Experience opposing perspectival views from both side of a conflict in MMOG

Briefly, Gonzalo Frasca's article in Serious Game Source talks about change in perspectival view players experience when they play the role of the enemy in videogames. I have heard of videogames that allow players to choose whether they want to take the role of the good guy or the bad guy at the start or at an advance stage of playing so that they can experience opposing perspectival views of both side of the conflict.

In WOW, Nick Yee found that players would usually go for characters that are visually pleasing and associated being on the good side when they first sign up for an account. For their second account (alt) they would go for the least popular, gore-looking characters. While these visually least pleasing characters are not the bad guys of the game (but perceived to be by players), players using them experience being treated to some degree as social outcasts. In Whyville, Kafai reported that white players facing social discrimination in the game world when taking up black-bodied avatars.

So experiencing different perspectival views mediates what players take away from playing, impacts their identity development and how they "read" the game. Granado Espada does not have characters that are perceived to be the bad guys or allow players to take the role of the enemy. All characters in GE are pleasing-looking, and have their own attractions and special abilities. So opportunity to experience different perspectival view is non-existent in GE. But interestingly, there is a particular faction in the server that I am playing that is well-known for being the NUMBER ONE enemy of botters and macro-users. They seems to be policing the game for IAH (:D I'm just joking).

I can say they are disliked by many players. I wonder what it will be like to be in their faction, listen to their faction chat, and get into their faction activities like reporting and pk botters and macro-users. That will surely provide a good window why they do what they did. I think I should explore this. Or interview someone who have experience playing in their faction and other faction that are open to botting and macroing. Wonder what interesting insights can I gain.

MMOG situated in multiple of networks that mediate players' identity development

Upon reflecting what I had learnt yesterday from the CRRP Conference 09 invited panel discussion, I realise that in trying to understand how players "read" and what they take away from playing an MMOG, we cannot solely look at culture and practices in the small "g" (g)ame and big "G" (G)ame, as Gee puts it. I figure that the MMOG under study is just one of many nodes in a network and that network too sits in a web of multiple networks. In Demerath words, negotiation and "orchestration" of competing discourses and social structures in these nodes and networks mediate players' identity construction. It will be quite difficult to see which node or network exerts the greatest influence on players' identity development. This is because very often it is not so much of the content that players are confronted with, but the social discourses that emerges from their interactions that mediates the meaning they take away.

I like to draw an example of a game that will definitely make many people in one particular country in the Middle East to frown in rejection (well, there could be many too who will rejoice :D). It is a game called Nijabigame. Below is a description of the game taken from its game website.

Ninjabi is an empowerment fantasy game set in the Muslim world, where a young woman dares to defy the rules and fight for her rights. The term Ninjabi is a combination of ‘Ninja’ and ‘Hijabi’ and is used by Muslim American women to subvert stereotypes. Ninjabi is a superhero who, like many Muslim women, sees her hijab as a symbol of strength.

In this platforming and fighting game, the player must collect support from the community by tagging the environment in order to make enemies vulnerable.

The main character, Layla, begins the game undertaking small acts of rebellion against the status quo. She sneaks begins her adventure by sneaking out at night, and tagging her neighborhood with her signature. This symbolizes mobility and claim to physical space as the a first step towards freedom. Layla’s adventures attract attention from the women in the neighborhood and she uses their support to confront their oppressors face to face.

Whatever lofty goals the developers of nijabigame hope to achieve, the process of shaping players' identity and worldview is not so simplistic. Players come into the game having armed with life experience, and exposed to real-world discourses as well as what they find in cyberspace pertaining to the central issue of the game. Negotiation of meanings from all these exposure can be reflective and kept with personal domain, but they can also be engaged in a social discourse. The two comic strips on the left are taken from nijabi.blospot.com and nijabi.com. They are just samples of many more available at their respective websites. Cartoon strip from nijabi.blogspot.com appears weekly on the Texan Daily. The descriptions read:

The ninjabi in this editorial cartoon is a fusion of this and a Texan identity. She reflects the voice of many Muslims who have experienced discrimination and struggle with defining their identites post-9/11.

