tag:theconversation.com,2011:/ca-fr/topics/nintendo-4247/articlesNintendo – La Conversation2024-01-10T13:29:57Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2206202024-01-10T13:29:57Z2024-01-10T13:29:57ZFrom besting Tetris AI to epic speedruns – inside gaming’s most thrilling feats<p>After 13-year-old Willis Gibson became the first human to <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2024/01/03/arts/tetris-beat-blue-scuti.html">beat the original Nintendo version</a> of Tetris, he dedicated his special win to his father, who passed away in December 2023. </p>
<p>The Oklahoma teen beat the game by defeating level after level until he reached the “kill screen” – that is, the moment when the Tetris artificial intelligence taps out in exhaustion, stopping play because its designers never wrote the code to advance further. Before Gibson, the only other player to overcome the game’s AI was <a href="https://gamerant.com/ai-plays-tetris-so-well-it-breaks-the-game/">another AI</a>. </p>
<p>For any parent who has despaired over their children sinking countless hours into video games, Gibson’s victory over the <a href="https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/mathematicians-prove-tetr/">cruel geometry</a> of Tetris stands as a bracing corrective. </p>
<p>Despite the stereotypes, most gamers are anything but lazy. And they’re anything but mindless. </p>
<p>The world’s top players can sometimes serve as reminders of the best in us, with memorable achievements that range from the heroic to the inscrutably weird.</p>
<h2>The perfect run</h2>
<p>“<a href="https://www.thegamer.com/games-with-big-speedrunning-communities/#fallout-new-vegas">Speedrunning</a>” is a popular gaming subculture in which players meticulously optimize routes and exploit glitches to complete, in a matter of minutes, games that normally take hours, from the tightly constrained, run-and-gun action game <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6FfD4Ims198">Cuphead</a> to the sprawling role-playing epic <a href="https://esi.si.com/speedrunning/baldurs-gate-3-world-record-speedrun">Baldur’s Gate 3</a>.</p>
<p>In top-level competition, speedrunners strive to match the time of what’s referred to as a “TAS,” or “tool-assisted speed run.” To figure out the TAS time, players use game emulators to choreograph a theoretically perfect playthrough, advancing the game one frame at a time to determine the fastest possible time. </p>
<p>Success requires punishing precision, flawless execution and years of training.</p>
<p>The major speedrunning milestones are, like Olympic races, marked by mere fractions of a second. The urge to speedrun likely sprouts from an innate human longing for perfection – and a uniquely 21st century compulsion to best the robots.</p>
<p>A Twitch streamer who goes by the username Niftski is currently the human who has come closest to achieving this androidlike perfection. His 4-minute, 54.631-second <a href="https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2023/09/record-breaking-super-mario-bros-speedrun-approaches-robotic-perfection/?comments=1&comments-page=1">world-record speedrun</a> of Super Mario Bros. – achieved in September 2023 – is just 0.35 seconds shy of a flawless TAS. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Khu9BB2g4Ks">Watching Niftski’s now-famous run</a> is a dissonant experience. Goofy, retro, 8-bit Mario jumps imperturbably over goombas and koopa troopas with the iconic, cheerful “<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=37-paiEz0mQ">boink</a>” sound of his hop. </p>
<p>Meanwhile, Niftski pants as his anxiety builds, his heart rate – tracked on screen during the livestream – peaking at 188 beats per minute.</p>
<p>When Mario bounces over the final big turtle at the finish line – “boink” – Niftski erupts into screams of shock and repeated cries of “Oh my God!” </p>
<p>He hyperventilates, struggles for oxygen and finally sobs from exhaustion and joy.</p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">Twitch streamer Niftski’s record speedrun of Super Mario Bros. missed perfection by 0.35 seconds.</span></figcaption>
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<h2>The largest world and its longest pig ride</h2>
<p>This list couldn’t be complete without an achievement from Minecraft, the revolutionary video game that has become the <a href="https://www.ign.com/articles/best-selling-video-games-of-all-time-grand-theft-auto-minecraft-tetris">second-best-selling title in history</a>, with over 300 million copies sold – second only to Tetris’ 520 million units. </p>
<p>Minecraft populates the video game libraries of grade-schoolers and has been used as an educational tool in <a href="https://education.minecraft.net/en-us/blog/university-students-learn-to-communicate--create--and-collaborate-with-3d-gaming-software">university classrooms</a>. Even the <a href="https://www.britishmuseum.org/events/masterpieces-minecraft">British Museum</a> has held an exhibition devoted to the game.</p>
