Games e plataformização: uma análise sobre o grupo de pesquisa de games da Intercom

Abstract

In this final project, we conducted research in the proceedings of the Intercom's Research Group on games with the aim of building an overview of the study of platforms and platformization of digital games in Brazilian academia. We based our study on definitions by authors such as Nieborg, Poell, Van Dijck, Chia, Keogh, Leorke, Nicoll, Gillespie, and D’Andrea, to develop an accurate panorama of what platformization is and how it occurs in video games, from production to distribution, including how games themselves can become platforms. Within the Research Group on games, 210 papers have been accepted between 2016 and 2023, with only 6 addressing platformization issues, meaning less than 3% of papers over eight years at Intercom discuss this theme. Based on our study of these authors, we grouped the approaches to platformization in various ways each study tackled its object of study. Thus, we divided them into "Games as Base," "Datafied Games," "Monetization and Distribution of Games," and "Games as Platforms of Discourse". We concluded that research on platformization is still in its infancy in Brazil, but all share the core of platformization studied by Nieborg.