This research investigates the responses of three individuals engaging with the Super Mario World (SMW) platform videogame glitches, and how they learned to solve the problem without formal help. This investigation was chosen because it explores connections between media literacy, critical thinking, and play in adults in the context of responding to unexpected technological errors. At the core of this study is the question of how encounters with arbitrary glitches can motivate and elicit critical thinking. Following a case study model, data were collected as the three subjects played SMW and encountered glitches. Questions regarding the (glitchy) game play experience were addressed in the first interview immediately following. The subjects were asked to create a visual essay and keep personal journals, which were gathered after 30 days, and a second interview at that time focused on the overall experience. Several results emerged from the data. Each of the subjects identified and solved for glitches in a way that suggested critical thinking processes. In addition, they all reflected in various ways on the challenges that glitches presented, making connections to larger issues and their everyday lives. The data also showed the importance of memory in these processes. The results suggest that while subjects approached and solved a technological glitch in SMW game play, they simultaneously acquired, developed, and—at least for the duration of the study—sustained new literacy skills and expanded their proficiency with critical thinking. This holds some potential implications for the value of incorporating glitch experiences both inside and outside the classroom, suggesting that videogame play—and particularly glitches in play—can be considered valuable opportunities for learners and teachers alike.

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Studies exploring the first wave of digital performance foregrounded technology by cataloging experimentation and novel interactions between liveness, projections and code. As exercises in medium, these high tech spectacles demonstrate the aesthetic potential of digital media while introducing key media concepts. Jennifer Haley is a writer with one foot in theatre and one in code. She is uniquely positioned in two interdependent spheres, which makes her particularly suited to engineer a theatrical bridge into the virtual, because at the heart of the contemporary technological revolution is a new level of writing and media literacy. Theatre has been effectively accessing the virtual imagination for millennia, and new technologies create new intricacies for engaging the virtual within theatrical space. Each is a medium defined by action, which host other media, and provide in depth simulations. Haley’s plays push beyond the fascination and spectacle of technology to incorporate the mundane reality of the digital into the structure of her work. Haley writes plays specifically to resonate with the similarities she sees between theatre and virtual worlds. Utilizing techniques and tropes from other media and then framing the narrative from within a theatrical world Haley exploits the essence of an active, critical audience and opens a dialog between virtual worlds and the perceptions of the audience. She treats her media generated worlds as places. Other digital theatre plays may peer through a window into the virtual by dramatizing a conversation through media; Haley sends an expedition over the threshold into another world. A flesh version of an avatar breathing before the audience establishes a material existence unattainable in two dimensional screen media. Haley illuminates the constructed nature of mediatized communication, but she does it dramaturgically deemphasizing the technology and re-centering the human within the virtual drama. Her approach builds a metaphorical bridge between theatre and virtual digital realities. Through a close reading of Haley’s plays I will demonstrate how Haley takes the artistic next step for computer technology and theatre.

This thesis presents the playthrough evaluation framework, a novel framework for the reliable usability evaluation of first-person shooter console video games. The framework includes playthrough evaluation, a structured usability evaluation method adapted from heuristic evaluation. Usability evaluation can help guide developers by pointing out design issues that cause users problems. However, usability evaluation methods suffer from the evaluator effect, where separate evaluations of the same data do not produce reliably consistent results. This can result in a number of undesirable consequences affecting issues such as: • Unreliable evaluation: Without reliable results, evaluation reports risk giving incorrect or misleading advice. • Weak methodological validation: Typically new methods (e.g., new heuristics) are validated against user tests. However, without a reliable means to describe observations, attempts to validate novel methods against user test data will also be affected by weak reliability. The playthrough evaluation framework addresses these points through a series of studies presenting the need for, and showing the development of the framework, including the following stages, 1. Explication of poor reliability in heuristic evaluation. 2. Development and validation of a reliable user test coding scheme. 3. Derivation of a novel usability evaluation method, playthrough evaluation. 4. Testing the method, quantifying results. Evaluations were conducted with 22 participants, on 3 first-person shooter action console video games, using two methodologies, heuristic evaluation and the novel playthrough evaluation developed in this thesis. Both methods proved effective, with playthrough evaluation providing more detailed analysis but requiring more time to conduct.

