neils clark

Most of the people who know me well know that I love the Weekly World News, harbingers of pivotal cultural phrases, like “Experts say.” E.g., “Experts discover radioactive alleycats inhabiting Martian dumpsters.”

It’s a cool magazine and I just had to get that out of the way.

While I’ll assault those around me with the latest and greatest from the WWN, I’ve kind of been out of sight this last month while I pre-tested and collected data for a long exploratory study. Many of the factors tested were based off of literature review conducted after the M.A. thesis, in the process of writing a book on gaming addictions. The survey covered videogame immersion, socialization, game structures and factors which could influence addiction. Or so-called addiction. In some ways that remains to be seen. The respondents were either current or former World of Warcraft players.

Though most players know that gaming can be a major problem with some people, the link between their problems and addiction is still, in many ways, tenuous. My website has always used the word addiction, but my reasons for that are probably as complicated as the word itself. I overthink things to a degree that would probably give most people the illusion of being trapped in the ball pit.

So the factors being analyzed dealt less with the way we’ve been looking at excess gaming and more about factors like going “between worlds” or encouragement to play gotten by other players. Some of these were potentially pathologic, though most were not.

But before I talk more about it, the free open-source survey app I used: limesurvey, must be hailed as easy to use, dependable and, of course, amazing. I would recommend it without hesitation and nobody’s paying me to say it.

Back on topic, there is a lot of data. Enough to warrant writing “there is a lot of data” rather than using the contraction “there’s a lot of data.” You’d still have the italics, but it would be a completely different feel.

I is drowning in data.

So far it’s been relatively easy to eyeball the statistics. Key factors appear to be (for starters, anyway) the meaning that players attach to in-game relationships, raiding and raid-related communication and the applicability of Internet Addiction Disorder criteria. The most fulfilling and vexing, so far, have been the relationships that seemingly came out of nowhere. So right now I’m working on regressions for some blog bullet-points, the first set of those will be what this data says about our current way of measuring addiction. The plan is to fully analyze those before moving on to a game’s structure and culture, then finally “addiction factors.”

Finally, one last time I’d like to say that no online survey can diagnose addiction. The person who built mine (that would be me) isn’t qualified to diagnose addiction either. Addiction is complicated. The people who diagnose it in individuals pull that insight from more than just quick and quippy questions. If you took the survey and have questions, then emailing through this blog is a great way to get a hold of me. That said, my sincere thanks to any and all who participated. And anyone whose been interested enough to keep reading.

Neils Clark :: Jun.30.2008 :: Game Addiction, Games, General, Media Experience, Neils' Gaming Journal, Real Men Write Poetry. True Story., Research :: No Comments »

I’m saddened to report that World of Warcraft has gotten easier.
They’ve always been in flux, the game mechanics. One skill gets tweaked to be more powerful, this talent gets nerfed so that rogues can ceaselessly own warriors, etc. et al. But World of Warcraft is easier today than it was at release, even a few months ago. They even made it easier to level from 1-50, so that people could stock up on higher level characters for the next expansion (right, that’s not what I’m referring to here).

The painful ease of which I speak: certain key mobs (i.e. monsters) are no longer elites. Elite mobs, for those untainted by Warcraft, are those that possessed far more deadly abilities than normal monsters. It was an ingenious game mechanic to add them and far better to have certain key mobs present the player with bigger challenges.

For my upcoming research (more details soon) I’ve, you know, found it necessary to add a few levels onto certain key characters in order to experiment with a new form of sampling. I’ve been incredibly disappointed with mobs that I always looked forward to as a refreshing challenge. Monsters with more deadly powers had to be taken seriously, with preparation and skill. Add to that there was always a, shall we say contingent chance that you’d get torn to pieces. It makes the otherwise mindless grind a bit more thrilling. Gets the blood pumping, yaknow?

This ultimately gets to the heart of where the addiction discussion can crap on games. If developers make commercial decisions that are the least bit influenced by wanting to create something that’s easy to keep healthy, they play with a delicate balance between fun game design that goes in tandem with our real world obligations - or attempts that fall flat. Without any thought to real-world balance, you get something different. Something I’d suggest Warcraft felt in the time of 40-man raiding and Grand Marshal/High Warlord grinds. There’s an incredibly alluring dynamic in the game world - but the toll exacted by preference to that world would, and has, added a new dynamic to the online-space-race that’s finally going to gas up for its pageant.

I know at least four people who just fly around Shattrath when they play. They have this world that they’ve invested in - largely in a time when the raiding spirit was only somewhat plagued by the notion of balance. Now the world firsts are long gone, the essence of raiding that brought in so many people is tired and people are looking for a unique new kind of dynamic within games but interlaced with reality. Raiding has always been on the menu of the hardcore gamer, WoW made its contribution, but whether by the attrition of exhausting addiction or the imbalancing of the WoW raid dynamic, there’s an essential spirit that’s gone missing.

