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Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons™
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Articles 1 - 3 of 3
Full-Text Articles in Social and Behavioral Sciences
Gamer Resistance To Marketization Of Play, Jacob C. Almaguer
Gamer Resistance To Marketization Of Play, Jacob C. Almaguer
Markets, Globalization & Development Review
Video games provide an important context to understand the role of markets in a virtual space. Particularly, consumerism has appeared to have transferred from actual reality in the virtual reality in video games. For instance, growth in use of microtransactions by companies enable consumers to exchange real currency for in-game currency. Thus, the distinction between reality and fiction appears to be blurring. This may be problematic given the hegemony of AAA video game developers (Triple-A games are those with very high development and promotion budgets), commonality of neoliberal appeals in video games, and the potential influence that video games can …
Virtual Avatars: Trans Experiences Of Ideal Selves Through Gaming, Kai Baldwin
Virtual Avatars: Trans Experiences Of Ideal Selves Through Gaming, Kai Baldwin
Markets, Globalization & Development Review
This article aims to explore the experiences transgender gamers have with avatars. Building on a foundation of identity construction theories from both media studies and queer studies, this study theorizes that these gamers will use their virtual world avatars to experiment with gender performance and ideal selves. These theories of identity construction are explored and examined through digital ethnography, by using the participant observation method, in which trans gamers are interviewed about their experiences with avatar creation and use. Based on the evidence gathered from those interviews, this study concludes that trans gamers in general tend to create avatars who …
The Unfree Space Of Play: Emergence And Control In The Videogame And The Platform, Logan Brown
The Unfree Space Of Play: Emergence And Control In The Videogame And The Platform, Logan Brown
Markets, Globalization & Development Review
This article attempts to understand the economic and informatic ramifications of the convergence between increasingly connective games and massive online platforms by considering recent trends in both that center around designing for emergence. Scholarship on emergence as a property of games overwhelmingly treats emergent design as a liberating force that privileges player agency in a virtual space. Yet, as games fuse with surrounding platform ecosystems like Steam, Facebook, and Google, those emergent behaviors are subject to vast systems of inscription that analyze user behavior in order to reshape the free space of emergence and extract greater social and financial capital. …