Cute, cuddly and completely crushable: Plushies as avatars in video games

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (2) ◽  
pp. 131-149 ◽  
Author(s):  
Emma Reay
Keyword(s):  
Video Games ◽  
Video Game ◽  
Close Reading ◽  
Game Mechanics

This article examines video game avatars that are designed to resemble toys. It names this trope the ‘Blithe Child’ to capture the carefree, careless and childlike interactions this avatar invites. This article argues that the connection between the Blithe Child and traditional toys functions to express and explain non-violent game mechanics, to shape sentimental player–avatar relationships, to create cosy, snug playspaces and to encourage pro-social, creative and self-expressive playstyles. However, the Blithe Child inherits some of the more sinister dynamics latent in human–toy relationships, namely the desire to humiliate and mutilate the cute object and anxieties about what it means to be ‘real’ – to be an independent, agential subject rather than a passive, manipulated, othered object. Drawing on theories derived from cuteness studies and toy studies, this article uses a close reading approach to critique the age-based hierarchies that underpin this trope.

Training cognition with video games

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Pedro Cardoso-Leite ◽  
Morteza Ansarinia ◽  
Emmanuel Schmück ◽  
Daphne Bavelier
Keyword(s):  
Video Games ◽  
Video Game ◽  
Cognitive Enhancement ◽  
Simulation Games ◽  
Impact Action ◽  
Systematic Assessment ◽  
Game Mechanics ◽  
Third Person ◽  
State Of Affairs ◽  
New Research

This chapter reviews the behavioral and neuroimaging scientific literature on the cognitive consequences of playing various genres of video games. The available research highlights that not all video games have similar cognitive impact; action video games as defined by first- and third-person shooter games have been associated with greater cognitive enhancement, especially when it comes to top-down attention, than puzzle or life-simulation games. This state of affairs suggests specific game mechanics need to be embodied in a video game for it to enhance cognition. These hypothesized game mechanics are reviewed; yet, the authors note that the advent of more complex, hybrid, video games poses new research challenges and call for a more systematic assessment of how specific video game mechanics relate to cognitive enhancement.

Toward Broader Definitions of “Video Games”

2016 ◽  
pp. 1-37 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lucas John Jensen ◽  
Daisyane Barreto ◽  
Keri Duncan Valentine
Keyword(s):  
Video Games ◽  
Video Game ◽  
Essential Elements ◽  
Technological Capabilities ◽  
Game Mechanics ◽  
Art Form ◽  
Digital Environments

As video games grow in popularity, ambition, scope, and technological prowess, they also mature as an art form, shedding old definitions tethered to video games as simple, competitive exercises. Greater technological capabilities, in addition to years of experimentation and maturation, have expanded the ability of games to tell different kinds of stories, offering branching paths. The question of “what makes a game a game?” looms larger than ever in this era of video game storytelling. As plots and characters grow, branch, and develop, so, too, do the boundaries of what a game actually is. In traditional definitions of gaming, a set of rules and a victory condition were essential elements to a game. As game narratives and game mechanics grow in increasingly complex and experimental directions, new player goals have emerged. Now, gamers socialize, customize, nurture, kill, build, destroy, break, glitch, and explore as much as they work to win and accrue points. This chapter surveys the current landscape of video games, highlighting examples and trends that challenge more traditional notions and definitions of what it means to be a “video game.” The broader definition presented here takes into account play, narrative, digital environments, and more, acknowledging the expanse of the video game experience.

scholarly journals Unifying Rigid and Soft Bodies Representation: The Sulfur Physics Engine

2014 ◽  
Vol 2014 ◽  
pp. 1-12 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dario Maggiorini ◽  
Laura Anna Ripamonti ◽  
Federico Sauro
Keyword(s):  
Video Games ◽  
Video Game ◽  
General Purpose ◽  
Game Engine ◽  
Unified Approach ◽  
Game Mechanics ◽  
Physics Simulation ◽  
Game Engines ◽  
Player Experience ◽  
Game Environment

