[...] Read it here: http://www.raphkoster.com/2006/08/18/shocking-study/ [...]

[...] Remember the “shocking study”? Well, it made CNN and Reuters today. And that right there is why it mattered. [...]

[...] http://www.raphkoster.com/2006/08/18/shocking-study/ [...]

Third places include a cadre of regulars who attract newcomers and give the space its characteristic mood.

As far as Subconcious, it’s not for me anymore. When I’m a regular I’m intentionally creating a space where people can unwind and if not be themselves than at least not be the guy they are at work. Seems to me that bringing RL things into the game upsets the journey that Bartle talks about, about discovery and self discovery.

Rik’s got a good point about the link between the third place and the desire that many players have to keep real world resources from affecting virtual world ones, but at the same time I think there’s more to it as well. The entire third place aspect is more of a subconcious contributor, I think.

I have to disagree though about this:

Further, more time available to spend in the third place seems likely to me to convert this person into a regular. Regulars are an important part of the third place, and being a vocal regular and helping others in the community can quickly eat into his time. That is to say he’s running newcomers thru the Old Lighthouse instead of teaming up with old friends to challenge the Dragon’s Hidden Castle.

I’ve met a lot of players who you could classify as regulars who weren’t necessarily running newcomers through the old lighthouse. After all, these games are crafted (well, the good ones) so that it should take you months to years to get through all the available content. There are just as many newbie-helper social type gamers out there as there are tightly bonded achievement oriented players. Players on both sides could be considered regulars and assets to the community in a game, just in different ways.

Yes, the world outside the virtual world effects the things that happen inside the virtual world. As designers we can do things to minimize that instead of allow it. Worlds of Warcraft’s rested bar, A Tale In The Desert’s Offline chores are examples of this. (I’m reminded of the things Dungeon Keeper II would say as the hours of the night got later. )

Quoting someone quoted in the paper: “It didn’t matter what you drove to the arcade. If you sucked at Asteroids, you just sucked” (Herz, 1997). Yes, more time spend playing Asteroids will make you better, but a contest between two players is not going to simply go to the person who has played more.

Further, more time available to spend in the third place seems likely to me to convert this person into a regular. Regulars are an important part of the third place, and being a vocal regular and helping others in the community can quickly eat into his time. That is to say he’s running newcomers thru the Old Lighthouse instead of teaming up with old friends to challenge the Dragon’s Hidden Castle.

[...] There’s been some other commentary floating around on this as well – Joystiq, Blackguard, and Raph all have their piece to say on it. The researchers in question are long time gamers and have invested a lot of time and passion into the MMO genre, so it isn’t as though this is something that a couple of egg heads simply stumbled upon. Personally I’m with Raph on this, while not a revolutionary statement by any means it now gives us a formalized scientific study to point to that extols the virtues of Virtual World/MMO spaces as places of social worth. Find all posts by mineforfish. Find all posts in “MMOs Provide Sociability”. [...]

Rik wrote:
That’s the topic of bringing money into the game all over again, in my mind.

Unfortunately, money is already in the equation. Time is money, and people able to spend more time in the game get better stuff, period. The lower-middle class father of two can’t spend as much time in the game as a college student can. Why? Because the father has to work harder (that is, make money) to support his family than the college student has to work.

I’d further recommend reading an interesting post about the topic from Matt Mihaly. It’s an interview where he talks to someone that just spend about $240 on an item that pretty much just gives a custom text message. Bought by a college student, mind you, so not likely just someone flaunting their wealth. Read the article and it might give you a slightly different view on the whole “pay for perks” business model.

Some thoughts.

Comments on Data:

Raph-

“More importantly, the common sense of game players has no validity in, say, a Congressional hearing. Common sense and anecdotal impressions aren’t worth much in science in general, and having concrete data to present to game detractors is an incredibly valuable thing.”

Paul-

“It’s not even just that its hard to defend your opinions without data”

Look at who’s proposing regulation of game content, who they are, what are they after, and how are they compiling their “proof”. Is their data (compelling?) superior (how mature is the research, data and analysis in the field they’re drawing from). The video game industry perhaps should be trying to meet and exceed their opponents in this. Good policy is informed by good data; one cannot bemoan policy outcomes that harm ones industry if the industry fails in this simple task.

Darnaiq-

“These are the sorts of studies that help everyone make their arguments more solidly. It’s fun for the anti-establishment sub-culture of video gaming to deride anything that they themselves didn’t prompt, and there’s no easier target than studies that prove things they already think they know.

However, they themselves benefit greatly from scientists and the like that approach hypothesis>theory>fact the right way. The Joystiq crowd is being a bit elitist in their attempt to own facts they themselves borrowed from conventional wisdom. But conventional wisdom is not fact, as has been rightly said here.”

Yeah, besides casuals, the powergaming-uber-L33t-haxxor-I’m-to-cool-for-you crowd can continue to thumb their noses at contributing researchers. However the cost of this attitude is that their opinions and flaming marginalizes them. The industry will ignore their opinions as uninformed, and government will regulate their entertainment.
This is the end result of gamer hubris and this can be avoided by building gamer buy-in into industry and research that seeks to prevent game-sameness and over regulation. But gamers have to meet industry half way…if you make an industry guess what you want you’ll neither get what you want nor what you need.

Obviously from my end of things we’re working toward correcting these areas I mentioned above. Of course we don’t know if it’ll work, we hope it will though…

Michael-

Thanks for the link

Ok enough of my blathering, I have wire frames and a site architecture to fill my sunday with, I just got FrontPage two weeks ago…oh the horror!