<p>Minecraft is known as a sandbox game, which means that gamers can create and explore their own virtual worlds, limited only by their imagination and a few simple tools and resources – like buckets and sand, or, in the case of Minecraft, pickaxes and stone. </p>
<p>So what can you do in the Minecraft playground? </p>
<p>Well, you can ride on a pig. The Guinness Book of World Records marks the farthest distance at <a href="https://www.guinnessworldrecords.com/news/2015/10/stephen-daultrey-our-gamers-edition-editor-shares-his-favourite-records-from-th-400538">414 miles</a>. Or you can collect sunflowers. The world record for that is <a href="https://www.guinnessworldrecords.com/world-records/590304-most-sunflowers-picked-in-one-minute-in-the-sunflower-field-in-minecraft-conso#:%7E:text=The%20most%20sunflowers%20picked%20in,Records%20event%20at%20WAFI%20Mall.">89 in one minute</a>. Or you can dig a tunnel – but you’ll need to make it <a href="https://www.guinnessworldrecords.com/world-records/627501-longest-minecraft-tunnel-made-in-survival-mode#:%7E:text=The%20longest%20Minecraft%20tunnel%20made,China%2C%20on%201%20February%202023.">100,001 blocks long</a> to edge out the current record. </p>
<p>My personal favorite is a collective, ongoing effort: a sprawling, global collaboration to <a href="https://buildtheearth.net/">recreate the world on a 1:1 scale</a> using Minecraft blocks, with blocks counting as one cubic meter. </p>
<p>At their best, sandbox games like Minecraft can bring people closer to the joyful and healthily pointless play of childhood – a restorative escape from the anxious, utility-driven planning that dominates so much of adulthood.</p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">Popular YouTuber MrBeast contributes to ‘Build the Earth’ by constructing a Minecraft replica of Raleigh, N.C.</span></figcaption>
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<h2>The galaxy’s greatest collaboration</h2>
<p>The Halo 3 gaming community participated in a bloodier version of the collective effort of Minecraft players. </p>
<p>The game, which pits humans against an alien alliance known as the Covenant, was released in 2007 to much fanfare.</p>
<p>Whether they were playing the single-player campaign mode or the online multiplayer mode, gamers around the world started seeing themselves as imaginary participants in a global cause to save humanity – in what came to be known as the “Great War.”</p>
<p>They organized round-the-clock campaign shifts, while sharing strategies in nearly 6,000 Halo wiki articles and 21 million online discussion posts. </p>
<p>Halo developer Bungie started tracking total alien deaths by all players, with the <a href="https://www.ign.com/articles/2009/04/14/halo-3-hits-10-billion-kills">10 billion milestone</a> reached in April 2009.</p>
<p>Game designer Jane McGonigal <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yIhruoUvf80">recalls with awe</a> the community effort that went into that Great War, citing it as a transcendent example of the fundamental human desire to work together and to become a part of something bigger than the self. </p>
<p>Bungie maintained a collective history of the Great War in the form of “personal service records” that memorialized each player’s contributions – medals, battle statistics, campaign maps and more. </p>
<p>The archive beggars comprehension: According to Bungie, its servers handled 1.4 petabytes of data requests by players in one nine-month stretch. McGonigal notes, by way of comparison, that everything ever written by humans in all of recorded history amounts to <a href="https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/305501/reality-is-broken-by-jane-mcgonigal/">50 petabytes of data</a>.</p>
<h2>Gamification versus gameful design</h2>
<p>If you’re mystified by the behavior of these gamers, you’re not alone. </p>
<p>Over the past decade, researchers across a range of fields have marveled at the dedication of gamers like Gibson and Niftski, who commit themselves without complaint to what some might see as punishing, pointless and physically grueling labor.</p>
<p>How could this level of dedication be applied to more “productive” endeavors, they wondered, like <a href="https://academictech.uchicago.edu/2021/11/23/introduction-to-the-use-of-gamification-in-higher-education-part-1/">education</a>, <a href="https://www.kofax.com/learn/blog/the-uses-and-benefits-of-gamification-in-tax">taxes</a> or <a href="https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-319-07626-3_70">exercise</a>?</p>
<p>From this research, <a href="https://gamification-europe.com/">an industry centered on the “gamification”</a> of work, life and learning emerged. It giddily promised to change people’s behaviors through the use of extrinsic motivators borrowed from the gaming community: badges, achievements, community scorekeeping. </p>
