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论社交游戏及在线社区对用户生活的积极影响

发布时间:2011-05-25 09:42:11 Tags:,,,,,

引言:

在过去的十年里,英特网和万维网发展尤为迅速,影响范围几乎涉及人们日常生活的每一方面。人们听音乐,看电影和视频,与朋友交流聊天都是围绕着万维网进行的;英特网更是无时无刻地地现身于人们的生活中。

在英特网的推动下,游戏的影响力得到了加强,开始不断地“侵入”人们的日常生活。作为当今游戏的主要部分,英特网推动了很多在线社区的诞生,并加强了游戏内外的社交联系。这篇文章将通过观察在线社交游戏所带来的社交影响,讨论在线社交游戏和诸如《Farmville》和《魔兽世界》这些游戏社区对用户日常生活产生的一些正面影响。本文作者在文章中使用了一些学术文章和期刊杂志的例子以支持他的观点,同时他还公开了一些知名游戏专家所作的评论,为他的调查结果提供了一些真实论断。《Farmville》和《魔兽世界》是当今比较出名的在线游戏,它们都拥有庞大的游戏社区和数量较多的用户群体,所以可以说,这两款游戏是当今在线社交游戏的范例。

farmville(from farmville-cheats-tips.com)

farmville(from farmville-cheats-tips.com)

游戏影响正常社交生活?

因为游戏本身对用户日常生活带来了正面影响,各个平台上的社交游戏和新平台上的在线社区正在健康成长。推动在线社交游戏不断发展的原因有很多,但是最为突出的要数苹果在全球范围内的普及和苹果App Store的诞生。苹果App Store里有很多主流休闲游戏,同时用户通过使用iPone,iPad和iPod都能够在该应用商店中购买到这些游戏和数十万种应用。用户每天都会使用这些应用,换句话说,在线休闲游戏已经渗透进玩家的日常生活中了。除此之外,应用商店的普及也带动了在线社区的发展。在游戏社区中,玩家能够对一些特别的游戏或应用做出评价,提供建议给其他玩家,帮助他们决定该应用或游戏是否值得购买。

但是这只是在线社区的一种形式,像Facebook这种类型的社交网络在社交游戏对人类日常生活的持续影响中更是扮演着极其重要的角色。据统计,世界上有上亿人在使用社交网络,就像上述提到的众多苹果应用的用户一样,这些活跃于Facebook等社交网络上的用户更是为休闲游戏的普及创造了一种良好的机遇。Facebook不仅为用户提供了一个强大的在线社区,同时它也为这个在线社区提供了一个配套完整的基础设施。

Saul Rivers曾在他的一篇文章中提到了游戏的一些负面特征,他表示:“关于在线游戏的最古老且最普遍的评述是,这是一种违逆社交性的游戏。反对英特网的一些人士认为,在线游戏是社区的敌人,因为在线游戏玩家比起传统的社交游戏(游戏邦注:如体育游戏,当地bingo大厅游戏等)更青睐于独自一个人上网玩游戏。”从这个例子我们可以看出,那些认为在线游戏会对玩家产生负面影响的观点主要是基于游戏对玩家的社交生活带来了负面影响,即如果在线游戏玩家不再玩游戏,他们将能更多地接触到现实世界的其他人。然而情况却并非如此,这个观点只是那些掌握着微不足道知识的人所作出的片面论断,他们并未真正深入探析整个游戏世界。

本文作者对于一些新传媒专家所认为的社交游戏有益于用户日常生活的这一观点表示赞同。新兴在线社交游戏的诞生和一些在线游戏社区的崛起,使得那些形式上并不存在的游戏社交元素凸显了出来。传媒专家Bill Pratt表示,“在线游戏世界中包含着各种各样的游戏社区。这类型的游戏获得了如此高的普及率,证明了这是一款具有‘强制性’的游戏。擅长于视频游戏的玩家能够为个人社交带来一些帮助。游戏社区是非常强大且有利可图,但同时它也是非常脆弱的。根据研究,游戏产业已经成为整个娱乐产业中发展最为迅速的一个环节了,它的成就已经大大超越了长篇电影的成就。纵观历史,游戏确实可以称得上是一种社交活动,仅仅是玩游戏也能帮助玩家建立起社会等级和社会关系。”正如Pratt所述,游戏是当今世界上最重要的一种社交工具,比起其它媒介方式,游戏能够带来更大的利润,并且在不久的将来还将持续影响着整个世界。