It is an example of a node (if you wish to say so) or a network (if you look at the activities around the cartoon strips). And if nijabigame players are fans of the cartoon script, how they"read" and what they take away from the game will be mediated too by the node or network (cartoon script).
I am sure that there are many people out there who are confronting or exploring their subjectivity in various ways and means. Drawing cartoon scripts is one way. We can take the artists of these scripts as special individuals who are exploring and trying to come to terms with their identity as Muslims in a new found land. So drawing and sharing their arts and ideals can be so liberating and empowering, and can bring together like-minded people into constructive discourse. So if they too play the game, how they "read' and what they take away from playing will definitely be mediated with this new found space that liberates and empowers them to express what they truly fell.

So again, looking at what is within and around game is not enough. We need to see the multiple networks of nodes where the game sits in (and these networks and nodes are concerned too with central issue/themes of the game) in oder to understand what mediates how players "read" and what they take away from playing a game.

Popular Culture

I attended an invited panel session at CRPP today entitled: Popular Culture and Education is Asia. Panel included Peter Demerath (University of Minnesota), Zawawi Ibrahim (University Malaya) and Yoshitaka Mori (Tokyo University of the Arts).

What I take away for my research are these questions:

From Demerath

1. MMOG is a playground that attracts players from all nooks and corners of the world. Various culture and practices emerge when people of all background meet and interact. Players become "cultural innovators" whose identities emerge from the negotiation and "orchestration" of competing discourses and social structures.

Beyond MMOG, what are the multiple networks that have "educational effects" on players' identity development?

How is the mass culture associated with globalising era, consumerism and individual freedom mediate players' identity development?

What kind of cultural resources players draw on to make powerful moral judgment about appropriate selves?

How players' identities impact how they "read" and what they take away from playing?

How to establish players' critical media and digital literacy? How do they learn these? And how they impact how players "read" and what they take away from playing?

From Zawawi

2. Cosplay is one of the emerging popular culture associated with media and videogames that transcend beyond game environment into the real world. Granado Espada too is a big hit with players for its baroque period costumes. I wonder what motivate players to engage in cosplay and how immersing in this culture (whether they are participants or just observers) impact how they "read" and what they take away from playing.

From Mori

3. When popular icon in television or videogame crosses into the realm of players' everyday life (Mori used the example of Doremon who makes an appearance in textbooks and other print materials), how would players read this development?

Do they see it to mean that the television programme or videogame associated with the popular icon is accepted by society as safe and good?

How would this perception impact how they "read" and what they take away from playing?

Granado Espada is the first and so far the only MMOG recommended to be used in Singapore Schools. While it has yet to make an appearance in the curriculum hours, only find solace in after-school activities, still what does it mean to players when they can play GE in school.

Another day to go for the conference tomorrow. I hope to take away as many probing questions for my research as possible.

Memorable expeirences = Dynamic experiences of subjectivity, affect and emotion

I found out an interesting news in Gamasutra by Leigh Alexander today. He reported what Sam Gilbert from MacArthur funded GoodPlay Project said during a panel discussion at the Games for Change 2009 Conference in New York.

Interesting quotes are below:

Bad experiences in games are important, Gilbert argues, because they're essential to engendering empathy. Getting "screwed out of loot" in WoW can teach a player "what it means to be taken out of something you feel you've rightly earned," he says -- and that design principle can encourage players to better empathize with others in the real world.

"Often times, to encourage change in the way we think about ethical issues, you need to be at the brunt of some bad moral issues," he says.

When a game forces players to take actions or confront issues with which they're uncomfortable, said Gilbert, it makes them "most reflective on what it is that you're doing, why you're doing it -- and often that can lead to very positive things."

Research questions for my study also focus on memorable playing experience: What kind of game playing experiences players find memorable? Why are these experience memorable? My hypothesis is that experience that they allow players to confront their subjectivity and impact their affective domain and emotion will rank high. This is also in line with Loyer's view of how where game design ought to put focus on.

From my own experience playing Granado Espada, I can remember vividly how I was in tears when I had to leave my first faction. Then there were many occasions where I have to come to terms with my online behaviour and conduct with my belief and life principles. Experiences that make me confront my subjectivity and impact my affective domain and emotion are memorable to me. Whether these are what I take away from playing? I do not know. How can I translate how players "read" and what they take away from playing into simpler constructs that players can understand and respond at ease. : /

GE lanyard design: Magical bond and transcending game playing experience beyond fun and social enjoyment

On the left is a lanyard designed by Keo-Hime following Granado Espada theme. I thought the design was incredibly fantastic. There seems to be interest from IAH for the design. Whatever happens, I hope Keo-Hime gets her share of monetary reward for her effort.

