Play To Win Or Win To Play

Play to win or win to play Charlie Breindahl University of Copenhagen

Jonas Heide Smith

Dissertation from ITU (here) in 2006: ” Plans and Purposes: How Videogame Goals Shape Player Behaviour”

The Rational Player Model : “the player is seen as an entity optimizing her outcome within the game as defined by the objective goals”

Smith, J. H. (2006). Plans and Purposes: How Videogame Goals Shape Player Behaviour. Unpublished Dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of PhD, The IT University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, URL: http://jonassmith.dk/weblog/wp-content/dissertation1-0.pdf. Charlie Breindahl, hitch@hum.ku.dk 16-10-2008

Smith’s empirical research

Six groups of university students aged 23-33

Each group had one gaming session playing

FIFA Soccer 2004 (Xbox; fully cooperative)

Champions of Norrath (PS2; semi-cooperative)

Mashed (PS2; competitive)

Charlie Breindahl, hitch@hum.ku.dk 16-10-2008

FIFA Soccer Charlie Breindahl, hitch@hum.ku.dk 16-10-2008

Champions of Norrath Charlie Breindahl, hitch@hum.ku.dk 16-10-2008

Mashed Charlie Breindahl, hitch@hum.ku.dk 16-10-2008

Smith’s game analysis model

The game circle

The levels of the rules of the game; the game-as-system (Juul)

The level of the world created by the game; the game-as-fictional-world (Juul)

Representation (Egenfeldt-Nielsen et al.)

Game geography (Egenfeldt-Nielsen et al.)

Narrative and setting (Egenfeldt-Nielsen et al.)

The gaming circle

Egenfeldt-Nielsen, S., Smith, J. H., & Tosca, S. P. (2008). Understanding Video Games : The Essential Introduction. New York: Routledge. ISBN: 978-0415977210. Juul, J. (2005). Half-Real: Computer Games between Real Rules and Fictional Worlds. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press. Charlie Breindahl, hitch@hum.ku.dk 16-10-2008

Smith’s session recording technique Charlie Breindahl, hitch@hum.ku.dk 16-10-2008

We have a problem

Only one game session

Three games in one session

Students knew close to nothing about the games, so

Students had trouble using the controllers and grasp the goals of each game

Where are those controllers anyway in the analysis?

Smith’s new model Charlie Breindahl, hitch@hum.ku.dk 16-10-2008

We need a new model! Charlie Breindahl, hitch@hum.ku.dk 16-10-2008

Control heuristics of Mashed

X=Accelerate

[]/O=Brake

X+[]/X+O=Hand Brake

R1=Fire Weapon

R2=Drop Weapon

L1=Shout Insult

Control heuristics of FIFA Soccer

Left Stick: Controls your player’s basic movement

Right Stick: Controls your player’s First Touch Control

Left Trigger: Secondary input. Calls in another defender when defending

Right Trigger: Sprint

X: Lobbed Pass/Cross (hold LT and press X for Early Cross, double tap for Low Hard Cross)

A- Regular Pass (hold LT and press A for a Manual Pass)

B- Shoot (hold LT and press B for a Chip Shot)

Y- Through Pass (hold LT and press Y for a Lobbed Through Pass)

Control heuristics for Champions of Norrath

L2 button : Consume mana potion

L3 button : Center camera (behind person)

R1 button : Block attacks/cycle right through inventory tabs

R2 button : Consume health potion

R3 button : Open mini-map (Aka : AutoMap)

Directional buttons : Open quick cast menu

Left analog stick : Move character

Right analog stick : Rotate camera view

Start button : Pause game, bring up Options Menu

Select button : Open Character Inventory

Hold Square button, hit Select button : Use Gate Scroll

Circle button : Use Special Ability (Assigned at quick cast menu)

Triangle button : Use Special Ability (Assigned at quick cast menu) /Drop item (Inventory screen)

Square button : Pick up items/Interact with NPCs and objects/open spell book (Abilities screen) buy/sell (Shop)

X button : Attack/unequip item (Inventory screen)

Summary of game controls and game type Charlie Breindahl, hitch@hum.ku.dk 16-10-2008 Game Controls Control schemata Mashed Avatar, fire weapon, insult Direction Two single-button actions Champions of Norrath Avatar, block, change weapon, potion, map, cast, inventory, drop, pick up/interact, attack

Direction

Multiple artifacts

Multiple actions - >

Combos

Re-mapping

FIFA Avatar, first touch, call, sprint, ball lob, ball pass, ball shoot, ball through pass

Direction

One artifact

Multiple actions

Combos

Champions of Norrath requires help Charlie Breindahl, hitch@hum.ku.dk 16-10-2008

Mashed is easier to control Charlie Breindahl, hitch@hum.ku.dk 16-10-2008

We need another hypothesis!

