A very entertaining documentary full of good references. Enjoy.
Go gamers!
Go gamers!
quarta-feira, 16 de outubro de 2013
quarta-feira, 9 de outubro de 2013
The new generation
Ludic interfaces are leading and intertwining landmarks of contemporary culture. In the last thirty years or so, gaming culture has become a major trend. From videogame consoles connected to the internet to playing traditional board games, people are increasingly experiencing the field of entertainment.
The contemporary multiplatform environment, with so many connections to different devices, becomes a privileged ambient for the wide use of gaming language.
The new category of mass self-communication (CASTELLS 2009) poses further challenges to understanding current modes of sociability and consumption inside this field. As Castells says (2009:135), the great amount of content access by multiple platforms - digital TV, tablets, smartphones, video games etc. - offered to the public is one essential characteristic of global communication in the digital age. In this digital scenario, many governments, citizens, business groups and entertainment companies have begun to explore the advantages and have started to integrate these multiple platforms in their everyday communication processes.
Why mention all this? The new generation of consoles that will be arriving in the end of the year is a mirror of this process. The Xbox One and The Playstation 4 will surely create new ways of selling entertainment. Not only through the high sophisticated games, but integrating the gaming experience in an ecosystem with television, internet, voice command and social media.
We have many languages involved in this process, but undoubtedly the language of entertainment has a very important role in this context. It’s still early to make predictions, but I bet we will have a significant revolution in the way to make entertainment with this new generation of consoles.
PS: I played Xbox One and Playstation 4 at F.R.O.G congress 2013! Awesome experience.
References:
CASTELLS, M. Communication power. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009.
The contemporary multiplatform environment, with so many connections to different devices, becomes a privileged ambient for the wide use of gaming language.
The new category of mass self-communication (CASTELLS 2009) poses further challenges to understanding current modes of sociability and consumption inside this field. As Castells says (2009:135), the great amount of content access by multiple platforms - digital TV, tablets, smartphones, video games etc. - offered to the public is one essential characteristic of global communication in the digital age. In this digital scenario, many governments, citizens, business groups and entertainment companies have begun to explore the advantages and have started to integrate these multiple platforms in their everyday communication processes.
Why mention all this? The new generation of consoles that will be arriving in the end of the year is a mirror of this process. The Xbox One and The Playstation 4 will surely create new ways of selling entertainment. Not only through the high sophisticated games, but integrating the gaming experience in an ecosystem with television, internet, voice command and social media.
We have many languages involved in this process, but undoubtedly the language of entertainment has a very important role in this context. It’s still early to make predictions, but I bet we will have a significant revolution in the way to make entertainment with this new generation of consoles.
PS: I played Xbox One and Playstation 4 at F.R.O.G congress 2013! Awesome experience.
References:
CASTELLS, M. Communication power. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009.
quarta-feira, 2 de outubro de 2013
F.R.O.G (Future and Reality of Gaming) Congress - Vienna, September 2013
Last week I was at Vienna (Austria) presenting a poster at the F.R.O.G (Future and Reality of Gaming) congress. Awesome keynotes and fantastic content in three days full of games in this beautiful city.
Vienna’s annual Games Conference offers an open and international platform for leading game studies researchers and scholars, game designers, researchers and scholars from various other fields, education professionals, and gamers from around the world. The main objective of FROG13 was to explore the “Context Matters” in regard to questions of player communities, challenging or problematic play settings, game theory and development, impact of games and cultural facets of play.
And now I would like to share the content that I presented at the congress. I hope you enjoy.
ECOLOGICAL CONCEPTS IN A BOARD GAME: How to discuss serious causes using ludic interfaces
Author: MsC. Vicente Martin Mastrocola (ESPM/Brazil)
E-mail: vincevader@gmail.com
MINI-ABSTRACT
In this presentation we seek to analyze the use of game mechanics for serious causes. We discuss, using a brazilian board game named Climate Game, how we can use a playful and ludic interface to cast a message for a serious cause and how a game could work with ideas about global warming in a fun/educational way. In this context, we use the idea of magic circle proposed by Johan Huizinga, author of the book Homo Ludens, in which the author explains how a physical space could be a place for playing, meaning and experience.
In this presentation we also discuss the impact of a ludic interface in the mediatic scenario, the gaming culture and how important it can be for the contemporary world.
