Icarus Studios News

When discussing what games have to offer us, often people say, “Games offer the chance to see something new, explore another place, and become someone else...” And that’s a very romantic idea; but, do games really provide the opportunity to reinvent ourselves? For any amount of time?

If equating real-life behavior with avatar behavior teaches us anything, it’s that people don’t always act as their physical appearance might suggest, nor do people always behave according to the cultural norms associated with a race or region we attribute to them. It’s often debated whether the choices a person makes in picking a game character, avatar appearance, or online environment in general say anything concrete about the person behind the computer. On design blogs, commentators discuss the attainable strength of communication in a virtual medium when the information we’re given to respond to is not necessarily trustworthy. Does it even matter that the information in the virtual reality might not be true in actual reality? Is absolute truth necessary in order to analyze the end user's ultimate in-world experience?

I don’t think there will ever be one overarching premise with which to define and discuss play, but I can see how a lack of solid data about gamers’ motivations is frustrating for anyone trying to determine the ways in which a virtual reality can be successful both as a commercial creation and as an effective play experience. These discussions on identity, motivation, and expression generally begin with the assumption that an avatar is an expression of the user more than anything else, and that the user identifies strongly with his or her virtual representation and virtual activities. But I’d argue that the entertainment of virtual environments depends very little on such things. It’s worth it to consider that perhaps players don’t often use games to express themselves, or that expression made in play isn’t synonymous with actual self-identification—regardless of how finely the user interacts with the medium or how detailed their choices become. It’s a little unfair to broach so many multilayered topics at once (such as motivation, expression, and identity), and then try to fit them under the general subject of New (or Mixed) Media Entertainment. It's important to first link these topics to subcategories that correspond to the conceptual differences inherent in the diverse gaming market. Depending on the platform and goal of the game (such as those of an alternate-reality game, a single-player video game, an MMO, or a virtual world), the data on each topic will change.

Or, let’s approach the question of identification from a different angle: With every game you play, movie you watch, or book you read, you should ask yourself, “Am I doing this for an emotional release, to escape from reality, or as a way of expressing myself somehow? How is this activity letting me express myself? Is it relaxing? If it isn't, why not? Do I find myself reacting strongly to anything in the environment? Why or why not? Does my reaction have anything to do with the game itself?”

The goals of catharsis, relaxation, and expression don’t always have to be related—but they usually overlap. Often, end users and developers will ask themselves if an experience was fun and know the answer right away, yet rarely go beyond answering yes or no, without ever really analyzing why “fun” was an appropriate label for the experience at all.

“I just know it when I see it,” is a reply sometimes given by developers when asked about their “fun” process, or by users shopping for a new product they want but can't quite express. Maybe the questions of what constitutes identification and the different ways in which expression can become part of the overall experience belongs with the discussion of what is the source of fun and how to make fun rather than the more morbidly fascinating, “Does the player identify with this killer, now that he has controlled the killer's image?”

(Continued in Part 2)

-Miri Funderburk, Virtual Worlds Team