Task #10 – Yay!

Part One:

There are many ways in which virtual worlds can increase education for students all around the world. The Internet has become the most widely aquired piece of technology all around the world. The Internet in general, especially virtual worlds have given education many opportunities to grow and exapand all over the world. Advantages of using virtual world for education would be taking advantage of eliminating any constraints of time and space. Anyone anywhere can meet up in a virtual world such as second life. Virtual worlds, like second life created many outlets and possibilities for education to be possible within virtual worlds. I think that the best level of education that would benefit from education in virtual worlds is upper level highschool students and university students. I think that this type of education would benefit these students because when in a virtual world there are alot of distractions and it’s sometimes difficult to pay attention. Students need to be serious and attentive a most times to benefit from this type of education.

Part Two: Throughout writing my research paper, I’ve learned many things, about serious games and video games in general. It was really interesting to see how people are so effected my immersive and interactive video games. It was interesting and informative to compare serious games to violent video games and the analyze if player would react and play in the same manner. I also really enjoyed applying other communications theories to new media and tweeking them so that they can apply and make sense. I also learned alot about how video games can enhance society as a whole in regards to using them to raise awareness about social issues and public conflict.

Task #9 – The Course so Far…

Part One:

Throughout the past five weeks my outlook on video games, gamers and virtual worlds has changed dramatically since the class started. I’ve changed my views in that I used to think that playing video games was merely a waste of time, and now I understand that many video games, especially MMORPGs have deeper underlying factors that affect the players on an emotional and psychological level. I also enjoyed analyzing the stereotypes and ideologies in the new digital media. I found it interesting studying these new mediums because we’ve been studying and picking apart traditional media to death and I really like applying the theories we’ve learned in other classes that we’ve applied to film, television, news and music and apply it to this new cutting edge interactive media in which, I believe, has a much greater impact on the audiences. I really enjoy studying this type of media because instead of looking at what types of media has been used in the past for communications such as the telegraph, telephone, snail mail ect., and looking at how people can use the Internet, and virtual worlds to enhance communication, essentially eliminating the constraints of time and space from communications as well as it being just the beginning of this new media and there is much more to come. I like to look at it as studying ‘future’ rather than history, which hold my interest much, much more.

Part Two:

As I’ve been working at my paper, there are many further questions that arise from my research. These questions include will video games be the new frontier for education, and if serious games can help teach people about these social implications then where else can video game be  used in an educational atmosphere. It going to be interesting to see where the remainder of my research takes me and  conclude to my research question.

Task # 8 – Participatory Narrative and Collaberative Play

Part One:
Yes I do believe that video games can be consumed in the same way that we consume traditional media for entertainment purposes. New games have risen within the last few years such as the Wii console as well as games such as Guitar Hero and Rock Band where the goal of the game is clear and simple to all. Games where the player is very immersed in the game and the goal is unclear and misunderstood or not understood at all the ‘audience’ will not be as immersed in the narrative. On the other side of things, narratives in which the audience is very involved and interested it may be more likely that a passive audience will be more immersed. Also I think that people watching their friends or relatives play video games, this gives them a sense of agency and give the audience a chance to be active within the game. In the past when I have watched others play a game I was captivated by trying to learn what is going on in the game and how to play and the goals of the game. I think that there is a definite difference between consuming media and passive play because consuming media is merely consuming media where as being a passive player you can have input into the game and have an impact on the narrative.

Task #7 – Virtual Communities

Part One:
I’m not sure if the “online communities” that I think I belong to are actual “online communities” But I belong to some different facebook groups that help me keep in touch with RL friend that I’ve known for years. These groups were formed because of RL personal relations that have translated online. I really enjoy being part of this group because we can all keep in touch and have the ability to keep our closest friends up dated with out the hassle of everyone being together at the same time, convenience is a main reason why I take part is this type of community. Another online communities that I used to take part is was synchronized Skating Message board, where girls who synchronize figure skate can talk about upcoming competitions, their teams, judging and other social engagements. I really enjoyed this communitity becauseI felt that the only people I could talk to about Synchro was my team member and it was nice to meet other girls outside of a competitive setting and in more of a social setting. I got a sense of belonging and shared interest out side of my usual teammates which I valued very much, I also found it excited that every month or 2 weeks we could meet at competitions face to face.
I do think that virtual worlds and communities are real, this is because, as we discussed in lecture communities give people a sense of belonging, shared interest and common social goals, and because these 3D virtual worlds are mainly focused on social interaction and many of the players/participants gain many needed social interactions and relationship which are built within these virtual worlds. Like I stated before there are many reasons how people can benefit online and offline in virtual worlds, such as helping people with some social insecurities they may have, as well as creating a sense of belonging within a community and can act as an outlet for escapism.