<p>The concept caught fire, spreading everywhere from <a href="https://ojs.southfloridapublishing.com/ojs/index.php/jdev/article/view/150">early childhood education</a> to the <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/forbesbusinesscouncil/2023/03/29/features-and-steps-for-gamification-in-the-food-retail-industry/?sh=381f32593956">fast-food industry</a>.</p>
<p>Many game designers have <a href="https://www.gamedeveloper.com/design/persuasive-games-exploitationware">reacted to this trend</a> like Robert Oppenheimer at the close of the eponymous movie – aghast that their beautiful work was used, for instance, to <a href="https://www.fastcompany.com/90260703/the-dark-side-of-gamifying-work">pressure Disneyland Resort</a> laborers to load laundry and press linens at anxiously hectic speeds.</p>
<p>Arguing that the gamification trend misses entirely the magic of gaming, game designers have instead started promoting the concept of “<a href="https://www.wssu.edu/profiles/dichevc/cit-2014-dichev.pdf">gameful design</a>.” Where gamification focuses on useful outcomes, gameful design focuses on fulfilling experiences.</p>
<p>Gameful design prioritizes intrinsic motivation over extrinsic incentives. It embraces design elements that promote social connection, creativity, a sense of <a href="https://www.urmc.rochester.edu/community-health/patient-care/self-determination-theory.aspx">autonomy</a> – and, ultimately, <a href="https://www.ted.com/talks/mihaly_csikszentmihalyi_flow_the_secret_to_happiness?language=en">the sheer joy of mastery</a>.</p>
<p>When I think of Niftski’s meltdown after his record speedrun – and Gibson’s, who also began hyperventilating in shock and almost passed out – I think of my own children. </p>
<p>I wish for them such moments of ecstatic, prideful accomplishment in a world that sometimes seems starved of joy.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/220620/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>James Dawes does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Whether they’re heroic or inscrutably weird, video game records reveal a lot about play, cooperation and the drive for perfection.James Dawes, Professor of English, Macalester CollegeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2148532024-01-04T20:01:45Z2024-01-04T20:01:45ZVacuuming, moving house, unpacking are boring in real life – so why is doing them in a video game so fun?<p>After an exhausting day, housework is often the last thing I feel like doing. But I sometimes relax by playing video games where you tidy and arrange household items in living rooms, kitchens and bathrooms.</p>
<p>In a game, domestic tasks can be exciting. Like the indie success <a href="https://goose.game/">Untitled Goose Game</a> and the blockbuster series <a href="https://www.ea.com/en-au/games/the-sims">The Sims</a>, the games I’m thinking of position the completion of mundane tasks as entertainment and art. </p>
<p>Here are four inventive Australian video games where players perform household tasks that, in real life, are often repetitive or unpleasant. But in games these activities can be entertaining and relaxing. </p>
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<a href="https://theconversation.com/heres-why-the-legend-of-zelda-tears-of-the-kingdom-is-big-news-even-among-those-who-dont-see-themselves-as-gamers-205229">Here's why The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom is big news – even among those who don't see themselves as 'gamers'</a>
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<h2>Moving Out</h2>
<p>In Moving Out (and its sequel, Moving Out 2), you’re a removalist with a time limit to move objects like fridges, beds and sofas out of homes. Created by Australian and Swedish studios, Moving Out also involves the team that made the cooking game, Overcooked. </p>
<p>In Moving Out, removal is an athletic activity. Floor plans and yards are like obstacle courses with animals, swimming pools and even ghosts. </p>
<p>Players shift furniture in haunted houses and on space stations. Each new setting brings a sense of the unreal to what, in real life, would be a pretty dull task: moving stuff from A to B. </p>
<p>Video games allow us to do things that are unacceptable in real life. In Moving Out, players save time by breaking windows and throwing objects instead of using stairs. We’re invited to embrace the pleasures of recklessness. </p>
<p>In a world obsessed with buying homes and ever more things to fill them, Moving Out offers property destruction as a cathartic alternative.</p>
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<h2>Unpacking</h2>
<p>In <a href="https://www.unpackinggame.com/">Unpacking</a> – which describes itself as a “zen puzzle game” – you learn about someone’s life from youth to adulthood by sorting their possessions through a series of removals. </p>
