The Game Thing: Ludology and other Theory Games

2004 ◽  
Vol 110 (1) ◽  
pp. 10-18 ◽  
Author(s):  
Patrick Crogan
Keyword(s):  
Short Story ◽  
Computer Games ◽  
Computer Game ◽  
Academic Competence ◽  
Game Studies ◽  
Current State ◽  
Games Studies ◽  
Productive Potential ◽  
Computer Culture

The current state of computer games studies is critically examined in this paper by means of an analysis of the recently released computer game, The Thing. Game studies is an emerging area of humanities scholarship, an emergence that exhibits characteristically ambivalent processes of defining its own object and staking out its own field of expertise from other areas of academic competence. A principal dynamic of these processes concerns the opposition between ‘ludological’ and narratological theorisations of the computer game. This opposition is examined for both its limitations and its productive potential by means of consideration of The Thing game and its relation to John Carpenter's cinematic iteration of the original short story from which it is adapted. This consideration leads away from the question of the specificity of the computer game object to some concluding speculations about the relation of contemporary computer games to the broader computer culture within which games are taking on an increasingly significant profile.

scholarly journals Intermediality between Games and Fiction: The “Ludology vs. Narratology” Debate in Computer Game Studies: A Response to Gonzalo Frasca

2014 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 171-188 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michalis Kokonis
Keyword(s):  
Computer Games ◽  
Methodological Approach ◽  
Theoretical Perspective ◽  
Computer Game ◽  
Game Studies ◽  
Hybrid Nature ◽  
Games Studies ◽  
Semiotic Perspective ◽  
Narrative Forms ◽  
Electronic Games

Abstract In the last ten or fourteen years there has been a debate among the so called ludologists and narratologists in Computer Games Studies as to what is the best methodological approach for the academic study of electronic games. The aim of this paper is to propose a way out of the dilemma, suggesting that both ludology and narratology can be helpful methodologically. However, there is need for a wider theoretical perspective, that of semiotics, in which both approaches can be operative. The semiotic perspective proposed allows research in the field to focus on the similarities between games and traditional narrative forms (since they share narrativity to a greater or lesser extent) as well as on their difference (they have different degrees of interaction); it will facilitate communication among theorists if we want to understand each other when talking about games and stories, and it will lead to a better understanding of the hybrid nature of the medium of game. In this sense the present paper aims to complement Gonzalo Frasca’s reconciliatory attempt made a few years back and expand on his proposal.

Gamers, Gender, and Representation

2009 ◽  
pp. 911-921 ◽  
Author(s):  
Diane Carr ◽  
Caroline Pelletier
Keyword(s):  
Recent Work ◽  
Media Studies ◽  
Computer Games ◽  
Computer Game ◽  
Game Studies ◽  
Formal Learning ◽  
Learning Contexts

The issue of gender reoccurs in debates about the introduction of computer games into formal learning contexts. There is a fear that girls will be alienated rather than engaged by games in the classroom. There is also concern over sexist imagery, and thus about representational aspects of computer games. In this chapter, particular aspects of these issues are addressed in turn. The authors explore the issue of gender and gendered game preferences, in relation to the cultural framing of the gaming audience. Attention is then directed at the issue of representation, with a consideration of the tensions between representation, meaning, and playability. These issues are considered primarily through perspectives drawn from media studies, and with reference to recent work from the emerging field of computer game studies.

scholarly journals Sensuous proximity in research methods with expert teams, media sports, and esports practices

2018 ◽  
Vol 34 (64) ◽  
pp. 21
Author(s):  
Emma Witkowski
Keyword(s):  
Research Methods ◽  
High Performance ◽  
Computer Game ◽  
World Of Warcraft ◽  
Game Studies ◽  
Research Approach ◽  
Performance Practices ◽  
Research Guidelines ◽  
Games Studies ◽  
Expert Team

This paper examines epistemological issues in game studies research, specifically exploring qualitative research approaches to networked, expert computer game teams who engage in esports practices. Expert teams deliver their expert practice in part through interembodied sensitivities to sensorial team-based phenomena, which is made across multiple bodies and machines in the process of play. Drawing on fieldwork with World of Warcraft Arena tournament esports teams and research methods orientations from games studies, sensuous ethnography, and sports studies, a position of sensuous proximity in games research is explored and developed as a suite of research guidelines for engaging with esports teams high performance practices. I suggest a research approach that involves differing lenses and stances in the study of embodied team play, and varying scales of sensuous proximity to the layers of expert team practices that augmens the notion of playing research in game studies.

scholarly journals Audio Interaction in Computer Mediated Games

2008 ◽  
Vol 2008 ◽  
pp. 1-8 ◽  
Author(s):  
J. R. Parker ◽  
John Heerema
Keyword(s):  
Computer Games ◽  
State Of The Art ◽  
Interactive Media ◽  
Computer Game ◽  
Media Environment ◽  
Current State ◽  
Computer Mediated ◽  
Practical Design ◽  
Design Ideas

The use of sound in an interactive media environment has not been advanced, as a technology, as far as graphics or artificial intelligence. This discussion will explore the use of sound as a way to influence the player of a computer game, will show ways that a game can use sound as input, and will describe ways that the player can influence sound in a game. The role of sound in computer games will be explored some practical design ideas that can be used to improve the current state of the art will be given.