Anyway, what interest me the most about the lanyard is what I draw from insights I gain making commentaries on an article post by Aldo Tolino in Gamasutra and a blog post by Henry Jenkins. The lanyard is an example of ludic artifact and it transcends game playing experience beyond the game environment. What is interesting about the lanyard is that while it is product of a player, but it came through from collective effort of critical friends who are fans of GE. There seems to be a kind of magical bond created from the process of making the lanyard that brings the designer and her critical friends together if not closer, and this magical bond transcends beyond this circle to include all GE players as the creator dedicates her design to all. Amazing.

I am at odds trying to reconcile how lanyard is situated in the designer's exploration of her subjectivity and experimentations with many identities while searching for meaning to her existence and her relations to the social environment around her. I can see that the process of making the lanyard afford her some degree of recognition from her circle of close GE friends and overall, the GE community. This is very empowering and she has established herself in the community (even IAH notices her now).

So her playing experience transcend what we normally associated games with- fun and social enjoyment. For her, it is bigger and one that potentially affects and mediates her future. We cannot dismiss that she also sees playing as empowering and providing opportunities to explore her potential and interest. It will be interesting if I could interview her and find out more about how she read GE and what she takes away from playing.

How teens' experimentation with identities affects how they read game?

Henry Jenkins shares an autobiography of one of his students reflecting on her journey and engagement with popular media during her teens. The post reminds me that I too did collect pictures on my bedroom wall and in my scrapbook. Those pictures are pictures of soccer teams and players. I remember those collections meant a lot to me then and I had to save before I could afford to buy soccer magazines from sundry shops where they had pull out centre piece that featured a famous players or soccer teams competing in the English Division One, equivalent to today's EPL. I drew pictures of soccer players and paste them onto the cover of my school text books. Back then, I aspired to be like them, most importantly to be like my all time favourite player, Ian Rush. While I play nowhere near Ian Rush, I remember fondly calling myself as him when I got together for a game of soccer or even when I hanged out with friends. I agree that I was experimenting with identities back then and media facilitated that.

Jenkins' post alerts me to the influence of age factor on how players "read" games. Teenage is a period of time where teens explore their subjectivity and experiment with many identities while navigating their way in searching of meaning to their existence and their relation to the social environment around them. Hence, MMOGs can be seen as laboratories to experiment with identities and how this experimentation mediates how they "read" and take away from playing MMOGs.

What do you take from watching Eugene, the Librarian?

Fancy that you'll get into the semi? I have already had standing ovation from two thousands people. I can die happy now.

-Eugene the Librarian

Amazing. One of my favourites to win this season BGT. Simon and Piers ought to be ashamed of what they did here. I guess they must have forgotten lesson from Susan Boyle's episode which Amanda called "a wake-up call".

Anyway, if you keep coming back to this video or share it with anyone, you may want to ask yourself why you keep coming back and what kind of conversation you have about the video. As Henry Jenkins puts it (when reflecting on the Susan Boyle phenomenon), the "meaning doesn't reside in the video itself -- we won't exhaust it no matter how many times we watch it. The meaning rests in the conversations that [in this case, Eugene and not Susan Boyle] enables us to have with each other."

So it follows that the meaning that colours our conversation is what we take from watching Eugene.

Players' generated narratives = players reading of games?

Last month, City of Heroes (COH) introduced an authoring tool built-into its game called Mission Architect that allows players to create their own adventures, share them with other players in the game and have them rated. I would bet that the affordances would make the game more popular and extend its longevity. Tolino wouldn't classify these players' generated adventures as ludic artifacts because they remain within the confine of the game environment. But I would say that the opportunity to share one's own narratives in the form of game play and have it rated by others would stir up a lot of interest and encourage participation.

Well, I was right theoretically but in real practice, players abuse the opportunity to create short cut to level up the characters quickly. Micheal Abbot's posting, Rouge architect describes in greater detail of these abuses. I find this quote from him explains in a nutshell players' motivation to abuse the system (bold added):

While I'm sympathetic to the devs' desire to maintain a level playing field in their MMO, gaming the system and figuring out its loopholes is a game with a certain seductiveness all its own. Players are drawn to exploits like moths to flames.

