Arrival

In late September 2024, I arrived in Manchester. It was an extraordinarily rainy day, to the point that even Mancunians said that it was a lot. I was starting my month- long stay there as a visiting research fellow at Manchester Metropolitan University (MMU). MMU hosts the Manchester Game Centre, hub for multidisciplinary approach to game studies on a local, national and international level. During this visit, I was going to work on my upcoming doctoral dissertation work, which is about transmedia worldbuilding in the miniature wargame franchise Warhammer 40,000. The plan was to interview local Warhammer 40,000 players about their engagement with Warhammer’s transmedia and observe their games. After trudging through the pouring rain with my suitcase, I arrived first at the Righton Building, where I met with fellow Doctoral Researchers, and had a chance to dry my clothes. Built into an old shopping mall, Righton was a charming old building, if somewhat drafty. The entire second floor was reserved exclusively for post-graduate researchers, and there was even a sign informing anyone attempting to climb to the second floor.

I met with the Game Centre’s co-leads professor Paul Wake, dr. Chloe Germaine and dr. Jenny Cromwell. I also had a meeting with dr. Jack Warren, from which I got a chance to assist him on his course “Reading/Writing Games”. This gave me a first-row seat to see how game studies are taught in MMU. Structurally, the day was divided into three sections: lecture, workshop, and seminar. In the lecture, dr. Warren went through a brief history of game studies and through some key themes there, such as agency and narrative. In the workshop, students were asked to write down and go through their gaming history, and then play or examine old gaming consoles (Game Centre provided the class with an old Amiga computer and multiple games for it) or game manuals, and what sort of narratives they might contain. Some students didn’t engage with old games and wanted to play more modern games, such as Candy Crush Saga. This was fine, and together with the student we concluded that the addictive mobile game about tile-matching is also about upholding monarchy. Last part of the day was the seminar, for which the students read an assigned text, Ian Bogost’s Video Games Are Better Without Stories article from The Atlantic, and then we discussed it together. It was quite a different experience from any game studies class I’ve ever attended before, but the format was good and despite the length of the day, it didn’t feel exhausting. As the job of the researcher is sometimes very solitary, it was good to get back to the basics, even for a day.

Games Workshop Research Day

Games Workshop Research Day was one of the first things that was discussed when my visit to MMU was confirmed. It started as an idea to showcase Warhammer related research done in the Game Centre and beyond. We also wanted to have someone talk from the industry itself, either a current or a former Games Workshop employer. We got one from Mark Gascoigne, former head and co-founder of Black Library, Games Workshop’s publishing wing. The event was held on October 17th at International Burgess Foundation, a center dedicated to the works of author Anthony Burgess. First speaker at the event was my second PhD supervisor, dr. Mikko Meriläinen, and his talk was about the miniaturing phenomenon of “pile of shame”, the unused potential that accumulates as you continue to pursue different miniaturing projects. That was followed by Paul Wake’s presentation about his ongoing book project about the cultural history of Blood Bowl, a game of fantasy football set in the universe of Warhammer Fantasy. After a short break, Jenny Cromwell continued the program with her presentation about how Warhammer uses ancient Egyptian imagery. Last academic presentation of the day was mine, as I talked about how transmedia is used in worldbuilding of Warhammer 40,000.

Final speaker of the day was Mark Gascoigne, who talked about the history of Games Workshop’s book publishing, from the initial anthologies published in 1989 to the founding of Black Library in the late 1990s. Gascoigne’s talk was the longest of the day, filled with interesting anecdotes from his long career, painting a picture of a small operation that then grew to be a major part of the Warhammer experience. After the last talk, everyone was free to stay, mingle and play some of the games we brought to the event. Paul had brought his impressive Blood Bowl pitch and bunch of old and new Warhammer board games. Most popular seemed to be Gorechosen, a four-player game published by Games Workshop in 2016. Mark brought his collection of much older Games Workshop games, including their children’s game Trolls in the Pantry, made in 1989. Attendees ended up being more interested in his copy of the Judge Dredd board game from 1982!

