B8 Online Video Games from the Player`s Perspective

Online Games from the
Player’s Perspective
Dale Storie
April 24th, 2009
Massively Multiplayer Online Games (MMO)
• Persistent 3D Virtual Worlds
• Thousands of players on each
game server
• Open-ended Design
Massively Multiplayer Online Games (MMO)
Ultima Online
Everquest
Star Wars Galaxies
(1997)
(1999)
(1999)
Massively Multiplayer Online Games (MMO)
Runescape
(2001)
World of Warcraft:
• Released in November 2004
• 2 Expansions (Jan. 2007 & Nov. 2008)
• 10 million players
World of Warcraft
• Guilds
• IM-style chat
• Voice chat
World of Warcraft is trademark and copyright Blizzard Entertainment, Inc.
Guilds
Context:
• Players spend an average of 23.4
hours per week playing MMOs
• Average age: 27
• Spend an additional 10.4 hours in
the “meta-game”
Yee (2006a, 2006b )
Context:
• Ethnographic studies of “power
gamers” by Silverman (2006) and Taylor
(2003)
• Knowledge and social interaction are
crucial elements of successful gameplay
Questions:
•
What do players gain from their
gameplay?
•
What do they find enjoyable?
•
What does this mean for libraries?
Four Case Studies:
•
Interview with each player (1.5 hours)
•
Observation Session (1.5 hours)
Katie:
•
Arts undergrad in
early 20s
•
1 year XP
•
Extremely small
social guild (<10)
Katie:
I'm a normal girl. Like I said,
I like my own little realm of
not quite as hardcore as
everywhere else.
Rick:
•
Computer programmer
in mid-30s
•
3 years XP
•
Leader of a competitive
raiding guild (~40)
Rick:
I’m number one or number two
on the damage charts every
night....I like the socializing part
but I’m also interested in being at
the top. Either the best in my
class or the best in my guild.
Adam:
•
19 years old, worked at
a grocery store
•
2 years XP
•
Large casual guild
Adam:
You kind of don't have a choice
but to be sociable, 'cause you try
to play the games by yourself,
it's not possible.
Dan:
•
In mid-30s, worked
for an airline
•
3 years XP
•
Large casual guild
Dan:
I made [this character]
'cause nothing's worse
than getting beaten up by
a pink-haired gnome.
Learning and Knowledge:
• Goal-based Information Seeking
• Playing Strategy
• Cultural learning
Goal-based information:
• Point of need
• I’m stuck, now what?
Goal-based information:
First things first is I ask the guild. 'Cause the
guild's full of 70s, and they're going to know....
Then, I used to ask the general chat, but I
stopped doing that 'cause no one really helps.
And then I would go on Allakhazam.
Adam
Goal-based information:
It's way easier to just send out a chat that just
says, you know, anyone run this quest and know
what I'm supposed to be doing here?
Katie
Playing Strategy:
•
•
Knowledge developed over time
Synthesized and integrated into
practice
Playing Strategy:
[WowWiki] is the big starting point for most of the
work that I do, in terms of coming up with
strategies....It’s really good for describing, you
know, what it is you’re encountering.
Rick
Playing Strategy:
One mage is good, two mages is okay, but they're
a little soft though, and we don't have any
healing, so we really have to crush people quick
and use our crowd control. And it ain't
happening.
Dan
Character-Building:
Character-Building:
Character-Building:
You can enjoy the game for a very long time and
not really know anything about your character, but
there comes a point where you really have to
spend some time, probably outside the game,
finding out various abilities you would have.
Rick
Character-Building:
I kind of didn't understand the talent thing so well.
Like, I knew it improved my skills, so I kind of put
my talents in erratically....But then as I went on
and searched, I found specific [talent] builds.
Adam
Character-Building:
I went kind of Assassinations/Subtlety meld,
'cause that gives me the most power in stealth,
and coming out of stealth, which I think is most
useful when you're in a group, and you're doing
instances, which is what I like to do the most.
Katie
Cultural learning:
•
Social norms
•
Specialized vocabulary
•
Valued texts
Social Norms:
Group looting roles, I mean that's a very hot topic,
'cause you have people who ninja items and
nobody likes that....Like they say in the podcast,
it's important to establish those rules before you
do anything.
Adam
Social Norms:
If you say Ponyboy, everybody knows who you're
talking about. Like, it was that dude, because he
ganked everybody.
Dan
Specialized Vocabulary:
Gank (from WoWWiki):
•
When an overwhelmingly large or more powerful group or
party kills you and/or your group. Commonly used as a verb.
"A 60 Hordie ganked me." or "Alliance players are ganking
lowbies." Related term: PKer.
•
Where a single player purposely attacks a player of the
opposing faction who is of substantially lower level.
•
When a single player attacks a player of equal or lesser
level who is in the middle of a fight with something else and is
handicapped by that fight and unable to deal with the ganking
enemy.
