Videogame cities are 'real-and-imagined' spaces whose ubiquity as a setting for games illustrates the persistent fascination with the opportunities for play in urban space. In order to describe these videogame cities, we need a framework that considers them as they relate not only to one another, but to other material and immaterial cities as well. Cities, according to landscape architect Douglas Allen, have a constitutional order that describes their structure and a representational order that fills this space with activity. While these concepts are useful for thinking about the way space organizes and afford certain activities, I pose that the addition of an experiential order better addresses the 'specificity' that makes each real-and-imagined city unique. The experience of these videogame cities primarily emerges from the movement of the player as they are embodied as something acting in the space. The videogame city in motion brings to life the 'spaces of flows' - sequences of exchange and interaction ﾖ that sociologist Manuel Castells argues characterize the city in the information/computer age. Thus, not only do videogame cities draw on existing architecture, narratives, and mediations, they exhibit the traits of networked cities in their coordinated processes. By looking at the history of the development of the open-world city, its architectural organization, visual representations, algorithmic infrastructures, and how players traverse space, it is possible to paint a picture of what kinds of places these videogame cities are and how they allow us to reflect on urban form.

Technology such as television, computers, and video games are often in the line for reasons of why people lack physical activity and tend to gain weight and become obese. In the case of video games, with the advent of the so called “serious games initiative”, a new breed of video games have come into place. Such games are called “exergames” and they are intended to motivate the user to do physical activity. Although there is some evidence that some types of Exergames are more physically demanding than traditional sedentary games, there is also evidence that suggests that such games are not really providing the intensity of exert that is at the recommended levels for a daily exercise. Currently, most exergames have a passive approach. There is no real tracking of the players progress, there is no assessment of his/her level of exert, no contextual information, and there is no adaptability on the game itself to change the conditions of the game and prompt the desired physiological response on the player. In this thesis we present research work done towards the design and development of an architecture and related systems that support a shift in the exertion game paradigm. The contributions of this work are enablers in the design and development of exertion games with a strict serious game approach. Such games should have “exercising” as the primary goal, and a game engine that has been developed under this scheme should be aware of the exertion context of the player. The game should be aware of the level of exertion of the player and adapt the gaming context (in-game variables and exertion interface settings) so that the player can reach a predefined exertion rate as desired. To support such degree of adaptability in a multimedia, multimodal system, we have proposed a system architecture that lays down the general guidelines for the design and development of such systems.

