Dom Ford

Postdoctoral Researcher

Center for Digital Narrative, University of Bergen

About me

I’m a postdoctoral researcher at the Center for Digital Narrative at the University of Bergen, as part of the LEAD AI programme. My current project looks at nonplayer characterss in games with AI-generated dialogue, how players respond to the use of this technology and how this use may challenge ideas in the philosophy of fiction like intentionality. I am also an editor for Eludamos.

Previously I was a postdoc at the University of Bremen, part of the Media and Religion lab in the ZeMKI Centre for Media, Communication and Information Research. There I focused on community formation in digital games and taught media studies, games and design in the ZeMKI’s study programmes. I was also the managing editor for gamevironments.

My first book, Mytholudics: Games and Myth, proposes a method for analysing games both as conduits of mythologies within society and as mythological structures in themselves. It’s out now and published by De Gruyter.

I wrote my PhD at the IT University of Copenhagen’s Center for Digital Play between 2019 and 2022.

Here you’ll find links to all the other relevant internet places you can find me at, all of my publications, games and other projects, and the occasional blog post whenever I feel like writing something here.

Last update: 7 October 2025.

Interests

AI-generated NPC dialogue
Myth and games
Digital game communities
Representations of the past
Reality formation in digital society

Education

PhD Game Studies, 2022
IT University of Copenhagen
MSc Game Design and Theory, 2019
IT University of Copenhagen
MA English Literary Studies, 2016
University of Exeter
BA (Hons) English, 2015
University of Exeter

Publications

Stefano Gualeni, Riccardo Fassone, Dom Ford (2025). On fictional games and fictional game studies. Eludamos: Journal for Computer Game Culture, vol. 16, no. 1: Fictional Games.

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Dom Ford (2025). Mytholudics: Games and myth. De Gruyter.

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Dom Ford, Joleen Blom (2025). 'Honor died on the beach': Constructing Japaneseness through monstrosity in Ghost of Tsushima. In: Sarah Stang, Mikko Meriläinen, Joleen Blom and Lobna Hassan (Eds.), Monstrosity in games and play: A multidisciplinary examination of the monstrous in contemporary cultures. Amsterdam University Press.

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Dom Ford (2024). Community, alienation and the experience of networks: Gamevironments and theories of community. gamevironments, no. 21 (Revisiting Gamevironments).

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Dom Ford (2024). Approaching FromSoftware's Souls series as myth. Transactions of the Digital Games Research Association, vol. 6, no. 3.

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Dom Ford (2022). Mytholudics: Understanding games as/through myth. IT University of Copenhagen.

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Dom Ford (2021). The haunting of ancient societies in the Mass Effect trilogy and The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild. Game Studies, vol. 21, no. 4.

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Dom Ford (2020). Giantness and excess in Dark Souls. Proceedings of the International Conference on the Foundations of Digital Games (FDG ‘20).

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Dom Ford (2020). Techno-giants: The giant, the machine and the human. Proceedings of the 2020 DiGRA International Conference: Play Everywhere.

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Dom Ford (2019). Beyond the wall: The boundaries of the neomedieval town in singleplayer roleplaying games. Proceedings of the 2019 DiGRA International Conference: Game, Play and the Emerging Ludo-Mix.

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Dom Ford (2016). “eXplore, eXpand, eXploit, eXterminate”: Affective writing of postcolonial history and education in Civilization V. Game Studies, vol. 16, no. 2 (War/Game: Studying Relations Between Violent Conflict, Games, and Play).

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Conference talks

Dom Ford (2025). Magical rationalism and genetic prophecy in science fiction games.

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Dom Ford (2025). Communicative artificial intelligence for nonplayer characters in digital games: Mapping the field.

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Dom Ford (2025). Player democracy in Old School RuneScape.

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Dom Ford (2025). [Keynote] Mytholudics: Games and myth.

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Dom Ford (2024). How players talk about disastrous game launches: What went wrong with Cities: Skylines II?.

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Dom Ford (2024). What went wrong with Cities: Skylines II, according to players: A qualitative analysis of player perceptions of a poor digital game launch.

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Dom Ford (2024). Community, alienation and the experience of networks: Maybe the real gamevironment was the friends we didn’t make along the way.

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Dom Ford (2024). A world to escape to? Digital gameworlds as otherworlds.

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Dom Ford (2023). The city, according to city builders: The mythology of city-builder games.

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Dom Ford, Sophie Thorkildsen (2023). The magic prison: Game rules as a tool for dread in Sir Gawain and the Green Knight and Inscryption. Extended Abstract Proceedings of the 2023 DiGRA International Conference: Limits and Margins of Games.

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Dom Ford (2020). That old school feeling: Processes of mythmaking in Old School RuneScape.

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Dom Ford (2018). Lost futures: In the presence of long-lost civilisations in The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild.

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Dom Ford (2018). Speedrunning: Transgressive play in digital space.

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Blog

New Books Network Podcast on Mytholudics

I was invited to talk about my book, Mytholudics, on the New Books Network

14 Aug 2025

Longlisted for Enter Open Access Award 2024

I've been longlisted for the Enter Open Access Award 2024, celebrating researchers furthering the cause of open access publishing.

19 Jun 2024

Call for papers – Special issue on fictional games and fictional game studies

Along with Stefano Gualeni and Riccardo Fassone, I am editing a special issue of Eludamos on fictional games and fictional game studies.

16 Feb 2024

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Games

Too Many Crooks

Band together a ragtag team of criminals to start building your own crime syndicate. Start with humble raids on innocent hot dog stands and work your way up to well-organised casinos and banks in this crime management game.

25 May 2018