Beginning players focus on game mechanics (and need help)

Intermediate players focus on in-game achievement

Advanced players focus on community

Only very committed players reach the advanced stage

Do very committed players (power gamers) play to win or win to play?

Taylor, T. L. (2006). Play Between Worlds. Exploring online game culture. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press. ISBN: 0262201631. Charlie Breindahl, hitch@hum.ku.dk 16-10-2008

Forza Motorsport 2 (Xbox 360)

Beginners play offline

Intermediate to advanced players go online

Xbox LIVE

WWW

http://www.forzamotorsport.net/

http://www.forzamotorsport.co.uk/

Etc.

Winning to play

Forza Motorsport 2 on Xbox LIVE

361 threads (0.14 % of all) and 10,461 postings (0.38 % of all)

2,327 (22 % of all Forza Motorsport 2 postings) were in the “CAR WANTED / DESIGN WANTED / SWAP THREAD”

Winning to play

Forza Motorsport 2 on forzamotorsport.net

70.042 threads

two forums created for customized designs had 9670 threads (14 % of all threads) and 328027 postings (30 % of all postings)

Goth girl design by Treewick Charlie Breindahl, hitch@hum.ku.dk 16-10-2008

Goth girl design by Treewick (from above) Charlie Breindahl, hitch@hum.ku.dk 16-10-2008

Win to play practices

Customization of unlockable cars

Garage (for keeps)

Gifting (reciprocal)

Xbox LIVE Auction House

In-game currence CR (credits)

Putting a design up for sale

Ok, i recently painted a B683 Camaro SS, with a pretty good design. Go here to see the design. Its in screenshots, in members cars. Post your bids here! Posted By: Khyte in Forza Motorsport 2 Subject: Devl® Camaro SS

Putting a tune up for sale

EzR tuning is releasing our newest tune. A C550 PT Cruiser built for handling tracks. Although big and ugly this car can keep up with most C class cars, excluding the Renault 5 Turbo. A very easy to drive and consistent build, this car has quickly become my favorite C class car. Tuners: Gorman 628, locksjr19 Painter: LOG1C173 Sellers: Gorman 628, locksjr19, LOG1C173 Buyout: 300,000 credits Posted By: Gorman 628 in Forza Motorsport 2 Subject: (EzR) C550 PT Cruiser

Enforcement of players’ rules

What I experienced as a result of reselling a tune that I thought was mine since I bought it was to have about 5 guys hassle the crap out of me while I was playing the game. They would curse at me, yell at me, and drive into me over and over again. The whole situation devolved into a Lord of the Flies type of ordeal where these guys felt they had the right to verbally abuse me becasue I re-sold a few of their tunes, something I openly admitted to when they asked me about it since I didn't think it was something I shouldn't be doing. Posted By: tekQ in Forza Motorsport 2 Subject: What do you own in a game?

Reporting the incident

To make matters worse it appears this type of behavior by guys in tuning garages is condoned and even encouraged by Turn10, the creators of Forza 2. While I was being harassed by this group of tuners I attempted to report the abuse so these guys could be dealt with officially. I read through the code of conduct and saw that they were in violation of most of this code. The problem is that none of the complaints I submitted appeared to have any affect, so I decided to take matters into my own hands as a last resort. I decided these guys needed to know that there are things that can be done to hassle them in the way they were hassling me, so I posted the details of each of their tunes on forzamotorsport.net, the online forum for the game.

Unexpected outcome

And what do you think the result was? I got banned from the forum for flaming other players. Does this sound fair? These guys harrased me for weeks, destroying my experience as a gamer without anything happening to them. Turn10 ignored everything that was happening to me until I posted the tunes in an effort to punish these guys for the way they were treating me and then I was expelled from the forum. Absolute crap.