Thresholds of Digital Gameplay
How the often-overlooked interfaces, interactions, and inequities on the edges of gameplay are more central to gaming than we realize.

Contemporary digital gameplay is only accessible by navigating an ecosystem of interfaces that support its computational nature. Account logins, controllers, and an assortment of menus, settings, and other peripheral-to-gameplay elements support a range of practical and necessary functions that result from the transformation of gameplay into digital gameplay, as well as broader shifts toward an increasingly networked and data-driven world. The games industry has adopted usability testing on top of play testing to evaluate how these interfaces may influence the accessibility and success of their game software. But, how embedding gameplay within webs of software, hardware, and platform infrastructures impacts the medium, players, and production has not yet been fully explored.

In Thresholds of Digital Gameplay, Daniel Gardner demonstrates how a series of interfaces and other elements on the periphery of digital gameplay fundamentally alter the phenomena of gaming. This book examines non-gameplay-centered material or mechanical attachments that surround and enclose gameplay while directing or mediating our experience of it—for example, access controls, character configuration, and microtransactional storefronts.
1147147652
Thresholds of Digital Gameplay
How the often-overlooked interfaces, interactions, and inequities on the edges of gameplay are more central to gaming than we realize.

Contemporary digital gameplay is only accessible by navigating an ecosystem of interfaces that support its computational nature. Account logins, controllers, and an assortment of menus, settings, and other peripheral-to-gameplay elements support a range of practical and necessary functions that result from the transformation of gameplay into digital gameplay, as well as broader shifts toward an increasingly networked and data-driven world. The games industry has adopted usability testing on top of play testing to evaluate how these interfaces may influence the accessibility and success of their game software. But, how embedding gameplay within webs of software, hardware, and platform infrastructures impacts the medium, players, and production has not yet been fully explored.

In Thresholds of Digital Gameplay, Daniel Gardner demonstrates how a series of interfaces and other elements on the periphery of digital gameplay fundamentally alter the phenomena of gaming. This book examines non-gameplay-centered material or mechanical attachments that surround and enclose gameplay while directing or mediating our experience of it—for example, access controls, character configuration, and microtransactional storefronts.
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Thresholds of Digital Gameplay

Thresholds of Digital Gameplay

by Daniel L Gardner
Thresholds of Digital Gameplay

Thresholds of Digital Gameplay

by Daniel L Gardner

eBook

$48.99 
Available for Pre-Order. This item will be released on December 16, 2025

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Overview

How the often-overlooked interfaces, interactions, and inequities on the edges of gameplay are more central to gaming than we realize.

Contemporary digital gameplay is only accessible by navigating an ecosystem of interfaces that support its computational nature. Account logins, controllers, and an assortment of menus, settings, and other peripheral-to-gameplay elements support a range of practical and necessary functions that result from the transformation of gameplay into digital gameplay, as well as broader shifts toward an increasingly networked and data-driven world. The games industry has adopted usability testing on top of play testing to evaluate how these interfaces may influence the accessibility and success of their game software. But, how embedding gameplay within webs of software, hardware, and platform infrastructures impacts the medium, players, and production has not yet been fully explored.

In Thresholds of Digital Gameplay, Daniel Gardner demonstrates how a series of interfaces and other elements on the periphery of digital gameplay fundamentally alter the phenomena of gaming. This book examines non-gameplay-centered material or mechanical attachments that surround and enclose gameplay while directing or mediating our experience of it—for example, access controls, character configuration, and microtransactional storefronts.

Product Details

ISBN-13: 9780262385060
Publisher: MIT Press
Publication date: 12/16/2025
Series: Software Studies
Sold by: Penguin Random House Publisher Services
Format: eBook
Pages: 336

About the Author

Daniel L. Gardner is Lecturer of Computing and Game Design at Robert Gordon University in Aberdeen, Scotland.
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