Games, Rules, Stories, Genres

MADD 25630

Most recently taught: Spring 2026
past student work from this class

Course Description

Digital and analog games are often defined in term of mechanics and systems—a feature they share with popular storytelling, which has its own genre mechanics and tried-and-true formulas. This class examines games and genre storytelling together as modes of rule-bound expression, with a special focus on games that take their inspiration from—and put their own unique mark on—genres borrowed from popular literature and cinema. How might we translate the longstanding rules of “fair play” in detective stories into game form? What is retained and what is lost from the tradition of romance novels and rom coms when dating sims gamify love? Can we laugh at our own pratfalls in slapstick games? In this course, students will play, discuss, write about, and collaboratively design their own games to answer these and other questions.

Learning Outcomes

By the end of this class, students will:

  • Understand the concept of genre within a comparative-media context and be able to assess historical aesthetic trends across disparate media.
  • Identify how technological, economic, social and cultural factors have transformed storytelling in a variety of media—not only games, but also cinema and literature.
  • Critically assess video games as a cultural form, from the relationships between game mechanics and storytelling, to their connection to historical generic forms, to their ideological underpinnings.
  • Form well-supported arguments about games and their relationship to broader storytelling traditions.
  • Undertake critical multimedia research projects incorporating game analysis, cross-media comparative examination, and critical commentary.

Assignments & Grade Distribution

Students’ final grades will be determined by the following breakdown:

15% Attendance and participation. Students will consistently attend play sessions and participate in class. Small, otherwise ungraded assignments and exercises (including in-class group work) will contribute to this area of the grade. Students may miss three class sessions or play sessions without penalty. Beyond that point unexcused absences will have an impact on this portion of your grade. Masking is encouraged if it will allow you to participate more fully.

15%  Discussion animation + game lead. Once during the quarter, students will take charge of animating class discussion about a game from the course. Topics will be divvied up according to student preferences. Overall time spent speaking should not exceed 10 minutes; the focus should be on posing discussion questions rather than an elaborate presentation. During in-person play sessions, discussion animators will be expected to take lead at a specific station where games are being played, maintaining it as other students cycle in and out.

15% Canvas discussion board posts. Students will post to the Canvas discussion board a total of six times over the course of the quarter. Posts should consist of 1–2 paragraphs reflecting on the themes and assigned materials of a given week. With nine weeks in the quarter, this means you can skip posting three times and still be fine—but choose wisely!

20%  Analog game design midterm project. Groups for this project will be assigned. Groups will be expected to produce a fully-playable analog game ready for in-class demonstration Thursday, April 30

35%  Final project. This project is variable in form, and variable in the number of people involved.

  1. Variable in form: The final project may be a traditional term paper, alternative analytical work (such as a video essay), analog game, digital game, or a game design document with early prototype materials.
  2. Variable in the number of people involved: Some of these forms (i.e., games) are more conducive to group projects, while other (i.e., term papers) are more conducive to individual authorship. You may pursue either an individual or group project.

Whatever the form of the project, or number of people involved, you must provide the following components:

  1. An abstract of 300–400 words, due Friday May 8 (3%)
  2. A presentation serving as a preview of the project, given May 21 (7%)
  3. The final version of the project, whatever form it may take (25%)

Course Materials & Play Logistics

Students are not required to purchase any reading materials for this course. All readings and other materials listed on this syllabus will be posted in PDF form on Canvas or linked to if already online.

This course has dedicated play lab sessions most Thursday evenings. Regular attendance at these sessions is expected as a general rule, as the games played during them are the course’s primary texts. The course absence policy allows for three unexcused absences including class sessions and play sessions. Beyond that point unexcused absences—including at play sessions—will have an impact on this portion of your grade.

If you do miss a play lab session, you can arrange to make up almost all games played at the MADD Center. Some games are available on physical media held at Crerar Library (indicated on the course’s Canvas page). Others are available on MADD Center hardware, which can be checked out during the Center’s regular hours.

Although most games will be played during these dedicated play sessions, there are two weeks with take-home play assignments rather than in-person events. Students will be expected to spend at least three hours playing on their own these weeks. For week 5, students are expected to play a dating sim of their choice. For week 7, students are expected to play Last Day of June (available for purchase on multiple platforms, and at the MADD Center).