Made available in DSpace on 2015-05-14T12:47:20Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 arquivototal.pdf: 2584404 bytes, checksum: e2a2c7e618dacf471fe8d3d19b90ed2d (MD5) Previous issue date: 2011-02-15 / Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior - CAPES / Due to the development of computer technology and its presence in the daily routine of professionals and students, more resources have emerged with the aim of providing an efficient way to transmit and enhance knowledge in all fields of science. In medical and therapeutic offices, is commonplace to note the existence of computer tools such as visualization applications, games and simulators that enable therapeutic methods based on information technologies and communication. Due to the fact that Speech Pathology is a profession in constant development, this study proposes describing and demonstrating the importance of using technology in speech-language therapies. Thus, it was necessary to conduct a field survey for lifting the profile of professionals of speech pathology on the use of technology in their clinical practice as well as a literature search on existing applications in general healthcare and in speech therapy. Later, it was proposed the building of an application to support rehabilitation processes. It was noticed that there is need for research directed to the field of Speech-therapy concerning to the use of assistive technology for speech-language therapies. Although there are specific computer programs for rehabilitation, little is known about the evaluation and validation of these software in scientific literature. It was developed a game as a way to assist in the treatment of atypical swallowing. The game, called MOtrilha, can support therapeutic techniques for the correction of atypical swallowing. It is one more tool to help professionals and to motivate patients. / Em virtude do desenvolvimento da tecnologia computacional e sua presença no dia-adia de profissionais e estudantes, mais recursos tem surgido com o objetivo de proporcionar uma forma eficaz de transmitir e aprimorar conhecimentos em todas as áreas das ciências. Nos consultórios médicos e terapêuticos, é comum observar a existência de ferramentas computacionais como aplicativos de visualização, jogos e simuladores que possibilitam métodos terapêuticos baseados em tecnologias da informação e comunicação. Sendo a Fonoaudiologia uma profissão em constante desenvolvimento, o presente estudo propõe-se a descrever e apresentar o uso de tecnologias em terapiasfonoaudiológicas. Para tanto, foi necessária a realização de uma pesquisa de campo para o levantamento do perfil de fonoaudiólogos quanto à utilização de tecnologias na sua prática clinica, assim como uma pesquisa bibliográfica sobre os aplicativos existentes na área da saúde em geral e em Fonoaudiologia. Posteriormente, foi proposta a construção de um aplicativo para o auxílio à reabilitação fonoaudiológica. Percebeu-se que há necessidade de pesquisas direcionadas ao campo da Fonoaudiologia concernentes ao uso de tecnologias de apoio a terapias fonoaudiológicas pois, embora existam programas computacionais específicos para a reabilitação, pouco se sabe a respeito da avaliação e validação dos mesmos respaldados na literatura científica. Foi realizada a construção do jogo MOtrilha como forma de auxiliar nos tratamentos de Deglutição Atípica. O jogo visa contribuir na facilitação e melhor aproveitamento das técnicas terapêuticas para a correção da Deglutição Atípica, sendo uma ferramenta a mais para o auxílio do profissional e motivação dos pacientes.

A motivação é um conceito poderoso e que pode ter grandes influências, positivas ou negativas, no aprendizado de alunos. Todavia, encontrar nas mais variadas salas de aula alunos que se encontram desmotivados com a experiência de aprendizado é uma ocorrência comum, que pode estar associada a fatores das mais diferentes origens. Dentre estas, nos atemos aqui a explorar o foco tradicional das escolas em aulas expositivas com cópia mecânica de conteúdo, uma prática que é frequentemente apontada por pesquisadores por seu impacto indesejável na motivação dos alunos. Fato que se deve a sua grande distância do paradigma das tecnologias digitais, familiar à atual geração de estudantes e parte constante de seus cotidianos. Consequentemente, por entendermos que a integração adequada dessas tecnologias sala de aula possui alto potencial para motivar os alunos, proporcionando-lhes maior envolvimento com o conteúdo e as atividades propostas para ele, buscamos trazer para mais perto da sala de aula uma tecnologia digital com alto grau natural de interação e envolvimento: a tecnologia dos videogames. Dentro deste contexto, descrevemos e avaliamos neste trabalho uma abordagem para o desenvolvimento de um jogo educacional (Serious Game) centrado nos personagens míticos do Folclore Brasileiro, a fim de apresentar estes seres e suas histórias aos alunos. Aumentando seu conhecimento e sua valorização por um tema da cultura nacional que é normalmente negligenciado. Para tanto, construímos um ambiente de jogo que mescla modelos e heurísticas motivacionais ao seu próprio processo de desenvolvimento. O que proporciona aos alunos um ambiente atrativo, capaz de mantê-los atentos e envolvidos à medida que os direciona a exploração de um mundo de jogo que os ensina um conteúdo que, de acordo com professores das turmas de testagem de nossa pesquisa, carecem de material didático de qualquer tipo. / Motivation is a powerful concept, greatly capable of influencing, in a positive or negative manner, the ways of students’ learning. However, to find through the most different classrooms students who are unmotivated with their learning experience is far from uncommon. The reasons for this and its origins are very numerous, but we attain ourselves here to approaching the traditional focus schools place on the use of lectures with the mechanical copy of its contents by students. A practice often pointed by researches for its unwanted impact on the motivation of students due to its distance from the paradigm of digital technologies, which is so familiar to the present generation of students and, a constant part of their daily lives. Consequently, as we understand that the proper integration of these technologies to classrooms has great potential in motivating students – for allowing higher levels of involvement with the subject and its tasks –; we intend to bring classrooms closer to a technology with inherent high levels of interactions and engagement: the videogames. Within this context, we describe and assess in this work an approach to develop educational games ( Serious Games) centered on the mythical characters of Brazilian folklore, as a way to disclose these beings and their tales to students. Enhancing their knowledge and valuing for a theme of national culture that is often neglected. For that, we built a game environment that mixes motivational heuristics and models to its own development process. In turn, this gives students an attractive environment, able to keep them aware and involved at the same time that directs their exploring of a game world that, according to the teachers of the testing groups of this research, lacks all sorts of teaching materials.