I have been thinking about narrative and what players take from playing. I have a hypothesis that what players read from playing may have nothing to do with narrative their create. In the COH episode, I would to believe that players were likely to take away lesson on ingenuity in finding loopholes and capitalizing on the weakness of game design than reading into the lesson of good triumphing over evil (or vice versa) from the adventures they created. Well, I could be wrong? Hmm...I hope my research can shed light on this.

Grievers enhancing players's game playing experience?

My experience with grievers haved never been pleasant so far.

From the five stages of grief identified by Brett Staebell: Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression and Acceptance, I can say that I am still at the Anger stage. In Granado Espada (GE) there are maps where you find a lot of grievers that I choose to stay away, but on many occasions I still find them elsewhere too. I have never viewed that grievers can enhance my playing experience as how Staebell shares in his article: A Griefer's Life for Me in The Escapist. I guess I play GE like a book, like how designer want player to play the game.

Staebell reminds of a player I have meet in GE who is well-known for grief-play. The limited time I have seen him in action, he works alone. When I bumped into him in Auch (one of the cities in GE), I decided to have a friendly chat with him. I remember him pked me once when I was afking in Deprimida Valley (my buddy who squad with me told me so). He was expecting me to abuse him but was surprised by my warmth and friendly approach. In the end, he added me to his friend list and promised not to pk me anymore. When I asked him why he chose to pk others, he replied that was how he enjoyed the game.

Again, Staebell's article reminds me what grievers take away from playing when choosing to play the game differently from what gave designers have in mind. And how grievers impact the gameplay of other players and what the latter draw from this experience.

Framework to understand players' generated content

Call it grey literature if you like. All I can say is that it has really helped me in shaping my ideas for my dissertation. I guess for my study I need both: literature review of academic endeavours and everything I can dig from the blogsphere. I learn a lot from the latter from the few weeks of commentaries I have been giving to postings and articles from members of the gaming community in cybersapce.

And again, today I find an excellent article by Aldo Tolino in Gamasutra: Beyond Play: Analyzing Player-Generated Creations. Tolino analyzes player-generated creations inspired by videogames and calls them ludic artifacts. He makes a distinction that ludic artifacts only refers to artifacts that are made available in the internet beyond the confine of the game environment. He proposes a framework or what he calls "a taxanomy of ludic artifacts" to "better understanding player-created content and the motivation for players to creatively expand on their gaming experience" and for designers to design games in a way "which encourages players to not only play the game, but to transcend the video game itself and invent their own game-based creations".

We have learnt from Klastrup that a player's “continuous presence…helps keep the fiction of the world alive”. A player's presence and gameplay not only mediates the fiction of the gameworld, but also the fictions other players create. He becomes "part of the many "texts" which enable the collective and ongoing (re)creation of the world". I wonder whether players will get hook to a game longer if he is able to create his own content. Furthermore, the practices of generating ludic artifacts also transcend game playing experience beyond the game environment. How will these practices mediate the game playing expeirence, what player read from the games and the conversation he carries within and beyond the game?

Before reading the article, my understanding of players' generated contents is too narrow. There are many practices in Granada Espada that I see now as such. Tolino explains how players' motivation to create can be understood from any of the six categories he proposes. And within each categories, the practices can be situated to represent whether they afford players denser immersion into the games (which means the practices are closely linked to the rules of playing the games) or transcend players beyond the confine of the game environment. Again, excellent piece of writing!

"Nobody cares about your stupid story"

Ken Levine's 08 GDC talk (no prize for guessing who he looks like ;D) Nobody cares about your stupid story helps explain why many players in Granado Espada (GE) knows little of the background story behind the game. Levine, who is also fond to be known as one who not design games but design experience of play, say that storytellers have to keep in mind three kinds of gamers, and to strike a balance in providing details of their narratives and in ensuring no disruption to the enjoyment of play of all different kinds of gamers. According to him, there are casual gamers who have no interest in the narrative found in games. Then, there are also those who additional details of the narrative are necessary as part their enjoyment of play, and finally the hardcore who just adore everything about the game title and make it their habit to know more about it beyond game play. While technology advances afford complex and sophisticated narrative to be implemented in games, Levine advises to keep the narrative simple.

