Throughout much of the book Nardi discussed aesthetic experience and the magic circle and other similar things. Towards the end of the book Nardi switches to more general topics. In particular she deals with the topics of addiction, gender and culture.
She starts with reminding us that Dewey and others who study problematic internet use (PIU) can be easily frazzled by video games. World of Warcraft is no exception. Blizzard explicitly creates these games so that they are “addictive”. It’s about profit, the more people that play the game, the more money they make.
Its interesting that many of the most devout players of wow acknowledge that they are addicted to the game and even use pathologized terms to describe themselves. Nardi references the one fellow who compares himself to a dealer of crack in regards to trying to get his friends to play WOW.
It seems prudent to address the notion that addiction in video games is not necessarily the end all be all. People can suffer from PIU for a variety of reasons, addiction being prominetly featuered. But, often addiction to the video game can be caused by the fact that the player finds their “real life” to be less than satisfactory.
As with any other “abnormal” condition, the symptom is only “abnormal” when it begins to cause the subject duress and harm their lives. That being said, there is no norm for what an appropriate amount of Internet play is. I’ve often wondered if we all are not completely hooked on technology. Turkle so eloquently described the “cyborgs” who had a difficult time when they were not hooked up to the computer. Nardi Reference Dewey saying that it is important to find a balance in doing things. As with any aesthetic experience things can quickly get out of control. Balancing out one thing with another is perhaps a good idea.
Nardi also covers theory crafting and Mods. I’m particularly interested in Mods in part because I am curious about how “purists” and “tweakers” view games. WOW has a lot of room for each and many people may consider it “cheating” to use keybinds or macro’s. Indeed many of the more “seasoned’ players tend to have their characters automatically set up so that one button drops a mob.
I have a friend who is quite a techie. At one point this fellow set up a five screen display. Hooked up several computers to his display and linked 5 wow accounts together so that he had but use one keyboard and mouse and all five characters would act simultaneously. In terms of PVP this is ridiculus. How could one person (or even a PUG) deal with one optomized super bot of this nature?
The section on Gender is easily one of my favorite of the book. Though the topic is somewhat old hat at times, Nardi does a good job of keeping the concepts “fresh” and relating things to WOW. The notion of a guild really opens up the Gender studies in WOW. While in the game itself one mght avow to be a male or female there is no real way to be certain. Whereas in a guild often voice chat is an integral part of the gaming experience. When these factors come to bare it becomes much more difficult (but I suppose not impossible) to cover up who is in fact male or female.
Much of Nardi’s analysis of the Gendered speak kind of reminds me of Foucault. Who says what, when where and to whom. The use of blue language is one of the easiest measures for Nardi. She mentions that while the male dominated game tends to have somewhat course language the guild is very family friendly and as such they seek to be respectful of other members. This strikes me as a good balance for all kinds of team work. Being respectful of others-- powerful idea.
Moving to one of the last topics Nardi deals with is the use of WOW in Asia. I find the notion of “Gold farmers” to be very interesting. Amazon.com has an online tool called The Mechanical Turk where people will sign up to do very menial internet tasks often related to transcribing or entering numbers. The pay for these tasks is extremely low and almost anyone (with an internet connection) can undertake any number of tasks with little to no thought. Gold farming seems like this. I cannot imagine that an individual would be able to sit around and engage in the most mundane of tasks. I found it especially hard to believe that some of these people would want to continue to play the game even after their shift at work had ended.
Questions: Will another MMORPG be able to be “The WOW Killer”?
Where do you see the most potential for beneficial educational practices in MMORPG’s?
How has writing this book changed your outlook on video games?
She starts with reminding us that Dewey and others who study problematic internet use (PIU) can be easily frazzled by video games. World of Warcraft is no exception. Blizzard explicitly creates these games so that they are “addictive”. It’s about profit, the more people that play the game, the more money they make.
Its interesting that many of the most devout players of wow acknowledge that they are addicted to the game and even use pathologized terms to describe themselves. Nardi references the one fellow who compares himself to a dealer of crack in regards to trying to get his friends to play WOW.
It seems prudent to address the notion that addiction in video games is not necessarily the end all be all. People can suffer from PIU for a variety of reasons, addiction being prominetly featuered. But, often addiction to the video game can be caused by the fact that the player finds their “real life” to be less than satisfactory.
As with any other “abnormal” condition, the symptom is only “abnormal” when it begins to cause the subject duress and harm their lives. That being said, there is no norm for what an appropriate amount of Internet play is. I’ve often wondered if we all are not completely hooked on technology. Turkle so eloquently described the “cyborgs” who had a difficult time when they were not hooked up to the computer. Nardi Reference Dewey saying that it is important to find a balance in doing things. As with any aesthetic experience things can quickly get out of control. Balancing out one thing with another is perhaps a good idea.
Nardi also covers theory crafting and Mods. I’m particularly interested in Mods in part because I am curious about how “purists” and “tweakers” view games. WOW has a lot of room for each and many people may consider it “cheating” to use keybinds or macro’s. Indeed many of the more “seasoned’ players tend to have their characters automatically set up so that one button drops a mob.
I have a friend who is quite a techie. At one point this fellow set up a five screen display. Hooked up several computers to his display and linked 5 wow accounts together so that he had but use one keyboard and mouse and all five characters would act simultaneously. In terms of PVP this is ridiculus. How could one person (or even a PUG) deal with one optomized super bot of this nature?
The section on Gender is easily one of my favorite of the book. Though the topic is somewhat old hat at times, Nardi does a good job of keeping the concepts “fresh” and relating things to WOW. The notion of a guild really opens up the Gender studies in WOW. While in the game itself one mght avow to be a male or female there is no real way to be certain. Whereas in a guild often voice chat is an integral part of the gaming experience. When these factors come to bare it becomes much more difficult (but I suppose not impossible) to cover up who is in fact male or female.
Much of Nardi’s analysis of the Gendered speak kind of reminds me of Foucault. Who says what, when where and to whom. The use of blue language is one of the easiest measures for Nardi. She mentions that while the male dominated game tends to have somewhat course language the guild is very family friendly and as such they seek to be respectful of other members. This strikes me as a good balance for all kinds of team work. Being respectful of others-- powerful idea.
Moving to one of the last topics Nardi deals with is the use of WOW in Asia. I find the notion of “Gold farmers” to be very interesting. Amazon.com has an online tool called The Mechanical Turk where people will sign up to do very menial internet tasks often related to transcribing or entering numbers. The pay for these tasks is extremely low and almost anyone (with an internet connection) can undertake any number of tasks with little to no thought. Gold farming seems like this. I cannot imagine that an individual would be able to sit around and engage in the most mundane of tasks. I found it especially hard to believe that some of these people would want to continue to play the game even after their shift at work had ended.
Questions: Will another MMORPG be able to be “The WOW Killer”?
Where do you see the most potential for beneficial educational practices in MMORPG’s?
How has writing this book changed your outlook on video games?
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