This thesis studies knowledge processes which span organisational boundaries, examining how knowledge is formed and shared between two companies with divergent interests, facing the challenges of innovation processes. Cross-boundary work provides access to diverse sources of knowledge, specialties and approaches, and this enhances the innovative performance of firms. However, managing knowledge and spanning diverse boundaries has proven to be difficult. While the epistemic and social challenges have been identified to trigger conflicts and misunderstandings across boundaries, the complexity, inter-dependency and uncertainty of innovation processes have been found to multiply these challenges. Informed by the practice-based perspective, this thesis examines how the challenges of integrating knowledge in such a context are addressed and resolved. Building upon this theoretical perspective, the thesis aims to enhance understandings of knowledge processes between the large bureaucratic organisations (publishers) and small/medium-sized companies (developers) in the videogames industry. Underpinned by a social constructionist and interpretivist methodology, a qualitative study of three publisher-developer relationships was conducted. With thirty six semi-structured interviews with senior directors, managers and team leaders, the thesis examined cross- boundary practices and the conflicts experienced in this process. In order to achieve this, the study focused on the role that boundary objects, trust development and power structures played in facilitating knowledge processes. The thesis recognises the evolving and relational character of boundary objects, highlighting that a combination of static and dynamic boundary objects were effective in facilitating knowledge integration in the publisher-developer relationship. It also reveals that despite high levels of distrust between the parties involved, they managed to create and maintain a working relationship by resorting to opportunistic practices, such as knowledge hiding, deception and collusion. It is emphasised that understanding the power dynamics in the publisher-developer relationship is a pre-requisite to explaining 2 how knowledge is managed across organisational boundaries during the course of a project. Drawing upon a Foucauldian perspective, the thesis identifies the positive and enabling aspects of power dynamics in this relationship. It argues that when the parties have discrepancies, competition and high levels of distrust, power games positively influence cross-boundary practices, the use of boundary objects and knowledge processes, ultimately mobilising knowledge integration. The thesis makes four significant contributions to the knowledge management and cross-boundary work literature. First, it identifies an evolving role for boundary objects, showing how they develop during the course of a project. Second, it finds a relational and politicised dimension for boundary objects, highlighting the role of brokers to manipulate and mobilise the use and effectiveness of these objects. Third, the thesis extends the existing literature by revealing that despite high levels of distrust, parties can create a working relationship. The research shows that this is achieved through resorting to opportunistic behaviour, such as knowledge hiding, deception and collusion. As a result, this thesis adds a complementary level to Carlile's Integrated Framework, explaining that when there are high levels of differences, dependencies and novelty in the cross-boundary work, knowledge hiding, deception and collusion are the driving force to facilitate knowledge integration and maintain a functional relationship. The fourth contribution of this thesis is recognising the positive and productive aspects of power dynamics that enable and mobilise boundary objects and knowledge processes, ultimately bringing positive outcomes and creating a functional relationship between two companies with divergent interests.

The main topic is centered around videogame journalism and the way in which game reviewers look at videogames. The defining question is whether videogame journalists treat videogames as cultural or technical products thorough their work. The role and position of videogame journalism, games as art and aesthetics aspects of videogames are first studied in the theoretical section. These topics are further examined in practice using content analysis of chosen reviews which aims to investigate the means through which reviewers describe videogames in previously theoretically defined categories.