So far from my readings of blog posts related to game design, I conclude that behind every games you will find a storyteller spinning his story. While some storytellers may be Hollywood scriptwriters, it seems storytellers who themselves are avid gamers and are conversant with gamers' taste can cook up an interesting story and are flexible enough to accept changes to their story in allowing the need for interactivity. In 10 Game Design Process Pitfalls, Ian Fisch includes allowing the story to control game design as one of the 10 pitfall in game design process. I also sense that maintaining what Csíkszentmihályi calls flow in game play is important in keeping players, who are interested in the story behind game, hook onto the narrative. Adam Saltsman shares four Dynamic Difficulty Adjustment (DDA) systems he found in games that help keep players' frustration below affective filter (Gee, 2008).

Back to GE The background story behind GE (click here to hear the narrative in GE trailer) is set in a mysterious and dangerous continent, and is inspired by Europe’s exploration and conquest of America. I am sure there are the three kinds of gamers in GE, and many players I have chatted with have the least idea of what the background story in GE, except for one hardcore gamer I have met. He seems to be online all the time, has so many alts and does a lot of fanart of the game. His version why so many martial characters (and I feel the same can be said of other collectible characters too) require mystery powders (MPs) because they are all substance abusers. He likens MPs as drug and these characters fight better if the get enough of MPs to get high. :D

Then, there is my son too. Yesterday I asked him why he was not playing GE anymore, and he told me that most of his factions mates are too busy to squad up with him. He hates playing alone. It has happened to me before. There was a time I feel so pointless playing when you are playing alone. No fun. The again, my son is not a vet yet and I guess this could be why his faction mates refuse to squad up with him (assuming that they have high level characters). I guess when talking about players' state of flow, designers have to look beyond DDA systems and design games that requires a fair bit of collaboration, even between noobs and imba. Else, many players may retire early and not play long enough to reach the end of the game narrative.

Can players be duped or not?

James Gee dedicated the last chapter of his book What video games have to teach us about learning and literacy, to discuss whether players can be duped by videogames. He concluded that just as learners may not necessarily take the view propounded by authors when reading their books, and in some instances may take a totally opposite and unexpected view, in MMOG too there is likelihood that players may not necessarily “read” MMOG as game designers and developers would want them to. But this did not stop protesters, marching and chanting out “War is not a Game”, calling for the closure of the "Army Experience Center" in the Franklin Mills Mall. The centre, while meant to increase recruits into the army, allows kids to run an iteration of America’s Army from playing videogames,and it is fear that it is likely to promote violence among teens and “create a generation that is wired to kill and think that killing is something that is easy”. I was quick to brush this off as another paranoia until I found this post below in GamePolitics.com.

I won’t risk having my kids play RapeLay even if all the James Gees of the world were to unite and assure me that my kids are above the negative influences of this game. Game like RapeLay is rich with experiences that will allow in Loyers's word, "dynamic experiences of subjectivity, affect, and emotion". I wonder to what extent can players' discerning ability of what is right and wrong influences how they respond to such experiences. While it is natural to expect discerning ability to be positively related to age, but is this true for every players? Perhaps the protesters against the "Army Experience Center" is concerned about teens not being able to be discerning on what can be taken into the real world from playing and what should be kept purely within the confine of the gaming environment. I wonder what the field of psychology has to offer to enlighten us on these issues.

MMOG pervasiveness and reading of games

There is a post in tiltfactor that provides a review of a book On Deep History and the Brain written by Daniel Lord Smail (New York Times review of the book is here) from the perspective of videogames and human paranoia. Excerpt from the post:

" Last month’s Harvard Alumni Magazine explains:
“In eighteenth-century Europe, Smail points out, the list of addictive substances to be used with caution included books. With the rise of the novel and the spread of literacy, a new fear of ‘Reading mania’ gripped the populace. He quotes one scholar’s account that young women were seen as particularly vulnerable, because they might ‘grow addicted to the pleasures induced by novels…have their passions awakened, and form false expectations about life.”

If similar sexist fears persisted today, we might expect girls to be the leading consumers of games… and they aren’t. The numbers are about even actually. Seems we’ve been wrong about these things before, so what do you think? Are games psychotropic? Should we care? I think they are, but I’m not sure I can tell anyone what to do about it.

It would seem that humans (male and female alike) have learned how to cope with the addictive qualities of the novel. Perhaps fears of addiction are misplaced when applied to all media. Or, maybe our biological “passions” are more intensely evoked by digital media. Are video games drawing more vulnerable consumers into escapism while the novel is left in more steady hands? ”

Inventions that revolutionize how people communicate, socialize, work and play bring about changes to the brain structures and afford people the ability to do things in ways previous generation find too much cognitive load. These affordances lead to different ways of being in this world, and previous generation frowned in dismay and concern of these developments because the new practices not only look different and did not conform to the usual norms, they challenged old ways of being into extinction. So in this light, the paranoia is understandable.

