Recently in Video Games Category

MMORPGs have countless aspects worth studying. I could probably devote my entire life to learning about the socio-technical issues floating around this fairly recent gaming phenomenon. Unfortunately, I have not the time nor motivation to do so. Instead, I've taken a few topics and provided some quick overviews. For all of the blurbs, I've chosen to focus on World of Warcraft (WoW), as it is the most popular of the MMORPGs and the only one I have personal experience with.

Objectives of Gameplay
Before getting into some of the more in-depth topics, I thought it might be appropriate to explain how these kind of games work, for anyone who might not be familiar. Here's an excerpt from Wikipedia's entry for World of Warcraft:

As with other MMORPGs, people control a character avatar within a persistent game world, exploring the landscape, fighting monsters, performing quests, building skills, and interacting with NPCs, as well as other players. The game rewards success with money, items, experience and reputation, all of which in turn allow players to improve their skill and power. Players can level up their characters from level one to level 60, level 70 if they have The Burning Crusade expansion.

And below are some clips taken from YouTube that might help you visualize the process. The first is an official trailer from Blizzard. For the rest, I intentionally avoided videos with music, cinema scenes and fast camera cuts. This is what the game is. This is what people do, for hours upon hours upon hours, leveling up for new weapons, abilities, and places to explore. Once you get to the higher levels, you can slay other players as well, but it doesn't look much more exciting than other kinds of gameplay.

Motivations for Playing
Recently, Nick Yee, administrator of the Daedalus Project,set out to find the answer to the question, "What exactly drives people to play these games?". He asked players to "read through a set of motivations [generated from earlier findings] and pick the one that was most important to them". I'm not sure if the survey was open to unique responses, but the list seemed to be pretty comprehensive, and I don't think this would be cause for any significant inaccuracies. Below is a chart of the findings.

As you can see in the chart above, progress appears to be the most motivating aspect of play. Based on my experience, I couldn't agree more. The reward system is ingenious. At any given point, there is always a desirable skill or weapon that's only 2-5 levels away. It seems so close, and it makes playing an extra five hours (on top of the eight you've already played that weekend) completely feasible. And, guess what? As soon as you obtain your goal, there's another equally appealing treat dangling in front of your face and it's just as close. Progress is, by far, the most addictive aspect of WoW in my mind, and I believe that was the intention when the game was designed.

At first, I was a little surprised to see how highly socialization scored. But after realizing that it was only applicable for females and seeing some other research online, it made a little more sense. See the "Playing with Romantic Partners and Family Members" section.

Gender Composition
According to the Daedalus Project, the real-life gender distribution of WoW is 84% male v. 16% female. I didn't find the numbers particularly surprising, as I probably would have estimated an 85:15 or 80:20 ratio myself. I assume that the figures were calculated either from account holders' subscription information (which, not seeing any obvious incentive to lie, I think would be very accurate) or from surveying a large sample of players. In either case, I originally believed the statistics wholeheartedly. Then, I came across this article, claiming that Blizzard representatives assert that only 5% of the WoW population is female. These folks, more than anyone else, should know the ratio, but I (along with the author of the blog post) am a little skeptical. Considering the undisputed rise in female gamers, described in this NBC write-up, and my own beliefs coming into this assignment, I think 5% is too low. Maybe the blog post is inaccurate. Maybe the Blizzard representative didn't know his facts. Maybe the definitions of what constitutes a gamer were inconsistent. In any case, I'm leaning toward the Daedalus Project's work. I found quite a few YouTube videos, some being part of a series, proclaiming the presence of females in MMORPGs. At this point, I believe the stereotype that video games are solely for males is fading. Males still make up the majority, of course, but it's understood that the number of female players are increasing significantly and may someday even out the ratio.

 

Playing with Romantic Partners and Family Members
The Daedalus Project estimates that about 60% of female players and 16% of male players play the game with real-life romantic partners. The study also asserts that 40% of female players and 35% of male players play with family members.

I think the appeal of playing with those who share a real-life relationship is fairly obvious. Rather than being limited to interaction with people who, in most cases, the player will only communicate to through a digital medium, players can enhance existing relationships (romantic or family-based) they have with people they can interact with directly. While this post argues that, in some ways, meeting people through MMORPGs is more efficient and successful than in real-world situations, I believe that even the most hardcore of gamers would prefer real-life, face-to-face, human interaction over something mediated by a digital world. Also, playing with real-life peers, partners and family-members is more socially acceptable, because there is some form of human interaction that exists, so I believe this also makes players more likely to engage in the game with these people.

I also found it interesting that in both situations (romantic and family-based), females were more inclined to participate with other players they know in real-life. After thinking it through, it didn't take long to see why these statistics make sense. While the population of females in the gaming world is rapidly growing, the old gender roles are still prominent in society. It isn't as common for girls to start playing video games at an early age as it is for boys. Whether the reason for this is biological or dependent on the upbringing of the children (I'm guessing a combination of both), young females just aren't as inclined to be playing video games. I think that if they aren't introduced to video games early in life, they are less likely to play them later on for the same familiar reasons that most gamers play (progress, immersion, exploration, etc.). They need something else to spark their interest. As mentioned in the "Motivations for Playing" section, this is socialization. I think many females are introduced to gaming by males in their lives, whether boyfriends, husbands, brothers, fathers, or sons. Several may develop deeper interests in the games after they start playing, but the reason many start is, I believe, a social one.

