Computer games as a sociocultural

Although some game researchers maintain that player construction falls outside of the boundaries of the game and hence should not be studied as part of the game itself, others argue that game studies should include such extrinsic play Steinkuehler, b. As we are interested in the social aspect of games, we believe Downloaded from gac.

The Importance of Studying Extrinsic Play Therefore, understanding contemporary computer games requires examining them in relation to a broader sociocultural aspect. From this perspective, games are not restricted to interaction with the game software. Rather, they encompass all the player activities connected to game play. Game participatory cultures arise in rela- tion to a particular game or game genre. Only through examining game play in a sociocultural perspective can we fully understand computer games: how a game as a tool evolves and changes in terms of its motives of use and how different forms of extrinsic play emerge.

Moreover, this provides us with a better understanding of how and why extrinsic play emerges so that we can design game software that could facilitate extrinsic play. However, this area of game studies is often overlooked by both game scholars and game devel- opers. A few studies reported by Poremba , Salen and Zimmerman and Sotamaa discuss such play activities but are lacking in theoretical insight.

We believe there is a need for theoretical models to understand this phenomenon through the analysis of empirical data. Activity theory is a theoretical framework for studying different forms of human practices or actions, both at individual and collective level.

It is founded on the sociocultural theories originated in Russia, which stress sociocultural aspects in psychological development, claiming that human activities are mediated by cultural tools in which sociocultural knowledge amasses.

The first generation of activity theory maintains that people do not interact with the environment directly; instead, the interaction is socially mediated with tools, be it signs language or external tools.

Human activ- ities are understood to be a purposeful interaction of the subject with the world the object , and through the enactment of activities, human transforms the object while the object transforms human as well.

Two interacting activity systems. The subject is the individual who is selected as the focus point of the analysis. The object refers to the raw material or the problem space at which the activity is directed and which is transformed into outcomes with the help of tools. The community refers to those with whom the subject shares the same general object.

The division of labor is the classification of tasks among the members of the community, while the rules are the regulations, norms, and conventions within the activity system. This is then developed into the 3GAT, which claims that activity systems do not take place in a vacuum. In other words, they are not stand-alone; rather they occur in a complicated social setting. According to him, the object moves from an unreflected and situational state to a collectively meaningful object con- structed by the system.

He further contended that in the third generation, the object might be transformed into a potentially shared object for two or more connected activity systems. For instance, in a book writing activity system, the object moves from an initial state of raw material such as initial ideas and outlines for the book to a more meaningful object such as sentences and paragraphs constructed by the author and then to an object shared with another activity system e.

We would like to highlight three other important concepts associated with the 3GAT, which are relevant to game studies. Through its relation with other activity sys- tems, an activity system adopts new elements and this causes a collision between the new and the old elements.

Contradictions may happen at many levels in a network of activity systems. From the analytical view of the 3GAT, contradictions span across Downloaded from gac.

This might trigger contradictions with what the author has already become accustomed to in the writing activity. This leads to the second principle, development. As contradictions occur and dis- rupt the usual process of activity systems, the subject or the community begins look- ing into the issue that causes contradictions and, in some cases, this brings about the development of the activity systems.

In the analysis of the 3GAT, development involves the change in positional relations between the elements of different activity systems apart from the positional change of the elements within the activity system. The third principle is the different level of tools. Game Play and Activity Theory We maintain that activity theory and 3GAT in particular provides powerful theoretical constructs for analyzing computer games in a sociocultural context.

Although these theoretical constructs have been used by some activity theory scholars in various areas Guy, ; Leadbetter, ; Roth, , they have not been explicated in a clear manner in the context of computer games.

In this section, we explain how they can be used to analyze computer games. First, let us look at game play in general. The play activity is mediated by the computer game software the tool. In the multiplayer case, the play activity is also mediated by collective rules and division of roles. Note that the motive of play activities could also be something else, depending on the nature of the computer games as some games are designed specifically for educational purposes, health care training, advertis- ing, socializing e.

In this article, we focus on entertainment-oriented games and extrinsic play that arises from such games. This motive can be instantiated into a series of motives that contribute to the over- all enjoyment of game play. There are two types of play: intrinsic play and extrinsic Downloaded from gac.

The game play activity in general. Computer games Goals achieved Player To achieve game goals Figure 3. Intrinsic play. As aforementioned, intrinsic play refers to the play within the predefined boundary of the game structure, while extrinsic play refers to the play that goes beyond this original game structure.

