This article seeks to explore the digital hunting games genre, in particular the theHunter franchise, using the interpretative framework based on Roger Caillois’ concepts of paidia and ludus. It is argued that both of these notions are represented in the gameplay, narrative structure and graphical user interface of the analysed titles, effectively working towards reconciliation of the possible ecocritical and hunting-focused readings. The article interprets the theHunter games by juxtaposing the divergent stances towards environmental awareness and hunting culture, in the form in which they are communicated both in the games and within the communities of players.
{"title":"Ludic guilt, paidian joy: Killing and ecocriticism in the theHunter series","authors":"M. Felczak","doi":"10.1386/jgvw_00013_1","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1386/jgvw_00013_1","url":null,"abstract":"This article seeks to explore the digital hunting games genre, in particular the theHunter franchise, using the interpretative framework based on Roger Caillois’ concepts of paidia and ludus. It is argued that both of these notions are represented in the gameplay, narrative\u0000 structure and graphical user interface of the analysed titles, effectively working towards reconciliation of the possible ecocritical and hunting-focused readings. The article interprets the theHunter games by juxtaposing the divergent stances towards environmental awareness and hunting\u0000 culture, in the form in which they are communicated both in the games and within the communities of players.","PeriodicalId":43635,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Gaming and Virtual Worlds","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2020-06-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1386/jgvw_00013_1","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47477407","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Review of: Virtual reality: The expanding children’s marketThe impact of VR on, and top VR experiences for, children
评论:虚拟现实:不断扩大的儿童市场虚拟现实对儿童的影响和顶级虚拟现实体验
{"title":"Virtual reality: The expanding children’s market","authors":"Ray J. Gutierrez","doi":"10.1386/jgvw_00016_5","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1386/jgvw_00016_5","url":null,"abstract":"Review of: Virtual reality: The expanding children’s marketThe impact of VR on, and top VR experiences for, children","PeriodicalId":43635,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Gaming and Virtual Worlds","volume":"12 1","pages":"217-219"},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2020-06-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"41468913","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Facebook’s social VR: So many virtual worlds, so little time","authors":"Phylis Johnson","doi":"10.1386/jgvw_00015_5","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1386/jgvw_00015_5","url":null,"abstract":"Review of: Facebook’s social VR: So many virtual worlds, so little timeOculus Connect 6 San Jose, CA, 25‐26 September 2019, Occulus and Facebook","PeriodicalId":43635,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Gaming and Virtual Worlds","volume":"12 1","pages":"213-216"},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2020-06-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45618270","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
This article examines how ‘gambling’ secured a central economic and cultural position in the development of modern digital games. We first trace how developers have monetized ‘games’ and ‘play’, from slot machines to PC, console and mobile platforms, before considering the recent controversy over ‘loot boxes’ as an emblematic case study of the ongoing gamblification of digital play. We argue that (1) the rising costs of development and marketing for ‘blockbuster’ games, (2) an overcrowded marketplace and (3) significant shifts in the corporate culture of the games industry are creating cultural conditions which legitimize gambling as a form of digital game production and consumption. This is evidenced in developers’ capacity to innovate around legal challenges and player demand for further customization and rewards. What emerges is a question about the future direction of game development and the impact of a logic of money, rather than play, which now underwrites it.