Adapting Pathfinding with Potential Energy

2012 ◽  
pp. 23-39
Author(s):  
Thomas Hartley
Keyword(s):  
Path Planning ◽  
Potential Energy ◽  
Shortest Path ◽  
Computer Games ◽  
Computer Game ◽  
Location Analysis ◽  
Essential Requirement ◽  
Current State ◽  
Local Movement ◽  
Game Environment

Movement through a computer game environment is an essential requirement of non-player characters (NPCs) in today’s computer games. Local movement is typically reactive and based on the current state of the game and the NPC. Long-range movement is concerned with determining a short and appropriate route from one location in the game environment to another. A desired destination is typically not known in advance. Therefore, techniques are needed to determine a route while a game is being played. This problem is known as pathfinding or path planning. Traditionally, pathfinding systems have focused on determining the shortest path between locations; however, many computer games are beginning to incorporate terrain and strategic reasoning (also known as tactical location analysis) into the pathfinding process. This chapter describes an approach to strategic and tactical pathfinding that learns in-game from an NPC’s experience of executing previously generated paths. The experience is used to adapt future pathfinding and therefore allows NPCs to avoid (or be attracted to) areas of the game world. Hence NPCs can improve their chance of success and encourage the human player to adapt their behavior.

scholarly journals Within the Mainstream: An Ecocritical Framework for Digital Game History // Dentro del canon: Un marco ecocrítico para la historia del videojuego digital

2017 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 39-55 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hans-Joachim Backe
Keyword(s):  
Computer Games ◽  
Game Design ◽  
Serious Games ◽  
San Diego ◽  
Film Studies ◽  
Computer Game ◽  
Digital Games ◽  
Past Research ◽  
Game Studies ◽  
Literature And Film

      Ecocriticism of digital games has so far engaged with a rather small corpus of examples, predominantly from a prescriptive perspective and with a quite limited methodological toolkit. This essay systematizes and historicizes some of these commonly found limitations of past research and proposes methods for a more historically and generically diverse exploration of ecological thinking vis-à-vis digital games. The majority of discussions of games from an ecocritical perspective has applied concepts and frameworks borrowed from literature and film studies, thus privileging surface semiotics over game mechanics. More methodically aware studies have oriented themselves toward the popular framework of procedural rhetoric (Bogost 2007), resulting both in a selection bias towards serious games and an author-centric, intentionalist slant inherent in the approach. In general, the discussion revolves around a small number of games with apparent ecocritical potential, such as Myst (Cyan 1993) or Farmville (Zynga 2009), resulting in a selective, a-historic and therefore distorted discussion of ecology in the diverse medium of digital games. This essay discusses strategies for dealing with a larger corpus of digital games through a descriptive matrix for identifying and analyzing the ecological dimension of digital games. It proposes an extension of the ecocritical toolkit by including a more user-centered, ethics-based theoretical framework based on Sicart’s Ethics of Computer Games (2009). The gain of engaging with representation and simulation of the natural environment in mainstream computer game history will be demonstrated in an analysis of two paradigmatic games. In both Red Dead Redemption (Rockstar San Diego 2010) and Dishonored (Arkane Studios 2013), we encounter game design geared toward producing ludo-narrative dissonances which are highly inductive of critical engagement with the ecosphere. Resumen      La ecocrítica de los juegos digitales se ha centrado en un corpus de ejemplos muy pequeño. Asimismo, la ecocrítica se ha basado en un número muy limitado de métodos. La mayor parte de los debates sobre juegos han utilizado conceptos y teorías tomados de la teoría literaria y el análisis cinematográfico, haciendo prevalecer por tanto análisis semióticos superficiales sobre el estudio de las mecánicas de juego. Los estudios que aplican métodos de game studies suelen estar basados en la teoría de retórica de procesos (Bogost, 2007), lo que acarrea una selección de ejemplos sesgada hacia los serious games y los juegos de autor. En general, estos debates se centran en un número pequeño de juegos con potencial ecocrítico, como Myst (Cyan 1993) o Farmville (Zynga 2009), lo que deriva en una discusión selectiva y ahistórica de la ecología en un medio tan diverso como los juegos digitales. Este artículo presenta estategias para analizar un corpus de juegos mayor. Este artículo propone una matriz descriptiva para identificar y analizar la dimensión ecológica de los juegos digitales. Metodológicamente, este artículo opera con una extensión de la teoría ecocrítica que incluye un marco teórico centrado en el usuario y basado en The Ethics of Computer Games (Sicart, 2009). Los beneficios de centrarse en la representación y simulación del medio natural en el canon de los juegos digitales serán demostrados a través del análisis de dos juegos paradigmáticos. Tanto Red Dead Redemption (Rockstar San Diego 2010) como Dishonored (Arkane Studios 2013) producen disonancias ludo-narrativas que promueven una relación crítica con la ecoesfera.

