scholarly journals The Experience Created by the Social and Cultural Context Constructed by Video Games: A Digitization of Life and Death

2021 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 19-31
Author(s):  
Tulia Maria Cășvean ◽  
◽  
Vasile Hodorogea ◽  
Ioan Emanuel Cășvean ◽  
◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Video Games ◽  
Video Game ◽  
Real World ◽  
Cultural Context ◽  
Life Experience ◽  
Real Life ◽  
Cultural Issues ◽  
Life And Death ◽  
The Social ◽  
Game Industry

Appling the Gadamer’s filter on video games, reveals that they support an intimate connection with real life, built on basic mimesis of simple and, at the same time, coherent and meticulous realities. Video games are not intrinsically real-world escapism but generate a concrete, contextualized life experience that is ultimately connected to social and material realities (Spiridon, 2013, pp. 64-65). Moreover, experiences gained through video games can contribute, same as television, cinema or novels do, to the creation of perceptions that influence the way people relate to various aspects of life. The pivot of this study focuses on the experience created by the social, cultural context, captured by video games, which allow players to make choices of "life and death". Such choices are even more important in the current pandemic context when some people seem not to clearly understand the potential consequences on their own protection or even own survival. The aim of the research is to open a path for a better understanding of how a video game appreciated by critics and very popular among players, especially during the pandemic (DayZ, produced by Bohemia Interactive in 2013) explores social, cultural issues that can create a favorable context for players to be better equipped for the reality of everyday life. The study will include, besides the analysis of the video game itself, wikis, and walkthroughs, the views of other researchers and professionals working in the video game industry.

scholarly journals ‘Cease and desist?’ The persistence of Marlboro brand imagery in racing video games

2020 ◽  
pp. tobaccocontrol-2019-055300
Author(s):  
Susan Forsyth ◽  
Patricia A McDaniel
Keyword(s):  
Video Games ◽  
Video Game ◽  
Real Life ◽  
Smoking Prevention ◽  
International Policy ◽  
Policy Makers ◽  
Philip Morris ◽  
History Of ◽  
Negative Publicity ◽  
Game Industry

BackgroundSince 1972, Philip Morris (PM) has sponsored motorsports. Racing video games are a popular genre among youth and often emulate the branding of their real-life counterparts, potentially exposing youth to tobacco imagery. We examined racing video games for the presence of Marlboro imagery and explored the history of efforts to remove or regulate such imagery.MethodsWe searched the Truth Tobacco Industry documents for relevant documents and used information from video game-related websites and game play videos to identify racing video games that contained Marlboro trademarks and imagery. We also collected information on the Entertainment Software Ratings Board’s (ESRB) tobacco-specific and overall game ratings.FindingsIn 1989, negative publicity surrounding the presence of Marlboro logos in racing games led PM to threaten legal action against two game makers for copyright infringement. PM also launched a media campaign promoting this intervention as evidence of its commitment to youth smoking prevention. Nonetheless, we identified 219 video games from 1979 to 2018 that contained Marlboro trademarks and/or Marlboro-sponsored drivers and livery. Among the games in our sample with an ESRB game rating, all but one received an ‘E,’ indicating appropriateness for everyone, and all but three lacked tobacco content descriptors.ConclusionRacing video games have been and continue to be a vehicle for exposing adolescents to the Marlboro brand. Because voluntary efforts by PM and the video game industry to prevent youth exposure to tobacco brands in video games have been ineffective, USA and international policy-makers should prohibit tobacco content in video games.

The Hitman Study

2010 ◽  
Vol 15 (2) ◽  
pp. 99-108 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christopher J. Ferguson ◽  
Stephanie M. Rueda
Keyword(s):  
Experimental Study ◽  
Young Adults ◽  
Aggressive Behavior ◽  
Video Game ◽  
Real Life ◽  
Mood Management ◽  
Video Game Play ◽  
Video Game Playing ◽  
Violent Video Game ◽  
The Social

This article explores commonly discussed theories of violent video game effects: the social learning, mood management, and catharsis hypotheses. An experimental study was carried out to examine violent video game effects. In this study, 103 young adults were given a frustration task and then randomized to play no game, a nonviolent game, a violent game with good versus evil theme (i.e., playing as a good character taking on evil), or a violent game in which they played as a “bad guy.” Results indicated that randomized video game play had no effect on aggressive behavior; real-life violent video game-playing history, however, was predictive of decreased hostile feelings and decreased depression following the frustration task. Results do not support a link between violent video games and aggressive behavior, but do suggest that violent games reduce depression and hostile feelings in players through mood management.

