Depression is a common mental health issue in today’s society, unfortunately, mental healthcare is not easily accessible to a large number of people worldwide. Therefore, a lot of researchers have attempted to study the effectiveness of commercial video games in alleviating symptoms of depression as supplementary tools to mental healthcare, not as replacements. Even though some data suggests that there might be an effect, the games used in it are not designed to achieve such a goal, therefore their positive effect is mostly accidental.  This paper argues that in order for a game to help alleviate symptoms of depression, first, it must do a better representation of it. Therefore, it initially analyzes two games that arguably do a better representation of mental health: Celeste(2018) and Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice. Then based on the results and lessons extracted from the analysis, it presents one iteration of a design process of “Break It”, a game currently in development, intended to help those who suffer from depression. It presents the first steps toward a research through design project with the main aim to create a gaming experience that helps those who suffer from depression heal. Another potential benefit of such an experience would be the reduction of social stigma towards depression among players who do not suffer it themselves.

This thesis is exploring a new approach to the little known and conceptually diversified subject of immersion in video games. Immersion is defined here as a complex approach to a state induced by a long term exposure of the player to a video game. In the beginning we explore different approaches to the study of video games and presenting our own basic typology of games. In the next part we present different understandings of the concept of immersion. Empirical part of this thesis explores different elements influencing the level of immersion. On the background of this concept we are also trying to suggest possible forms of player- avatar relationship. The main suggested elements influencing the immersion and creation of player-avatar relationship are game genre specifics, user strategies/motivations towards gaming, in-game story, avatar creation, quality of gameplay and audio-visual quality.

This thesis is exploring a new approach to the little known and conceptually diversified subject of immersion in video games. Immersion is defined here as a complex approach to a state induced by a long term exposure of the player to a video game. In the beginning we explore different approaches to the study of video games and presenting our own basic typology of games. In the next part we present different understandings of the concept of immersion. Empirical part of this thesis explores different elements influencing the level of immersion. On the background of this concept we are also trying to suggest possible forms of player- avatar relationship. The main suggested elements influencing the immersion and creation of player-avatar relationship are game genre specifics, user strategies/motivations towards gaming, in-game story, avatar creation, quality of gameplay and audio-visual quality.

In previous research biological sex and gender are defined as the same thing, which has lead to a misconception of Gender. However, the notion of stereotypes being connected to a sex is inevitable. While this may not be true in each and every game, drastic underrepresentation becomes a problem. It is a self-perpetuating cycle; designing for a target group that is constructed from a stereotype, that stereotype then dictates the norm for the target group and society adapts to fit that norm. This cycle has to break, as people are not stereotypes. Our hypothesis is that a queer perspective could provide a more nuanced spectrum of gender thus making games more inclusive for a broader audience. We will test this by using a queer theoretical approach to discourse analysis of segments from the game: Dragon Age: Origins ™ (2009). We chose this game for the chance to explore the possibilities for self-expression and sexuality in an environment which allows a more complex relationship between characters.

The aim of this study review is to seek knowledge about how computer games affect students' motivation and vocabulary in English teaching. This paper will also examine the challenges that may occur when including games in education. The choice of game genre is based on Vygotsky's sociocultural theory, which states that learning occurs in social interactions. Using language in order to learn and communicate with others is emphasized in the theory. In order to obtain scientific articles that were of interest to the purpose and questions of the study, several different databases have been used. The studies that have been used are both national and international studies, which have led to a broader perspective in the results of this study. The results of the study show that computer games develop students' vocabulary where they are given the opportunity to both use their abilities and develop them. The students also get the opportunity to interact with other players where they can speak English freely while remaining anonymous. As games increase students' motivation for language learning, teaching becomes more meaningful. Furthermore, the results show that games also develop problems such as gambling addiction and sometimes even aggressive behavior depending on the game's gratification system.

