Jesper Juul – Interactive Digital Narratives

Training Noobz into Hardcore Gamers

This game log is the final log for Knights of Pen and Paper. As such, I am required to have found research on the game. It should be noted, for example, that Knights of Pen and Paper is playable on the PC (Personal Computer), a fact that was unknown to me. However, Knights of Pen … Continue reading Training Noobz into Hardcore Gamers →

This game log is the final log for Knights of Pen and Paper. As such, I am required to have found research on the game. It should be noted, for example, that Knights of Pen and Paper is playable on the PC (Personal Computer), a fact that was unknown to me. However, Knights of Pen and Paper has not attracted the critical eye of the academic. This log will analyze the game through a casual-academic perspective, investigating its mechanics and narrative for deeper meaning.

By analyzing the mechanics of the game, I will be able to determine the nature of Knights of Pen and Paper. After reviewing my previous logs, I noticed that I have looked at this game through the lens of a “hardcore gamer,” if I may call myself that. In Jesper Juul’s Chapter 2 of A Casual Revolution, Juul describes casual games as containing five elements: fiction, usability, interruptibility, difficulty and punishment, and juiciness. To me, Knights of Pen and Paper fulfills these categories. The game is set in fiction, it has a usable game design (it’s simply clicking!), you can stop and resume whenever you like, the game requires a level of strategy and the player is punished for failing (losing gold or time), and the positive feedback from clicking on attacks is disproportionately high considering the action in the game.

I think Knights of Pen and Paper can be considered a casual game. Though some might argue that this leans closer to hard core, the game welcomes players, naïve and experienced, to join and learn about nerd culture. It’s narrative covers topics from fantasy to sci-fi as the TV Tropes link can show below. What made the game seem more relevant for inexperienced players is the final battle with Mom. Granted, I only made it to “A Journey’s End,” but I found a video with this ending: “WOWOWOWOW! GAME IS OVER, GG WP! Congratulations, you beat the game! You’re a hardcore player!” Suddenly the narrative tells the player that they are a hardcore player, which strikes me as something odd for a casual game to claim. But this indisputably recognizes how this casual game introduces themes, motifs, tropes, concepts from a variety of games (tabletop and videogames alike) and rewards the player of any skill level after defeating the Final Boss (Mom) by giving them the title “Hardcore Player.”

It should be safe to say that this game acts as a tutorial for people who want to play games in general. Knights of Pen and Paper uses a simple clicking mechanic to introduce a variety of ideas using humor and “dumbed-down” explanations to bring players to a common understanding. And as for the nature of the game, I think the amount of grinding (repetitive monster-fighting in this case) alone is enough to welcome noobz (new players or newbies) to the world of the hardcore gamer.

Check these out!

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/VideoGame/KnightsOfPenAndPaper

http://www.brighthand.com/review/knights-of-pen-paper-review-the-pen-is-mightier-than-the-sword/

Referential Humor and Immersion in Britney’s Gameworld

As I discussed in my previous post, the gameplay in Britney Spears American Dream merges real and game world, leaving users in almost a constant state of play. American Dream is not concerned with creating a unique and separate space in the game that is separate from the real world. Rather, it plays on and borrows jokes and…

As I discussed in my previous post, the gameplay in Britney Spears American Dream merges real and game world, leaving users in almost a constant state of play. American Dream is not concerned with creating a unique and separate space in the game that is separate from the real world. Rather, it plays on and borrows jokes and ideas from the real world.

Britney at “Starbeans Coffee” making a joke about how the baristas never get anyone’s name, employing a real joke about Starbucks made all over the internet.

Some of these references are more heavy handed than others.

The player’s manager calling about a gig at “The Paperclip Center” in the game world’s Los Angeles

Player invited as backup singer for the comedy TV show “Friday Night Laughs.” Referred to later in the game as “FNL”

I think some of these references are useful in conveying to the player the importance behind the gigs they’re landing. For example, I know that the Paperclip Center in the game is meant to be the Staples Center, and therefore I know that landing a performance there is a pretty big deal.

Additionally, these reference are funny (at least, they made me laugh.) The not so subtle play on worlds they all use and their familiarity to almost any player can probably muster a laugh in most users.