SLIDES
TEXT
Homo Ludens, entertainment and games
First of all, the notion of homo ludens, introduced by the dutch historian Johan Huizinga, is the conceptual backbone for this work, where we seek to analyze the use of game mechanics, ludic concepts, and game thinking applied to a brazilian board game with ecological theme named Climate Game. This game uses a playful and ludic interface to cast a message for a serious cause, and works with ideas about global warming in a fun/educational way.
In his book "Homo Ludens" (1955) Huizinga discusses the possibility that playing is the primary formative element in human culture. The author also presents the idea of the magic circle, one important subject for our discussion.
As described by Adams and Rollings (2009, p.8), Huizinga did not use the term as a generic name for the concept: his text refers to the actual playground, or a physical space for playing, meaning and experience. As the authors says, inside the magic circle, real-world events have special meanings. In the real world you kick a ball into a net but in the magic circle you score a goal.
Huizinga (1955, page 10) wrote that the arena, the card-table, the stage, the screen, etc, are all function playgrounds. They are all temporary worlds within the ordinary world, dedicated to the performance of an act apart.
As Ehrmann says (1968, p.55) in an antropology of play, the latest cannot be defined by isolating it on the basis of its relationship to an a priori reality and culture. To define play is, at the same time and in the same movement, to define reality and culture.
The Climate Game
The Climate Game is a production from a brazilian company named Games For Business that works in the area of serious games, that, following the thoughts of Nick Iuppa and Terry Borst (2007), may be explained as games with a professional, educational or pedagogical use. Climate Game is a game that challenges its players to save the world from global warming. This game is both of competition and cooperation. It promotes competition because the player who emits no carbonic gas at all wins. But the integrated work of all the other participants is essential in order not to exceed the gas limits of the greenhouse effect.
Therefore, participants have lots of puzzles to solve together and, as Juul says (2005, p.8) games are usually well-structured problems, and this has led them to be used in several other fields.
This kind of game will not transform a player into a specialist in ecology or in global warming, but it can reinforce important concepts about the planet’s health. This game can teach basic ideas and stimulate the players to search for more information about the theme.
By this brief overview we can conclude that game mechanics can be a meaningful space for significative experiences. It seems that these ideas are essential to study and understand the gaming universe and the impacts of the game culture in the contemporary world.
Poster
REFERENCES
ADAMS, Ernest; ROLLINGS, Andrew. Fundamentals of Game Design. New Jersey: Pearson Prentice Hall, 2009
EHRMANN, Jacques. Homo Ludens Revisited. Yale French Studies, No 41. Game, Play, Literature (1968). pp. 31-57. (click here for download)
HUIZINGA, Johan. Homo Ludens: A Study of the Play-Element in Culture. Boston: The Beacon Press, 1955.
IUPPA, Nick & BORST, Terry. Story and simulations for serious games: tales from the trenches. Burlington: Focal Press, 2007.
JUUL, Jesper. Half-Real: Video Games between Real Rules and Fictional Worlds. USA: MIT Press, 2005.
Climate Game english site >> click here.
Vienna’s annual Games Conference offers an open and international platform for leading game studies researchers and scholars, game designers, researchers and scholars from various other fields, education professionals, and gamers from around the world. The main objective of FROG13 was to explore the “Context Matters” in regard to questions of player communities, challenging or problematic play settings, game theory and development, impact of games and cultural facets of play.
And now I would like to share the content that I presented at the congress. I hope you enjoy.
ECOLOGICAL CONCEPTS IN A BOARD GAME: How to discuss serious causes using ludic interfaces
Author: MsC. Vicente Martin Mastrocola (ESPM/Brazil)
E-mail: vincevader@gmail.com
MINI-ABSTRACT
In this presentation we seek to analyze the use of game mechanics for serious causes. We discuss, using a brazilian board game named Climate Game, how we can use a playful and ludic interface to cast a message for a serious cause and how a game could work with ideas about global warming in a fun/educational way. In this context, we use the idea of magic circle proposed by Johan Huizinga, author of the book Homo Ludens, in which the author explains how a physical space could be a place for playing, meaning and experience.
In this presentation we also discuss the impact of a ludic interface in the mediatic scenario, the gaming culture and how important it can be for the contemporary world.
SLIDES
TEXT
Homo Ludens, entertainment and games
First of all, the notion of homo ludens, introduced by the dutch historian Johan Huizinga, is the conceptual backbone for this work, where we seek to analyze the use of game mechanics, ludic concepts, and game thinking applied to a brazilian board game with ecological theme named Climate Game. This game uses a playful and ludic interface to cast a message for a serious cause, and works with ideas about global warming in a fun/educational way.