Part Two:
I’ve been playing my serious game and attempting to relate some communications theories as well as come up with a research question or thesis statement for my research paper. I’ve been throwing around ideas for my paper, I plan on discussing the agenda setting theory and the cultivation theory in regards to how educational video games like Energyville. I would like to analyze if these games when played for enjoyment in an educational setting will raise awareness of environmental issues for young students. I hope to analyze how different ages may play a factor in this, amount of time played (cultivation), types of educational games, interactivity within the games and compare these games to traditional games aswell, such as MMORPGs and FPS games.

Task #6: Gender/Race & Ethnicity

Part One:
A game that I found interesting from the gender/race/ethnicity point of view is that default game that comes with the newest console “Wii”. Although the characters in the Wii sports game or “Miis” do not have character personalities, and I wouldn’t consider them avatars because you can’t alter how they act or react by they are merely symbols that a person can use to distinguish one player from another and players don’t necessarily identify with their Mii. Female Miis differenciate from male Miis because of ‘feminine’ long hair and a dress, there is no ‘sexual’ differences between a male and female Mii character. Also, in regards to race and ethnicity all the same shapes, eyes, faces, hair style, hair colour is availaible to any skin colour when creating your Mii. I found this interesting because I feel that because Wii is meant to be a family type game Mii characters are very gender/race neutral and doesn’t discriminate against any race what so ever. I also found it interesting that on the technical side of it, Wii graphics and Mii characters seemed so amature (for lack of a better term). I think that Nindento deliberately decided to make their Mii characters essentially detail-less to have room for improvement (Wii2, Wii Sports 2) and again to encourage and support diversity but not to implement that it is important to recognize that people are ethnically different. Another main reason that I think Nintendo decided to do this is because it is supposed to be a family friendly, child friendly game and over and hyper-sexualized Mii characters would damped the values I believe Nintendo is attempting to instill in their programs. I think that other people may interpret these characters in a different manner, in terms of Nintendo being lazy and not putting any effort in to the characters, and again leaving themselves enough room for improvement and to make more money. I’m curious on how Nintendo feels about this, and how they justify their decisions on Mii characters.
Part Two:
In progress…

My Blog Surfing Discoveries:

I’ve been checking out some blogs on digital media ng social networking, and being a business communications student some business blogs sparked my interest. Richard Stacy’s blog, Social Media: Four Simple Things Every Organization Needs To Do. Stacy says that every organization should : (1)Uncovering your digital identity (2) Creating a credible story (3) Start creating “off-site” digital content and (4) Create a space to enagage with your stakeholders. I thought this article was really interesting in the fact that many organizations and companies have been switching from traditional media to digital media within many aspects of the company or organization.

Check it out! : http://richardstacy.com/2008/01/15/social-media-four-simple-things-every-organisation-needs-to-do/