Print (paper) media generation have brain structures different from generations where mass media are predominantly radio and television. And now where digital media technology has become the natural landscape for us, we find ourselves a generation that is totally different, not only in our brain structures but our very ways of being is this world are unique to us. How we work, play and enjoy our leisure are poles apart to how generations before us carry on with their lives.

Silverstone (1999) in his book Why We Study Media argues that MMOG is mass media and he points to the convergence of play and media when he says, “play is the core activity of everyday life […] we can see media as being sites for play, both in their text, and in the responses those texts engender […] We play on the net, downloading games, role-taking, role-making with other players, players not known to us, except through the characteristics they take, as allies and opponents in electronic space. Play masters and mistresses in virtual dungeons” (p. 60). Silverstone’s argument underscores the fact that play in MMOG is an integral part of our daily life and can be both playful and productive.

How is reading a book or watching a movie or television series for past generations different to play MMOG for us today? How integral is reading a book or watching a movie to daily life for past generations? I am sure technology was not so developed then to allow these leisure activities to become so pervasive in daily life. Such activities would have definitely their own, in Huizinga’s words, magic circle i.e. their separate sphere and time that are distinct from daily routines. Technology affords MMOGs to be so pervasive and form an integral part of our life. How would this make our reading of MMOG be different to how people read book or movies in the past? Would pervasiveness and being integral to our life impact our reading of MMOG and what meaning take from it? If true, I wonder how is this so?

What conversations game playing experience affords?

Henry Jenkins wrote a nice piece of reflection on the phenomenon of Susan Boyle from the perspectives how technology contributes to her instant global popularity and the motivations that drive viewers to pass her clip around. I find myself reflecting why I keep on coming back again and again to video clips of Britain's Got Talent (BGT) performances. Though I hardly talk to anyone about the performances, for me those unlikely stars, like Susan Boyle and Jamie Pugh, or those in Amanda's words "lump of coal to be turned into a diamond", like Julian Smith and Sue Son, have a story of their own that invokes strong emotions in me every time I watch them. Incredible. Jenkins explains it best why their performances have potential to invoke conversations we have with others (I guess for me, conversation with myself) when he says (bold part of citation):

" Does the wide-spread circulation of reality television suggest the triviality of what constitutes public interests? I don't think we can answer that question without knowing what we are using Susan Boyle to talk about. Her meaning doesn't reside in the video itself -- we won't exhaust it no matter how many times we watch it. The meaning rests in the conversations that Susan Boyle enables us to have with each other. As it starts to circulate, the Susan Boyle video gets inserted into all kinds of ongoing conversations across a range of different communities, so that I've stumbled into prayer circles for Susan Boyle; I've found scientists talking about how someone with that body could produce such a sound; I've seen discussions amongst Karaoke singers about her techniques, and I've seen reality television fans trying to explain why her success would never be possible given the rules of American Idol which exclude someone her age from competing in the first place. Susan Boyle circulates because she's meaningful on many different levels and after a while, all of this has started to go meta so that we are spreading Susan's videos to talk about how fast they are being spread. "

From my research perspective how players read games, I am wondering whether game playing experience does have such impact. Does meaning in game playing reside beyond the game and in the conversations players have with others? If it does, what kind of conversations do players have about their playing experience? What about game playing that spark certain kind of conversations? Who do players engage in conversations with? What they draw from such conversations and how it impact them and the things they do in game? At this stage of my study and my literature review, I am collecting as many questions as possible to give me a good sense where should I take my research forward.

Reflecting back on my own playing experience, I remember having a lot of conversations with myself about one aspect of game playing that is most prominent when I first play MMOG. It is about conflict I have with my online conduct and personal belief. There a numerous examples but I share just this one. It may sound trivial to others but is resonated deep into my belief of what is right and wrong.