Only problem gamblers spend less money when loot boxes are removed from a game: A before and after study of Heroes of the Storm

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
David Zendle
Keyword(s):  
Video Games ◽  
Problem Gambling ◽  
Video Game ◽  
Real World ◽  
Complex Pattern ◽  
Problem Gamblers ◽  
Before And After ◽  
Gambling Severity ◽  
Reliable Correlation ◽  
Before And After Study

Loot boxes are items in video games that may be paid for with real-world money, but which contain randomised contents. There is a reliable correlation between loot box spending and problem gambling severity: The more money gamers spend on loot boxes, the more severe their problem gambling tends to be. However, it is unclear whether this link represents a case in which loot box spending causes problem gambling; a case in which the gambling-like nature of loot boxes cause problem gamblers to spend more money; or whether it simply represents a case in which there is a general dysregulation in in-game spending amongst problem gamblers, nonspecific to loot boxes.The multiplayer video game Heroes of the Storm recently removed loot boxes. In order to better understand links between loot boxes and problem gambling, we conducted an analysis of players of Heroes of the Storm (n=112) both before and after the removal of loot boxes.There were a complex pattern of results. In general, when loot boxes were removed from Heroes of the Storm, problem gamblers appeared to spend significantly less money in-game in contrast to other groups. These results suggest that the presence of loot boxes in a game may lead to problem gamblers spending more money in-game. It therefore seems possible that links between loot box spending and problem gambling are not due to a general dysregulation in in-game spending amongst problem gamblers, but rather are to do with specific features of loot boxes themselves.

Tusslers, Beatdowns, and Brothers: A Sociohistorical Overview of Video Game Arcades and theStreet FighterCommunity

2017 ◽  
Vol 14 (7-8) ◽  
pp. 742-762
Author(s):  
Michael Ryan Skolnik ◽  
Steven Conway
Keyword(s):  
Video Games ◽  
Identity Formation ◽  
Video Game ◽  
Economic Conditions ◽  
Moral Panics ◽  
The Social ◽  
History Of ◽  
And Performance ◽  
Historical Movement

Alongside their material dimensions, video game arcades were simultaneously metaphysical spaces where participants negotiated social and cultural convention, thus contributing to identity formation and performance within game culture. While physical arcade spaces have receded in number, the metaphysical elements of the arcades persist. We examine the historical conditions around the establishment of so-called arcade culture, taking into account the history of public entertainment spaces, such as pool halls, coin-operated entertainment technologies, video games, and the demographic and economic conditions during the arcade’s peak popularity, which are historically connected to the advent of bachelor subculture. Drawing on these complementary histories, we examine the social and historical movement of arcades and arcade culture, focusing upon the Street Fighter series and the fighting game community (FGC). Through this case study, we argue that moral panics concerning arcades, processes of cultural norm selection, technological shifts, and the demographic peculiarities of arcade culture all contributed to its current decline and discuss how they affect the contemporary FGC.

Waltzing on Rooftops and Cobblestones

2021 ◽  
Vol 2 (3) ◽  
pp. 34-55
Author(s):  
Ailbhe Warde-Brown
Keyword(s):  
Video Games ◽  
Video Game ◽  
Real World ◽  
World History ◽  
Interaction Model ◽  
Virtual Space ◽  
Open World ◽  
Integrated Approaches ◽  
The Relationship