In his book "Homo Ludens" (1955) Huizinga discusses the possibility that playing is the primary formative element in human culture. The author also presents the idea of the magic circle, one important subject for our discussion.
As described by Adams and Rollings (2009, p.8), Huizinga did not use the term as a generic name for the concept: his text refers to the actual playground, or a physical space for playing, meaning and experience. As the authors says, inside the magic circle, real-world events have special meanings. In the real world you kick a ball into a net but in the magic circle you score a goal.
Huizinga (1955, page 10) wrote that the arena, the card-table, the stage, the screen, etc, are all function playgrounds. They are all temporary worlds within the ordinary world, dedicated to the performance of an act apart.
As Ehrmann says (1968, p.55) in an antropology of play, the latest cannot be defined by isolating it on the basis of its relationship to an a priori reality and culture. To define play is, at the same time and in the same movement, to define reality and culture.
The Climate Game
The Climate Game is a production from a brazilian company named Games For Business that works in the area of serious games, that, following the thoughts of Nick Iuppa and Terry Borst (2007), may be explained as games with a professional, educational or pedagogical use. Climate Game is a game that challenges its players to save the world from global warming. This game is both of competition and cooperation. It promotes competition because the player who emits no carbonic gas at all wins. But the integrated work of all the other participants is essential in order not to exceed the gas limits of the greenhouse effect.
Therefore, participants have lots of puzzles to solve together and, as Juul says (2005, p.8) games are usually well-structured problems, and this has led them to be used in several other fields.
This kind of game will not transform a player into a specialist in ecology or in global warming, but it can reinforce important concepts about the planet’s health. This game can teach basic ideas and stimulate the players to search for more information about the theme.
By this brief overview we can conclude that game mechanics can be a meaningful space for significative experiences. It seems that these ideas are essential to study and understand the gaming universe and the impacts of the game culture in the contemporary world.
Poster
REFERENCES
ADAMS, Ernest; ROLLINGS, Andrew. Fundamentals of Game Design. New Jersey: Pearson Prentice Hall, 2009
EHRMANN, Jacques. Homo Ludens Revisited. Yale French Studies, No 41. Game, Play, Literature (1968). pp. 31-57. (click here for download)
HUIZINGA, Johan. Homo Ludens: A Study of the Play-Element in Culture. Boston: The Beacon Press, 1955.
IUPPA, Nick & BORST, Terry. Story and simulations for serious games: tales from the trenches. Burlington: Focal Press, 2007.
JUUL, Jesper. Half-Real: Video Games between Real Rules and Fictional Worlds. USA: MIT Press, 2005.
Climate Game english site >> click here.
terça-feira, 24 de setembro de 2013
Player/interactor
In the early days of the videogame industry, PONG could be elected a huge turning point in this scenario. As Cohen (1984, p.17) reminds us, PONG was a tremendous success inside the arcades around the world and many people lined up to play the game.
And it’s important to remember that PONG, in these early years, became also a domestic console and one new component was added in the growing gaming market.
For the first time one person – at home or arcade - started to interact with a screen with real time responses using a controller. In this moment the spectator gained “new powers” and was transformed in something new: an interactor.
As proposed by Murray (1997, p.153) “the interactor is the author of a particular performance within an electronic story system”. In this new ecosystem the interactor would be a kind of spectator who has capacity for agency, understood as the ability to perform significant actions and experience the proposal of a fictional universe.
So, more than simple players, we have a world full of interactors. Today many people are not necessarily playing a game, but interacting with digital platforms that use the ludic language. I think it’s important to think beyond the player and try to observe a more complex piece in this complex stage: the role of the interactor.
References:
COHEN, Scott. Zap: The Rise and Fall of Atari. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1984.
MURRAY, Janet (1997). Hamlet on the Holodeck: The Future of Narrative in Cyberspace. New York: MIT Press, 1997.
And it’s important to remember that PONG, in these early years, became also a domestic console and one new component was added in the growing gaming market.
For the first time one person – at home or arcade - started to interact with a screen with real time responses using a controller. In this moment the spectator gained “new powers” and was transformed in something new: an interactor.
As proposed by Murray (1997, p.153) “the interactor is the author of a particular performance within an electronic story system”. In this new ecosystem the interactor would be a kind of spectator who has capacity for agency, understood as the ability to perform significant actions and experience the proposal of a fictional universe.
