The ENDGAME project will produce a new theoretical model for game cultural agency that takes into account both intersecting identity positions and local national and cultural contexts, demonstrating how individuals gain access to and are able to operate in game cultural environments in an impactful manner – or are excluded or limited in their capacity – based on their individual backgrounds. Our investigation of agency is conducted on three levels: environments, experiences, and empowerment.
ENDGAME’s overall aim is to reform the current scientific understanding of game cultural participation and agency and how intersecting identity positions affect them in specific local contexts. As such, we will approach game cultural agency as a fundamentally intersectional question while also grounding our investigation into a specific geographical and cultural area, focusing primarily on Finland and other Nordic contexts. While our focus is primarily on digital forms of game culture, the results of this project can also be applied in wider game, play, and media cultural contexts.
Research questions and objectives
ENDGAME has five main research objectives (RO), each connected to a corresponding research question (RQ):
| Research objectives (RO) | Research questions (RQ) |
| RO1: To produce an empirical overview of different forms of game cultural participation in Finland, within and beyond gaming | RQ1: What kind of forms does game cultural participation take within and beyond gaming? |
| RO2: To describe how expertise and competence in gaming are culturally constructed in online multiplayer gaming environments | RQ2: How are expertise and competence in gaming culturally constructed? |
| RO3: To assess how local cultural, national, and geographical contexts affect game cultural participation and agency and support cultural empowerment in organised gaming activities | RQ3: How do local contexts affect game cultural participation and agency? |
| RO4: To demonstrate how marginalised participants’ intersecting identity positions affect their opportunities for participation and agency in different game cultural contexts | RQ4: How do intersecting identity positions enable and limit game cultural participation and agency? |
| RO5: To create a new theoretical model for game cultural agency that can be applied to various game cultural contexts | RQ5: How is game cultural agency defined and what does it entail? |
Work packages
ENDGAME’s main research questions and objectives are addressed through four work packages (WP), each focusing on a different level of game cultural participation and agency in digital game culture: 1) environments, 2) empowerment 3) experiences, and 4) endgame.
WP1: Environments
WP1 will address game cultural participation and agency on the level of cultural environments. Our team will explore different modes and environments for game cultural participation, the structures of marginalisation in digital game culture, and cultural construction of competence and expertise in competitive gaming environments. This work is divided in two areas: 1.1 Modes of game cultural participation and marginalisation and 1.2 Gaming competence and expertise.
WP2: Empowerment
WP2 will address game cultural participation and agency on the level of cultural empowerment, i.e. breaking free from and playing against the oppressive cultural structures to claim space for and to increase agency of those in marginalised positions. Here, we investigate how the structures of marginalisation and empowerment in game culture are crucially connected to local cultural, social, and geographical environments. We will explore game cultural empowerment in local, cross-national, and cross-cultural contexts, focusing on three areas: 2.1 Gaming activities for Sámi empowerment, 2.2 Game cultural accessibility through local gaming events in the Arctic Norway and Finland, and 2.3 Digital gaming activities in immigrant queer people’s social integration in Finland.
WP3: Experiences
WP3 will address game cultural participation and agency on the level of participant experiences. Here, we focus on how people who represent marginalised identities experience game cultural activities and environments as inclusive and exclusive, and what enables and limits their participation and agency. The work is divided in three areas: 3.1 Neurodivergent youth’s inclusion in gaming activities, 3.2 Transgender and nonbinary participants’ experiences of inclusion in competitive gaming, and 3.3 Marginalised game cultural heritage in Finland. This work will demonstrate how the limits of game cultural participation and agency appear differently to different types of participants based on their intersecting identity positions.
WP4: Endgame
WP4 will tie together the theoretical and empirical findings made in WP1–3, forming the basis for the new theoretical framework for game cultural agency.
Collaborators
ENDGAME project is proud to collaborate with Professor Anne Tjønndal (Nord University, Norway), Associate Professor Egil Trasti Rogstad (Nord University, Norway), University Lecturer and Docent Riikka Turtiainen (University of Turku, Finland), and the Finnish Museum of Games (Tampere, Finland).
Funding
ENDGAME is an Academy Research Fellowship project funded by the Research Council of Finland from September 2025 to August 2029 (decision number: 368071).
Logo
ENDGAME project’s logo is designed by Sanna-Kaisa Mastokangas.