在线社交游戏和游戏社区的案例

《Farmville》是最能体现游戏社交性的一个典例。来自于Wired.com(游戏邦注:,美国著名科技杂志《连线》旗下互联网部门)的Chris Kohler表示:“作为Facebook上最火热的一款游戏,Zynga的《Farmville》每个月都吸引了上千万名玩家重复登陆游戏,种植,照料并收获他们自己的虚拟庄稼。游戏玩家和设计者均表示,比起游戏本身的魅力,该款游戏的社交体验具有更大的致命力:在游戏中,玩家的农场附近有亲戚或者朋友的农场,玩家能够拜访他们的土地,并帮助他们做农活以换取游戏道具作为奖励。”正如Kohler所述,玩家在《Farmville》中的社会联系完全等同于Facebook上的社会联系,并且玩家将能够利用这种社会联系更好地完成游戏。这款游戏很好地体现出了玩家如何与他人加强并改善友谊关系,同时玩家也能在游戏中认识到新的朋友,拓展社交圈。《Farmville》并不是第一款也不是唯一一款使用社会互动元素的游戏,譬如即时战略游戏,大型多人在线角色扮演游戏(例如《魔兽世界》)等游戏同样也具有社交互动性。

魔兽世界(from zzdesk.cn)

魔兽世界(from zzdesk.cn)

大型战略类网游和大型多人网络角色扮演游戏同样也对很多人的日常生活产生了重要的影响。大型多人网络角色扮演游戏(最知名的要数《魔兽世界》)成功吸引了很多游戏玩家,并增强了游戏的用户粘性。因为这是一款付费游戏,所以玩家都会尽可能频繁地使用这款游戏,从而使其成为影响玩家日常生活的一个重要因素。据Jostiq.com的Michael Gray所称,《魔兽世界》订阅量已经高达1千1百万,并且6年后,这种情况也仍将一直持续下去。和《Farmville》一样,《魔兽世界》也把在线社区和团队协作引入游戏中,在游戏中,玩家能够互相帮助完成任务和目标,而且游戏有时候还会要求玩家根据游戏中的不同级别和任务类型组队进行游戏。这款游戏还进一步拓展了游戏互动,使玩家能够通过文本和语音信息与其他玩家进行交流。和《Farmville》一样,这款游戏也能够帮助玩家结交来自不同国家的新朋友,即澳大利亚的玩家也能够与地球另一端的美国游戏玩家交朋友。这就是为什么玩家会认为其他游戏严重缺乏这些社交性,只是一种单纯的个人游戏体验而已了。

游戏对现实生活的影响日趋明显

人们玩游戏的目的到底是什么?这确实是个值得思考的问题。因为人们必须花费大量金钱进行休闲游戏,所以过去很多人都不能理解为什么会有那么多人热衷于玩游戏,且游戏对于玩家的日常生活到底会产生什么样的影响?如今,已经有很多休闲游戏玩家切实体验到了游戏所带来的收益,有很多例子表示,或者游戏中的内置付费功能或虚拟道具可让玩家慷慨解囊。而有趣的是,使用这些功能的绝大多数玩家都是属于休闲游戏玩家而不是硬核游戏玩家。休闲游戏玩家和硬核游戏玩家存在着明显的区别,Thanate Tan清楚地解释道:“休闲游戏玩家不会在游戏中投入大量的时间,而且比起复杂的游戏,他们更青睐于简单的游戏。而硬核游戏玩家完全相反。他们会花费大量的时间于游戏上,并且极端乐衷于体验视频游戏,而且他们对于游戏非常精通。”举个例子来说,在《Farmville》中,玩家可以通过付费让电脑帮助他“管理”农场,而不用自己耗费大量时间去做那些农事。《魔兽世界》同样也提供给玩家类似的服务,即玩家在付费后可以随时打开游戏找到并收集虚拟游戏道具,这种服务能够帮助那些缺少游戏经验的玩家取得较快的进展。当询问那些休闲游戏玩家这种游戏对其生活产生了什么影响时,他们表示,因为这些游戏只需要少额付费而且没有严格的游戏时间限制,所以对他们具有很大的吸引力,即使像《魔兽世界》这种看起来很难的游戏也瞬间变得不那么可怕了。这类型的游戏中玩家只需要花费少量的时间于游戏中,而能够把大量的时间用于“现实”世界的社交互动上,这点同样也能够使那些不希望子女花费太多时间于游戏世界的“目光短浅”的父母们开窍,使他们能够放心让孩子们在游戏世界里获得乐趣,并且也不需要花费太多的金钱。在某种程度上来讲,这可以称得上是“游戏化”的理想程度了。“游戏化”是指“提高游戏的趣味性和用户粘性。通过在网页中添加一些游戏机制或者做一些市场营销活动以吸引更多的游戏玩家,并使其成为该游戏最重要的回头客。”Zicherman曾经描述道,学校打算尝试在固定课程中引入一些游戏,“如今游戏有时候也会被当成改善教育的一种方式。有些学校把游戏化融入了教程中,还有一些特别的学校更是完全围绕游戏化进行授课。”早前如此刻板的学校都已经开始引进游戏化了,其它领域的游戏化引用更是让人好奇连连。