Memorable Gameplay
According to the Daedalus Project, the most memorable experiences players retained fell into the following categories:

Achievements
----Team
----PvP
----Solitary

The Trek

Relationships
----Random Acts of Kindness
----Romantic Relationships
----Friendships

Death
----The Memorable Wipe
----Guild Death
----Role-Played Funeral
----RL Death of Player

Misc.
----Role-Playing
----Meeting Guild IRL
----The Initial Euphoria

There are plenty of things to expound upon here, but of all the memorable experiences, I found the most interesting to be online funerals, specifically honoring those who have died in real-life...

My reaction to this video was confusing. On one hand, I thought it was ridiculous and cheesy, but on the other, it was possibly more moving than any real-life funeral I've ever attended (not that that's a high number). After experiencing this "funeral", I think I give more credit to those claiming that online communities can decently substitute, in some forms, actual human interaction. Although the circumstances under which their relationships developed are rather inhuman, it seems that there are genuine emotions connecting the individuals. But, with the good, apparently so come the bad. I also found this clip of a guild holding another funeral honoring a real-life death, then the ambush that followed.

Worth Studying?
I think we're getting to the point where it's almost necessary to study MMORPGs. These games are hugely popular in today's culture, and I have a feeling that they won't be going away any time in the near future. Not being an advocate of a society where individuals devote more time to online communities than they do to the physical ones around them, I can't say that I see a lot of good coming from this research, though. Learning what kind of games are most addictive so companies like Blizzard can make more profit isn't something I find to be particularly beneficial to society. Even with studies like comparing the relationship of age and status in digital v. physical environments, there is surely interesting and beneficial information to be extracted, but I feel that it will mostly help us move toward more submersion into digital environments. And yes, there's something good to be said for this (distance learning, perhaps?), but I don't know how much.

Stereotypes v. Research
I think that most stereotypes are derived from some form of the truth. Stereotype: Girls don't play video games. Yes, female players are on the rise, and they may be in equal numbers with males before too long. However, because this stereotype was, at one point in time, completely true, the change is a process, and we're not there yet. There's still some truth to it. Stereotype: Gamers are asocial geeks that stay cloistered up in their basements all day, never interacting with humans. When single-player console games were the only thing available, yes, this was the case. I don't think there were Super Mario Bros. 2 parties happening everywhere in the late 80's, and hardcore gamers probably were social outcasts. Now, however, gaming is becoming a more social activity. As mentioned earlier in the post, many players are interacting with people they know physically and many start relationships (friendly and romantic) over the internet that, in several ways, resemble traditional relationships. Still, they are typically alone in the physical sense. So, once again, I think the stereotype is fading, but still has roots in truth. I think, for the most part, this is a reoccurring trend (partially true stereotypes) but there are some cases that are absolutely factual - children who play video games are overweight.

So, I've discussed MMORPGs quite a bit. How do I feel about them personally? Well, I've seen them from both third and first-person perspectives. For about two months, I was mildly hooked on WoW before finally cutting it off cold-turkey. I've experienced the appeal, the addictive nature, and the enlightenment giving it up, and I don't plan to play any MMORPGs anytime in the near future. I think this article sums up my thoughts pretty well. The games require huge investments of time and offer nothing in return. They are evil.

Over the course of our lives, most of us have witnessed the evolution of video game controllers - starting with the "anything goes" era of the Atari joystick and an assortment of very alien-looking controller designs, then several years of developers building on the revolutionary NES template, and now into the next generation, brought about by the Wii Remote. I consider the progress up until this point to be, for the most part, progressive, however I think we may soon bump our heads on the ceiling (at least until we have a few significant technological advances).

Excluding the Wii, I feel that most recent systems (XBox 360, PS3, GameCube) have mastered the ergonomics of traditional controller design. Sure, there are complaints, but they're mostly issues of preference rather than better design. The NES-derived controllers are about as good as they can get, which makes Nintendo's attempt to break the mold a logical and almost predictable business decision. The company was falling behind in the gaming world and needed something revolutionary to bring them back into the game. Traditional controller design couldn't go much further, so they changed the rules.

I don't dispute the fact that Nintendo's latest release has been beneficial and innovative, but because the success of the Wii and its games has so much riding on the controller design and style of gameplay, I feel that developers are making a lot of poor decisions. Sure, bowling, golfing, performing surgery on convulsing rabbits, and, in some cases, first-person shooters are really appropriate for the WiiMote, and having this new technology enhances gameplay. But the applications are limited, and mini-games can only go so far. Once the novelty wears off, those that don't already will start to miss the old-fashioned controllers. The WiiMote is more of an extension than a substitute, and as a long-term solution, it just isn't going to cut it. It's not that the WiiMote is poorly designed, it's just that its predecessors are just too efficient in most situations. So, I guess what I'm saying is that until we have a big breakthrough (like being able to control characters with our minds), there probably aren't going to be any controller innovations that will completely replace our current standard. The NES template is here to stay for a while.