Course Schedule

Tues, March 24: Rules and Standards in Games and Genres

Critical & academic texts to read by this class meeting:

  • John G. Cawelti, Adventure, Mystery, and Romance (1976), Ch 1 “The Study of Literary Formulas”
  • George Skaff Elias, Richard Garfield, and Karl Robert Gutschera, Characteristics of Games (2012), Ch 3 “Infrastructure”

Thurs, March 26: Environmental Storytelling and Domestic Space in Fiction (1)

Critical & academic texts to read by this class meeting:

  • Henry Jenkins, “Game Design as Narrative Architecture” (2004)
  • Andrew Hock Soon Ng, Women and Domestic Space in Contemporary Gothic Narratives (2015), “Introduction: The Subject of the House in Gothic Narrative” [excerpt]

Fiction to read by this class meeting:

  • Marilynne Robinson, Housekeeping (1980), Ch 6
  • Alison Bechdel, Fun Home (2006), Ch 1 “Old Father, Old Artificier”

Thurs, March 26 Play Session, in-person at the MADD Center

  • Gone Home (Fullbright, 2013)
  • What Remains of Edith Finch (Giant Sparrow, 2017)
  • Hindsight (Team Hindsight, 2022)
  • Open Roads (Open Roads Team, 2024)

Tues, March 31: Environmental Storytelling and Domestic Space in Fiction (2)

Critical & academic texts to read by this class meeting:

  • James Krasner, Home Bodies (2010), Ch 2 “Mess and Memory”
  • Andrew Hock Soon Ng, Women and Domestic Space in Contemporary Gothic Narratives (2015), “Conclusion: Housing Redemption” [multiple excerpts]

Thurs, April 2: The Bildungsroman and Procedural Storytelling (1)

Critical & academic texts to read by this class meeting:

  • Ian Bogost, Persuasive Games (2007), Ch 1 ”Procedural Rhetoric” [multiple excerpts]

Fiction to read by this class meeting:

  • half the class read: Bharati Mukhergee, “Saints” (1995)
  • half the class read: Zoe Wicomb, “When the Train Comes” (1995)

Thurs, April 2 Play Session, in-person at the MADD Center

  • Signs of the Sojourner (Echodog Games, 2020)
  • Perfect Tides (Meredith Gran, 2022)
  • Consume Me (Jenny Jiao Hsia et al., 2025)
  • Perfect Tides: Station to Station (Meredith Gran, 2026)

Tues, April 7: The Bildungsroman and Procedural Storytelling (2)

Critical & academic texts to read by this class meeting:

  • Sarah Graham, “The American Bildungsroman” (2019)

Recommended further reading:

  • Jaakko Stenros and Markus Montola, The Rule Book (2024), Ch 5 “Material Rules”

Thurs, April 9: Detective Stories and “Fair Play” (1)

Critical & academic texts to read by this class meeting:

  • Howard Haycraft, Murder for Pleasure (1941) Ch 11, “The Rules of the Game”
  • Howard Haycraft, ed., The Art of the Mystery Story (1946) Section 2, “The Rules of the Game”

Fiction to read by this class meeting:

  • Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, “The Speckled Band”

Thurs, April 9 Play Session, in-person at the MADD Center

  • Clue (Anthony E. Pratt, 1943)
  • Sherlock Holmes Consulting Detective: The Thames Murders & Other Cases (Raymond Edwards, Suzanne Goldberg, and Gary Grady, 1982)
  • HER STORY (Sam Barlow, 2015)
  • Chronicles of Crime (David Cicurel, 2018)
  • The Case of the Golden Idol (Color Gray Games, 2022)

Tues, April 14: Detective Stories and “Fair Play” (2)

Critical & academic texts to read by this class meeting:

  • Marie F. Rodell, Mystery Fiction (1943), Ch 8 “Clues” & Ch 11 “Concealing the Murderer”
  • Rex Stout, “What to Do About a Watson” (1956)
  • Greg Costikyan, Uncertainty in Games (2013), Ch 5 “Sources of Uncertainty”

Thurs, April 16: The Robinsonade, Pastoral Aesthetics, and Game Ecologies (1)

Fiction and memoirs to read by this class meeting:

  • Daniel Defoe, Robinson Crusoe (1719) [54-page excerpt covering the first year on the island]
  • Henry David Thoreau, Walden (1854), Ch 1 “Economy” [excerpt] & Ch 2 “Where I Lived, and What I Lived For”

Thurs, April 16 Play Session, in-person at the MADD Center

  • Robinson Crusoe: Adventures on the Cursed Island (Ignacy Trzewiczek, 2012)
  • Discover: Lands Unknown (Corey Konieczka, 2018)
  • Minecraft (Mojang Studios, 2011)
  • Don’t Starve Together (Klei Entertainment, 2016)
  • Walden, a game (USC Game Innovation Lab, 2017)