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Video gaming has always been a blooming industry. With the emergence of online multi- player video games , this industry’s worth have sky rocketed. Online multiplayer video games store data of player’s credentials, in-game progress, in-game virtual assets and payment details etc. Which mean security threats to these systems are nothing new and securing these games have always meant to protect player’s data from unauthorized breach. Integration of Blockchain technology in online multiplayer video games apart from other amazing features, provides a way to prove digital ownership of virtual assets with their verifiable scarcity. Trade of these in-game virtual assets have always been a goal for online multiplayer gaming companies, but there was none enough trust-able infrastructure available which can be relied on. Blockchain just solved that problem. It provided a platform for these asset’s secure and transparent transaction between players. Topic for our research not only consider the security challenges in online games but specifi- cally blockchain based online multiplayer games. This adaptation is still new and there is need of consideration of new security challenges. In this dissertation we try to bring out some important challenges related to security of blockchain based online multiplayer video games. There are currently no studies around security concerns and challenges of the integration of the online multiplayer video games in the emerging blockchain systems. In order to fill in the gap, this dissertation discusses and identifies two main security concerning questions related to this domain. Also this dissertation provides basic steps for expanding future research and application in this joint domain.

Usando o quadro teórico de diversas disciplinas, como a Semiótica Francesa (GREIMAS; FONTANILLE, 1991; ZILBERBERG; FONTANILLE, 2001; FONTANILLE, 2011; ZILBERBERG, 2011), a Ludologia (SALEN; ZIMMERMAN, 2004; JUUL, 2005; RANHEL, 2009) e os Estudos de Mídia (MURRAY, 1995; SANTAELLA, 2004), esta dissertação tem por objetivo analisar a relação complexa entre a estrutura procedural (as regras e possibilidades) e o enredo no jogo Final Fantasy XIII; a organização narrativa da paixão \"vingança\" foi escolhida como objeto principal de nossa análise devido a sua estruturação complexa e sua popularidade na cultura ocidental. Essa relação concerne muito mais a uma experiência do que a uma contemplação, tendo em vista que o jogador não meramente observa o que personagens vivem e fazem, mas tem uma experiência de vivenciar de fato o conteúdo narrativo ao engajar-se em uma atividade estruturada de modo procedural; cada atributo procedural tem aspecto e ritmo particulares, os quais moldam a experiência e, por extensão, a história contada. Para conferir a maior clareza possível a esta análise, dividimos a dissertação em quatro capítulos, os quais abordam o problema sob pontos de vista diferentes porém complementares. No primeiro, o conceito de \"jogo\" será discutido de modo a evitar especulação, senso comum e interpretação errônea das ideias aqui presentes; com a ajuda da Semiótica Francesa, no segundo capítulo analisaremos mais profundamente os resultados do Capítulo 1, e, ao fazê-lo, chegaremos a uma definição Semiótica do ato de jogar; o terceiro capítulo será dedicado a uma visão geral da relação complexa entre enredo e jogo títulos como Super Metroid, Resident Evil e Silent Hill serão comparados; por fim, no Capítulo 4 usaremos os resultados obtidos nos capítulos anteriores para analisar Final Fantasy XIII e sua organização da vingança. / Based on the theoretical framework of a number of disciplines such as French Semiotics (GREIMAS; FONTANILLE, 1991; ZILBERBERG; FONTANILLE, 2001; FONTANILLE, 2011; ZILBERBERG. 2011), Ludology (SALEN; ZIMMERMAN, 2004; JUUL, 2005; RANHEL, 2009) and Media Studies (MURRAY, 1995; SANTAELLA, 2004), this thesis aims to analyze the complex relation between procedural structure (the rules and possibilities) and storytelling in the game Final Fantasy XIII; the narrative organization of the passion \'vengeance\' has been chosen as the main subject of our analysis due to its complexity and popularity in Western culture. This relation is one of experience rather than portrayal, since the player does not simply learn about what the characters do and live, but has an actual experience of living the narrative content by engaging in a procedurally structured activity; each procedural feature has a particular aspect and rhythm which shapes the experience and, by extension, the story itself. To make this analysis as clear as possible, this thesis has been divided in four chapters, each tackling the problem from different but complementary angles. In the first one, the concept of \'game\' will be discussed to avoid common sense speculation and misinterpreting of the ideas presented herein; with the aid of French Semiotics, in the second chapter we analyze the results of Chapter One more thoroughly and, by doing so, we arrive at a semiotic definition of gaming; the third chapter features an overview of the complex relation between storytelling and gaming titles such as Super Metroid, Resident Evil and Silent Hill are compared therein; finally, in Chapter Four we use the results of the previous chapters to analyze Final Fantasy XIII and its organization of vengeance.