The relationship between music, sound, space, and time plays a crucial role in attempts to define the concept of “immersion” in video games. Isabella van Elferen’s ALI (affect-literacy-interaction) model for video game musical immersion offers one of the most integrated approaches to reading connections between sonic cues and the “magic circle” of gameplay. There are challenges, however, in systematically applying this primarily event-focused model to particular aspects of the “open-world” genre. Most notable is the dampening of narrative and ludic restrictions afforded by more intricately layered textual elements, alongside open-ended in-game environments that allow for instances of more nonlinear, exploratory gameplay. This article addresses these challenges through synthesizing the ALI model with more spatially focused elements of Gordon Calleja’s player involvement model, exploring sonic immersion in greater depth via the notion of spatiotemporal involvement. This presents a theoretical framework that broadens analysis beyond a simple focus on the immediate narrative or ludic sequence. Ubisoft’s open-world action-adventure franchise Assassin’s Creed is a particularly useful case study for the application of this concept. This is primarily because of its characteristic focus on blending elements of the historical game and the open-world game through its use of real-world history and geography. Together, the series’s various diegetic and nondiegetic sonic elements invite variable degrees of participation in “historical experiences of virtual space.” The outcome of this research intends to put such intermingled expressions of space, place, and time at the forefront of a ludomusicological approach to immersion in the open-world genre.

scholarly journals REAL LIFE EXPERIENCE IN INQUIRY-BASED EARTH AND SPACE SCIENCE INSTRUCTION

2019 ◽  
Vol 7 (5) ◽  
pp. 284-292
Author(s):  
Roldan D. Atienza
Keyword(s):  
Science Teachers ◽  
Learning Process ◽  
Real World ◽  
Life Experience ◽  
Life Experiences ◽  
Science Instruction ◽  
Real Life ◽  
Space Science ◽  
Global Issues ◽  
Teaching Learning

Science teachers play an important role in improving science literacy of their students. In achieving and building students’ interest and literacy about science, teachers must have an appropriate approach to be used in teaching. In teaching science, students must be active and participative in the learning process. Engaging students in variety of activities can help them in constructing their own knowledge by experiencing and observing results of the experiment. Teachers must provide real world experiences for students to engage with around global issues. This took the form of service-learning projects emphasizing issues of global concern, or working in teams to devise and debate solutions to real-world problems. Notably, these activities were student-centered and inquiry-based. Teachers also incorporated their own cross-cultural experiences into the classroom through informal conversation, discussions, around artifacts and photos, and lesson plans that incorporated knowledge gained and relationship built though their global experiences. The need for utilizing real life experiences in science teaching is a must in today’s classroom as the new generations of learners are ready to work with the different global issues and concerns of which can play an important role in the learning process. However, the utilization of real life experiences in science instruction grows as a measure when teachers are able to develop an engaging and positive learning environment for learners. With this, teachers should carefully plan how to utilize the students’ real life experiences efficiently and effectively in inquiry-based science instruction to enhance more the teaching-learning process. The focus of this study was to determine the real life experience in inquiry-based earth and space science instruction in public secondary schools in Batangas City. The descriptive method of research was applied in the study, with the questionnaire as the main data gathering instrument responded to by 102 science teachers. Based on the analysis, it was revealed that real life experiences in science areas were moderately utilized by the students while teachers applied inquiry-based learning activities along its phases of exploration, concept introduction, and concept application to a moderate extent. It was recommended that the proposed learning plans be used to enhance science instruction and an instrument or assessment tool may be developed to determine the impact of utilization of real life experiences in teaching-learning process.

Patriarchy in play: Video games as gendered media ecologies

2021 ◽  
Vol 20 (2) ◽  
pp. 195-212
Author(s):  
Jennifer Jenson ◽  
Suzanne de Castell
Keyword(s):  
Video Games ◽  
Sexual Harassment ◽  
Video Game ◽  
Media Ecology ◽  
First Century ◽  
Cultural Economic ◽  
Mainstream Media ◽  
Feminist Perspectives ◽  
Game Industry ◽  
Hostile Environments