So, more than simple players, we have a world full of interactors. Today many people are not necessarily playing a game, but interacting with digital platforms that use the ludic language. I think it’s important to think beyond the player and try to observe a more complex piece in this complex stage: the role of the interactor.
References:
COHEN, Scott. Zap: The Rise and Fall of Atari. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1984.
MURRAY, Janet (1997). Hamlet on the Holodeck: The Future of Narrative in Cyberspace. New York: MIT Press, 1997.
terça-feira, 17 de setembro de 2013
Candy, fans and profit
I’m an old school true gamer. I really like to play everything. I can have fun playing The Last of Us in the survivor mode and I can have equal fun playing Zombie Tsunami. One important thing in gaming research is looking at all kinds of games (and players) without prejudice. And this piece is about players, passions, casual games and fans.
Recently I started to play Candy Crush on iPhone. The simple game catches me. Not for the game mechanics (that is nothing new if you’ve played Bejeweled sometime in your life), nor for the thematic/aesthetics (I really don’t like candy) but the game has an excellent idea of business model and how to engage the users in the experience transforming great part of them in fans of Candy Crush.
The video below shows the game mechanics idea and the colourful interface:
King.com – the studio behind Candy Crush - is the largest site for free games online. But “free” requires a good strategy to earn money from other sources and other formats. The most part of King.com games works on a “freemium” model.
Freemium (free + premium) is a business model by which a proprietary product or service (typically a digital offering such as software, media, games or web services) is provided free of charge, but money (premium) is charged for advanced features, functionality, or virtual goods.
In Candy Crush, King.com puts lots of efforts to create a balance between entertainment for players, sharing in social media and selling of virtual goods (extra lives, special powers, etc.). The game offers limited lives to the player and when they are finished the user has two options: 1) wait a few minutes to gather more lives or 2) pay with real money to get new lives (or powers) immediately. The addictive game mechanics create the perfect ecosystem to sell virtual lives and powers that facilitate the journey in the game. Players can also gain new lives sharing Candy Crush features on Facebook (bonus in exchange of advertising).
King.com is trying to create an intense relationship with the players to achieve more profit. More than just users, the company needs fans to grow. As Sandvoss and Harrington (2007) remark, for better or for worse fans tend to engage with their passions not in a rationally detached but in an emotionally involved and invested way.
Jenkins (2006: 41) reinforces this idea about the role of the fan in contemporary participatory culture. Although the author examines television shows and other kinds of fan activity, we believe his ideas may help us make sense of what goes on in the social networking service in question. Let us quote what Jenkins has to say about the way one becomes a fan:
As we know, fans have a special role inside social media communities. A community of fans that surrounds a specific platform becomes a fandom, and this audience deserves special attention. A well-structured fandom can become an effective marketing tool for any specific social media platform.
It seems that companies like King.com must understand how to motivate and activate the fandom audiences, as well as how to bring them closer. Meaningful experiences are important in this context because it’s a key for players to spend money inside the game experience. The idea of freemium is surrounded by strategies to engage the player as a fan.
And now let me try to finish the level 89 of Candy Crush.
References:
GRAY, J.; SANDVOSS, C.; HARRINGTON, L. (eds.). Fandom: identities and communities in a mediated world. New York: NYU Press, 2007.
JENKINS, H. Fans, bloggers and gamers: exploring participatory culture. New York: NYU Press, 2006.
King.com official site (link here)
Recently I started to play Candy Crush on iPhone. The simple game catches me. Not for the game mechanics (that is nothing new if you’ve played Bejeweled sometime in your life), nor for the thematic/aesthetics (I really don’t like candy) but the game has an excellent idea of business model and how to engage the users in the experience transforming great part of them in fans of Candy Crush.
The video below shows the game mechanics idea and the colourful interface:
King.com – the studio behind Candy Crush - is the largest site for free games online. But “free” requires a good strategy to earn money from other sources and other formats. The most part of King.com games works on a “freemium” model.
Freemium (free + premium) is a business model by which a proprietary product or service (typically a digital offering such as software, media, games or web services) is provided free of charge, but money (premium) is charged for advanced features, functionality, or virtual goods.
In Candy Crush, King.com puts lots of efforts to create a balance between entertainment for players, sharing in social media and selling of virtual goods (extra lives, special powers, etc.). The game offers limited lives to the player and when they are finished the user has two options: 1) wait a few minutes to gather more lives or 2) pay with real money to get new lives (or powers) immediately. The addictive game mechanics create the perfect ecosystem to sell virtual lives and powers that facilitate the journey in the game. Players can also gain new lives sharing Candy Crush features on Facebook (bonus in exchange of advertising).