Although the link between violent video games and aggressive behavior has received extensive coverage, there is growing evidence that prosocial video games can exert a positive influence as well. However, whether these effects generalize to costlier prosocial behaviors that help more distant recipients remains unclear. Here I propose an experimental study to examine whether prosocial video games can influence charitable donation behavior. College students will be randomly assigned to play 45 min of either a prosocial video game (Lemmings) or neutral video game (Tetris), followed by a 10 min filler task (mental calculation). Participants will then be asked to complete a payment form, indicating if they want to donate a portion of their experimental participation payment to a local nonprofit organization. Based on previous research, we predict that there will be a main effect of gender, with female participants more likely to donate than males. Additionally, we hypothesize a main effect of video game, where participants who play the prosocial video game will be likelier to donate than those who play the neutral game. If confirmed, these results would extend the existing literature on prosocial video games beyond informal face-to-face helping behaviors, potentially providing a psychological mechanism for costlier needs such as charitable appeals.

This paper is about locating the meaning of a series of games known as the Dark Souls series in relation to contemporary social conditions in Japan. I argue that the game should be thought of as an emblem of the current cultural zeitgeist, in a similar way one might identify something like Jack Kerouac's The Dharma Bums as an emblem of the counter cultural 60s. I argue that the Dark Souls series expresses in allegorical form an anxiety about living in a time where the meaning of our everyday actions and even society itself has become significantly destabilized. It does this through a fractured approach to story-telling, that is interspersed with Buddhist metaphysics and wrapped up in macabre, gothic aesthetic depicting the last gasping breath of a once great kingdom. This expression of contemporary social anxiety is connected to the discourse of postmodernity in Japan. Through looking at these games as a feedback loop between text, environment and ludic system, I connect the main conceptual motifs that structure the games as a whole with Osawa Masachi's concept of the post-fictional era and Hiroki Azuma's definition of the otaku.

Video games are an everyday experience for adolescents and have changed how adolescents interact with one another. Prior research has focused on positive and negative aspects of video game play in general, without distinguishing Voice Over Internet Protocol (VOIPing) as the mode of play. Grounded in entertainment theory, motivational theory, and psychological distress theory, this cross-sectional, correlational study examined the relationship between VOIPing and quality of life (Pediatric Quality of Life Inventory), Yee's motivation to play video games, and resilience (Child and Youth Resilience Measure). A series of linear regression and multivariate canonical correlation models analyzed self-report responses of 103 adolescents aged 13 to18. Results indicated that VOIPing was not statistically related to quality of life or resilience. However, VOIPing correlated positively with motivation to play video games, particularly with the subscales of socialization and relationships. Canonical analysis of motivation for gaming and quality of life indicated that adolescents with high scores on customization and escapism motivation for gaming subscales tended to also have high scores on each of the emotional, social, and school quality of life subscales. Canonical analysis of motivation for gaming and resilience indicated that adolescents with low scores on the escapism motivation for gaming subscale tended to also have high scores on the individual, relationships, and community resilience subscales. The positive aspects of VOIPing, particularly with increased motivation to play video games, can be effectively used in coaching adolescents in social skills and relationship building.