In my game experience, these jokes and references have consistently pulled me out of the game world. While they may make me smile, I think of the actual thing the game is referring to rather than the object in the game itself. I may also recall another time where I saw the same joke on the internet somewhere. Either way, these techniques take away from the immersive quality of the game. The game world in American Dream is not unbrokenly presented. These references function the same as a loading screen or a game error, they remind me of the real world and its power over the game world. (An unbroken presentation of the game world is one of Jane Madigan’s criteria for an immersive game: http://www.psychologyofgames.com/2010/07/the-psychology-of-immersion-in-video-games/)

The level of immersion is often the number one criteria by which people (including myself) determine the quality of video games. This is not always a fair judgement, perhaps especially in a game like American Dream. It’s a casual game through and through, and its mechanics do a great job of making it so. It’s possible Glu Mobile aimed to maintain a certain low level of immersion in order to preserve the integrity of a casual game. American Dream is not meant to be played nonstop, its mechanics make it nearly impossible to play for even 30 straight minutes. The game is meant to be picked up multiple times in a day for a quick play, and it’s lack of immersion ensures this.

The Casually Hardcore Pokémon X

In my opinion, the Pokémon series was always a game series for hardcore gamers. With type advantages, and the stats of various Pokémon to memorize and manipulate, it always seemed daunting to take my experience as a casual gamer into … Continue reading →

In my opinion, the Pokémon series was always a game series for hardcore gamers. With type advantages, and the stats of various Pokémon to memorize and manipulate, it always seemed daunting to take my experience as a casual gamer into the Pokémon world. However, when comparing my experience playing Pokémon X to the characteristics of casual games found in Jesper Juul’s, “What is Casual,” I found it extremely difficult to clearly classify Pokémon X as a casual or hardcore game.

The first characteristic of a casual game is fiction. The cover of Pokémon X immediately clues the player into the game’s fictional setting. Taking place in a world populated by colorful cartoonish animals known as Pokémon, the game quite obviously satisfies this requirement.

The cover to Pokémon X’s box shows the positive fiction used in the game by highlighting one of the cartoonish and colorful Pokémon found in the game

It should be noted however, that Pokémon X contains some fictions more closely associated with hardcore videogames. Throughout the game, the player must battle the villainous Team Flare, a group of thugs who commit various crimes in an attempt to take over the world. This effort culminates in the activation of an “ultimate weapon” which has the power to kill all the Pokémon in the world (see video below). The inherent dangers of these plot points and setting provide an experience more characteristic of a hardcore game rather than a casual game.

Like the blurred aspects of Pokémon X’s fiction, the usability of the game also does not clearly classify it as a casual or hardcore game. The majority of Pokémon X’s controls are easy to use and understand. To move the protagonist, the player pushes the arrows of the control pad and there is a button for performing actions and another for canceling actions. However, Pokémon X also relies on a turn-based combat system that could be confusing to novice players. The turn-based combat relies more on the manipulation of stats (as the fastest Pokémon attacks first) and the player’s careful planning rather than a free-for-all combat system which allows the player to simply push buttons until their opponent is subdued.

The Pokémon series has many long-term fans, yet still attracts new players. The inability of Pokémon X to be clearly classified as a casual or hardcore game could explain the universal appeal of these games. Even if we take into account Juul’s remaining three aspects of casual games, the classification is still foggy as some aspects (interruptibility) push the game towards becoming a casual game, while others (difficulty/punishment and juiciness) are more reminiscent of hardcore games. These blurred lines suggest that Pokémon X is a much more complex game than it might appear, or that Juul’s classifications are not as clear and universal as they seem.

Works Cited:

Juul, Jesper. “What Is Casual.” A Casual Revolution: Reinventing Video Games and Their Players. Cambridge, MA: MIT, 2010. 25-63. Print.

Image Sources:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pok%C3%A9mon_X_and_Y

Problems of Identity in brain games

During the initial tutorial stage in which Lumosity accustoms you to the interface and gameplay, the game uses statistical data to compare you against other players in your age range. Your performance is represented on a bell curve. When you performed poorly, the game’s text remains “juicy” by directly rewarding your intent and ignoring the game score. When I see that I have performed better than the majority, it was an ego boost and bar that was raised for myself. On the other hand, when I performed under the average, I was determined to better myself and more importantly, beat them. Once the tutorial is over, the game no longer compares you to other players, but instead measures your high scores and encourages you to be better than your ‘previous’ self. The design is meant to invoke competitive game play, and creates a difference experience when the competitor is oneself. This type of priming is intentional, and feeds into what James Paul Gee defines as the “projected identity.” This identity bridges the “real-world” identity with the “virtual” identity. According to James Paul Gee, the projective identity is to:

