Regional game studies

In the last few years there has been an increase in game scholarship conducted in and focussed on areas outside of Western Europe and North America. This scholarship has been recognized and supported by the establishment of regional research networks and regular regional conferences, and has been collected in edited books and journal special issues. Drawing on Edward Casey’s philosophical history of space and place we label this trend “regional game studies” and identify in it a number of general characteristics: regional game studies investigates games and gaming cultures at a range of scales and identifies connections across and between these scales; it highlights and addresses unequal global relations within gaming culture and within the academic study of games; and it enriches the field with new perspectives drawn from regional cultural contexts. The article provides a number of examples of regional game scholarship that demonstrate these characteristics and illustrate the potential of regional game studies to influence game scholarship and shape game studies as a field

Price decisions, values, and cost management: : A pragmatic constructivist approach

This paper suggests the paradigm of pragmatic constructivism as a novel and fruitful way for researchers to explore pricing approaches in practice. To do so, the paper leverages pragmatic constructivism’s concept of reality integration to discuss four classical pricing approaches. These approaches are: i) the economist approach; ii) the cost-plus pricing approach; iii) the competition-based pricing approach; and iv) the customer-based pricing approach. Our findings suggest that pricing literature within the fields of economics, marketing and strategy often is not able to to sufficiently take the complex reality of practice into account. Specifically, we argue that the literature takes too reductionistic approaches to the pricing phenomenon. This paper agrees with the marketing- and strategy-based pricing literature’s critique of the assumptions of the neoclassical theory of the firm. However, in contrast to this literature, we argue that the cost-plus and competition-based pricing approaches are still highly relevant. Based on our findings, we suggest that the practice-paradigm of pragmatic constructivism may be a fruitful departure point for future research to develop a richer and broader understanding of pricing in practice that potentially could lead to more advanced pricing conceptualisations.    &nbsp

The ban on gaming consoles in China: protecting national culture, morals, and industry within an international regulatory framework

From its ‘opening up’ policy in 19781 to the present day, China’s rapid economic growth has not only lifted hundreds of millions of its citizens out of poverty and made many extremely rich, but it has also been the catalyst for immense social transformation. In this chapter, we explore the tension between 1) Chinese policymakers’ desire for the wealth that access to global markets gives its citizens; and 2) the challenges to Chinese cultural and traditional ideas about morality that this social transformation brings in its wake. Our investigation focuses primarily on one particular case that exemplifes this tension: the Chinese government’s 2000 to 2014 ban on the importation of foreign-made video game consoles. We frst situate the ban within the context of China’s international commitments to ‘free trade’ and then consider the arguments made for exempting media content from such commitments. Here, the Chinese leadership’s ambiguous stance toward Western infuence is an important policy-shaping factor. For the second half, we zoom in on the policy document installing the de facto ban on consoles. Here policymakers frame the ban as a way of curbing the negative infuence of wangbas—Internet cafes—on China’s youth. We discuss whether such a move actually resonated with the public and to what extent public concerns were constructed rather than refected by the media. Although a critical approach to video game policy should remain skeptical of the motivations underlying policy, it also needs to acknowledge the possibility that policy responds to actual public concerns, even in a one-party state

(Digital) tools as professional and generational identity badges in the Chinese creative industries

Animators, architects, designers, and others active in the Chinese creative industries are expert users of tools, both analog and digital. Performances of expert tool use (the wearing of professional identity badges) are strategic ways of signaling creativity understood as sets of skills and character traits essential for attracting work projects but also for professional identity formation. Analogue tools are generally associated with creative openness and fluidity whereas digital tools are discursively constructed as a technological other to the analogue. ‘Older’ creatives (born before 1980) tend to apply some of the media-inflected discourse around the balinghou generation (born 1980–1989) to their younger competitors, including an assumed affinity with digital media and technologies (the pinning on of a generational identity badge). Such generational assumptions can have the effect of reinforcing project hierarchies and denying expert users of digital tools their claims to creativity

GENETIC PARAMETERS FOR DAILY GAIN, MUSCLE AREA AND FAT THICKNESS IN SHEEP

Uzgojni programi za pasmine mesnih ovaca u Danskoj od 1979. godine uključuju centralno testiranje proizvodnosti mladih ovnova. Godine 1995. izmijenjen je postupak izračunavanja pokazatelja testa performance od postupka koji se temeljio na unaprijed ispravljeni fenotipskim izrazima, na primjenu procjene BLUP-a na modelu životinje. Svrha ove analize bila je procijeniti odgovarajuće genetske parametre (heritabilnost i genetske korelacije). Direktna selekcija za svaku osobinu posebno bit će vrlo djelotvoma u mijenjanju genetske razine, odnosne osobine. Usporedne reakcije u drugim osobinama bit će vrlo malene. Da bi se postigla veća sposobnost rasta, povećana mišićavost i manja debljina, selekciju ovnova testiranih na proizvodne osobine valja temeljiti na indeksu selekciju, što uključuje dnevni prirast, povšinu MLD i debljinu masti.The purpose of this analysis was to estimate appropriate genetic parameters (heritabilities and genetic correlations). The edited data set included complete test results from 1534 animals which had been performance tested from 1983 to 1994. The relationship matrix also included 3053 ancestores without records. The animals belonged to six different breeds (Texel, Oxforddown, Leicester, Shropshire, Marsh and Dorset). Direct selection for each trait individually will be highly effective in altering the genetic level for that particular trait. Correlated responses in the other traits will be very small. In order to obtain higher growth capacity, increased muscularity and reduced fatness, selection of performance tested rams should be based on a selection index, which includes the performance for Daily gain, LD-area and Fat thickness