In an earlier study, we looked into intrinsic play with activity theory. Because the understanding of intrinsic play is crucial for this article, we describe briefly intrinsic play from the activity theoretical point of view Figure 3. In intrinsic play, the object lies in the process of the intrinsic play itself. This object triggers the motive, which is to achieve the game goal; whether it is developer-defined or player-defined.

The out- come of the intrinsic play activity system is the achievement of the game goal, which will directly and indirectly contribute to the overall enjoyable experience. The out- come could also be the inability to achieve the goal, and this is known as contradiction. Although this level of activity analysis gives us an overview of the play structure in its long-term formation, a useful analysis can be carried out at the action level, in which the dynamic process of play can be examined more closely.

The play activity system Downloaded from gac. In other words, activities are realized by individual and collaborative actions and the chains of networks of these actions that are related by the same overall motive. Thus, intrinsic play goals could be structural or progressive as well as nonstructural or expressive. Progressive play actions are actions mediated by the game tool to progress through the game structure. Expressive play actions are actions mainly mediated by signs and lan- guage, which are directed toward free-form play such as expression through the game avatar, socializing with other players, and so on.

Some examples of primary tools in games are the game interface, the game avatar, other game entities such as weapons, the game avatar abilities such as magic casting, and so on.

The main aim of this article is to analyze extrinsic play around computer games and to develop models of extrinsic play from a sociocultural perspective. In the fol- lowing section, we describe the methodology of the study.

Methodology To identify extrinsic play within online communities, we investigated the activities in game community Web sites. We collected more than pages from 30 game Web sites of four genres of games, based on the taxonomy proposed by Lindley The selection was based on fundamental differences in the mechanics of the games: Super Mario Bros.

The Web sites consisted of official and unofficial game Web sites, discussion boards, online forums, and online communities of the games. For instance, there are a substantial number of official and unofficial Web sites that support player community for The Sims. These Web sites contain not only player out-of-game interaction in term of verbal exchanges but also fan-constructed artefacts such as the family albums, in-game 3D models, machinima videos, or even an entirely new game based on the original game.

Through analyzing the artefacts, we were able to infer the activities in the out-of-game context. For each of the selected game, we started by browsing and reading the information from a popular Web site of the game usually the official site. Through this Downloaded from gac. The Themes for Extrinsic Play Rule-Based Element Content-Based Element Around the game discussion on and Discussion on Discussion on the game exchange of game experience game rules, game stories, sharing the game strategy images, fan journal Beyond the game use of the game to Sims Idols Fan fiction, move making, play in a different way and breaking the comic strips game modification of the game Changing the Changing skins, wallpapers, game code using level editors to create new stories process of snowballing, a number of Web sites dedicated to the particular game were selected.

The selected Web sites were not limited to just one particular version of the game but included all franchises of the title. For instance, for Super Mario Bros. After that, each selected Web site was browsed at a high level, to examine its structure. Through this, we were able to quickly identify the major information types such as the stories of the game, tips, and strategies, etc.

After that, the contents were read carefully and critically to extract important information that would reveal extrinsic play activities. The goal at this point was to find out all pos- sible types of play activities around the game, which could be observed on the Web site.

Therefore, irrelevant information such as information about other unrelated games, the help function of the Web site, and so on, was ignored. Information ranging from textual contents, images, to other media such as video, sounds, and animations was extracted from the Web site and stored in a qualitative data analysis tool.

The same process was carried out for the other Web sites for the same game. Redundant information types from the same game were ignored so that a solid set of trimmed data was obtained. This data collection process was repeated for all five games. Essentially, thematic analysis approach was adopted to identify the themes of extrinsic play. Reading through the data, we identified types of play activities observed at the Web sites for each game. Emphasis was put on issues that occurred frequently or that were deemed of fundamental importance.

We then categorized these activities to obtain a set of more consistent and generic themes Table 1. Table 2 shows some examples of the data. Once we had modeled all the types of extrinsic play, we attempted to generalize the activity systems so as to obtain a generic activity sys- tem that could illustrate all the extrinsic play activities that fall under the same theme. A neighbor will stroll by your house at the fol- lowing times: a. It allows you to change the character properties how high they jump, how fast they run, how fast they pick up things, etc.

There are six other books here—silver. They are the prophecies of the Watcher. Particular emphasis was placed on the interaction of the tools, the objects, and the outcomes.

The model will be explained in depth in the next section. Further data collection and analysis was done until analyzing more data no longer yielded new insights. To ensure the reliability, a focus group with three colleagues was run to validate the results.