{"title":"The ‘gambling turn’ in digital game monetization","authors":"Mark R. Johnson, Tom Brock","doi":"10.1386/jgvw_00011_1","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1386/jgvw_00011_1","url":null,"abstract":"This article examines how ‘gambling’ secured a central economic and cultural position in the development of modern digital games. We first trace how developers have monetized ‘games’ and ‘play’, from slot machines to PC, console and mobile platforms,\u0000 before considering the recent controversy over ‘loot boxes’ as an emblematic case study of the ongoing gamblification of digital play. We argue that (1) the rising costs of development and marketing for ‘blockbuster’ games, (2) an overcrowded marketplace and (3) significant\u0000 shifts in the corporate culture of the games industry are creating cultural conditions which legitimize gambling as a form of digital game production and consumption. This is evidenced in developers’ capacity to innovate around legal challenges and player demand for further customization\u0000 and rewards. What emerges is a question about the future direction of game development and the impact of a logic of money, rather than play, which now underwrites it.","PeriodicalId":43635,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Gaming and Virtual Worlds","volume":"1 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2020-06-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1386/jgvw_00011_1","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"41885520","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
EVE Online is a MMOG which has gained notoriety for player organizations boasting thousands of active members. The complexity of these groups presents substantial challenges, and leaders have explored multiple approaches to organization and governance. They often employ structures and language drawn from historical social systems, family, or nationality to create social order. Here we examine the use of feudalism in EVE: as a structure of power, an indicator of legitimacy, and a mechanism of waging war. We demonstrate that even as leaders incorporate feudal language into their organizations, their application of these concepts is influenced by capitalism and individualism. We argue that the final social and economic system is neither truly feudal nor capitalist, but instead an accommodation between the two, shaped by player knowledge, experience, and in-game needs. We conclude that such systems support legitimate structures of power which encourage player participation and produce more sustainable player organizations.
EVE Online是一款MMOG,因拥有数千名活跃会员的玩家组织而臭名昭著。这些群体的复杂性带来了巨大的挑战,领导人已经探索了多种组织和治理方法。他们经常使用历史社会制度、家庭或国籍中的结构和语言来创造社会秩序。在这里,我们考察了封建主义在EVE中的使用:作为权力结构、合法性指标和发动战争的机制。我们证明,即使领导人将封建语言融入他们的组织,他们对这些概念的应用也会受到资本主义和个人主义的影响。我们认为,最终的社会和经济制度既不是真正的封建制度,也不是资本主义制度,而是由玩家的知识、经验和游戏中的需求形成的两者之间的调和。我们的结论是,这种制度支持合法的权力结构,鼓励玩家参与并产生更可持续的玩家组织。
{"title":"Feudal alliances in a hyper-capitalist world: Power and organization in EVE Online","authors":"Oskar Milik, N. Webber","doi":"10.1386/jgvw_00012_1","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1386/jgvw_00012_1","url":null,"abstract":"EVE Online is a MMOG which has gained notoriety for player organizations boasting thousands of active members. The complexity of these groups presents substantial challenges, and leaders have explored multiple approaches to organization and governance. They often employ structures and language drawn from historical social systems, family, or nationality to create \u0000social order. \u0000 \u0000Here we examine the use of feudalism in EVE: as a structure of power, an indicator of legitimacy, and a mechanism of waging war. We demonstrate that even as leaders incorporate feudal language into their organizations, their application of these concepts is influenced by capitalism and individualism. We argue that the final social and economic system is neither truly feudal nor capitalist, but instead an accommodation between the two, shaped by player knowledge, experience, and in-game needs. We conclude that such systems support legitimate structures of power which encourage player participation and produce more sustainable player organizations.","PeriodicalId":43635,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Gaming and Virtual Worlds","volume":"12 1","pages":"165-181"},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2020-03-11","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44214942","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Tabitha Nikolai’s Shrine Maidens of the Unseelie Court and Ineffable Glossolalia are impure specimens of the walking sim. While these are still first-person games that see players exploring eerily underpopulated environments and archiving textual fragments, they are at once more aesthetically reflexive and more referentially dense than many walking sims. Accommodating giant spiders, Weimar sexologists, messageboard trolls and quotations from Roman poetry, Nikolai’s unorthodox spins on the ‘archival adventure’ reflect her interest in queer and trans history and her commitment to interrogating discourses of purity, progress and redemption. Reviewing critical discussions of the walking sim alongside queer, trans and decolonial perspectives on archives, identity and subjectification, the article argues that while walking sims have often been praised for telling emotionally engaging stories, in Nikolai’s hands the form assumes different function: that of reckoning with history and exploring subjectivity.