<p>Doing banal tasks in a game can take us out of our own lives to explore other people’s lives and unexpected environments. </p>
<p>Unpacking allows us to sort the unseen occupant’s possessions, but their life remains a mystery. The game’s pixel art makes their book covers and journal entries tantalisingly unreadable. </p>
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<h2>Florence</h2>
<p>In Florence, you have limited storage space for objects like kitchen utensils, clothing and books. The lead designer of this game also created the enormously popular puzzle game <a href="https://www.monumentvalleygame.com/mvpc">Monument Valley</a>. </p>
<p>When Florence’s partner moves in, you learn about their differences while finding space to store their possessions.</p>
<p>Like Unpacking, Florence allows us to do familiar, domestic tasks in an unfamiliar setting; the player organises characters’ possessions but has no knowledge of the words the couple exchange in blank speech bubbles. </p>
<p>Games set in homes have been linked to <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/10509208.2010.544980">materialistic consumer culture</a>; this is a concern some have raised about The Sims. But not all games link buying with happiness.</p>
<p>Florence (like Unpacking) involves organising people’s used possessions, not new goods. </p>
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<h2>Rumu</h2>
<p>In an earlier Australian game, <a href="https://www.rumugame.com/?fbclid=IwAR2FwNLrOHlr4TbUOPvrtDGBSO93yshjSK-fNS7c3NReVSb3kvQzVeK5-wM">Rumu</a>, you’re a robot vacuum cleaner who cleans up food and drink spills and tidies clothing while you investigate the disappearance of the house’s owners.</p>
<p>This vacuum cleaner is not only an appliance but part of a futuristic home where the artificial intelligence home assistant has emotional problems. </p>
<p>The house in Rumu is like a maze; full of gadgets and secrets, this setting is designed like a puzzle that players must solve to navigate from one place to another. The home is full of advanced “smart” appliances but is abandoned, dysfunctional and alienating. Again, the surreal is mixed with the everyday.</p>
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<h2>Why are we drawn to games involving mundane tasks?</h2>
<p>These examples are not brand new games, but reflect the growth in popularity of everyday settings in games where you can do banal tasks as entertainment. </p>
<p>Such games invite us to <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/10304312.2023.2215973">relate differently to everyday settings and work</a>. They can confirm French philosopher and sociologist Henri Lefebvre’s view that the <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/2930193">everyday can be surreal</a>, extraordinary, surprising and magical. In these games, everyday tasks involve encounters with robots, aliens and the supernatural.</p>
<p>Women spend more time on <a href="https://www.pmc.gov.au/resources/status-women-report-card-2023">unpaid work</a> than men. But with women making up almost <a href="https://igea.net/2023/08/australia-plays-2023/">half of video game players</a> in Australia, these games also cleverly allow us to challenge norms around gender, work and domesticity. For example, players may be able to choose from avatars of various genders and species or control a character with both masculine and feminine <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/10304312.2023.2215973">traits</a>. </p>
<p>Games link domestic labour to fantasy and adventure, challenging us to imagine everyday life and ordinary places as extraordinary.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/214853/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Lesley Speed does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Why are we drawn to video games where we have to complete tasks that, in real life, may be unappealing or boring? Here are four games that show how the mundane can be made extraordinary and surreal.Lesley Speed, Senior Lecturer in media and screen studies, Federation University AustraliaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2037182023-05-22T15:22:15Z2023-05-22T15:22:15ZPokémon Scarlet and Violet: how the game’s glitches gained a fandom of their own<p>Last November, <a href="https://scarletviolet.pokemon.com/en-gb/">Pokémon Scarlet and Violet</a> were released for Nintendo Switch as the first so-called open-world <a href="https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2022/11/pokemon-scarlet-and-violet-deliver-a-fully-open-world-beset-by-technical-problems/">Pokémon games</a>. These are non-linear games in which players can freely explore the environment as they collect Pokémon characters.