On the Origin Myths of Creativity, with Special Attention to the Use of Digital Tools in Architectural Work

Creativity is currently undergoing significant changes both in terms of actual practices (creative work) and conceptually. As for practice, this article is empirically grounded in interviews with architects who integrate virtual worlds in their work. It is argued that studies of “creative technologies” will benefit from focusing on specific, professional domains. As for conceptualisa- tion, reflections on creativity often intertwine with reflections on humanity and technology. In philosophers Henri Bergson and Hannah Arendt, the article finds a conceptual framework for making explicit the notions of creativity, or “origin myths of creativity”, underlying some contem- porary creativity literature

PBL Student Projects and Sustainable Development Goals: A Case Study

Working with the Sustainable Development Goals can be a highly motivating factor in Problem Based Learning, especially if the solutions produced can be used afterwards and have an actual impact on people and communities. This paper describes how three engineering students from Aalborg University, Denmark, collaborated with the South African Organisation Green Shoots on bringing IT-supported Math education out to some of the most disadvantaged learners from townships and rural areas of the Western Cape. The project provided the Danish students with a unique learning experience and have a lasting impact on the communities involved. While the content of the project focused on bringing IT-supported Math education to learners in previously disadvantaged areas around the Western Cape, the project also provided valuable insight into how such students’ projects, where the outcomes benefit people and communities suffering from socio-economic challenges e.g. poverty, can be carried out. In addition to demonstrate that such projects are actually possible, we studied three critical aspects: How to ensure a good fit between learning objectives and project outcome, how to ensure that the project creates value for the partner organisation and communities, and how to ensure that the projects can be conducted without overloading the university supervisors. We believe that student projects focusing on SDGs have a big potential in terms of providing highly motivating student projects yet at the same time contribute to a better world through solutions that are being used even afterwards. However, our study was just a single case with one group of three students. We hope it will serve as inspiration for larger studies, where more quantitative data could be gathered in terms of how to establish a good framework around such projects, and in order to demonstrate the value for students and societies

Contemporary Chinese creatives as literati

The importation of the creative industries 1 policy and discourse in China in the early twenty-first century has both reinforced the government’s desire to encourage more innovation and amplified existing tensions over differing conceptions of creativity. Along with China’s entry into the World Trade Organization (WTO) in 2001, the adoption of policies to develop the creative industries has bolstered the nation’s rapid modernization program. Producers of creative content in China have found themselves having to navigate difficult domestic and international policy domains, where restrictions on content and pressure to project a certain image of China at home have been complicated by a need to produce content which appeals to highly commercial global markets. As this chapter will demonstrate, attempts to resolve this tension have engendered a creative industries policy approach significantly different not only from other continents, but from the rest of Asia too. It is against this background we conducted interviews to explore how and why some of today’s Chinese artists choose to identify themselves as ‘literati’. The literati’s ‘purist’ view of art opens up a space for critical reflection, from the perspective of the Chinese creative producer, on China’s integration into global creative industries discourse and policy making

Investigating the Dose-Response Relationship between Deep Breathing and Heart Rate Variability in Healthy Participants and Across-Days Reliability in Patients with Rheumatoid Arthritis and Systemic Lupus Erythematosus

Rheumatoid Arthritis (RA) and Systemic Lupus Erythematosus (SLE) are associated with autonomic dysfunction, potentially through reduced vagus nerve tone. Vagus nerve stimulation has been proposed as an anti-inflammatory treatment, and it can be performed through deep breathing (DB) exercises. In this study, the dose-response relationship between DB exercises and heart rate variability (HRV) was investigated in healthy participants and reliability across days in patients with RA and SLE. On three separate days, 41 healthy participants performed DB for: 5, 15, or 30 min. On two separate days, 52 RA or SLE patients performed DB with the dose associated with the highest HRV increase in healthy participants. The HRV was estimated from ECG-recordings recorded prior and post the DB exercises. Increases in dose led to larger HRV-responses. Thirty minutes led to the largest HRV-response. In the RA and SLE patients, this dose increased the HRV-parameters consistently across the two days, indicating reliability. DB increases HRV in healthy participants and RA or SLE patients, which indicates stimulation of the vagus nerve. Of the tested durations, 30 min of DB was the optimal period of stimulation. A potential anti-inflammatory effect of DB exercises should be investigated in future studies

Modulating Heart Rate Variability through Deep Breathing Exercises and Transcutaneous Auricular Vagus Nerve Stimulation:A Study in Healthy Participants and in Patients with Rheumatoid Arthritis or Systemic Lupus Erythematosus

Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) and systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) are associated with an impaired autonomic nervous system and vagus nerve function. Electrical or physiological (deep breathing—DB) vagus nerve stimulation (VNS) could be a potential treatment approach, but no direct comparison has been made. In this study, the effect of transcutaneous auricular VNS (taVNS) and DB on vagal tone was compared in healthy participants and RA or SLE patients. The vagal tone was estimated using time-domain heart-rate variability (HRV) parameters. Forty-two healthy participants and 52 patients performed 30 min of DB and 30 min of taVNS on separate days. HRV was recorded before and immediately after each intervention. For the healthy participants, all HRV parameters increased after DB (SDNN + RMSSD: 21–46%), while one HRV parameter increased after taVNS (SDNN: 16%). For the patients, all HRV parameters increased after both DB (17–31%) and taVNS (18–25%), with no differences between the two types of VNS. DB was associated with the largest elevation of the HRV parameters in healthy participants, while both types of VNS led to elevated HRV parameters in the patients. The findings support a potential use of VNS as a new treatment approach, but the clinical effects need to be investigated in future studies