Online Gaming in Context: The social and cultural significance of online games

Digital gaming has, over only a few decades, become a major global and leisure industry rivalling the movie and music sectors. Given gaming's widespread, and increasing, popularity this has in recent years become the focus of increased academic interest and activity, but still relatively little is known about those who play digital games. Online Gaming in Contextprovides a key introduction to the study of gamers and the games they play, and reflects upon key debates and literatures, but beyond this, it is the first book to explicitly and comprehensively address how digital games are experienced and engaged with in the everyday lives, social networks and consumer patterns of gamers.