作为休闲游戏中的佼佼者,苹果App Store中的游戏更是让人不容小觑,这些游戏一般都只是一些小游戏,即意味着不需要耗费玩家太长的游戏时间。然而很多较为受欢迎的游戏下载量却是无比巨大,尽管游戏开发者需要投入很大的成本,但是这类型游戏的售价通常都很低。iTune本身就是一个在线社区,跟很多社交游戏一样,在iTune应用商店中的很多在线游戏也都是玩家“面对面”或相互合作完成游戏的,在这个社区里玩家通过手机网络上的小型休闲游戏互相对战。

总结

为什么社交游戏和在线社区对玩家的社交生活会产生正面的影响呢?本篇文章对这种新型游戏做了介绍,游戏玩家和游戏本身的社交体验都明显提高了,这对于很多玩家的日常生活都产生了影响。从苹果App Store和《Farmville》以及《魔兽世界》等将社交元素和交互性融入到游戏中的案例,我们很清楚地看到了这种影响。在这篇文章中我们同样也看到了游戏中的社会交互性的重要性,它要求玩家必须与其他玩家进行沟通才能继续进行游戏。同时,我们也看到了当玩家支付一定费用后,他们不需要耗费大量的时间于游戏中也能取得游戏的成功。如今在整个游戏领域有无数的社交游戏和在线社区,它们也都具备有社会交互性,但是却仍然有许多人固执地认为游戏只是一种独立的体验,且对个人社交能力会产生负面的影响。通过整篇文章的描述,作者阐述了社交游戏能够提供给玩家大量的社会交流,帮助玩家结交更多新朋友,并帮助他们不断拓展“现实世界”中的朋友圈。(本文为游戏邦/gamerboom.com编译,如需转载请联系:游戏邦

The positive effects of Social Online Games and Online Communities on the social behavior of their users

Introduction:

Over the past decade the Internet and the World Wide Web in particular have evolved at an astronomical level with its influence having affected almost all forms of our everyday life. The Web is now central to the way in which individuals go about listening to music, watching movies and videos and talking and communicating with friends; people are using the Internet all the time. Like many of these activities, gaming has been significantly enhanced with help from the Internet and has continuously made inroads into the everyday lives of many. The introduction of the internet as a key and integral part of gaming today has also led to a number of online communities being created and has allowed for strong social connections both within and outside of games. This article will argue that social online gaming and social communities such as Farmville and World of Warcraft have had a positive effect on the everyday lives of their users, by looking at the social implications of online social games. I will be displaying my case using a number of scholarly articles and journals that will backup and reinforce the points that I have made, I will also share comment with known experts in the field to get a proper insight and to show as much factual evidence to support my findings. Both Farmville and World of Warcraft are some of the more popular online games today, and both have a large community and user base and are perfect examples of social online games that have a large community based aspect to the overall gameplay.

Gaming and a social life?

