This is the first article for our class. In the NYTimes article "Online Game, Made in the US, Siezes Globe" what seems to be the biggest cultural difference for the games slow success in the mainstream US? According to the article what demographic of Amercian Society seems to be left out of this market? How might future software developers tapp into this market?
4 comments:
Sadly I related to this article. My boyfriend plays war craft or one of the versions of it, and could play for many hours at a time at night with his friends. I find it something of a loser thing to do but from reading what the man had to say in the article, it gave me a little bit more of an understanding about why my boyfriend enjoys it so much. He doesn’t enjoy it as much as the man in the article does, such as meeting “50 friends” because he plays with his own friends, but enjoys it because its an adventure. He also tells me about the comparison with television and I think that’s a valid point. Playing a video game is more interactive than an idiot box. Games create a fantasy world that keeps your mind active and keeps you alert at your surroundings. I think that the man in the article is over doing online gamming by meeting the people on the other side of the computer. That’s when the gamming world becomes dangerous and harmful to children who get caught up with 30 year olds playing the game as well. Many people don’t have the same intentions as others and this line of the gamming world and real world should be watched carefully.
I have never been one to play video games. Many people find it interesting and that is fine. Just as I have my interests, they too have their own interests.I agree with the end of what zohra wrote in that it is fine if it is a hobby and something you like to do, but it can also be dangerous if it is not balanced correctly with the real world. As demonstrated by the man in the article, he created a seperate world out of this game. There is no reason for that to be done and it is not safe, especially when children are involved. He is meeting people "of all ages" who share the love for this game which is fine but he has a wife and a baby on the way. Some of those 4 hours he sets aside to play this game could be put to better use...Im sure of it. Again I am in no way saying that playing a video game is bad, but too much of anything can never be a good thing.
A Personal Perspective:
Ginny Georgekutty
Upon reading the article, I was surprised to hear about this successful video game because I had never heard of World of Warcraft. However, I have discovered a similar game called Maple Story. My brother would play the game for 2-3 hours straight. Being a hard-core player, my brother loved the game as his character(s) went on quests and obtained magical items. Like Zohra, I first thought it was "something of a loser thing to do." However, when my brother first got me to actually create an account, I found myself absorbed into the game. Although, I personally loved it more for its "cute anime-looking" characters to chose from rather than the quests itself. For my brother, it was a challenge to be defeated, a record to be beaten at all costs.
While his goal was to create and build successful characters (ranging from archers to warriors), my goal was to create one character that looked cute and was a good archer. This is one department that not even World of War craft has managed to change. While the game has successfully attracted the hard-core and casual players, it has yet to attract a large part of the female population. Only when that has been accomplished will a game truly sculpt the gaming world and attract the whole world's attention.
After reading the article for World of Warcraft, I can say that it has been a pretty general consensus that among the readers of this article, we are all a bit shocked by the huge success of a video game we have never even heard of. I had no idea that a video game that would require so much time comsumption would be such a large success especially in america. In America I think that we often think that video games, especially online, are classified as something that a loser would spend their time endulging in. I had no idea that this game alone could start a billion dollar corporation. In the article that was written in the New York Times said that "World of Warcraft" as the "First trukly global video game hit since Pac-Man in the early 1980's". What is different about this game is that it gives the players man different options, which therefore allows the creators to target a slighty more diverse group of gamers. Although I myself do not play video games, my view of the corporations out there that release them, has definetly changed.
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