Democratic theorists argue that democratic institutions thrive when the citizens of the society robustly participate in governance (Galston, 2004; Barber, 2001). A traditional indicator of democratic participation is voting in elections or referendums. However, democratic apologetics posit that humans need to be trained in democratic processes in order to be democratic citizens (Dewey, 1916; Gutmann, 1990; Sehr, 1997; Goodlad, 2001). Citizens need to know not only the protocol of participation, they also need to be trained in the processes of mind (Dewey, 1916; 1927). Educational systems in this country have been the traditional place where democratic training has been vested (Spring, 2001). It seems, though, that the methods that educators are using to train young people fail to meet this challenge as voting rates among the youngest citizens (under 30) have never been higher than slightly more than half of eligible voters in the age group. To remedy this situation, Congress and several private civic-education organizations have called for changing curricular approaches to engage more youth. One such method that may hold promise is the use of video game technology. The current generation of youth has grown up in a digital world where they have been labeled "Digital Natives" (Prensky, 2001a). They are "tech savvy" and comfortable with their lives being integrated with various forms of digital technology. Significantly, industry research suggests that over 90% of "Digital Natives" have played a video game in the last 30 days, and business is booming to the level that video games pulled in more money than the movie industry did in 2008 (ESA, 2009). As early as the 1970s, educational researchers have looked at the use of video game technology to engage student learning; however, this research has been limited at best. More recently, educational scholars such as James Gee (2003; 2007) and Kurt Squire (2002; iii 2003; 2006) have sought to make the academic conversation more mature with regard to using video games as a classroom supplement. This study continues that conversation by using quantitative methods to investigate whether or not different groups of middle school students self-report a greater propensity to be civically engaged as a result of civic-themed video gameplay. The investigator collected data from middle school students who were given access to civic-themed video games to see if there were statistically significant differences in self-reported civic-engagement scores as a result of gameplay. This investigation was conducted at a large, urban middle school in the Southeast region of the United States.

No / Digital content is increasingly pervasive. Communication technologies enable the creation and dissemination of content on a transnational basis. However, the relationship between communication technology and society is complex and is impacted both by the requirements of the communicator and also cultural and social norms associated with the context of the user. How does digital technology influence media communication? How far does media communication transcend technology? The boundaries between the various forms of formal communication and social communication are blurring and the user is no longer just a consumer or someone who interacts with information; they are also a creator of new information. Companies with commercial interests in these areas are seeking to exploit new forms of communication without alienating the user.

No / Firstly, the methodology for characters development in computer games was analyzed from both aspects of art-sourced character development and story-sourced character development separately from the different views of various research fields. In the second section, four different techniques relating to character design and the creation of emotion has been deeply discussed. At the end, the four diverse designs for character OEDIPUS were given according to the plot development based on the background of tragical fable of the ancient Greece.

Although the effects of violent video games on aggression in users have been researched extensively and the resulting body of research shows that violent video games can increase aggressive behaviors, aggression-related feelings and thoughts, and physiological arousal, no empirical studies to date have examined whether there are similar and parallel effects of verbal aggression (e.g., profanity) in video game content. A 2 X 2 between-subjects factorial experiment (N = 321) tested the effects of profanity used by protagonists (protagonist profanity present versus absent) and antagonists (antagonist profanity present versus absent) on users' hostile expectations, accessibility of aggressive thoughts, aggressive feelings, perceived arousal, use of profanity, enjoyment, presence, and perceived performance while taking into account the potential moderating role of gender and controlling for several individual difference variables. The study's factors were manipulated via the creation of four versions of an original three-dimensional "first-person shooter" video game. Profanity used by both protagonist and antagonist characters was found to have significant effects on players' hostile expectations, an important higher-order aggressive outcome that is the most direct precursor to aggressive behaviors in the process described by the general aggression model. There was limited evidence for effects of profanity in game content on players' accessibility of aggressive thoughts, aggressive feelings, and perceived arousal. Additionally, profanity had little impact on how much players used profanity themselves, how much they enjoyed the game, feelings of presence, and how they rated their performance in the game. These trends were consistent across a range of demographic, personality, and video game experience dimensions that were measured, even though several of these individual difference variables were found to be related to some outcome variables and to each other. Therefore, while this study's findings did not necessarily indicate imitative modeling of profanity, they point to the possibility of more general effects regarding aggressive outcomes. This study's findings emphasize the need for future research investigating the effects of profanity in video games and other media. / Ph. D.

Yes / Despite great strides in past years are being made to generate motions of elastic materials such as cloth and biological skin in virtual world, unfortunately, the computational cost of realistic high-resolution simulations currently precludes their use in interactive applications. Thin elastic materials such as cloth and biological skin often exhibit complex nonlinear elastic behaviors. However, modeling elastic nonlinearity can be computationally expensive and numerically unstable, imposing significant challenges for their use in interactive applications. This paper presents a novel simulation framework for simulating realistic material behaviors with interactive frame rate. Central to the framework is the use of a constraint-based multi-resolution solver for efficient and robust modeling of the material nonlinearity. We extend a strain-limiting method to work on deformation gradients of triangulated surface models in three-dimensional space with a novel data structure. The simulation framework utilizes an iterative nonlinear Gauss–Seidel procedure and a multilevel hierarchy structure to achieve computational speedups. As material nonlinearity are generated by enforcing strain-limiting constraints at a multilevel hierarchy, our simulation system can rapidly accelerate the convergence of the large constraint system with simultaneous enforcement of boundary conditions. The simplicity and efficiency of the framework makes simulations of highly realistic thin elastic materials substantially fast and is applicable of simulations for interactive applications. / Publisher embargo ended 5th Jun 2016