The recent rise in online social gaming via a variety of platforms and the creation of online communities with these new platforms can be attributed to the positive effects that gaming has had on the everyday life of its users. There have been many contributors to the rise of social online gaming in particular the worldwide popularity of Apple and the creation of the Apple App Store. The App store has been able to bring casual games into the mainstream and to many people through the iPhone, iPad and iPod products which all utilize the app store and it 200,000+ Applications. Apple’s advertising website claims that “The apple audience has downloaded more than 6.5 billion applications, spends on average, 30 minutes per day using their apps and sets trends and shares with family and friends” (iAd, 2010). Just the sheer number of users of these products and the fact that people that own these products are using them everyday means that online casual games are being brought into the everyday life of consumers. Another thing that has come with the popularity of the app store has been the creation of an online community within it, which allows for users to comment and rate particular games and applications so that other users are able to determine whether it is worth spending money on or not.

This is just one form of an online community, Social Networking websites such as Facebook have also been an important factor in how gaming has continued to work its way into the everyday lives of many. Social networking websites are used by millions of people around the world (Nielsen, 2010) and much like the numerous number of Apple products mentioned, websites like Facebook are used by people every day and therefore provide a perfect host and opportunity to distribute casual games. With Facebook already providing such a strong online community already, it also provides a perfect infrastructure for an online gaming community.

Saul Rivers addresses the negative stigma associated with gaming in one of his articles  “One of the most ancient and common claims against online gaming was directed towards its anti social nature. Internet opponents saw online gaming as the community enemy, which causes people to prefer the solitary act of playing internet games over taking part in more traditional types of social activities such as playing sports games, visiting the local bingo hall, etc” (Rivers, 2007) From this excerpt we can see that generally the negative opinion on gamers is based on gaming effecting peoples social lives negatively, that there is no social side to games and that instead of playing games they could be out socializing with others in the ‘real world’. However, this is not the case, this opinion is generally held by people with insignificant knowledge on the subject and have no real insight into the gaming world.

I believe and agree with a number of new media experts that believe that social gaming can be beneficial to the everyday lives of its users.  The creation of the number of new social online games paired with the creation of a number of online gaming communities has allowed for the formally non-existent social elements to games come to light. Another new media expert Bill Pratt says “The world of online gaming is basically all about community. Gaming has gained such popularity that it could now be considered as practically mandatory. Being great and skilled at playing these video games gives individuals several social benefits. Gaming communities have proven to be powerful, profitable, and at the same time, very fragile. Based on studies and research conducted, gaming has become one of fastest growing in the entertainment sector. It has surpassed the achievements of full-length feature films, revenue-wise. Gaming is truly a social activity and the mere act of playing games has been directly linked in the establishment of relationships as well as social hierarchies throughout history” (Pratt, 2008). As Pratt says games are now one of the most important social tools in the world, they currently make more revenue than any other media form, and will continue to do so in the near future.

Examples of social online games and communities:

One game in particular that demonstrates the social aspect to gaming is FarmVille. As Chris Kohler of Wired.com states “Zynga’s FarmVille, the biggest FaceBook game of all, pulls in more than 75 million players who log in each month to plant, tend and harvest virtual crops, over and over. The attraction is less about the game itself, say players and designers, and more about the social experience: Fields adjacent to your farm belong to family members and friends pulled from your FaceBook profile. You can visit their acreage; help them complete farm chores and exchange gifts of in-game items.” (Kohler, C. 2010) As is pointed out by Kohler, FarmVille utilises the social connections that you have already made through Facebook and allows you to use these social connections to help you during the game. The social interaction that is shown in this game is pretty much the perfect example of how people can strengthen and improve their friendships with others, as well as find new friends. Farmville however is not the first or the only game to use social interaction as a focal point to gameplay design, other games such as RTS and MMORPG such as World of Warcraft also hold social interaction of the highest regard.

MMOs and MMORPGs are also an integral part of how gaming has become part of everyday life in the lives of many. The introduction of MMORPGs the most famous being World of Warcraft have been able to be really successful in drawing in consumers and enthralling them to keep playing and renew their subscription, because it is a paid service this generally makes users try and use it as much as possible and therefore it becomes part of their everyday life. According to Michael Gray of Jostiq.com World of Warcraft now has over 11 million subscribers which proves that people are still subscribing and keeping it alive after 6 years. Like Farmville, World of Warcraft invokes this online community and co-operation atmosphere into its gameplay as well.