Task # 5 – Fandom and Participatory Culture

Part One

Reading 1 – Fantasy Baseball: The Case for Competitive Fandom

           The ready describes competitive fandom as the learning, play and fandom of fantasy sports. These fantasy sports exploded because of something called cultural convergence. Fantasy sports take the statistical output of sport ad the mechanism that allows fans to compete with other fans to more accurately predict the statistical performance of players. The article calls this the “game-upon-a-game feature”. In other words fantasy sports takes real life sports statistics and makes it into a game where players can create teams based on their real life statistics. Fandom becomes competitive when the knowledge acquired in the fan domain is transformed into strategic information to guide play in a new kind of game. This specific article focuses on fantasy baseball and how it is played. Over 10 million people play fantasy baseball and $500 million is spent annually on this obsession.
The article discusses 5 stages of a fantasy sports league:
1. Preparation – Using traditional media to acquire knowledge and prepare to select players in the fantasy league.
2. Player Selection – Players select players through drafts and auctions, depending on salary caps for 25 players. 1/3 pitchers and 2/3 hitters.
3. Daily Roster Management – Players manage their team through daily trades, injured reserve list, waiver or free agent claims.
4. Negotiation – Discuss players, “trash talk” and psychological ploys to acquire valued players
5. Winning and Losing – Winner is determined by who sits on top of the rankings with players and team statistics.
               The article discusses the beginning of these types of game with the “Strat-o-matic”. The goes on to state that Competitive Fandom = Fan culture + competitive gaming. There are three aspects of fan culture for fantasy baseball, which include: the dual planes of activity, mash up production, and trans-media complex. Within competitive gaming there are three aspects when relating to fantasy baseball, these include: artificial, rules and quantifiable outcomes.
              Fantasy baseball and fantasy sports blur the lines between traditional media and digital media, this means taking the real statistics from television sport and turning it into a game in real-time. Participatory culture is used in this article as the players of fantasy sports having control over what happens within the game and its players create each league and team.

Reading 2 – Computer Game Modding, Intermediality and Participatory Culture

                 This article discusses how the customer modifications of games or the modding phenomenon links together media production and consumption that clearly goes beyond the simple oppositions of cooptation and resistance. The article discusses how there is recent changes in the new media environment, these include: (1) New tools and Technologies (to archive, annotate, appropriate and recirculate media content) (2) A range of subcultures that promote do-it-yourself media production. And (3) Economic trends encouraging the flow of images, ideas and narrative across multiple media channels.
                The article analyzes the forms and meanings of gamer made designs, specifically Mods. Mod is a modification or gamer create content, which blur the boundaries between gamers and game designers. This creates innovation and creative within gamers and game culture, this creative involvement becomes the fundamental feature in any game. Modding and innovation can consist of not only technological changes in the game but game practices aswell. As there is a very big social nature to games classified as Muds or MMORPGs which make helping create and innovate within the game even more appealing to Modders.
             The article discusses how Modders “hack” or “patch” games. This is defines as “to write computer programs for enjoyment”. Avant-garde artists can lead to limited view that emphasizes the ironic and distanced appropriation and pays no attention to the affects and passion attached to games. Innovation helped improve the game play throughout the history of games. Modders manipulate and modify the game in many different ways, these include, in world, weapons, characters and manipulating game mechanics.
             Within this article participatory culture is defined as being actively involved in the innovation and creation of a game that a person plays and is involved in, although power remains partial and modders are never fully independent to create whatever they which within a game. This article discusses 5 categories in order to explain what happens in the intersections of participatory culture and corporation driven media convergence these categories include conflict, critique, challenge, collaboration and recruitment. In the same way that modder adopt different positions, also the game industry in far from a homogeneous entity.

Reading 3 – Of Mods and Modders – Chasing Down the Value of Fan Based Digital Gaming Modifications

            This article discusses how fans are turned in to programmers in context. The article points out the consumers in general were named persons of the year by time magazine because of how fans have such an impact on producing aswell as consuming (prosumer). Mods can range from changes in the physics of the game to a change in the story line from changing conversations throughout the game. Normally add-ons, maps, mods and skins focus on developing realism and historical accuracy. The article also debates if modifications are the cause or effect of gaming success. A large mod typically requires more than 100 hours of work to complete where as a smaller mod typical take 20 – 40 hours to complete. All “prosumers” generally modify games for enjoyment. There are 3 themes in which people will typically decide to become a modder, these include: Artistic endeavor, Allowance for gamers to identify with games which in turn increases level of enjoyment of game play and lastly, the gain experience to acquire a job in the digital gaming industry.
              Game companies recruit employees from their hobbyist communities. Digital game fan programmers are important part of a digital games context community. This is because modders are more likely to take creative risks that game companies are not willing to take.
            This specific article discusses participatory culture in the context of the actual producer or the gaming industry and how they rely on prosumers and fan modifiers and developer to create a successful game.