“project one’s values and desires onto the virtual character and seeing the virtual character as one’s own project in the making, a creature whom I imbue with a certain trajectory through time defined by my aspirations for what I want that character to be and become.” (page 55)

Lumosity continues to feed and prime my “projected identity” through a variety of ways. The juiciness is always encouraging of any progress that is made. When I don’t perform as well as I hope to, it never communicates that negatively. The explanations of games and their purpose prime me into believing that the game will help me develop a certain skill. Lumosity has the illusion of unmasking the ‘black box’, although I, as a player, have no idea how tapping on train tracks or swiping on the screen makes me a better multitasker.

In my third blog post, I will discuss more in depth the effectiveness of these brain games and the role of the “projected identity” in Lumosity’s marketing and design.

References:

Gee, James Paul. 2003. What video games have to teach us about learning and literacy. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.

When casual games become ‘fruitful’

Lumosity is marketed as a game that was co-designed by game designers and scientists to improve the player’s cognitive functions. This simple wording already forms the basis of their conditioning, but it definitely works. The app has a mini-game that opens explaining what cognitive function it strengthens. The games are ‘scientifically’ broken down into five […]

Lumosity is marketed as a game that was co-designed by game designers and scientists to improve the player’s cognitive functions. This simple wording already forms the basis of their conditioning, but it definitely works.

The app has a mini-game that opens explaining what cognitive function it strengthens. The games are ‘scientifically’ broken down into five different modes: velocity, flexibility, resolution of clues, attention, and memory. I play each game with these goals in mind (sometimes not always understanding exactly how the mini-game is designed for these goals). The game mechanics are simple, which usually require just a touch to the screen. Because the game rules themselves are sometimes difficult to grasp the first time, Lumosity does a great job at scaffolding with short, easy tutorials. When I get combos or correct answers, the sounds are pleasant. When I mess up, the game makes an unpleasant, yet gentle sound and sometimes allows the player to correct their error. Failure is just as accepted as it is in Lumosity as it is in any other game. The game is so ‘juicy’ with encouraging text after each game, lots of in- and out-of-game compliments, no matter how well or bad I performed.

As a response to the exclusivity of hardcore games, Jesper Juul has defined casual games as a game for all ages that have the following five characteristics: fiction, usability, interruptibility, difficulty, and ‘juiciness.’ In the table below, I will judge Lumosity according to Juul’s characteristics for a casual game.

Doesn’t he just look so much smarter?

References:

Jesper Juul, A Casual Revolution, chapter 2

Is Mystic Messenger Casual?

From my last post, we know that Mystic Messenger involves an almost constant attention for at least 11 days (the time it takes for a single playthrough), because of its real-time mechanics, which would make it appear as more of a hardcore game than a casual one. However, following the criteria Jesper Jull describes in…

From my last post, we know that Mystic Messenger involves an almost constant attention for at least 11 days (the time it takes for a single playthrough), because of its real-time mechanics, which would make it appear as more of a hardcore game than a casual one. However, following the criteria Jesper Jull describes in his article, “A Casual Revolution,” MM still counts as a casual game.

Casual games have positive valence, or have associations with happy or fun vibes. Dating sims involve romance, which have associations with love, happiness, and comfort. Although certain choices can lead to negative outcomes (or bad ends), overall MM has a positive frame work.

The romance options allow the player to choose which personality works best for them, and makes them happiest.

Casual games are easy to use, either building off conventions from outside the game or using simple mechanics that can be easily taught. MM falls into the first category, as the mechanics involve: text-messaging, email, phone calls, and a chatroom. This applies for the first 5 days, which is when the “visual novelization” mode gets added, complicating things as this doesn’t have a real-life counterpart, but even then, the other, more familiar forms still dominate.

Casual games are easily interrupted, allowing players to play for short bursts. Despite the real-time attention needed for MM, it can still be interrupted. The chatrooms and phone calls feature a pause button, allowing players to take a break. They also only take a few minutes to play, and then have hour breaks in between.

Casual games are difficult to master, but feature little punishment for failure. This is the hardest category to measure in a dating sim. Mastery would involve a complete understanding of every romance route, and both the multiple good and bad endings. In that sense, yes the game is difficult to master, but that comes from how long it takes to go through entirely, not that the game gets more difficult as you play; the types of responses you can give vary little as you progress. Also, failure can be a reward as it unlocks the “bad” ending, which many players purposely seek out.

