Another peace to read:

The History of Computer Role-Playing Games Part I: The Early Years (1980-1983).

Note for myself: check this paper:
Rajava et al (2004), Emotional response patterns and sense of presence during video games: potential criterion variables for game design, http://portal.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=1028014.1028068.

D.B. El’konin (1971),Toward The Problem of Stages
in the Mental Development of Children at
http://www.marxists.org/archive/elkonin/works/1971/stages.htm (from Voprosy psikhologii).

• the role or (role-)play in children’s development
• transferring meaning to an object to another (props)
• social meaning of play

I noticed some new papers on role-playing games:

On the Role of the Die: A brief ludologic study of pen-and-paper roleplaying games and their rules. Game Studies 6(1).

by Joris Dormans

Pen-and-paper roleplaying games, like computer games, are in their essence rule-based simulation “engines” that facilitate playful interaction. These similarities make it possible to take some theoretical concepts and notions developed for computer games and use them to study roleplaying games.

Communication in Multi-Player Role Playing Games – The Effect of Medium in Technologies for Interactive Digital Storytelling and Entertainment

(version available: http://jonassmith.dk/weblog/wp-content/effectofmedium.pdf)

by Tychsen, Anders & Smith, Jonas Heide & Hitchens, Michael & Tosca, Susana

The Pen-and-Paper role-playing game is a successful example of collaborative interactive narrative. Meanwhile, computer-based role-playing games, while structurally similar, offer quite different narrative experiences. Here results are presented of an experimental study of role-playing gamers in Pen-and-Paper and computer-supported settings. Communication patterns are shown to vary significantly on measures such as the share of in-character statements and the share of dramatically motivated statements. These results are discussed in the light of differences between the two gaming forms and finally some design implications are discussed.

Brian Morton (Assistant Professor in Philosophy at Indiana State University) have quite interesting site on (critical) role-playing game theory.

I noticed that there is a discussion on rules in Jesper Juul’s blog. More and more, I feel that there would be need to distinguish rules (as something based on agreement,that comes with possibility to cheat) and system in computer games (that regulates play in implemented ways). If one considers sports, there are rules and the laws of nature that both contributes to a sport game, but probably no-one would call gravity as a rule (see also my entries Games and Philosophical Investigations and On Rules, Game Systems, and Practices).