Players are able to help each other out to complete quests and other goals within the game, it is sometimes a requirement for players to team up with others due to the different classes and character types within the game. The social interaction within the game also branches out, as players are able to connect with each other through both text and voice messages. Much like in Farmville this allows for new connections with others to be made, and because of the game being online you are able to make new friends with people all over the world, you could be playing in Australia and make friends with someone on the other side of the world in the U.S. This is what many people are missing, believing that there are not any games with these social elements and that most games are purely an individual experience.

Gaming has real life repercussions?

The purpose of gaming has also been brought into question, people that haven’t previously been understand what purpose gaming can possibly have on a person’s everyday life, one of these reasons is the amount of money that can be made through casual gaming. Now that casual games and gamers are more prominent people are now able to realise that real money can be made through casual gaming, a great example is the many add-ons and virtual items contained within game applications which charge to your credit card or iTunes account. The interesting thing about this is that the majority of people that utilise these services are casual gamers not hardcore. Before continuing it would be ideal to explain what exactly the difference is between casual and hardcore gamers Thanate Tan explains it well “Casual gamers: They do not spend much time on playing games and prefer to play simple game rather than complex ones. Hardcore gamers: They spend most of their leisure time on game and are quite dedicated to the cult of video gaming. They are usually quite proficient.” (Tan, 2009). For example in Farmville players are able to pay money to have the computer ‘farm’ for them so that they don’t have to spend hours doing it themselves. Paying for things that can be later found or collected later in a game is also an option in World of Warcraft to give an in-experienced player a faster route or a leg-up so that they can progress faster. What does this have to do with social lives of these gamers you may be asking, by paying these relatively small amounts of money and bypassing playing the game for an extended period, it makes the game both attractive to more casual gamers especially when looking at games that may look daunting to a casual gamer such as your World of Warcraft. It also allows for gamers to spend significantly less time playing the game itself and more time socializing in the ‘real world’ which makes it an attractive option for the narrow minded parent who may not want their child playing games for hours and hours but can understand that by paying a small fee they are able to keep their child happy with the game that they love. This in some ways is the idea of gamification. Gamification is “…about making an activity more fun and engaging. By adding game mechanics to a website or marketing campaign consumers become more invested in a service or product and keep them coming back again and again.”

(Brodie, 2011) in relation to what I was discussing earlier, schools are trying to integrate games with the regular curriculum again as Zicherman describes “Gamification has been used to improve education for sometime now. Schools are integrating more gamified learning structures while some specialty schools have an entire curriculum centered around it.” (Brodie, 2011) with gaming growing into previously narrow-minded school systems we could continue to see gamification carry over into other areas.

We must also look at the leader in the field for casual games that we touched on earlier being the Apple App store, the games that are featured within it are generally only small games that are meant to be played for only small periods of time. However the number of downloads that many of the popular games get is astronomical and despite the small prices for these games they are making the creators a lot of money. iTunes is an online community itself, however like the social games I have already mentioned nearly all games from the app store allow for some online head to head play or co-op, where players are playing against each other in these small casual games over a mobile network.

Conclusion:

To conclude we have looked at and argued as to why social casual games and online communities have had a positive effect on the social lives of gamers. We have seen through the introduction of this new form of gaming, that gamers and games in general have become a far more social experience, which have introduced a new form of gaming to the everyday lives of many. We have seen how this has been done by making games cool once again, through the Apple app store and also through games other games such as Farmville and World of Warcraft which have all incorporated social elements and interaction into their gameplay.  We have also seen that the incorporation of social interaction into these games has been made an integral part of the game, where some parts of the games require social interaction with other players to continue. It was also seen that through a number of paid services, players are able to get ahead in their games without going through hours of gameplay. To conclude there are a number of social games and online communities that have been created and have incorporated social interaction, but do they offset what many choose to believe about gaming being a purely independent experience that has a negative impact on an individual’s social ability, I believe with the significant evidence that I have shown throughout this article I have proven that social online gaming does allow for sufficient social interaction, the ability to make new friends and strengthen and increase current ‘real world’ friendships.(source:networkconference


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