Casual games are juicy. This works for MM because anytime the player responds with the “correct” response, a heart with pop up on the screen, and the player will receive it as a reward at the end of the chat. The game lets the players know when they’re doing the “right” thing.

The heart appears when a character approves of your comment, which is the game’s juiciness.

So, despite its real-time mechanics that make players constantly check it, Mystic Messenger still fits snugly into Jesper’s definition of a casual game.

A Hardcore Casual

In my last game log, I analyzed how the designers of Super Smash Bros. for Wii U reward longtime, dedicated gamers by packing their game full of intertextual references to so many different kinds of games for the 50+ characters in Smash. Super Smash Bros. seemed designed to be intertextual, bringing many characters (Nintendo and non-Nintendo) under a fighting competition. In this light, Super Smash Bros. sounds like a typical fighting game for dedicated, “hardcore” gamers. The fact that there is a community of professional (paid) and extremely dedicated Smash players seems to support Super Smash Bros’s hardcore-ness (a topic for another game log). However, Super Smash Bros. doesn’t fit neatly into the binary of casual v. hardcore games. In fact, the game is extremely popular, as the Wii U iteration 4.9 million copies so in its lifespan (and the 3DS version of the game sold 8.23 million copies as well) (Nintendo Sales). Super Smash Bros. caters to all kinds of people and balances between casual and hardcore gaming effectively.

In his book A Casual Revolution, Jesper Juul outlines five components that make up his definition of a casual game: a positively-charged fiction, accessible usability, interruptibility, a tiered difficulty and lenient punishment, juiciness, which is “excessive positive feedback for every successful action the player performs” (Juul 50). Does Smash fit in this casual framework? Not really, but there are some casual components that Smash is built on. First, most Smash characters—save Solid Snake, Samus Aran, Ganondorf, and a few others—come from positive game worlds like the Mushroom Kingdom, Kirby’s Dreamworld, or Pikmin, even if these positive fictions mask a lot of cartoon violence. Second, Smash is very much a game of controlled short bursts of playing with the multiplayer mode being designed as a series of short matches that can have time limits. Turning off Smash only means leaving a single match that can easily be re-created later (unless you’re in single player mode, which, again, is a series of matches that are easily reproducible). There’s no story or large time investment Smash requires up front (unless you’re playing the Subspace Emissary in Super Smash Bros. Brawl). The units of play are quick morsels of action, not a full course RPG meal. Third, Smash has a tiered difficulty system in terms of its overall controls, where players can learn more and more advanced moves (wave-dashing and such) if they wish, or keep spamming down+B with Pikachu. However, these controls aren’t necessarily “easy to learn, hard to master” (Juul 41). With a GameCube controller, there are about 7 buttons along with the move stick that controls a player’s actions, as well as directional variants for each button; for a Wii remote held horizontally, there are 3 (4, if you like taunting) and a directional pad, which simplifies the control schemes a bit. However, Smash’s controls aren’t easy to pick up and play right away. In order for someone to learn Smash, it takes a lot of lectures from other players and playing the game over and over again. Then, after someone learns the basics, competitive mastery (wave dashing, timing tilts, etc.) is lightyears away. I do mean that in terms of time commitment and physical impossibility (for me, at least). The game further contradicts casual standards by not rewarding players for every single action (juiciness). Smash doesn’t hold the player’s hand nor reward every action. So, Smash scores a 2.5 (somewhat positive fiction, interruptibility, tiered difficulty) out of 5 on Juul’s Casual scale.

Smash is an interesting example of how blurry the distinction between casual and hardcore games really is. Smash appeals to many and doesn’t exclude based on its cartoonish atmosphere; however, Smash can offer dedicated gamers an arena of competitive mastery and genuine challenge. In this way, Smash toes the line between casual and hardcore to large financial and critical success.

Works Cited:

Juul, Jesper. “Ch.2: What is Casual?” A Casual Revolution. Cambridge: MIT Press, 2010. Web PDF.

“Top Selling Software Sales Units.” Nintendo: IR Information. Nintendo, 30 June 2016. Web. Date accessed: 3 Oct 2016. https://www.nintendo.co.jp/ir/en/sales/software/3ds.html