scholarly journals Mapping Persona and Games

2021 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. 1-6
Author(s):  
Christopher Moore
Keyword(s):  
Media Studies ◽  
Textual Analysis ◽  
Computer Game ◽  
Tipping Point ◽  
Game Studies ◽  
Games Studies

For those new to games studies, the most important primer is the recognition that, as a field of research, it is at its most revealing when in conversation with perspectives from other fields and domains of inquiry. Espen Aarseth (2001) announced that the first issue of Game Studies, the international journal of computer game research, marked the commencement of computer game studies. Aarseth's editorial launched the trajectory for the following two decades of game research, obscuring much of the previous work examining digital and analogue games that had contributed to the tipping point at which the fields' coalescence could become a reality. Emerging from media studies, sociology, and a particular tradition of textual analysis in cinema and literature studies, games studies has since had a reputation for being the latest kid on the block. Like persona studies, game studies features key moments in which intersections between it and other fields and their theoretical and analytical perspectives prove enlightening, enriching, and even entertaining.

A Cooperative Computer Game for Public Efficiency Development

2014 ◽  
Vol 13 (8) ◽  
pp. 4760-4766
Author(s):  
Sachchida Nand Prasad
Keyword(s):  
Group Therapy ◽  
Group Work ◽  
Computer Games ◽  
Computer Game ◽  
Target Population ◽  
Design Interfaces ◽  
Design Case Study ◽  
Effective Group ◽  
Public Group

This paper presents a design case study of SIDES: Design Interfaces to Develop Effective Public Efficiency. SIDES is a tool designed to help adolescents in Public group therapy, specifically individuals with Asperser’s Syndrome, practice effective group work efficiency using a four-player cooperative computer game that runs on computer games technology. We are represent the design process and evaluation of SIDES conducted over a period of six months with a middle school Public group therapy class. Our findings indicate that   computer games   are a motivating and supported tool for effective group work among. My target population and reveal different design lessons to inform the development of similar systems.

Learning to program with Game Maker

2017 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 17 ◽  
Author(s):  
Claire Johnson
Keyword(s):  
Computer Games ◽  
Computer Game ◽  
Visual Programming ◽  
Cultural Significance ◽  
Pair Group ◽  
Positive Attitudes ◽  
Programming Software ◽  
Constructionist Approach ◽  
South East England ◽  
Computing Curriculum

Game Maker is widely used in UK secondary schools, yet under-researched in that context. This paper presents the findings of a qualitative case study that explores how authoring computer games using Game Maker can support the learning of basic programming concepts in a mainstream UK secondary setting.  The research draws on the learning theory of constructionism, which asserts the importance of pupils using computers as ‘building material’ to create digital artefacts (Papert, 1980; Harel and Papert, 1991), and considers the extent to which a constructionist approach is suitable for introducing basic programming concepts within a contemporary, game authoring context.  The research was conducted in a high achieving comprehensive school in South East England. Twenty-two pupils (12 boys; 10 girls; 13-14 years old) completed a unit of work in computer game authoring over an eight-week (16 x 50 minute lessons) period. In planning and developing their games, they worked in self-selected pairs, apart from two pupils (one boy and one girl) who worked alone, by choice. Nine of the ten pairs were the same gender. Data were collected in planning documents, journals and the games pupils made, in recordings of their working conversations, and in pair, group and artefact-based interviews. Findings indicate that as well as learning some basic programming concepts, pupils enjoyed the constructionist-designed activity, demonstrated positive attitudes to their work, and felt a sense of achievement in creating a complex artefact that had personal and cultural significance for them. However, the findings also suggest that the constructionist approach adopted in the research did not effectively support the learning of programming concepts for all pupils. This research arises out of a perceived need to develop accessible, extended units of work to implement aspects of the Computing curriculum in England. It suggests that using Game Maker may offer a viable entry, and identifies the programming concepts and practices which pupils encountered, the difficulties they experienced, and the errors they made when authoring computer games. It also offers recommendations to increase the readiness with which students engage with key programming concepts and practices when using this visual programming software. In so doing it makes a practical contribution to the field of qualitative research in secondary computing education. 

Playing power: gendered discourses in a computer games magazine

1997 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 43-55 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joanna Thornborrow
Keyword(s):  
Computer Games ◽  
Computer Game ◽  
Stylistic Analysis ◽  
Game Playing ◽  
Gender Specific ◽  
Conflicting Discourses

The focus of this article is the language of computer game previews and guides in the magazine Sega Mean Machines. I examine the presence of conflicting discourses within these texts, and discuss the possible effects they may have on the construction of gender-specific identities for the reader. Through a stylistic analysis of these texts, I will argue that entering the computer game-playing world means essentially a shift for the female readers/players into male-centred discourses.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document