Tues, April 21: The Robinsonade, Pastoral Aesthetics, and Game Ecologies (2)

Critical & academic texts to read by this class meeting:

  • Diana Loxley, Problematic Shores (1990), “Introduction”
  • Lawrence Buell, The Environmental Imagination (1995), Ch 1 “Pastoral Ideology”

Recommended further reading:

  • Phillip Lobo, “Novel Subjects: Robinson Crusoe & Minecraft and the Production of Sovereign Selfhood” (2019)

Thurs, April 23: Romance as Game (1)

Popular texts to read by this class meeting:

  • Ellen Fein and Sherrie Schneider, The Rules (1995) [various excerpts]
  • Neil Strauss, The Game (2005) [various excerpts]

Thurs, April 23: NO in-person Play Session at the MADD Center

Take-home play assignment instead:

  • Choose you own dating sim!

Tues, April 28: Romance as Game (2)

Critical & academic texts to read by this class meeting:

  • Mark Kretzschmar and Sara Raffel, The History and Allure of Interactive Visual Novels (2023), Ch 4 “The Aesthetics and Functions of Kawaii Culture and Dating Simulators”

Thurs, April 30: Analog Game Design Midterm Project Showcase

No reading. Just come in prepared to demonstrate & play games.

Thurs, April 30 Play Session, in-person at the MADD Center

  • Nintendo Land – Luigi’s Ghost Mansion minigame (Nintendo EAD, 2012)
  • Keep Talking and Nobody Explodes (Steel Crate Games, 2015)
  • Jaws (Brian Kirk, 2019)
  • Rainswept (Frostwood Interactive, 2019)
  • Mouthwashing (Wrong Organ, 2024)

Tues, May 5: Suspense, Hidden vs. Public Information, and Flashback Structure

Critical & academic texts to read by this class meeting:

  • François Truffaut with Alfred Hitchcock, Hitchcock (1967) [short excerpt, pp 72–73]
  • Richard Rouse III, “Match Made in Hell” (2009)
  • Linda Aronson, The 21st Century Screenplay (2010), Chs 36, 37 & 38

Recommended further reading:

  • Jesper Juul, “Introduction to Game Time” (2004)
  • Linda Aronson, The 21st Century Screenplay (2010), Ch 40

Thurs, May 7: Tragedy and Its Paradoxes (1)

Critical & academic texts to read by this class meeting:

  • David Hume, “Of Tragedy” (1754)
  • Susan L. Feagin, “The Pleasures of Tragedy” (1983)
  • Aaron Smuts, “The Paradox of Painful Art” (2007)

Fiction to read by this class meeting:

  • Ovid, Metamorphosis, Book X – The Story of Orpheus and Eurydice

Thurs, May 7: NO in-person Play Session at the MADD Center

Take-home play assignment instead:

  • Last Day of June (Ovosonico, 2017)

Fri, May 8

Final project abstracts due

Tues, May 12: Tragedy and Its Paradoxes (2)

Critical & academic texts to read by this class meeting:

  • Jesper Juul, Half-Real (2005) [short excerpt]
  • Jesper Juul, The Art of Failure (2013), short excerpt from Introduction + Ch 2 “The Paradox of Failure and the Paradox of Tragedy”

Thurs, May 14: Comedy, Pain, and Power (1)

Critical & academic texts to read by this class meeting:

  • Mikhail Bakhtin, Rabelais and His World (1965), multiple excerpts
  • Louise Peacock, Slapstick and Comic Performance (2014), Ch 1 “What Is Slapstick?”

Thurs, May 14 Play Session, in-person at the MADD Center

  • CHUCHEL (Amanita Design, 2018)
  • Untitled Goose Game (House House, 2019)
  • There Is No Game: Wrong Dimension (Draw Me A Pixel, 2020)
  • De Tres al Cuarto (Deconstructeam, 2021)
  • Baby Steps (Gabe Cuzzillo, Maxi Boch, and Bennett Foddy, 2025)

Tues, May 19: Comedy, Pain, and Power (2)

Critical & academic texts to read by this class meeting:

  • Gaëtan Brulotte, “Laughing at Power” (2006)
  • Muriel Andrin, “Back to the ‘Slap’” (2010)

Thurs, May 21

Final group project presentations – will use class period for these, and also play session slot as needed

Due date for final projects TBA, will depend on how many group & individual projects there are. No earlier than Tues, May 26.