I ended up running a game of stripped-down version of Warhammer 40,000, using limited resources and miniatures to craft a snapshot story for three players to go through. The scenario was called The Doom of Burgess Prime, and it was a three-way battle between the Death Guard, Space Marines and the Tau Empire, full of thinly veiled allusions to The Clockwork Orange. The game ended up being a very violent affair, and the Death Guard played by me ended up winning the battle and taking control of both the world of Burgess Prime and the mysterious artifact known as Ludovico.

Games Workshop Research Day was a great success and showcased multiple different approaches towards Warhammer as a subject of research. During the day, the discussions ran from the hobby practices and phenomena surrounding them to how real-world elements affect the different games and worlds within the larger Warhammer label. Together with the Warhammer 40,000 Conference, held for the first time in Heidelberg in late September, the Research Day proved once again the untapped potential of Warhammer as a subject for academic research.

Living and doing research in Manchester

When I was not organizing the Research Day, writing articles or conducting interviews with local Warhammer 40,000 players, I found myself regularly just walking around Manchester. It took me a good while to go to any museum or other classic tourist spot. I just enjoyed the experience of walking in a massive, bustling city where you were but one of the many. Manchester’s signature animal is the bee, symbolizing the industrial and communal spirit of the Mancunians. That symbol can be seen everywhere, from the souvenir merchandising and public transports, and it feels right. The city does sometimes feel like a hive of bees, in a good way! There is a sense of rhythm to walking in cities like Manchester, and it took me a while to find the exact rhythm. When I did, it felt like you were absorbed into the mass of people, just one more pair of feet walking from Princess Street to Charles Street, taking a shortcut from Loverose Way to Brancaster Road and from there to Oxford Road and MMU’s campus grounds.

The life of a postgraduate researcher is a stressful one. It’s filled with deadlines, applications for funding, new projects appearing before old ones are finished, and financial precarity. When you are also queer or trans and suffer from minority stress, that can quickly just become overwhelming. Add to that living abroad alone for the first time in your life and you can imagine just how stressful I was about the whole trip beforehand! So, I was pleasantly surprised at just how friendly Manchester is to LGBTQ+ people. The UK in general does not have a good track record of treating its transgender citizens, and my experiences do not reflect those that live there permanently, and my positive experiences do not negate the continued mistreatment of trans people in the UK. My experience was one of acceptance, solidarity and friendliness, wherever I went there. I had not felt such belonging to a city before. Queerness is part of Manchester, from the clubs and bars of Gay Village to Queer Lit bookshop and queer memorials in Sackville Gardens.

During my time in Manchester, I managed to get in contact with the Manchester Wargaming Society and hold interviews with several members. In these, the respondents were asked about their relationship to the Warhammer transmedia, if and how it is seen in their wider hobby practices, and how they’ve experienced the change in the ongoing story of Warhammer. I also managed to set up a game of Warhammer 40,000 between do members of the Wargaming Society, where I monitored how they interacted with their armies and events during the play. Working and talking with the colleagues at Game Centre was very inspiring, and I garnered new insights into multiple topics that interest me; for example, gendered experiences in Warhammer tournaments, that rose from the shared experiences between me, Dr. Germaine and Dr. Cromwell at the Full Beard Cup Blood Bowl tournament.

I felt welcome in Manchester, and everywhere else I went as well – Liverpool, Saltburn-by-the-Sea, Nottingham, York and Hebden Bridge – seeing friends I’ve only known through social media before, making new ones in punk shows, around games of Blood Bowl, and of course, at the campus. I am thankful for the colleagues at MMU and Game Centre who welcomed me in, guided me in a new city, making my time there both pleasant and productive. When it was time to leave back to Finland, I did feel sad about leaving after being there for only one month. I didn’t know you could feel homesick for another country.

The combined broad academic interest in Warhammer on academic level at the Game Centre, the pervasive queer-friendliness of Manchester, and the openness and friendliness of many people there made Manchester feel like a second home to me, and one where I can’t wait to come back to. Also, the food is a lot better than many people say!

This trip was made possible by a grant received from Tampere University Communication Sciences Unit with funding provided by the C.W. Åkerlund Media Foundation.

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