The Notion of Participatory Culture
           Wikipedia describes participatory culture as one: With relatively low barriers to artistic expression and civic engagement, with strong support for creating and sharing ones creations with others, with some type of informal mentorship whereby what is known by the most experienced is passing along to novices, where members believe that their contributions matter, and where members feel some degree of social connection with on another.
           These articles that discuss mods and prosumers of gaming relates to this course discussion because obviously mods and modders are a larger part of 21st century gaming and most of the popular game that we are analyzing today are developed and innovated by gamers.
             Participatory culture fits into the theories we’ve discussed in audience studies such as the agenda setting theory, I think that if through web 2.0 consumers have the ability to produce media content this diminished the agenda setting theory in the fact that the public is creating the media, in which the public agenda will bring about topics and different forms of salience within the media and the media agenda which will then be consumed again by the public. I feel with the new Web 2.0 such as blogging and other forms of digital media in which consumers can help produce and create media content, the face of media and the agendas in which the media ‘follows’ will soon diminish.

Part Two

I found another serious game on games for change (G4C). This game, called ElectroCity, has the same ideas and concepts as EnergyVille. It seems as though ElectroCity is for an older audience becasue there is many more aspects to the game than just creating energy. A player can build cities, rural neighbourhoods or just leave it alone, on top of creating energy for their place. The game takes 4 different areas when scoring you. (1) The security of your city (2) your popularity (3) your population and (4) your environment. Players must make people in there city happy while sustaining energy, environment and the economy. I Like this game more than Energyville because I feel that it is much more interactive and can teach more about sustainability. I feel that children who will be learning about these types of things will be more interested in the game ElectroCity.

Link to ElectroCity: http://www.electrocity.co.nz/Game/

Task #4 – Identities in Games

Part One
I decided to choose the MMORPG World of WarCraft, this is because I feel that this game/world is little more current, compared to EverQuest and I like the concepts better that lie underneath WoW. I think that I’ve heard more about Wow compared to EverQuest and I feel that it is more popular and I think those are the reasons that compelled me to choose World of WarCraft over EverQuest II. I chose to be the “Undead” race, this is because I don’t think I would want to be one of the crazy creatures like a Orc, Troll or Gnome, but I didn’t want to be a boring plain human when I have the chance to be someone other than myself. The big monster races didn’t appeal to me because I don’t feel that these characters and races don’t have any sex appeal and aren’t attractive, and I believe that people to want to create an idealized self when creating avatars. I think that I would enjoy being this race because it would bring out a different ‘dark’ side of me that I rarely show. As for a class I think I would choose to be a priest I think that I would choose this class because it’s ironic with my race and a little bit funny to me, kind of like a demon or zombie with a heart of gold. It’s not that none of the other classes didn’t appeal to me I just really liked the idea of an undead priest. I’m not sure what I would name my character, something that’s kind of sassy, but rare name that would compliment how my character looks and acts. I would want my character to be somewhat sarcastic and ironic like her “culture” and but would still be nice and sweet like a priest. Currently I have an avatar in Second Life, through my virtual cultures class last semester. My avatar I made to look like me, I’m not sure why I created my avatar to look like me. This is possible because I was using the virtual world solely for research rather than my own entertainment. My avatar, I believe would have turned out very differently if I was actually immersed in the game, rather than just exploring and researching. I think that a characters or avatars appearance does really matter to people who are in a virtual world because, like one of the readings suggested, if a person has the opportunity to create an idealized self they are going to do it. I definitely think it would depend on what you are playing; this is because virtual worlds such as Second Life depend solely on communication and social interactions along with games like WoW and EverQuest. Where as if you were playing a game that’s mainly about game play and competition an avatar might not matter as much.
Part Two:
I think I am going to discuss the Magic Bullet/Hypodermic needle theory along with the Agenda Setting theory when it comes to my serious game research paper. The Magic Bullet or Hypodermic Needle theory states that media effects everyone in the same way and media ‘injects’ its information into everyone who listens/watches/plays and interacts with media. Some questions and points of the theory I would like to analyze is do video games, in specific serious video games include do playing serious games actually increase the awareness of the topic for every person who plays it. The second theory I would like to analyze is the Agenda Setting Theory; this theory states that the media although might not tell us what to think, but it certainly tells us what to think about. A discussion topic that will be discussed is, does digital media such as serious games have an impact on the public agenda. I would also like to compare these results with applying the Agenda Setting theory to some different console games, violent and non-violent. Another questions I would like to as is does traditional media such as news papers and television have an impact on what games are popular or vice versa. I think that these theories and discussion questions are relevant to my topic and serious game and will make for interesting research and findings within the paper. 