King.com is trying to create an intense relationship with the players to achieve more profit. More than just users, the company needs fans to grow. As Sandvoss and Harrington (2007) remark, for better or for worse fans tend to engage with their passions not in a rationally detached but in an emotionally involved and invested way.
Jenkins (2006: 41) reinforces this idea about the role of the fan in contemporary participatory culture. Although the author examines television shows and other kinds of fan activity, we believe his ideas may help us make sense of what goes on in the social networking service in question. Let us quote what Jenkins has to say about the way one becomes a fan:
“One becomes a “fan” not by being a regular viewer of a particular program but by translating that viewing into some kind of cultural activity, by sharing feelings and thoughts about the program content with friends, by joining a “community” of other fans who share common interests. For fans, consumption naturally sparks production; reading generates writing, until the terms seem logically inseparable” (…)
As we know, fans have a special role inside social media communities. A community of fans that surrounds a specific platform becomes a fandom, and this audience deserves special attention. A well-structured fandom can become an effective marketing tool for any specific social media platform.
It seems that companies like King.com must understand how to motivate and activate the fandom audiences, as well as how to bring them closer. Meaningful experiences are important in this context because it’s a key for players to spend money inside the game experience. The idea of freemium is surrounded by strategies to engage the player as a fan.
And now let me try to finish the level 89 of Candy Crush.
References:
GRAY, J.; SANDVOSS, C.; HARRINGTON, L. (eds.). Fandom: identities and communities in a mediated world. New York: NYU Press, 2007.
JENKINS, H. Fans, bloggers and gamers: exploring participatory culture. New York: NYU Press, 2006.
King.com official site (link here)
quarta-feira, 11 de setembro de 2013
quarta-feira, 4 de setembro de 2013
4 Minutes and 33 Seconds of Uniqueness
Is game art? Well, it’s a very wide discussion and I think a simple blog post is not sufficient to debate this, but, undeniably, games use lots of things from the art field. This post is about a very curious ludic experiment that mixes art with games. In 2010, the Nordic game designer Petri Purho took the main idea of John Cage’s composition 4’33’’ and transformed it in a ludic interface.
4’33’’ (pronounced "Four minutes, thirty-three seconds" or just "Four thirty-three”) is a composition by American experimental composer John Cage (1912–1992) and the idea of the performance consist of NOT playing any musical instruments during that period of 4 minutes and 33 seconds. The sounds of the environment is the only thing that the listeners hear while it is performed, although this composition is commonly perceived as "four minutes thirty-three seconds of silence".
In the digital gaming experiment 4 Minutes and 33 Seconds of Uniqueness the user needs to look into a white screen with a black progression bar for 4 minutes and 33 seconds. To reach the end of the experience successfully, the “player” must be the only person in the world looking into the screen. You’ll win the game if you’re the only one playing it at the moment in the world and the experiment works online only.
The creative mind behind this ludic interface said in his website that 4 Minutes and 33 Seconds of Uniqueness is “an exploration to what actually defines a game. You can win or fail in the game, but there is no user input or interactivity of any kind. I was tempted to leave the graphics out completely, but I figured that the white progress bar is abstract enough.”
You can play the experiment by clicking here.
And you can see a live performance of the John Cage’s composition in the video below:
Now on to your opinion.
4’33’’ (pronounced "Four minutes, thirty-three seconds" or just "Four thirty-three”) is a composition by American experimental composer John Cage (1912–1992) and the idea of the performance consist of NOT playing any musical instruments during that period of 4 minutes and 33 seconds. The sounds of the environment is the only thing that the listeners hear while it is performed, although this composition is commonly perceived as "four minutes thirty-three seconds of silence".
In the digital gaming experiment 4 Minutes and 33 Seconds of Uniqueness the user needs to look into a white screen with a black progression bar for 4 minutes and 33 seconds. To reach the end of the experience successfully, the “player” must be the only person in the world looking into the screen. You’ll win the game if you’re the only one playing it at the moment in the world and the experiment works online only.
The creative mind behind this ludic interface said in his website that 4 Minutes and 33 Seconds of Uniqueness is “an exploration to what actually defines a game. You can win or fail in the game, but there is no user input or interactivity of any kind. I was tempted to leave the graphics out completely, but I figured that the white progress bar is abstract enough.”
You can play the experiment by clicking here.
And you can see a live performance of the John Cage’s composition in the video below:
Now on to your opinion.
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