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.ign.com/articles/pokemon-scarlet-and-violet-review">Reviewers</a> and gamers alike have generally agreed that the games succeeded in introducing changes that were long overdue such as free roaming, a less linear adventure and a large amount of collectables. But they also criticised the games’ appalling <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/games/2022/nov/17/pokemon-scarletviolet-review-poor-performance-holds-an-exciting-game-back#:%7E:text=Much%20like%20Arceus%2C%20Scarlet%20and,constantly%20judders%20to%20a%20crawl.">visuals and technical failures</a>. These failures – known as “glitches” – are moments when the game fails to behave as intended. Instead of chomping on a sandwich, for example, a character might be seen munching thin air. </p>
<p>The original Pokémon games, Red and Blue (1996), had <a href="https://bulbapedia.bulbagarden.net/wiki/List_of_glitches_(Generation_I)">their fair share</a> of glitches too. This included “<a href="https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2019/02/the-mythos-and-meaning-behind-pokemons-most-famous-glitch/">MissingNo</a>”, an unofficial critter that could be found by deliberately using glitches. But times have changed since the first games. Pokémon is now a global behemoth and must meet fans’ high expectations for visual quality.</p>
<p>In some ways, Scarlet and Violet’s many issues have become a blessing in disguise, however. They have fuelled <a href="https://www.nintendolife.com/news/2022/11/random-pokemon-scarlet-and-violets-body-horror-glitches-are-going-viral">an unexpected glitch-chasing frenzy</a>. </p>
<p>This has contributed to the expansion of the franchise’s “<a href="https://www.merriam-webster.com/words-at-play/words-were-watching-headcanon-fanon#:%7E:text=Standard%2C%2022%20Feb.-,2018,spelled%20out%20in%20the%20text.">headcanon</a>”(something fans believe to be true about a franchise or character, despite a lack of evidence) and illustrated the creative potential of fan culture as players start to accept and even celebrate these glitches.</p>
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<p>Many Pokémon fans are aware of <a href="https://bulbapedia.bulbagarden.net/wiki/Sinistea_(Pok%C3%A9mon)">Sinistea</a>, for example, a ghost-type Pokémon from 2017 who is found lodging in a teacup. But in January, a few fans <a href="https://www.dexerto.com/pokemon/pokemon-scarlet-violet-glitch-spawns-wild-paldean-sinistea-2033495/">started to speculate</a> and joke about whether the ghost Pokémon had been given a new form. This followed a viral <a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/PokemonScarletViolet/comments/10c23q9/paldean_form_sinistea/?utm_term=2197035873&utm_medium=post_embed&utm_source=embed&utm_name=&utm_content=header">Pokémon egg hatching video</a>, recorded from the game and published on Reddit, which showed a phantom coffee cup randomly floating in the air .</p>
<p>While this error was due to a non-player character failing to load, <a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/PokemonScarletViolet/comments/10c23q9/paldean_form_sinistea/">fans immediately started</a> to suggest names for the new creature, such as Caffiend, Coffantom and Sinisffee. <a href="https://www.dexerto.com/_ipx/w_640,q_75/https%3A%2F%2Feditors.dexerto.com%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2F2023%2F01%2F15%2Fpaldean-sinistea.jpg?url=https%3A%2F%2Feditors.dexerto.com%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2F2023%2F01%2F15%2Fpaldean-sinistea.jpg&w=640&q=75">Fan-made artworks</a> imitating the official games were produced and a new “fakemon” was born.</p>
<p>As this shows, glitches aren’t simply destructive malfunctions, but also a starting point for the creation of new fan narratives.</p>
<h2>Body horror in Pokémon Scarlet and Violet</h2>
<p>Darker glitches have emerged too. A video recorded from the game showed <a href="https://www.facebook.com/reel/832923954427294/">a child being attacked</a> by a Pokémon that had turned into a drill when they crossed the boundaries of the battlefield.</p>
<p>There was no gore, no screaming, but the contrast between the naïve, innocent tone of the Pokémon game’s universe and the violent narrative created by the recorded glitch made the video go viral.</p>
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<p>This example is only one among many manifestations of body horror that have occurred since the release of the Scarlet and Violet games. Players have <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Mbv4b7yLgE&ab_channel=BetaBrawler">shared playthroughs</a> showcasing avatars with spinning limbs, gigantic spaghetti-shaped bodies, or skeleton-like faces taking selfies.</p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">A compilation of Pokémon glitches.</span></figcaption>
