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Faculty, graduate students, undergrads, alumni, and community members—all passionate about the study of games and play
Faculty, graduate students, undergrads, alumni, and community members—all passionate about the study of games and play
Cluster Lead
Cluster Lead
Research Interests
postcolonial studies, occult studies, media studies, video and divinatory games
Recent Presentation
“Conspiratorial Play and Occult Seduction in Assassin’s Creed” (2023) Playful Knowledge conference, Počakovo, Slovenia
“The Truth: Now Available on the Animus and Amazon” (2023) SLSA 2023, Arizona State University
“Letters from Mom: Animal Crossing and Motherhood” (2024) SCMS 2024, Boston, Massachusetts
Current Work
currently arguing that Kingdom Hearts demonstrates a global interruption of Disney’s aggressive Western assertions of power, remediates the American mythos of Disney within a Japanese framework, and decentralizes the Western subject from the object of play
Cluster Coordinator
Cluster Coordinator
Research Interests
environment, place, identity, American cultures, neutrality, science fiction, the Gothic/horror, and how these are speculated, designed, and lived
Recent Publications
“Become the Warmongers: Menus & the Fiction of Neutrality in Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker” in The Metal Gear Solid Series: Critical Essays and New Perspectives (2025)
Current Work
“Maps of a City that Does Not Exist,” dissertation, on the speculative modes that govern the leap from virtualities to actualities in (un)(hyper)real cityspaces of Los Angeles; project focused on Japanese social reactions to and perspectives of American narratives about the necessity of extreme methods of maintaining global military hegemony via Metal Gear Solid V: Ground Zeroes
Affiliated Faculty
Affiliated Faculty
Gina Bloom
Professor of English, affiliated with Cultural Studies, Education, & Performance StudiesGina Bloom
Faculty Head for Critical Hit: DHI Research Cluster 2024–2025
faculty for ModLab
Stephanie Boluk
Associate Professor of Cinema and Digital Media & EnglishStephanie Boluk
faculty for Alt-Ctrl Lab
Patrick LeMieux
Associate Professor of Cinema and Digital MediaPatrick LeMieux
faculty for Alt-Ctrl Lab
Colin Milburn
Gary Snyder Chair in Science and the HumanitiesColin Milburn
Professor of Cinema and Digital Media, English, & Science and Technology Studies
faculty for ModLab
Active Cluster Members
Active cluster members have attended at least one Critical Hit event and are still in the UC Davis community.Active Cluster Members
Steven Alvey
Steven Alvey
Research Interests
climate fictions, race and climate change, representations of race in video games, racial identity formation, racial and environmental justice in gaming
Current Work
project interrogating how the Tellius saga of Fire Emblem games (FE: Path of Radiance and FE: Radiant Dawn) imagine racial justice in the face of historical injustices (and how it falls back on [but also opposes] colorblind notions of justice)
Benjamin Barrett
Benjamin Barrett
Daria Buka
Daria Buka
Esteban Colom
Esteban Colom
Halil Ozgur Demir
Halil Ozgur Demir
Jasper Fadden
Jasper Fadden
Arthur Gan
Arthur Gan
Iliya Giyahchi
Iliya Giyahchi
Aaron Halverson
Aaron Halverson
Noel Kim
Noel Kim
Mikayla Knight
Mikayla Knight
Saba Kolahchian
Saba Kolahchian
Rebecca Newman
Rebecca Newman
Brian Ramanis
Brian Ramanis
Arunpreet Sandhu
Arunpreet Sandhu
Robin Watkins
Robin Watkins
Marcelle Weaver
Marcelle Weaver
Shaoni C. White
Shaoni C. White
Research Interests
game history, speculative fiction, history of technology, post-phenomenology, videogame narrative design
Recent Presentations
“My Myst Linking Book” -- Myst, HyperCard, and the Link” (April 26, 2024) Connections 2024, UC Davis
“The Handwritten Scrawl: Bloodborne’s ludic sublime as an aesthetics of surveillance” (2023) PAMLA 2023, Portland, Oregon
“Beyond Procedurality: Situating The Witness in the Proceduralism Debate” (2019) DiGRA 2019, Kyoto, Japan
Current Work
Ryan’s current work concerns how the black boxed character of digital gameworlds structurally lend the medium toward representing speculative imaginaries. They are pursuing a designated emphasis in Science and Technology Studies.
Cluster Members
Cluster Members
Chloe Amaden
Chloe Amaden
Stacey Baran
Stacey Baran
Jeff Breitenbuecher
Jeff Breitenbuecher
Diana Cage
Diana Cage
Dana Davis
Dana Davis
Jasmin Green
Jasmin Green
Sabi Iniguez
Sabi Iniguez
Jade Lee
Jade Lee
Mohammad Linjawi
Mohammad Linjawi
Matthew Liu
Matthew Liu
Kyle Mitchell
Kyle Mitchell
Fred Nelson
Fred Nelson
Samuel Pizelo
UC Davis PhD 2024Samuel Pizelo
Hawanya Smith
Hawanya Smith
Hayley/Harlin Steele
Hayley/Harlin Steele
Arvind Sudarshan
Arvind Sudarshan
Vergil Valino
Vergil Valino
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