A motivação é um conceito poderoso e que pode ter grandes influências, positivas ou negativas, no aprendizado de alunos. Todavia, encontrar nas mais variadas salas de aula alunos que se encontram desmotivados com a experiência de aprendizado é uma ocorrência comum, que pode estar associada a fatores das mais diferentes origens. Dentre estas, nos atemos aqui a explorar o foco tradicional das escolas em aulas expositivas com cópia mecânica de conteúdo, uma prática que é frequentemente apontada por pesquisadores por seu impacto indesejável na motivação dos alunos. Fato que se deve a sua grande distância do paradigma das tecnologias digitais, familiar à atual geração de estudantes e parte constante de seus cotidianos. Consequentemente, por entendermos que a integração adequada dessas tecnologias sala de aula possui alto potencial para motivar os alunos, proporcionando-lhes maior envolvimento com o conteúdo e as atividades propostas para ele, buscamos trazer para mais perto da sala de aula uma tecnologia digital com alto grau natural de interação e envolvimento: a tecnologia dos videogames. Dentro deste contexto, descrevemos e avaliamos neste trabalho uma abordagem para o desenvolvimento de um jogo educacional (Serious Game) centrado nos personagens míticos do Folclore Brasileiro, a fim de apresentar estes seres e suas histórias aos alunos. Aumentando seu conhecimento e sua valorização por um tema da cultura nacional que é normalmente negligenciado. Para tanto, construímos um ambiente de jogo que mescla modelos e heurísticas motivacionais ao seu próprio processo de desenvolvimento. O que proporciona aos alunos um ambiente atrativo, capaz de mantê-los atentos e envolvidos à medida que os direciona a exploração de um mundo de jogo que os ensina um conteúdo que, de acordo com professores das turmas de testagem de nossa pesquisa, carecem de material didático de qualquer tipo. / Motivation is a powerful concept, greatly capable of influencing, in a positive or negative manner, the ways of students’ learning. However, to find through the most different classrooms students who are unmotivated with their learning experience is far from uncommon. The reasons for this and its origins are very numerous, but we attain ourselves here to approaching the traditional focus schools place on the use of lectures with the mechanical copy of its contents by students. A practice often pointed by researches for its unwanted impact on the motivation of students due to its distance from the paradigm of digital technologies, which is so familiar to the present generation of students and, a constant part of their daily lives. Consequently, as we understand that the proper integration of these technologies to classrooms has great potential in motivating students – for allowing higher levels of involvement with the subject and its tasks –; we intend to bring classrooms closer to a technology with inherent high levels of interactions and engagement: the videogames. Within this context, we describe and assess in this work an approach to develop educational games ( Serious Games) centered on the mythical characters of Brazilian folklore, as a way to disclose these beings and their tales to students. Enhancing their knowledge and valuing for a theme of national culture that is often neglected. For that, we built a game environment that mixes motivational heuristics and models to its own development process. In turn, this gives students an attractive environment, able to keep them aware and involved at the same time that directs their exploring of a game world that, according to the teachers of the testing groups of this research, lacks all sorts of teaching materials.