Granado Espada allows players to put their playing characters on auto mode where characters continue to fight mobs while players are afk. Very often I squad up with friends in maps where it is difficult to survive alone because of high spawn rate or when there are high level mobs. While my friends were afk, their characters would get very good drops but they were not there to collect them. When this happened, the items would remain there for a few seconds before dissapearing. I always end up struggling with my own conscious whether to take them or just to ignore them. It also happened with very good drops belonging to other players not in my squad but they happened to be nearby and afk. Should I take or should I not? Does taking and not informing the owner consider stealing? But when does ownership starts? Does it begin only when you choose to take them? But does this rule apply when they are afk? Is there an unwritten rule where players do come to a consensus about this even though they do not talk about this at all? Or does stealing in virtual world have to be looked differently from stealing in real world. So many questions and what a dilemma.

I guess, game playing has potential to invoke strong emotion when players is confronted with a dilemma in decision making, and this in turn may encourages a lot of self-reflection and conversations with others. I think "emotion" and "dilemma" are keywords I should include in my literature review search as well.

Stories as instruments

In my literature review search on the keyword "fiction", I get an immediate sense that "game design" is another keyword I need to include. There seems to be transactive processes whereby neither gamers nor designers have full agency over the game experience, and I believe that much of what players draw from playing also have their roots in how the game is designed. And hence you cannot disregard game designers and developers' role here.

There is a lot of interest in experimenting with different approaches in integrating narrative with game design. I came across an interesting post in Gameology that touch on Erik Loyer's talk entitled Stories as Instruments. The post brings to light how Loyer views game design when it mentions (bold added):

" Loyer explained his design philosophy that games should break free of the restrictions of plot-centric progression and character focused instrumentality (his recent innovative iPhone game Ruben and Lullaby is a particularly illustrative example of this trajectory). Loyer points to the genre of the musical as an important influence and model for new forms of storytelling in games. Musical arias feature characters that step just outside the world in moments of intense expression. Loyer analogized this as a blend of first and third person perspective. The singing character in the musical is locked into the narrative space contextually yet elaborating that context. The best games, according to Loyer, allow the player to assume this role: doing things as they should be done logically in the world but also knowing what one is doing.

In this way, the best moments in games happen when a player does what the developer wants them to do, without explicit narrative prompting, and does it in a way that fits within the context and expressive aims of the game. He cited an example of his own experience with the N64 classic Goldeneye where, after having just learned to use the sniper rifle, he was presented with a situation where he got to surreptitiously eliminate a few targets from afar in a building. The revelation was that he had done exactly what James Bond would have done and that’s what made it so exhilarating. He was simultaneously doing something and knowing what he was doing. He was character, fan, and player all in one.

Loyer’s central critique is of the obsessive push in game design toward large branching plot-driven stories centered on the freedom and autonomy of a character (think: Mass Effect) which often denigrate the Goldeneye experience. He argues that the focus should be on the potential for dynamic experiences of subjectivity, affect, and emotion rather than thousands of potential choices. Characters and stories should be considered the facilitators of these experiences not the ultimate focus or endgame as in plot-centric design. "

A demo of Loyer's iPhone game is below and its review is here.

When decisions in games get intertwine with real life agenda...

I was alerted to this news report from a post in joystick101. The MMOG is maple story. How wrong I am to think that maple story is only played by tweens. It is great to see countries acknowledging that virtual worlds is fast becoming very much part of our life and are including in their legislation, laws that look into crimes related to virtual worlds.

Players play out their own stories when they play games and that is how it has always been with all things we do. Narrative is in our nature and it is how we remember, reflect and relate our experiences to others. MMOG is another window for us to experience existence. So it follows that game play in MMOG be viewed in and around MMOG within cyberspace but also beyond it, into the realm of real life.

MMOG is situated in the sociocultural domain of our real life and such it is only natural to find decisions made in games are intertwined with real life agendas like the news headings here. All these news have unfolded nicely for me a theoretical concern that I need to think about when I draw my theoretical sampling. I have met players who themselves are leaders in their workplace (real life) and they create their own factions to test and enhance their leadership abilities. While decision like this is likely to have taken place very early when they stared playing games, I wonder what would spark other decisions in games that are likely to have links with real life. When are such decisions likely to happen? What conditions in game and in real life that may motivate these decisions?

I think my research has potential to reveal something very interesting. Said that, it could also be too colossal and beyond my means to do it. If that is the case, I have to draw perimeter and declare early what I will do and what I won't do. Anyway, I end my post with a video of a news report Hell hath no furry like a "Second Life" scorned: Women accused of real-life kidnap plot after online relationship end. Very interesting. Worth your time to check it out.

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