Colonialism is Fun? Sid Meier's Civilization and the Gamification of Imperialism
Not specifically about colonialism, but game systems and code reinforcing harmful ideas - How RimWorld's Code Defines Strict Gender Roles
Potential issues when trying to create non-colonialist games - The Pitfalls of Trying to Tell Stories Outside Your Own Experience
Wikipedia's Article on Colonialism - This isn't citeable as a scholarly source, but points to several, and is interesting as a publicly-produced definition, although 'Wikipedia editors' is a distinct group.
Colonialism and Modern Constructions of Race: A Preliminary Inquiry
Digital Conquerers: Minecraft and the Apologetics of Neoliberalism
Myths of the Native - This web page is a great resource on postcolonial studies & has pages that summarize many important works and biographies of important authors.
Colonialism Definition in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy - Another broad summary of a lot of literature on colonialism.
Pleasure of Exploration and Colonial Mastery in Civilization III Play the World - 2003 article on colonialism in Civ III that covers a lot of the same ground we propose to explore in terms of analysis, but without such direct reference to mechanics or any technical component.
"You Have Unleashed a Horde of Barbarians!:" Fighting Indians, Playing Games, Forming Disciplines - Thorough (but not fully mechanics-oriented) analysis of how colonialism manifests in the Civilization series.
Postcolonial Playgrounds: Games as postcolonial cultures - Argues that Civ-style games don't exactly reproduce colonial mapping practices. Peter thinks this is a bit too optimistic, but it does point to an important possibility: that games and especially subversive play can in some cases reconfigure some aspects of the colonialist dominant narrative.
'Shadow of the Tomb Raider' Tries, but Fails, to Tackle Its Own Colonialism
Monster Hunter World Can't Envision That Maybe Hunters are the Baddies
More articles by the above author can be found listed here
Beneath Its Cute Exterior, Forager Is Indisputably a Game About Colonization
Slide on colonialism in games and possible counters at slide 17 of this powerpoint
Implications of mechanics of constant progression: Level 99 Capitalist
The Culture-Historical Configurations of the American Peoples - An early and somewhat flawed anthropological theory of colonization processes. This theory is essentially progressivist.
A Definition of Colonialism - A flawed and very analytical definition that contrasts with the above; the included critical responses are useful.
Anthropology and Colonialism - A bit indirect, but a good article summarizing some of the ways that colonialism has manifested within anthropology as a discipline.
Nintendo® and New World Travel Writing: A Dialogue - An essay in dialogue form cited by the article above that talks about Super Mario Bros. relationship to colonial mythos of princess rescue.
Playing at Colonization: Interpreting Imaginary Landscapes in the Video Game Tropico - Need to figure out access...
The SEGA and Microsoft History of India: The British Raj in Videogames
The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim and its audience as a world-building benchmark for Indigenous virtual cultural heritage. - Thesis on Skyrim as a potential site for modding that could enable modern transmission of Australian Aboriginal culture. Relevant as a more positive prospect for the sociocultural function of games.
Dirt not Soil: A Unit Analysis of Minecraft Dirt Blocks and Gameworld Representations of Global Environmental Ideologies - Haven't gotten full access, but seems to be a parallel similar work focusing on issues of environmentalism instead of colonialism. PDF of preview.
Gardening Games - Games studies academic article that talks about colonialism, Minecraft, and design options.
Childhood's End (or, We Have Never Been Modern, Except in Minecraft - Article on grids, modernity, and Minecraft, which isn't completely relevant to our arguments but is a good general example of critical scholarship on the game.
Minecraft is an Allegory for Colonialism - Blog post on Minecraft and colonialism.
Colonialism & the Observer Principle in Minecraft - Another (very short) blog post on Minecraft and colonialism, with a focus on villagers.
Minecraft Education Module on British Colonisation - Kinda... pro-colonial actually :(
Another example of false equivalencies in action: The Truth About Western "Colonialism"
Quite prominent pro-colonialist academic article: The Case for Colonialism