Made available in DSpace on 2016-02-05T18:30:00Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 0 Previous issue date: 2015-10-29. Added 1 bitstream(s) on 2016-02-05T18:34:06Z : No. of bitstreams: 1 000857427.pdf: 964299 bytes, checksum: a51df913dd8c220e7f59657ecf0ba700 (MD5) / Com o aumento da população idosa, no Brasil, também podemos notar um aumento da expectativa de vida e a atenção à assistência à mesma, mais especificamente ao envelhecimento, o qual é caracterizado pelas reduções das funções do corpo gerando um desequilíbrio postural e quedas. A partir disso existem estudos demonstrando que os jogos eletrônicos, mais especificamente o Nintendo Wii, devido realizar uma interação física entre os jogadores realizando movimentos corporais acompanhando a imagem na tela, pode contribuir para uma melhora da postura física dos idosos e consequentemente, melhorar o equilíbrio. Um outro meio que visa promover uma prevenção às quedas é o Yoga, uma técnica milenar que visa proporcionar aos seus adeptos equilíbrio físico, mental e espiritual podendo também interferir no equilíbrio postural. O objetivo do estudo foi observar os resultados do treinamento com jogos e o Yoga no equilíbrio de idosos caidores. Foram avaliados 20 idosos com histórico de quedas, que realizaram os treinamentos durante 4 meses divididos em Grupo Yoga, constituído de 10 idosos, que realizaram a prática por um profissional 1 vez por semana com duração de 1 hora e Grupo Wii, constituído por 10 idosos, o qual realizou a prática 2 vezes por semana, com duração de 30 minutos cada sessão. A mobilidade foi avaliada pelo teste Timed and Up and Go (TUG). O medo de cair foi avaliado pelo FES-I. Foram adotados testes estatísticos apropriados para a comparação inter e intra-grupo antes e após o treinamento, com p ≤0,05. Após as coletas de dados foi observado que o Nintendo Wii surtiu um efeito maior em relação ao Yoga no quesito equilíbrio e medo de quedas, porém no âmbito subjetivo como: melhora do sono, maior disposição para as atividades diárias, redução da depressão, as duas técnicas utilizadas surtiram efeito positivo / With the increasing elderly population in Brazil, we can also notice an increase in life expectancy and attention to assisting them more specifically to aging, which is characterized by reductions in body functions generating a postural imbalance and falls. From this there are studies showing that video games, specifically the Nintendo Wii due conduct a physical interaction between players performing body movements accompanying the image on the screen, can contribute to an improvement of the physical posture of older people and thus improve balance . Another way that aims to promote prevention of falls is the Yoga, an ancient technique that aims to provide its supporters physical balance, mental and spiritual, and can also interfere with postural balance. The aim of the study was to observe the results with the training games and Yoga in the balance of fallers. They evaluated 20 elderly patients with a history of falls, which carried out the training for four months divided into Group Yoga, consisting of 10 elderly, who carried out the practice by a professional 1 to week lasting 1 hour and Wii Group, made up of 10 elderly which relizou practice two times a week, lasting 30 minutes each session. Mobility was evaluated by the test and Timed Up and Go (TUG). Fear of falling was assessed by the FES-I. Appropriate statistical tests were adopted to compare inter- and intra-group before and after training, with p ≤0,05. After the data collection was observed that the Nintendo Wii has had a greater effect in relation to Yoga balance Question and fear of falling, but in the subjective sphere as improved sleep, greater willingness for daily activities, reducing depression, the two techniques have heightened positive effect

This thesis explores a specific form of fan-content creation namely videogame modding. The goal is to explore and compare these forms of content and its communities which are present around selected videogames: The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim and Cities: Skylines. The theoretical part of this thesis firstly describes media audiences and their functions in contemporary new media environment. Concern is then shifted to problematic of fandom and fan-content production. Theme of the next part is mainly modding itself, its essence is then described, various aspects of modding research are presented and modding communities and aspects of their functions are introduced. The analytic part firstly describes selected videogames and their mechanics. Later, thesis explores the forms of modifications and corresponding communities, for both games, while also concerned with feedback of other players presented in discussions. It has come to light, that this particular type of fan-content is in general very diverse and very popullar among other players, while, for both games, approach to modifications by gamers and developers is in some aspects slightly different.

"Royalty Free" is a video game that looks like a gallery, containing a curated selection of custom plant objects made by fans of The Sims franchise. By exploring the visual style and social-technical activities of players outside the game, it both appreciates and speculates about the potential future of 3D computer graphics as an expressive medium.