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Publications
Publications (25)
This paper describes the appropriation of video game culture for discursive use during the 2019–20 Hong Kong anti-extradition movement, with participants relying on game argot for mass protest communication and mobilization purposes, and employing game frameworks (especially from MMORPGs) for organizing protest actions. Data from online forums are...
Due to the long-delayed release of the second expansion of World of Warcraft (WoW) in China, many Chinese players “migrated” to Taiwanese game servers in 2008. This “WoW rush” resulted in extensive daily contact between tens of thousands of Taiwanese and Chinese players until 2011, when Chinese officials finally permitted a new WoW expansion. The a...
Lin and Sun discuss three characteristics of Massively Multi-Player Online Games (MMOGs) that make them promising social gathering spaces, which are also known as virtual “third places.” Through analyzing the MMOGs, this chapter explicates that the sense of co-presence, the crystallization of game communities and identities, and digital-game subjec...
Massively multiplayer online role playing games (MMORPGs) constitute a relatively recent game genre that contains elements from a variety of past game genres. While character development is still a central feature, MMORPGs are not just online extensions of console or personal computer role playing games. Instead, they offer vivid online worlds thro...
Starting with the Nintendo Wii craze in 2007, a new media trend and public discourse are taking shape in which the Wii replaced the traditional image of “parents-to-children game machine” with a new image of “machine for filial piety”. Grown-ups bought Wii as a gift for their parents to fill in their own absence in the family life, or to carry out...
Developments in personal information communication technology (ICT) are facilitating opportunities for turning internet-based hobbies into self-employed occupations. Real income can be earned by trading virtual objects and currencies used in massively multiplayer online games - a form of economic activity known as real money trade (RMT). This study...
This article started with an introduction of the objectives of planning and holding the special forum on online games and media culture. It went on further to synthesize more discussions from the face-to-face roundtable meeting among the five invited experts in this field. The discussions generally focused on three aspects. The first aspect is to l...
Cash trades for virtual items in game worlds are now a recognized part of the "free game" business model, but perhaps at the expense of players' senses of immersion, fairness, and fun. We review several perspectives related to Huizinga's (8) "magic circle" concept in order to establish an analytical framework, then discuss player opinions in suppor...
In this article we bring onlookers to front stage. Normally considered invisible participants in video game arcades, their multiple and fluid roles are key to establishing interactional frames in public gaming spaces. We identified three such frames — showroom, gymnasium, and clubroom — after analysing interactions and finding examples of self-pres...
The rapidly expanding ‘‘free-to-play’’ online game payment model represents a huge shift in digital game commercialization, with cash payments for virtual items increasingly recognized as central to ‘‘free game’’ participation. In this article, the authors look at implications of this trend for gameplay experiences (especially in terms of immersion...
When analyzing Taiwanese and American market separation and online gaming cultures, sooner or later researchers hear the assertion that players in Taiwan emphasize achievement and players in the US emphasize recreation. This belief may explain why a significant number of Taiwanese World of Warcraft (WoW) players claim that they would rather connect...
The aim of this study was to look at motivations behind altruistic behavior in virtual communities by studying the sharing of game tips by experienced gamers. We examine several possible motivations (pure altruism, generalized reciprocity, and reputation) and qualitatively analyze tip types in terms of usefulness, visibility, and skill level. We fo...
The authors propose a small-world network model that combines cellular automata with the social mirror identities of daily-contact networks for purposes of performing epidemiological simulations. The social mirror identity concept was established to integrate human long-distance movement and daily visits to fixed locations. After showing that the m...
This article looks at the negative images on cash trades of in-game assets in Taiwan, through interview of participants in this activity, we believe the blurring of boundaries between work and play, adulthood and adolescence, real and virtual is what distinguishes this market from previous markets of virtual goods, resulting in its social stigma. W...
This study explores the social process governing the nature, emergence, application, and consequences of labeling the 'white-eyed' or grief players in massively multiplayer online role playing games in Taiwan. We found that two types of 'white-eyed' players exist in MMORPGs. The explicit type, who come out and organize themselves into griefer pledg...
This paper explores how the social relations embedded in varied gaming spaces affect players' online gaming experiences, and how gender comes into play in such spatial experiences. Three major sites of online gaming in Taiwan are examined: (1) home as a space of domestic surveillance and discipline; (2) NetCafé as a stigmatized public leisure space...
The authors propose a novel small-world model that makes use of cellular automata with the mirror identities of daily-contact social networks to simulate epidemiological scenarios. We established the mirror identity concept (a miniature representation of frequently visited places) to acknowledge human long-distance movement and geographic mobility....
The authors look at computer-mediated simulation as an approach to studying social science issues and discuss its limitations, with the design process for a Multiple-User Dungeon (MUD) game serving as a context. Using data gleaned from interviews with the MUD designers, the authors present three findings: (a) fun is a key difference between simulat...
Virtual online gaming clan organizations are used to ana- lyze social grouping and cooperation within competitive gaming communities. Participants from two popular massive multi-player online role-playing games (MMORPGs) in Taiwan were interviewed to collect data on the social dynamics of gamer networks in virtual worlds. Our essential argu- ment i...
The authors look at online tip exchanges as parts of gift economies created by the players and designers of console and online role-playing games in Taiwan. A group of experienced players and tip contributors agreed to be interviewed about the mechanisms and processes of providing free strategy guides on the Internet. Their comments reveal needs fo...
The authors explore the disintegration and reintegration of online gaming communities via cross-boundary co-playing and the social implications of this phenomenon. Boundary-crossing is an essential factor in distinguishing game cultures from traditional forms of leisure and entertainment. Whereas traditional game players engage in activities and in...
Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of California, Davis, 1995. Degree granted in Sociology.