Videogames are a dominant cultural, economic and creative medium in the twenty-first century, whose varied ecologies are increasingly recognized as particularly hostile environments to those identifying or identified as women. These ecologies include those encoded and enacted within the virtual environments of digital games, across the spectrum of those ecologies materially inhabited in games education, game cultures and, paradigmatically, the video game industry. In June 2020, top videogame maker Ubisoft saw high ranking employees resign from the company as accounts went public on Twitter and in mainstream media of sexual harassment, abuse and other misconduct at the company being covered up and ignored. But this is by no means the first public revelation of sexual harassment and discriminatory injustices directed at women who develop and play games: many will recall the vitriolic online hate movement #gamergate. Despite the familiarity of these tropes, we seem to ‘rediscover’ every few years or so that making and playing video games can present toxic environments for women. Drawing on feminist perspectives that understand how videogames have been a gendered, primarily masculine, domain, this article proposes that a topographical view, one specifically attuned to examining gender through a media ecology lens, can demonstrate how these successive re-enactments of ‘shock and awe’ operate in the service of, and are functionally integral to, the preservation of media ecologies exclusionary by design, legitimizing the repetition of their gendered hostilities. The intent is to move beyond naïve expressions of surprise and righteous indignation, to a grounded recognition and elucidation of the extents to which misogyny and harassment are and have been deeply structured into the gendered ecologies of video games.

A study on game consumer behavior

2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (9) ◽  
pp. 2323-2330 ◽  
Author(s):  
Phuong Nguyen ◽  
Luong Nguyen
Keyword(s):  
Consumer Behavior ◽  
Video Games ◽  
Customer Satisfaction ◽  
Video Game ◽  
Social Factors ◽  
Market Research ◽  
Factors Affecting ◽  
Game Industry ◽  
Theoretical Foundations ◽  
Analyze Data

In the world, the video game industry has really exploded until about 2000, and since then has achieved great strides, becoming one of the leading forms of the entertainment industry, at least in terms of revenue. The main purpose of this paper is to examine the consumer behavior in the case of video games with three objectives: identify the factors affecting customer satisfaction for video games; analyze these factors to understand how they affect consumer behavior and propose some recommendations to improve the customer satisfaction for video games. Data was collected from 205 Vietnamese gamers addressing the variables of individual, psychological, cultural, and social factors. Regression analysis found that all four factors positively affect consumer behavior, in terms of customer satisfaction, especially cultural factors. The findings of this research analyzed the theoretical foundations of the theory of behavior, based on which investigated the study of consumer behavior of video game services of players in Vietnam by market research, analyze data, thereby helping businesses understand the psychological response, consumer behavior of customers, and can devise appropriate strategies.

Gaming as a Woman

2013 ◽  
pp. 106-122 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kristen B. Miller
Keyword(s):  
Video Games ◽  
Gender Gap ◽  
Virtual Worlds ◽  
Online Communities ◽  
Video Game ◽  
Real Life ◽  
Rock Band ◽  
Affinity Groups ◽  
Males And Females

This chapter reports the findings of two surveys taken by players of the video game Rock Band. The purpose of the surveys was to determine what differences, if any, exist between the ways that males and females learn to play the game, are motivated to improve, interact with other players both online and in real life, and interact with other players in online communities for the game. This study suggests that while females do not appear to learn to play this game much differently from males, they are motivated differently and interact with other players differently, and ultimately they have a harder time than males finding a place in the affinity groups that exist for the game, and these findings provide starting points for teachers who intend to use video games and virtual worlds for educational purposes in guarding against creating a “gender gap” between males and females.

Categorisation of New Classes of Digital Interaction

Leonardo ◽  
2011 ◽  
Vol 44 (1) ◽  
pp. 90-91 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tack Woo ◽  
Kwangyun Wohn ◽  
Nigel Johnson
Keyword(s):  
Video Games ◽  
Video Game ◽  
Real World ◽  
Digital Culture ◽  
Physical Interaction ◽  
Interactive Installation

This article introduces a new concept, digital interactivity, through examining local digital culture; and video game culture is employed as a metaphor to interpret local digital culture. As a result, ‘control-’ and ‘communication’-based interaction are initiated, based on ‘user to media’ relationships. Based on the degree of physical interaction, ‘liminal’ and ‘transitive’ interactions are initiated. Less physical digital interaction is described as ‘liminal’ interaction and more physical digital interaction is described as ‘transitive’ interaction. These new classes of digital interaction can be applied to real-world examples, such as digital interactive installation artworks and video games.

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