Task #3: Theorizing Games

As I’ve researched the virtual world “Second Life” in the past and applied theorys of the culture industry and Adorno to virtual worlds when dealing with commodities within a virtual space. I’ve analyzed the notion of a “prosumer” within virtual worlds, as well as psuedo individualization, and identity within virtual worlds. I think it would be really interesting to apply communications theories to virtual worlds and communication within virtual worlds. I would like to apply theories such as the expectancy violations theory (EVT) and uncertainty reduction theory (URT) along with Stuart Halls cultural studies, to communications within virtual worlds and how avatars communicate and deal with unexpected communication, how the people behind the avatar or in the avatar . A research question I would like to ask would ask is how to people in real life act vs. avatars in Second Life when it comes to reducing uncertainty of others and relationships and expectancy violations. (Avatars vs. Ratavas). There would be some difficulty doing this type of research within Second Life and in First Life because to me the best and only way to research this type of data is to perform ethnography research towards avatars and ravatas. Ethical issues always arise when performing any type of human research, especially when the only way you can retrieve the rich and useful data is to unknowingly perform the research. For my research I would attempt to communicate on 3 or 4 different expecancy levels as well as different breadths and depths of conversations, questions and interaction . I predict things such as proxemics will be irrelevant in a virtual world, I would focus on violations valence and verbal and non-verbal communication differences. I would purposely conduct my research within similar environment (ie. RL coffee shop and SL coffee shop) both with the same social standards and expectations in RL. The only limitations would be ethical limitations which comes with the type of ethnography that would be conducted. Different research method would have to be tested to find a suitable method that would retrieve the richest and most relevant data to the research questions. Some limitations and critiques that the theory arises is that in both theories of URT and EVT is that many communcations studies believe that communication goes beyond simple axioms and reducing uncertainty, or is not the driving force of communication. “Motivations for interaction is a desire for a positive relational experience.” (Wikipedia) Some other critques of EVT is that both positive and negative communication and violate a persons expectancy where the theory only discusses negative violations of expectancy. These critiques could be harmful to the purity of my data and research because if I were to completely follow the theories components to exert my research it may be skewed according to these critiques.
In my research paper about serious games, I will discuss how video games effect people and how serious games such as Energyville actually make people aware of the issues of sustainability when refering to energy, environmental factors and security factors. A theory that I might discuss is the magic bullet theory or the hypodermic needle theory, and the opposing uses and gratificaitons theory. I would used these theories to examine both ‘regular’ video games and some serious games within youth of today. Some questions I’d like to ask is, do these games actually raise awareness within its players of these issues. Does the game actually teach players about sustaibibility or the players disengaged from the actual issue and more concerned with playing the game? Would this be useful in the classroom? The message of the game is to raise awareness about environmental, energy and economic sustainability and the difficulties that the governements face when dealing with these issues. The game also educations its players on the different ways in which a city can be powered (ie. Solar/Nuclear), and how each form of energy effects the economic and security situations of today.

UhOh!

With video games at it’s current peak and still growing researchers and universities have been studying how youth and teens can become addicted to gaming and video games. Check out this wired blog I found about some research done at Iowa State University!

“The study, which compared traits found in nearly 1,200 young gamers to adults diagnosed with gambling addiction, found that one in twelve exhibited one or more of the following behaviors:

-Lying to family and friends about video game usage
-Using video games to escape from problems or bad feelings
-Becoming restless or irritable when attempting to stop playing video games
-Skipping homework in order to play video games
-Doing poorly on a school assignment or test because they spent too much time on games.”

http://www.wired.com/gamelife/2009/04/study-one-in-tw/

What is this world coming to?! Or are we over-reacting?