And yet the bonds that hold Warcraft together are only beginning to bend. This online space race, the commercial war of the worlds, will be a lot of things. Interesting is one that I’m betting on, though for more betting see my last post.

Neils Clark :: Jun.07.2008 :: Games, Media Experience :: No Comments »

Shavaun and I are polishing a chapter on the ways in which children develop, and how videogames can influence that process in ways that are positive and negative.

The final section explores the “right to play.” A few years ago, the then-secretary general of the UN Kofi Annan, said that children have the right to play.

…the right to play belongs to everyone. And that, by the same token, development, health and peace are not “spectator sports”. They require commitment and engagement by individuals, communities, as well as governments.

Obviously, he didn’t seem to have videogames on his mind. Instead, he was discussing organizations like Right to Play. I’d recommend you all check out their video [here]. It’s an organization supported by a number of world-class athletes, and it’s focus is bringing play and sport to young kids around the world.

To develop right, kids need to learn physical movement, they need social interaction, and they’ve got to be able to creatively and spontaneously imagine things (”I am not Pete the 5 year old, but rather MONSTRO THE WISH-GRANTING GENIE! FEAR MY WISHES, MORTAL!!!”). As they go through different stages, what’s appropriate, and what they can understand in their play-time changes.

Imagination is Important.

We tend to see videogames as something apart from ‘play,’ or ’sport,’ and some of that separation hasn’t been warranted. We like to attach words like “virtual” to online worlds, so as to understand this distance, or dissonance. In the end, the general population is still trying to understand how these spaces are different or similar to the ones we have. Nevermind that, I’m still trying to figure it out. One of my favorite papers in this area is Malaby’s [Beyond Play].

But there are also tangible differences right now, and most videogames simply don’t fit the bill for kids of certain younger ages. But this won’t always be the case. Take, for instance, Richard Bartle’s view that game companies are working on providing more agency for the imaginative elements, and Spore, the game that promises such agency. Certainly not all virtual worlds will be appropriate, as taking a game online tends to mean that lighthearted topics of discussion will meander from prim troubles to violent rape. And not all kids are developmentally at the point where they understand the facetiousness, double entendre, and plain old crudeness of that humor. Most adults don’t get it.

And with interfaces like the Wii or the Dance Dance Revolution pad, the physical activity needed for a child’s sensory integration could happen in well-designed environments via videogames.

Still, there’s just so much to talk about when we contrast that video, linked above, to kids who have been growing up with today’s games.

It comes down to the texture of the experience in the game, and understanding that there’s really a large range of experiences possible. Games could be made where young children in developing countries could create their own castles, right alongside other children in Britain, Peru and Japan. Maybe the game would make them move their body.

Or Maybe the Game Should Give ‘em One of Theeeeese!

Right now, there are free online games which sport more gore, and are more invisible to parents than ever before. I watched a 12 year old boy play this game [Endless War] and other intensely graphic games while sitting three feet from his mother. He was on a site called addictinggames.com, of all things. I sat down next to his mother, and asked about his gaming. She said that he was a perfect angel, and used the computer for highly educational ends.

So I walked over to the boy, and encouraged him to show his mother how cool his games were. Suckeerrrrrr.

Videogames are unique experiences, and I would argue that the UN’s “right to play,” for the time being, is a wholly different game.

Neils Clark :: Oct.17.2007 :: Games, Media Experience :: 2 Comments »

From this study [here], which I stumbled upon recently, apparently elephants are one of a few animals that can realize that they’re looking at themselves in a mirror.

Scientists have tested mirror self-recognition in a variety of animals other than humans and great apes, but invariably failed, with the exception of the bottlenose dolphin. “After the recent discovery that dolphins are capable of recognizing themselves in the mirror, elephants seemed the next logical species for testing,” said Reiss. “Humans, great apes, dolphins and elephants, well known for their superior intelligence and complex social systems, are thought to possess the highest forms of empathy and altruism in the animal kingdom.”

This made me wonder whether great apes, bottlenose dolphins and elepnants would be able to recognize their own virtual world representation. Obviously, seeing yourself in the mirror is a little bit different than owning it up in Warsong Gulch, but it made me wonder. If given the right trunk and tusk attachments, or the right fin and flipper nodules, would another kind of animal be capable of partaking in the gaming experience? We’ve already seen that primates can learn to sign, as seems to be the case with Koko the gorilla [Here], who has apparently learned American sign language (ASL), as well as created terms in Gorilla sign language (GSL[ROFL]).

Human computer interaction (HCI) is the art of creating devices that help us to navigate computers (and online games, obviously). Could bottlenose dolphin computer interaction (BnDCI) be helping our aquatic allies to roll on epic drops?

Time will tell.

