This article examines the notion of genre in video games. The main argument is that the market-based categories of genre that have been developed in the context of video games obscure the new medium's crucial defining feature, by dividing them into categories (loosely) organized by their similarities to prior forms of mediation. The article explores the inherent tension between the conception of video games as a unified new media form, and the current fragmented genre-based approach that explicitly or implicitly concatenates video games with prior media forms. This tension reflects the current debate, within the fledgling discipline of Game Studies, between those who advocate narrative as the primary tool for understanding video games, "narratologists," and those that oppose this notion, "ludologists." In reference to this tension, the article argues that video game genres be examined in order to assess what kind of assumptions stem from the uncritical acceptance of genre as a descriptive category. Through a critical examination of the key game genres, this article will demonstrate how the clearly defined genre boundaries collapse to reveal structural similarities between the genres that exist within the current genre system, defined within the context of visual aesthetic or narrative structure. The inability of the current genre descriptions to locate and highlight these particular features suggests that to privilege the categories of the visual and narrative is a failure to understand the medium. The article concludes by suggesting that the tension between "ludology" and "narratology" can be more constructively engaged by conceptualizing video games as operating in the interplay between these two taxonomies of genre. Read more...

Given the interactive media characteristics and intrinsically motivating appeal, computer games are often praised for their potential and value in education.allHowever, comprehensive research testing these assumptions is still missing. Preliminary comparative studies on the learning effects of games versus traditional media have shown some promise. In this paper, we describe a comparative study that thoroughly investigates the effects of interactivity and media richness on science learning among college students. We also discuss important results and implications yielded from comparisons among four conditions in our experiment (game, replay, hypertext and text). Read more...

Massively multiplayer online games (MMOGs) are no longer a chimera. Everyday, new exemple of this application are released, available for free on the Web or on sale. Yet, high lags frequently affect MMOGs, annoying customers. This frustrating phenomenon is mainly due to the best-effort service provided by the Internet that is often responsible for congestion and loss of responsiveness. To address this challenging issue, we consider a mirrored game server architecture and present a mechanism aimed at accelerating the delivery of game events generated during game sessions. Our approach rests upon the use of an optimistic synchronization mechanism that exploits the semantics of the game to diminish the delivery time of game events, whilst maintaining the full consistency of the game state. Experimental results are reported confirming the adequacy of our approach. Read more...

Despite the growth of embedded brands in entertainment media, few theory-based studies have assessed consumer processing of brand placements in games. This study contrasted the influence of media context (play, watch) and psychological response (telepresence) on consumer recall, game liking, and perceived persuasion for real and fictitious brands in a racing game. Results show that playing the game impeded recall, but had no effect on game liking or perceived persuasion across brands. Telepresence and game liking were positively related to perceived persuasion for real and fictitious brands, with telepresence mediating the effect of game liking on perceived persuasion for real brands. Results are explained according to cognitive capacity and media context effects. Read more...

What are the exact aspects of the videogame medium, the precise features or combinations of features that lend themselves to expressing ideas and meaning? To chart this out, I begin with an American legal case that serves as a foundation for the basic issues involved and then move on to show how this relates to some of the broader attitudes the world of videogame discourse. Based on this, I break down the expressive strategies of videogames into three aspects—non-playable sequences, rule-based systems, and the relationship between the two—which I then illustrate with examples proving that videogames can indeed be an expressive medium. Read more...

Game studies methodologies which focus on the visual, narrative, and semiotic content of digital games overlook the way that embodied perception and physiological response contribute to the meaningfulness of games. Gameplay also needs to be understood in terms of affective response: the embodied, multisensory perception of the game environment. Distinguishing between affect and emotion, this paper frames the former in terms of the unquantifiable bodily dimensions of gameplay – the ‘feel’ of a game. It argues that affective response incorporates physiological and temporal dimensions that lie outside the domain of linear time and conscious choice, using examples of games like Rez that link positive player experience to bodily awareness and uncontrollable biological responses. It then proposes some ways that a theory of affect can further our understanding of what digital games are and why people play them. Read more...