Video games are (also) real-time interactive graphic simulations: hence, providing a convincing physics simulation for each specific game environment is of paramount importance in the process of achieving a satisfying player experience. While the existing game engines appropriately address many aspects of physics simulation, some others are still in need of improvements. In particular, several specific physics properties of bodies not usually involved in the main game mechanics (e.g., properties useful to represent systems composed by soft bodies), are often poorly rendered by general-purpose engines. This issue may limit game designers when imagining innovative and compelling video games and game mechanics. For this reason, we dug into the problem of appropriately representing soft bodies. Subsequently, we have extended the approach developed for soft bodies to rigid ones, proposing and developing a unified approach in a game engine: Sulfur. To test the engine, we have also designed and developed “Escape from Quaoar,” a prototypal video game whose main game mechanic exploits an elastic rope, and a level editor for the game.

scholarly journals Chronotypology: A Comparative Method for Analyzing Game Time

2019 ◽  
Vol 15 (7) ◽  
pp. 809-824
Author(s):  
Darshana Jayemanne
Keyword(s):  
Video Games ◽  
Video Game ◽  
Comparative Method ◽  
Efficient Set ◽  
Literary Studies ◽  
Comparative Approach ◽  
Close Reading ◽  
Temporal Experience ◽  
Temporal Complexity

This article presents a methodology called “chronotypology” which aims to facilitate literary studies approaches to video games by conceptualizing game temporality. The method develops a comparative approach to how video games structure temporal experience, yielding an efficient set of terms—“diachrony,” “synchrony,” and “unstable signifier”—through which to analyze gaming’s “heterochronia” or temporal complexity. This method also yields an approach to the contentious topic of video game narrative which may particularly recommend it to literary scholars with an interest in the form. Along with some examples from conventional games, a close reading of the “reality-inspired” game Bury Me, My Love will serve to demonstrate the use of a chronotypological approach.

scholarly journals CLASSIFYING VIDEO GAME TRANSLATION STUDIES FROM TRANSTEXTUALITY PERSPECTIVES

2019 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 29
Author(s):  
SF. Lukfianka Sanjaya Purnama ◽  
SF. Luthfie Arguby Purnomo
Keyword(s):  
Video Games ◽  
Video Game ◽  
Translation Studies ◽  
Game Studies ◽  
Cultural Issues ◽  
Game Mechanics

This paper attempts to classify video game translation(VGT)studies from the perspectives of transtextuality, Genette’s term referring to the relationships a text weaves with other texts (1992). In regard to VGT studies, applying transtextuality signifies the textuality of video game and its transtextual relationship with other texts. Transtextuality is linear to the connectionist perspectives Globalization, Internationalization, Localization, and Translation (GILT) holds, a conventional concept that houses VGT, emphasizing on the intra and inter relationships between the four elements of GILT. This necessity to consider VGT as a part of GILT is the linearity to which transtextuality conforms VGT studies. Applying transtexuality, VGT studies are classified into transversality, transcreation, transfiguration, and transmediation. Transversalityreferstothestudiesaimed at applying translation theories in VGT.Transcreation refers to VGT studies that focus on cultural issues in relation to video game mechanics. Transfiguration refers to VGT studies that incorporate game studies as a response to certain VGT issues. Transmediation refers to VGT studies that focus on the influence of video game media toward the translation aspects of video games. These four classifications construct a quadrant which opens probabilities for VGT studies to depart from the combination of each element.

scholarly journals Ludology and narratology: Legend about the battle

Kultura ◽  
2020 ◽  
pp. 263-280
Author(s):  
Biljana Mitrović
Keyword(s):  
Video Games ◽  
Video Game ◽  
Academic Community ◽  
The State ◽  
Game Studies ◽  
Academic Disciplines ◽  
Game Mechanics ◽  
Video Game Studies

The paper provides an overview and an analysis of the narratological and ludological approach to the study of video games and a review of the establishment of the fledgling field of game studies. The starting points of both theoretical positions, derived from the same literary theoretical corpus, are presented. The state of this discipline and the academic tensions in this field also indicate the ways in which academic community functions, as well as the mechanisms of their division or complication in the organizational and methodological plan. The ludological approach, which reduces the study of video games to the description and classification of rules and game mechanics, is regarded as reductionist, but also useful and applicable for understanding the specifics of video games. It is concluded that ludology, together with narratology and other academic disciplines in the field of humanities, forms a complete corpus of video game studies.

scholarly journals Video Games and Attitude Change: A Meta-analysis

2022 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lukáš Kolek ◽  
Ivan Ropovik ◽  
Vit Sisler ◽  
Herre van Oostendorp ◽  
Cyril Brom
Keyword(s):  
Video Games ◽  
Attitude Change ◽  
Video Game ◽  
Meta Analysis ◽  
Risk Of Bias ◽  
The Other ◽  
Implicit Attitude ◽  
Explicit Attitudes ◽  
Game Mechanics ◽  
The Impact

