluate them against present knowledge in university pedagogy. My investigation shows that while all the participating teachers have developed practical and inquiry-based methods, the practices are still too diverse to form a signature pedagogy.