塔比莎·尼古拉(Tabitha Nikolai)的《无名宫廷的神宫少女》(Shrine Maidens of the Unselie Court)和《无法无天的格洛索拉利亚》(Ineffable Glossolaia)都是行走模拟的不纯标本。虽然这些仍然是第一人称游戏,玩家可以探索人口稀少的环境并存档文本片段,但它们在美学上比许多行走的模拟游戏更具反射性,参考性也更高。尼古拉对“档案冒险”的非正统解读反映了她对酷儿和跨性别历史的兴趣,以及她对质疑纯洁、进步和救赎话语的承诺。文章回顾了对行走模拟的批判性讨论,以及对档案、身份和主体化的酷儿、跨性别和非殖民化视角,认为尽管行走模拟经常因讲述感人的故事而受到赞扬,但在尼古拉手中,这种形式承担着不同的功能:清算历史和探索主体性。
{"title":"Dirty footprints and degenerate archives: Tabitha Nikolai’s impure walking sims","authors":"R. Gallagher","doi":"10.1386/jgvw_00007_1","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1386/jgvw_00007_1","url":null,"abstract":"Tabitha Nikolai’s Shrine Maidens of the Unseelie Court and Ineffable Glossolalia are impure specimens of the walking sim. While these are still first-person games that see players exploring eerily underpopulated environments and archiving textual fragments, they\u0000 are at once more aesthetically reflexive and more referentially dense than many walking sims. Accommodating giant spiders, Weimar sexologists, messageboard trolls and quotations from Roman poetry, Nikolai’s unorthodox spins on the ‘archival adventure’ reflect her interest\u0000 in queer and trans history and her commitment to interrogating discourses of purity, progress and redemption. Reviewing critical discussions of the walking sim alongside queer, trans and decolonial perspectives on archives, identity and subjectification, the article argues that while walking\u0000 sims have often been praised for telling emotionally engaging stories, in Nikolai’s hands the form assumes different function: that of reckoning with history and exploring subjectivity.","PeriodicalId":43635,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Gaming and Virtual Worlds","volume":"12 1","pages":"105-122"},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2020-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47225973","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
The purpose of this article is twofold: first, to cast a critical eye on an arguably conservative aspect of so-called ‘walking simulators’ ‐ their walking simulation and second, to position viral browser game QWOP (2008) as an intervention into dominant paradigms of video game walking control. The first half discusses how walking simulators inherit and share a ‘grammar of action’ for simulating walking with a number of other games (Galloway). I argue this grammar of action constitutes the reification of a particular subject position ‐ one associated with a normative bodymind ‐ in video gameplay via a combination of representations, control procedures and player ‘embodied literacy’ (Keogh). The second half considers QWOP’s alternate grammar of walking simulation and how this precipitates a different relationship between player and video game, prompting questions about distributed cognition, intentionality, failure and what it means for a game to be critical.
{"title":"Unsettling embodied literacy in QWOP the walking simulator","authors":"Doug Stark","doi":"10.1386/jgvw_00004_1","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1386/jgvw_00004_1","url":null,"abstract":"The purpose of this article is twofold: first, to cast a critical eye on an arguably conservative aspect of so-called ‘walking simulators’ ‐ their walking simulation and second, to position viral browser game QWOP (2008) as an intervention into dominant paradigms\u0000 of video game walking control. The first half discusses how walking simulators inherit and share a ‘grammar of action’ for simulating walking with a number of other games (Galloway). I argue this grammar of action constitutes the reification of a particular subject position ‐\u0000 one associated with a normative bodymind ‐ in video gameplay via a combination of representations, control procedures and player ‘embodied literacy’ (Keogh). The second half considers QWOP’s alternate grammar of walking simulation and how this precipitates a\u0000 different relationship between player and video game, prompting questions about distributed cognition, intentionality, failure and what it means for a game to be critical.","PeriodicalId":43635,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Gaming and Virtual Worlds","volume":"12 1","pages":"49-67"},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2020-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"49053050","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
In 2012 The Chinese Room launched Dear Esther, a video game which would go on to shape video game history and define a new genre: the walking simulator. Walking simulators renounce traditional game tropes and foreground walking as an aesthetic and as a dramaturgical practice which engages the walker/player in critical acts of reading, challenging and/or performing a landscape. In October 2016, Dear Esther was adapted as a site-responsive, promenade performance set on the Scottish island of Inchcolm in the Firth of Forth. The resulting performance, Dear Rachel, was then experienced alongside the game under the umbrella name Inchcolm Project. This hybrid event multi-media (promenade performance, gameplay, musical performance) and mixed-reality (with physical, augmented and virtual components) required the development and implementation of complex processes of remediation and adaptation. Drawing from theoretical landscape and practitioner reflection, this paper puts forward a design framework – storywalking which reconciled the two adaptation challenges: responding to the site, and to the game.