Despite extensive research on attitudes and a rapid growth of the video game market, there is currently no meta-analysis mapping the link between narrative video games and attitude change. Here, we present such meta-analysis. The findings suggest that narrative video games affect players’ attitudes towards the topics depicted in games. This effect was present in studies focused on changes in both implicit (g = 0.36, k = 18) and explicit attitudes (g = 0.24, k = 101), with longer intervention duration and game mechanics such as stereotyping and meaningful feedback resulting in larger implicit attitude change. Regarding the robustness of the underlying evidence, half of the included studies were judged to be at high risk of bias. On the other hand, the impact of publication bias in this literature was found to be negligible. Altogether, this meta-analysis provides evidence that video games shape how we think about events they represent.

“There Are No Observers Here”

2016 ◽  
pp. 54-72
Author(s):  
Hazel E. Monforton
Keyword(s):  
Video Games ◽  
Critical Theory ◽  
Video Game ◽  
Emotional Response ◽  
State Control ◽  
Horror Genre ◽  
The Gaze ◽  
Game Mechanics ◽  
The Way

As an emergent medium capable of telling complex stories, the video game gives us unique insight and challenges to established critical theory. This chapter will examine the ways ‘the gaze' is expressed and utilized in video games, particularly the “survival horror” genre. It will discuss some of the ways ‘the gaze' has been shaped by literary and filmic studies before turning to Outlast (2013) by Red Barrels Games as an example of the way the medium can rearticulate our understanding of watching and being watched. Through its player-driven diegesis, immersion and phenomenologically-situated avatar body, and an ability to stimulate emotional response through game mechanics, the video game gaze might be capable of engendering emotional sympathy rather than constructing hierarchical positions of mastery. With its narratives of state control and institutionalization, journalistic distance, and medical invasiveness, Outlast uses critical understandings of ‘the gaze' to ask questions about privacy, complicity, and responsibility.

scholarly journals This is video game play: video games, authority and metacommunication

2015 ◽  
Vol 27 ◽  
pp. 37-52 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ricardo Fassone
Keyword(s):  
Video Games ◽  
Video Game ◽  
Close Reading ◽  
Game Play ◽  
Gregory Bateson ◽  
Specific Language ◽  
Video Game Play ◽  
Digital Nature

Gregory Bateson claims that all play acts should be primarily understood as meta-com­municative. In other words, playing a game implies being able to transmit and receive the meta-message ‘this is play’, which establishes a psychological frame among the players. I will propose a radical reading of Bateson’s theory in the context of video games; specifically, I will attempt at analysing the characteristics, specificities and implications of the message ‘this is video game play’. I will contend that the specific language through which video games convey this message is that of their rules, the inescapable limitations posed by their computational and digital nature. In other words, playing a video game is always, at least to a degree, playing a game of meta-communication with, against and around a video game’s hard-coded rules. Finally, I will propose a close reading of the game Papers, Please and contend that Pope’s work engages in a significant reading of the inherent reflexivity of video games, deliberately portraying their authoritative na­ture and communicative potential.

Frustration and Violence in Mobile Video Games

2020 ◽  
Vol 79 (2) ◽  
pp. 63-70
Author(s):  
Petr Květon ◽  
Martin Jelínek
Keyword(s):  
Video Games ◽  
Video Game ◽  
Implicit Association Test ◽  
Self Determination Theory ◽  
Psychological Needs ◽  
Basic Psychological Needs ◽  
Self Determination ◽  
Mobile Video ◽  
Violent Content ◽  
Before And After

Abstract. This study tests two competing hypotheses, one based on the general aggression model (GAM), the other on the self-determination theory (SDT). GAM suggests that the crucial factor in video games leading to increased aggressiveness is their violent content; SDT contends that gaming is associated with aggression because of the frustration of basic psychological needs. We used a 2×2 between-subject experimental design with a sample of 128 undergraduates. We assigned each participant randomly to one experimental condition defined by a particular video game, using four mobile video games differing in the degree of violence and in the level of their frustration-invoking gameplay. Aggressiveness was measured using the implicit association test (IAT), administered before and after the playing of a video game. We found no evidence of an association between implicit aggressiveness and violent content or frustrating gameplay.

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