ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I COULD NOT HAVE WRITTEN THIS BOOK WITHOUT help. And I received a lot of it.

First, I based much of this book on previously published research. Some of those projects I coauthored with smart folks. Chapter 1 is based on an article I coauthored with Kat Schrier. She is great: a smart writer and one of the hardest working people in game studies. With her help, that paper won a Top Paper award in the Game Studies Division of the National Communication Association. Chapter 2 would not exist without Mark Brown of Game Maker’s Toolkit. He has brought a lot of attention to accessibility in video games with his many videos on the topic. His video about 2019’s most accessible games was the basis for an article I helped him adapt for publication about the topic, and I used that article as the foundation for chapter 2. Chapter 3 grew from an article I wrote with Mark R. Johnson. He is a fun coauthor, and I wish I could write all of my research projects with him. Chapter 5 is based on a project that I wrote with Stephanie Orme. She hopped onto that project and immediately made it ten times better. She gathered additional data and helped improve the paper to the point where it was a Best Paper Award finalist at HICSS-55 in January 2022.

Second, I was terrified at the idea of writing a book, and I would never have taken the first steps if it were not for the mentorship of two scholars who had published brilliant books of their own: Hollis Griffin, who wrote Feeling Normal: Sexuality and Media Criticism in the Digital Age, and Christopher Hanson, who wrote Game Time: Understanding Temporality in Video Games. They both graciously took my calls, gave advice, read parts of my initial book proposal, and generally provided moral support. I give my thanks to both of them.

Third, I want to thank Jennifer Peeples, Matthew Sanders, John Seiter, Brad Hall, Chris Fischer, Carl Burgchardt, John Logie, Ron Greene, Bill Kirkpatrick, Mark Neužil, and Peter Gregg for their mentorship and support.

Fourth, I want to thank those people who contributed their interviews to this book. Their perspectives were vital to this project.

Fifth, I want to thank the editors and reviewers for their work overseeing and responding to this book.

Finally, and most importantly, I want to thank my wife, Katie Palkki Anderson. She listened to my ideas, encouraged me to do the work, provided childcare when I needed to vanish off to writing retreats to finish chapters, and generally supported me through every step of the process. I hear you, lovebird.