We explained the final models to the participants of the focus group and each participant was given an excerpt of data of a specific type of extrinsic play activity. Then they were required to explain in detail the specific play activity using the models. Any discrepancy was recorded and resolved to obtain the final models. Findings: the Extrinsic Play Activity Models Studying game play from a broader context, taking on board the play activity and enjoyment the players experience not only within the game but also beyond, we Downloaded from gac.

Reflective play involves the process of externalizing various aspects of intrinsic play through communication, sharing, and discussion.

When reflective play occurs, players step out of the predefined game boundary and reflect on their intrinsic play activities. Expansive play refers to play activities that transgress the original game boundary and transform intrinsic play in an unexpected way.

Expansive play gener- ally involves modification of intrinsic play, which results in a new pattern of play that goes beyond the original game context. This study indicates that understanding social interaction in computer games requires the analysis of these two types of play.

These two types of play could occur at both the individual and collective levels. For example, our observation revealed an interesting collective dimension of reflec- tive play, in which players are coreflecting their play activities by externalizing their actions through the construction of external artefacts such as Wiki-based game strat- egy guidebooks. Similarly, expansive play also arises at the collective level, in which new artefacts are constructed; emerging rules and division of roles are nego- tiated and agreed.

In the next sections, we describe in detail each of these types of play and their relationships with intrinsic play. This will eventually result in the development of the activity so that the sub- ject can focus on the goal again. Taking this claim further, reflection can be analyzed like other forms of activities particularly when the subject is reflecting on the contra- diction in a social context within the community.

Although players often suspend their disbelief when playing games, they are always conscious of the rules of reality and different sets of rules in different types of play. It is particularly pronounced when they reflect on the play; they step back into reality in which they are fully aware that it is just play.

Figure 4 shows the reflective play activity system. We would like to call it the RPAM. The object of reflective play lies in the process of the intrinsic playing itself. This object triggers the motive that is to reflect on intrinsic play and it results in a pool of shared resources as the outcome. These resources can be combined, used, and trans- formed in novel ways through expansive play see the next section for expansive play.

We identified three types of reflective play actions. Reflective play activity model RPAM. The most prominent action of reflective play is perhaps discussion, in which players talk to each other about issues around intrinsic play. Players also externalize their intrinsic play experience through the construction of various artefacts. Players construct unofficial game strategy guides, novels of the in- game stories, game play videos, and so on.

For instance, using video capture func- tion of the game or other external software, players record their game play sequences or in-game stories in the form of videos. Although our observation shows that this construction is mainly individual, collective construction also exists, the most com- mon being the use of Wiki technology for game guidebook construction.

Then, players exchange and share the game artefacts. Players upload their high scores, tell their stories while others download and read.

This kind of play is sup- ported by the game analysis of Ducheneaut et al. Apart from sharing their intrinsic play experience, they also discuss their construction: complimenting, commenting, and talking about techniques for construction.

Juul for instance also recognized the importance of high score tables as part of the social play surrounding games. Therefore, such collective—reflective play not only helps each individual under- stand and play the game better but also creates a sense of community and brings players closer to each other. Collective rules emerge, for instance the community of players negotiates and agrees on rules of conduct in discussion boards.

Players also assume different set of roles that are not related to the roles of the in-game avatar they are playing, for example, some players become the moderators of the Downloaded from gac. In some cases, the in-game avatar is used to represent the player in such discussion to relate their reflective play experience to the intrinsic one. It is also noted that game play does not always begin with intrinsic play. Some- times, even before playing the game, players are already receiving some information through the discussion with other players, which contributes to the overall enjoy- ment of game play.

The outcome of reflective play, which is important for further examination, is development. Development in reflective play includes the resolution of the contra- diction that arises from intrinsic play. Sharing the knowledge from resolving the contradiction with other players generates a pool of resources the outcome of reflec- tive play at the activity level.

The outcome could also be artefacts. For instance, players externalize their reflection by constructing walkthroughs and strategy guide- books.

It also involves the narrative aspect, such as the externalization of the game stories and fictional elements through the use of symbols including writing, images, videos, and sounds.

In reflective play, the game software becomes a secondary tool that consists of externalized symbols of how to use the actual tool the primary tool. Procedural instructions such as instruction manuals can work as secondary tools. Founded on Activity Theory, we articulate theoretical models that explicate game play in a socio-cultural context. Our findings reveal that extrinsic play constitutes reflective play and expansive play, which transform the play activity and transport the players beyond the original boundary of play.

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