Patrick Prax
Senior Lecturer/Associate Professor at Department of Game Design
- Telephone:
- +46 18 471 84 23, +46 498 10 84 23
- Mobile phone:
- +46 70 167 99 52
- E-mail:
- patrick.prax@speldesign.uu.se
- Visiting address:
- Strandgatan 1b (Residenset)
621 57 VISBY - Postal address:
- Uppsala universitet, Campus Gotland
62167 Visby
Download contact information for Patrick Prax at Department of Game Design
Biography
Dr. Patrick Prax is assistant professor at the Department of Game Design at Uppsala University. Patrick has a PhD in Media Studies from the Informatics and Media Department at Uppsala University. He wrote his dissertation on the co-creation of digital games as alternative media. He is interested in how players can change the games they are playing to reflect an alternative perspective to a hegemonic world view. He is working with theories for shared cultural production like co-creation, open innovation, and participatory media. You can see his TEDx Uppsala University talk about this topic here.
Patrick has also been working with problematic gaming and game addiction (recorded for UR in English or in Swedish for Region Gotland) game journalism, games and learning and games and leadership. In a research project at the Swedish National Museum of Science and Technology Patrick investigated the preservation and exhibition of digital games and appears in the newly opened exhibition Play beyond Play as an expert on participatory media and games. He is also serving as board member for the Cultural Heritage Incubator of the Swedish National Heritage Board.
Patrick has been speaking for several municipalities in Sweden, has been an invited speaker at several events during Almedalsveckan and at the Sweden Game Conference as well as at the Swedish Gamification Meetup. He has appeared in national television in TV4 and UNT24 speaking about problematic gaming and social media, has been working with a school on a project around gaming students, and has been contributing to UNT and features in Hela Gotland with pieces about games in society. Finally, Patrick is co-chairing the Game Studies temporary working group at NordMedia and co-organizing the HEVGA European Games Research Summer School.
Patrick is fluent in Swedish, English, and German.

Publications
Recent publications
From Talking about Loot Boxes to Discussing Political Economy: Conceptualizing Critical Game Literac
Part of Gamevironments, p. 183-221, 2022
- DOI for From Talking about Loot Boxes to Discussing Political Economy: Conceptualizing Critical Game Literac
- Download full text (pdf) of From Talking about Loot Boxes to Discussing Political Economy: Conceptualizing Critical Game Literac
Networked Participation sets the Game Free: Warhammer 40k on Tabletop Simulator
Part of Proceedings of DiGRA 2022 Conference, 2022
Part of Gamevironments, 2022
- DOI for This Time it’s for all the Marbles: Towards Social Justice in Digital Gaming. Introduction to the Special Issue
- Download full text (pdf) of This Time it’s for all the Marbles: Towards Social Justice in Digital Gaming. Introduction to the Special Issue
Rethinking game heritage - towards reflexivity in game preservation
Part of International Journal of Heritage Studies (IJHS), p. 268-280, 2021
‘More like an Arcade’ – The Limitations of Playable Games in Museum Exhibitions
Part of Museum & Society, p. 437-452, 2019
All publications
Articles in journal
From Talking about Loot Boxes to Discussing Political Economy: Conceptualizing Critical Game Literac
Part of Gamevironments, p. 183-221, 2022
- DOI for From Talking about Loot Boxes to Discussing Political Economy: Conceptualizing Critical Game Literac
- Download full text (pdf) of From Talking about Loot Boxes to Discussing Political Economy: Conceptualizing Critical Game Literac
Part of Gamevironments, 2022
- DOI for This Time it’s for all the Marbles: Towards Social Justice in Digital Gaming. Introduction to the Special Issue
- Download full text (pdf) of This Time it’s for all the Marbles: Towards Social Justice in Digital Gaming. Introduction to the Special Issue
Rethinking game heritage - towards reflexivity in game preservation
Part of International Journal of Heritage Studies (IJHS), p. 268-280, 2021
‘More like an Arcade’ – The Limitations of Playable Games in Museum Exhibitions
Part of Museum & Society, p. 437-452, 2019
Part of Nordisk kulturpolitisk tidskrift, p. 332-354, 2019
- DOI for Drawing Things Together: Understanding the Challenges and Opportunities of a Cross-LAM Approach to Digital Game Preservation and Exhibition
- Download full text (pdf) of Drawing Things Together: Understanding the Challenges and Opportunities of a Cross-LAM Approach to Digital Game Preservation and Exhibition
Lost in Translation: Video Games Becoming Cultural Heritage?
Part of Cultural Sociology, p. 444-460, 2019
Part of Comunicazione Sociali, 2018
A weak scientific basis for gaming disorder: Let us err on the side of caution
Part of Journal of Behavioral Addictions, p. 1-9, 2018
- DOI for A weak scientific basis for gaming disorder: Let us err on the side of caution
- Download full text (pdf) of A weak scientific basis for gaming disorder: Let us err on the side of caution
Part of Néothèque, p. 257-287, 2017
Co-creative interface development in MMORPGs: the case of World of Warcraft add-ons
Part of Journal of Gaming & Virtual Worlds, p. 3-24, 2012
Assemblage, adaptation and apps: Smartphones and mobile gaming
Part of Continuum. Journal of Media and Cultural Studies, p. 731-739, 2012
Co-Creativity in Online Games as Alternative Media
Part of Questions de communication
Chapters in book
Problem Gaming from the Perspective of Treatment
Part of What’s the Problem in Problem Gaming?, p. 91-106, Nordicom, 2018
Comprehensive doctoral thesis
Conference papers
Networked Participation sets the Game Free: Warhammer 40k on Tabletop Simulator
Part of Proceedings of DiGRA 2022 Conference, 2022
Is this still participation?: A case study of the disempowerment of player labourers
Part of DiGRA '19, 2019
2016
Co-Creative Game Design in MMORPGs
Part of 2015 DiGRA '15 - Proceedings of the 2015 DiGRA International Conference, 2015
Game Design and Business Model: an Analysis of Diablo 3
Part of DiGRA '13 - Proceedings of the 2013 DiGRA International Conference, 2013
The Commodification of Play in Diablo 3 - Understanding the Real Money Market Place.
Part of Proceedings of Meaningful Play 2012. East Lansing, USA., 2012
Democracy has arrived!: A model for ethical decision making of players in MMOs
2012
The Commodification of Play in Diablo 3 – Understanding the Real Money Market Place
Part of The Commodification of Play in Diablo 3 – Understanding the Real Money Market Place, 2012