Engagement in independent video games through narrative and character development

Independent videogames (also known as “indie games”) have experienced an increasingly prominent role in the videogame industry. In the last decade, this particular genre has seen an exponential growth, filling its own niche in the market. Furthermore, the low level of investment required by this genre (both in terms of economical and human resources) makes it a favoured path for small companies to start producing videogames. This paradigm of low resources, allied with the technological limitations of mobile devices (this genre's most common platform) defines the “indie game's” playability and visual/narrative aesthetics; the result being a peculiar creative simplicity. We believe this simplicity to be the source of the independent videogames' appeal to the general playerbase. In other words, these videogames engage the player by presenting him/her with a simple yet rich storytelling experience, where complex elements such as long cinematics are eschewed in favor of a more primal and direct experience. Simply put, by investing on a solid narrative and fleshing out interesting, relatable characters, an independent videogame manages to achieve the engagement potential of its commercial counterparts, while doing so with a fraction of the cost. In this dissertation we aim to understand exactly how independent videogames achieve this phenomenon of player engagement through their narrative and characters. We will do so by allying theoretical research on these two creative resources with a the practical exercise of developing our own videogame concept (as a part of our Master's Degree project). Strictly speaking, we will study tools and techniques relating to achieving engagement through narrative and character development, subsequently testing them out in our own project and drawing conclusions on their effectiveness in the process

Game Fiction

“Game Fiction” provides a framework for understanding the relationship between narrative and computer games and is defined as a genre of game that draws upon and uses narrative strategies to create, maintain, and lead a user through a fictional environment. Competitive, ergodic, progressive (and often episodic), game fictions’ primary goal must include the actualization of predetermined events. Building on existing game and new media scholarship and drawing from theories of narrative, cinema, and literature, my project details the formal materiality that undergirds game fiction and shapes its themes. In doing so, I challenge the critiques of narrativism levied at those scholars who see a relationship between computer games and narrative forms, while also detailing the ways that computational media alter and reform narratological preconceptions. My study proposes a methodology for discussing game fiction through a series of ‘close playings,’ and while not intended to be chronological or comprehensive, provides a model for understanding narrative and genre in this growing field

Games and Time

Video games are a medium uniquely immersed in time. While the topic of time and games has been broached by many in the field of game studies, its centrality to both how games function and the experience of playing games remains underexamined. Reading games as literary texts, this holistic study uses queer and social theories to survey the myriad of ways games play with time. I argue games are time machines, each idiosyncratically allows players to experience time differently from traditional linear time. Beyond games with literal time machines, this dissertation examines games which structure themselves around labyrinthine and existential loops. It also considers real-time, or games competitively organized around time and those which change over time, in a sense, aging. Regardless of the subject, this dissertation seeks to illuminate the complexities of games and time, and argues that, despite their many conflicting messages about the topic, they all have something meaningful to say about the human experience of time

Serious Games: Video Game Design Techniques for Academic and Commercial Communication

Serious Games: Video game design techniques for academic and commercial communication, by Christian Bull-Hansen, Department of Informatics, University of Oslo, Norway. Traditional academic and commercial communication sources, like schools and television, are losing ground to video games. People of all ages spend increasingly more time engaged in virtual worlds and on the Internet, and are becoming used to actively pursuing the information they want to know more about, while rejecting the old passive communication channels where information is presented, but not requested. The result is a generation in need of new ways of informing. This thesis aims to provide ways for academic and commercial communication to exist in commercially popular video games while retaining the entertainment value of the games. Thus making students learn while gaming, as well as provide means for commercial interests to reach the gamer audience. The thesis provides information and analysis of game culture, player-types, social structures, game design techniques, and how knowledge of this information can be used to create and improve academic and commercial communication in video games. The thesis utilizes a custom made prototype, “The Renaissance Prototype”, designed for the purpose of researching and test the theories presented in this thesis

From Production to Education: An Analysis of Pipeline Requirements and Practices

Animation, visual effects, and video game studios have to manage complex and highly iterative productions. The processes, tools, and data flow that carry a production from initial idea to finished state is called a ’pipeline.’ Students in academic programs, even ones focused on educating for digital production, often do not have a well- defined pipeline and spend unnecessary time on technical details rather than creative work. Through interviews with industry professionals, analysis of published works on pipeline and digital production, and study of current academic pipelines, this thesis presents general principles for pipelines as well as suggestions for applying these principles in academic environments. Implementing these suggestions could provide a foundation for a robust academic pipeline that lets students spend more time creating and collaborating and prepares them for employment in the digital production industry