2012年,The Chinese Room发行了《Dear Esther》,这款电子游戏将继续塑造电子游戏的历史,并定义了一种新的游戏类型:行走模拟器。行走模拟器摒弃了传统的游戏比喻和前景行走,将其作为一种美学和戏剧实践,让步行者/玩家参与阅读、挑战和/或表演景观的关键行为。2016年10月,《亲爱的以斯帖》被改编为一场现场响应式的散步表演,场景设定在苏格兰福斯湾的英格科尔姆岛。最终的表演《Dear Rachel》将以《Inchcolm Project》的名义与游戏一起体验。这种混合活动多媒体(散步表演、游戏、音乐表演)和混合现实(具有物理、增强和虚拟组件)需要开发和实施复杂的修复和适应过程。从理论景观和实践反思出发,本文提出了一个设计框架——故事行走,它调和了两个适应性挑战:对场地的响应和对游戏的响应。
{"title":"Performing walking sims: From Dear Esther to Inchcolm Project","authors":"Mona Bozdog, D. Galloway","doi":"10.1386/jgvw_00003_1","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1386/jgvw_00003_1","url":null,"abstract":"In 2012 The Chinese Room launched Dear Esther, a video game which would go on to shape video game history and define a new genre: the walking simulator. Walking simulators renounce traditional game tropes and foreground walking as an aesthetic and as a dramaturgical practice which engages the walker/player in critical acts of reading, challenging and/or performing a landscape. In October 2016, Dear Esther was adapted as a site-responsive, promenade performance set on the Scottish island of Inchcolm in the Firth of Forth. The resulting performance, Dear Rachel, was then experienced alongside the game under the umbrella name Inchcolm Project. This hybrid event multi-media (promenade performance, gameplay, musical performance) and mixed-reality (with physical, augmented and virtual components) required the development and implementation of complex processes of remediation and adaptation. Drawing from theoretical landscape and practitioner reflection, this paper puts forward a design framework – storywalking which reconciled the two adaptation challenges: responding to the site, and to the game.","PeriodicalId":43635,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Gaming and Virtual Worlds","volume":"12 1","pages":"23-47"},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2020-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"43054925","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
This article pursues a deep dive into various enigmas presented by Davey Wreden's second effort, The Beginner's Guide (2015), moving beyond the vexed question of whether the work can count as a game to the perhaps more interesting subject of how the work intervenes in game culture and what it says about the nature of game poetics. The ultimate focus is on the structure of the game, especially in its adoption of a logic of coda, to which the article relates the Derridean notion of supplement.
{"title":"‘Turn back from this cave’: The weirdness of Beginner’s Guide","authors":"Stuart Moulthrop","doi":"10.1386/jgvw_00006_1","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1386/jgvw_00006_1","url":null,"abstract":"This article pursues a deep dive into various enigmas presented by Davey Wreden's second effort, The Beginner's Guide (2015), moving beyond the vexed question of whether the work can count as a game to the perhaps more interesting subject of how the work intervenes in game culture\u0000 and what it says about the nature of game poetics. The ultimate focus is on the structure of the game, especially in its adoption of a logic of coda, to which the article relates the Derridean notion of supplement.","PeriodicalId":43635,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Gaming and Virtual Worlds","volume":"12 1","pages":"91-103"},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2020-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47441490","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"The Worries of a Patriarchy : Death Stranding, Hideo Kojima (2019)","authors":"M. Kagen","doi":"10.1386/jgvw_00009_5","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1386/jgvw_00009_5","url":null,"abstract":"Review of: The Worries of a PatriarchyDeath Stranding, Hideo Kojima (2019)Kojima Productions, PlayStation 4, Microsoft Windows","PeriodicalId":43635,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Gaming and Virtual Worlds","volume":"12 1","pages":"132-137"},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2020-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"46006924","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}