•
A Gank setup is also used for all-out attack with little
consideration to defense, i.e., pure Strength and Attack Power
boosting to ensure maximum DPS.
Valued Texts:
The original [website] that we used to use was
Allakhazam.. I can't even spell it any more....It's
not bad, but it's updated kind of sporadically, and
it's a really slow browser. Like, this - it's slow.
And then WoWWiki became kind of the big thing.
Dan
Valued Texts:
Leeroy Jenkins is so famous now that you can't like, everyone says Leeroy Jenkins.
Adam
Leeroy Jenkins
- Pals for Life
Ben Schulz
AKA
Leeroy Jenkins
Jimmy
Robert Moran
Not Just Another Love Story
Part 1
Part 2
Tristan Pope
ROFLMAO
Brandon Dennis
Culture:
I'm pretty sure the guy who's the writer is the
same age as me. He puts in things like Dukes of
Hazzard. You know, just crap like that, stuff that I
can relate to.
Dan
Learning and Knowledge:
•
Situated in the experience of the game
•
Supported by a shared discourse
•
Always socially mediated
Evaluating Information:
I look at guilds that have progressed further than
me and look at their warlocks to see what talent
specs they’re using.
Rick
Evaluating Information:
Yeah, and people, how they play is completely
subjective....there are some talents that I think are
really good that people think are just terrible. And
so... [what it] gets to basically in World of Warcraft
is, play it how you want.
Adam
Enjoyment:
Meaningful play is what occurs when the
relationships between actions and outcomes in a
game are both discernable and integrated into the
larger context of the game.
Salen & Zimmerman (2004)
Enjoyment
•
Gradual introduction of new
information and challenges
• Probing and reprobing (Gee 2003)
•
Steady progression in difficulty
Enjoyment:
Like I could get to a certain level of success right
away without...you know, getting caught....You don't
hit any majorly new problems until you are at a
substantially higher level.
Katie
Agency:
• Narrative Architecture
• Game spaces are designed to be “rich
with narrative potential”
Henry Jenkins (2004)
The Back Story:
• Traditional Fantasy Setting
Alliance
The Back Story:
• Traditional Fantasy Setting
Alliance
Horde
The Back Story:
The Back Story:
The Back Story:
The Back Story:
The Back Story:
The Back Story:
The Franchise:
The Franchise:
Agency:
If you're a fan of the universe and you understand
you're fighting the Lich King in the next
expansion, that's kind of exciting. Like, this is the
dude you have to kill.
Adam
Agency:
Legendary Heroes:
We’re ranked #32 on our server....You
know, it’s a badge of honour.
Rick
Legendary Heroes:
In the beginning, Lost was an Alliance guild that
all they did was [Player vs. Player]....They were
awesome. If you saw those guys roll in, you knew
the crap was going down and the Horde was
going to pay.
Dan
Implications for learning:
• Games offer a combination of
overt instruction and hands-on
practice, with lots of opportunity for
feedback
James Paul Gee (2003)
Affinity Spaces:
• Shared social practices within a
semiotic domain
• Active agents in perpetuating the
world and the culture
James Paul Gee (2007)
Role of Public Libraries:
• Computer hardware = $$$
• Software & Subscription = $$$
Alternatives:
Runescape
www.runescape.com
List of free MMOGs on Wikipedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_free_MMOGs
Ten Ton Hammer - Reviews
www.tentonhammer.com
Questions?
Dale Storie
[email protected]
References:
Gee, James Paul. 2003. What Videogames Have to Teach Us about Learning and Literacy. New York:
Palgrave MacMillan.
---. 2007. Good Video Games and Good Learning: Collected Essays on Video Games, Learning, and
Literacy. New York: P. Lang.
Jenkins, Henry. 2004. Game Design as Narrative Architecture. In First Person: New Media as Story,
Performance and Game, edited by Noah Wardrip-Fruin and Pat Harrigan. Cambridge MA: MIT Press,
118-130.
Salen, Katie, and Eric Zimmerman. 2004. Rules of Play: Game Design Fundamentals. Cambridge, MA:
MIT Press.
Silverman, Mark. Beyond Fun in Games: The Serious Leisure of the Power Gamer. Master’s thesis.
Available from: Proquest Dissertation and Theses. http://proquest.umi.com (accessed April 24,
2007).
Taylor, T.L. Play Between Worlds: Exploring Online Game Culture. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
Nick Yee. 2006a. The Demographics, Motivations and Derived Experiences of Users of MassivelyMultiuser Online Graphical Environments. PRESENCE: Teleoperators and Virtual Environments 15:
309-329.
---. 2006b. Time Spent in the Meta-Game. The Daedalus Project 4 (4). http://www.nickyee.com/
daedalus/archives/001535.php (accessed April 15, 2007).