Spanish American, 02-13-1915

https://digitalrepository.unm.edu/sp_am_roy_news/1188/thumbnail.jp

Multimodalidade e traduções funcionais para investigar a aquisição de segunda língua em gamers

Tese (doutorado) - Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina, Centro de Comunicação e Expressão. Programa de Pós-Graduação em Estudos da TraduçãoPesquisas diversas sobre games comerciais têm pululado no decorrer das últimas décadas e coberto uma miríade de tópicos - entre eles, os letramentos através de games (BUCKINGHAM & BURN, 2007; SQUIRE, 2008; SALEN, 2007) e os princípios de aprendizagem embutidos em bons games (GEE, 2003). No entanto, há uma escassez de trabalhos relacionando games e a aquisição de segunda língua (DEHAAN, 2005, 2008). A presente tese investiga a aquisição de elementos linguísticos de segunda língua no domínio semiótico de games comerciais. Dois estudos exploratórios foram projetados: o estudo 1 com dois games série Need for Speed: Underground e o estudo 2 com o game The Sims. A sinergia visualverbal (KRESS, 2000) foi explorada nos testes de tradução com e sem screenshots dos games Need for Speed: Underground e nas paráfrases do game The Sims. A análise dos dados se apoderou de alguns conceitos teóricos do modelo funcionalista de tradução de Christiane Nord (1997). Os resultados de ambos os estudos exploratórios confirmam a aquisição de alguns elementos linguísticos essenciais para a progressão nos games investigadosMany academic works on commercial off-the-shelf computer games have appeared over the last decades investigating a myriad of topics such as game literacy (BUCKINGHAM & BURN, 2007; SQUIRE, 2008; SALEN, 2007) and the learning principles that good games incorporate (GEE, 2003). However there is a lack of academic works on computer games and second language acquisition (DEHAAN, 2005, 2008). The present thesis examines the acquisition of linguistic elements of a second language in the semiotic comain of commercial games. To this end, two exploratory studies were designed: the first with the two games of the series Need for Speed: Underground and the second with the game The Sims. The visual-verbal synergy (KRESS, 2000) was explored in two translation tests: with and without screenshots of the game series Need for Speed: Underground and in the paraphrases of the game The Sims. The data analysis made use of some of the theoretical concepts from Christiane Nord#s functionalist model (1997). The results of both studies confirm the acquisition of some linguistic elements that are pivotal for progressing within the games investigate

Ludic Dysnarrativa : How Can Fictional Inconsistency in Games be Reduced?

The experience of fictional inconsistencies in games is surprisingly common. The goal was to determine if solutions exist for this problem and if there are inherent limitations to games as a medium that make storytelling uncommonly difficult. Termed ‘ludic dysnarrativa’, this phenomenon can cause a loss of immersion in the fictional world of a game and lead to greater difficulty in intuitively understanding a game’s rules. Through close textual analysis of The Stanley Parableand and other games, common trends are identified that lead a player to experience dysnarrativa. Contemporary cognitive theory is examined alongside how other media deal with fictional inconsistency to develop a model of how information (fictional and otherwise) is structured in media generally. After determining that gaps in information are largely the cause of a player feeling dysnarrativa, it is proposed that a game must encourage imaginative acts from the player to prevent these gaps being perceived. Thus a property of games, termed ‘imaginability’, was determined desirable for fictionally consistent game worlds. Many specific case studies are cited to refine a list of principles that serve as guidelines for achieving imaginability. To further refine these models and principles, multiplayer games such as Dungeons and Dragons were analysed specifically for how multiple players navigate fictional inconsistencies within them. While they operate very differently to most single-player games in terms of their fiction, multiplayer games still provide useful clarifications and principles for reducing fictional inconsistencies in all games. Negotiation between agents (designers, players, game rules) in a game is of huge value to maintaining coherent fictional worlds and social information in some multiplayer games takes on a role close to that of fictional information in single player games. Dysnarrativa can also be used to positive effect in certain cases such as comedy games, horror games or for satirical purposes