Neils Clark :: Apr.05.2007 :: Media Experience :: 3 Comments »

I was looking to find a Haiku from one of Ian Fleming’s Bond books, “You only Live Twice.” I’d remembered the vocals on the theme going something like, “One life for yourself and one for your dreams,” and I was hoping to find something like a fancy-sounding and historically significant haiku (thoughtful, I know). I was a little dissapointed when I found that…

The title is often mistaken as being the work of a Japanese poet named Matsuo Bashō; however, the unique title comes from a haiku that James Bond wrote for his friend Tiger Tanaka. It is also mentioned in the novel that it isn’t a haiku at all, that in actuality it is a failed attempt by Bond after being taught the basics for creating a haiku.

In the epigraph and later explained in the novel, the haiku is listed as being “after Basho”, meaning written in the poet’s style.

“ You only live twice:
Once when you’re born
And once when you look death in the face.”

I was, however, highly excited to see that in the actual book…

Bond ultimately exacts revenge on Blofeld in a sword fighting duel

How awesome would that have been?

Anyway, I ultimately felt vindicated for my time when shortly after wikipediaing I found an MP3 of Nancy Sinatra’s 1967 “You Only Live Twice,” the theme playing at the opening and closing of the movie,

[Here]

The same site was also hosting a remake of Bjork’s cover,

[Here]

I decided to ante up and upload the beautiful instrumental version of this song, which has always been my favorite of the unique bond themes,

[Here]

After a long day of writing about ‘game addiction,’ these songs made me laugh pretty hard. They’re so pertinent, that if I ever do get back into gaming I may kick it off by leaving the Nancy Sinatra version of the song on repeat for a few hours. I’m not even joking.

Neils Clark :: Apr.05.2007 :: General, Media Experience :: No Comments »

If you’re a flaming nerd like I am, you might enjoy this Wired article on perception. Sunny Bains talks about technology that helps us to perceive more than the average human, like which direction is North. While I’m usually interested in technology that helps us to understand the not-so-real world, something toward the end of this article caught my eye.

For six weird weeks in the fall of 2004, Udo Wächter had an unerring sense of direction. Every morning after he got out of the shower, Wächter, a sysadmin at the University of Osnabrück in Germany, put on a wide beige belt lined with 13 vibrating pads — the same weight-and-gear modules that make a cell phone judder. On the outside of the belt were a power supply and a sensor that detected Earth’s magnetic field. Whichever buzzer was pointing north would go off. Constantly.

Apparently he loved it. He felt more confident, began realizing new ways that he could improve his life, even had dreams that incorporated the buzzing. Fast forward to the end of the experiment, where he had to relinquish the device. He was enormously upset, lost, and reported “phantom buzzing,” on a par with the phantom limb pain experienced by amputees. The device, when worn long enough, had remapped the brain, giving it a “6th sense.” Other users of the belt reported feeling dizzy, disoriented, and a sensation that the world had become less predictable.

For the last three weeks I’ve been working on a book chapter on how we experience different kinds of media. Is it possible that games are a kind of buzzing compass? When we learn to live and play inside of worlds - especially those that contain other real people, and objects which are worth real money, does our ability to see into this world become a kind of eye? In games we might even have different kinds of extra senses. In World of Warcraft (and many games), there’s a built-in compass and map feature. I would still get lost, but hey. In Alien vs. Predator, each race gets at least a couple of different ways that they can visually perceive the world - like infrared, pheromone sensation or night vision. In Dungeon Keeper you’ve got the power to do all kinds of unsavory, super-natural things.

Sunny’s article talks about using preexisting human senses, like sight, hearing and touch, in order to give us specific new senses (like a belt-compass that operates on touch). New technology can grant new senses in the world, and also in the World… of Warcraft. We don’t usually turn off our eyes, so might it be possible that we just don’t want to turn off our MMO-sense? Honestly, there are so many individual and universal factors going into what we call, “MMO Addiction,” that even if this did have some kind of contribution to excess, you’d have to be controlling for these other factors. That said, it’s interesting. =P

Neils Clark :: Apr.03.2007 :: Media Experience :: No Comments »

I’ve spent the last three weeks since the GDC very deeply involved working on a chapter for the book on how we physically and mentally experience games. How do our brains react to a game? What does this have to do with how a game is designed? What about that magical word, addiction?

This is a question that’s central to “addiction,” because on some level games hijack our nervous system (why can’t it be the calm system every once in a while?). Media experience has become “why you spend too much time on the internet, the exact affect of driving with cell phone, and what games physically do which allows them to seemingly addict non-addicts.”

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Neils Clark :: Mar.29.2007 :: Media Experience :: 2 Comments »

In last Friday’s Gamasutra article, I brought up three elements to game addiction that I feel are often overlooked: agency, media experience, and culture. Today I wanted to point out a very short paper that discusses media experience, Middle Earth and Brain Chemistry: J.R.R. Tolkien Explains Immersion. This paper looks at the possibility that human beings might experience game worlds in much the same way that they experience real life. It discusses JRR Tolkien’s ideas on fantasy, and how they might relate to the ways that we use games today.

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Neils Clark :: Jan.08.2007 :: Media Experience :: No Comments »