Thresholds of Digital Gameplay

Thresholds of Digital Gameplay examines how the often-overlooked interfaces, interactions, and inequities at the edges of play are central to gaming. Daniel L. Gardner argues that digital gameplay emerges not only from the act of playing but from a dense ecosystem of login screens, controllers, menus, settings, and microtransactions that mediate every choice. The book analyzes how these peripheral-to-gameplay elements shape accessibility, experience, and value, and how they connect to wider shifts toward networked, data-driven environments. Drawing on theory and practice across computing and game design, Gardner shows how periphery structures—access controls, configuration options, and storefronts—direct and constrain our engagement with games, production decisions, and player communities. A provocative contribution to the Software Studies series, the work invites readers to rethink what counts as gameplay and to see the edges as thresholds that define the medium itself.