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<p>As a queer game scholar I am fascinated by unorthodox and bizarre instances in gaming culture. I think that these glitches are pretty queer too.</p>
<p>Playing queerly means playing differently – whether it is to <a href="https://ourglasslake.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/Ruberg-No-Fun-QED.pdf">fail</a>, experience “<a href="https://static1.squarespace.com/static/58ad660603596eec00ce71a3/t/58becd3de6f2e1086b36a265/1488899390367/The+Politics+of+Bad+Feeling.pdf">bad feelings</a>”, be <a href="https://www.taylorfrancis.com/chapters/mono/10.4324/9781003022268-5/flawless-defeat-margins-gaspard-pelurson?context=ubx&refId=65754cf3-b563-4f5f-bd2a-c5a38ce140ea">aroused</a> or simply stray from mainstream gaming. </p>
<p>Queerness and horror have always shared a special relationship. Horror movies are often <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/film/2022/oct/31/queer-horror-cinema-babadook-frankenstein">beloved by queer audiences</a>, who frequently <a href="https://theconversation.com/m3gan-review-an-animatronic-doll-is-out-to-destroy-the-nuclear-family-much-to-fans-delight-198045">identify with the characters depicted</a> and enjoy seeing narratives that were, and still are, missing from the mainstream film industry.</p>
<p>The <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/film/2017/mar/23/body-horror-movies-get-out-life-alien-covenant">body horror</a> genre, with its obsession with “threatening” bodies, has resonated among the queer community. From <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vJVXTKkjsxA">Freaks</a> (1932) to <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q5_w2W5G9OM">Titane</a> (2021), body horror has come a long way from stigmatising to celebrating queer bodies. </p>
<p>And it has now found one of its most unexpected platforms – a globally successful, family-friendly digital game franchise.</p>
<h2>‘Gotta [glitch] ’em all’</h2>
<p>Witnessing characters becoming hugely elongated while trying to ride their bike, losing the skin on their faces while attempting to take a selfie, or moving through hard surfaces without any explanation has become common in the world of Pokémon.</p>
<p>Videos of these glitches have sparked conversations that go beyond the game’s original material and established glitch sharing as a way for fans to hijack the franchise.</p>
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<p>Pokémon has been trying to be more inclusive and has increasingly showcased <a href="https://thenerdsofcolor.org/2021/06/28/lets-take-a-moment-to-appreciate-the-diversity-pokemon-introduced-in-later-generations/">body diversity</a> among its characters. There are <a href="https://twitter.com/KholdKhaos63/status/1593653335390822402">buff women</a>, androgynous <a href="https://automaton-media.com/en/news/20220809-14779/">gym leaders</a> and <a href="https://automaton-media.com/en/news/20221130-16978/">curvaceous dads</a>. </p>
<p>The body horror glitches, however, might have unwillingly pushed the boundaries a bit too far. Players are now not only collecting pocket monsters, but monstrous bodies too.</p>
<p>Their awkward presence has provided a queer twist to the traditional Pokémon journey to “<a href="https://genius.com/Pokemon-pokemon-theme-gotta-catch-em-all-lyrics">become the very best</a>”. It has encouraged players to enjoy the game’s visible failures and share the visual feats of their transgressive avatars, in the hope of becoming the glitchiest player of them all.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/203718/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Gaspard Pelurson does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The many visual errors in the latest Pokémon games have led to an unexpected glitch-chasing frenzy.Gaspard Pelurson, Lecturer in Culture, Media and Creative Industries, King's College LondonLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2057972023-05-18T12:25:36Z2023-05-18T12:25:36ZThe Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom review – a masterclass in rewarding curiosity<p>Exploration and discovery have been key to Nintendo’s Legend of Zelda series since the <a href="https://www.nintendo.co.uk/Games/NES/The-Legend-of-Zelda-796345.html">first game in 1986</a> and its latest outing, <a href="https://www.nintendo.co.uk/Games/Nintendo-Switch-games/The-Legend-of-Zelda-Tears-of-the-Kingdom-1576884.html">Tears of the Kingdom</a>, builds on the lessons of the past. </p>
<p>Much like its 2017 predecessor, <a href="https://www.zelda.com/breath-of-the-wild/">Breath of the Wild</a>, the new game is an open-world sandbox action adventure title, in which players can traverse the entirety of the game’s landscape with relatively few limitations. Protagonist Link once again sets out into the kingdom of Hyrule to find the missing Princess Zelda.</p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">The trailer for Tears of the Kingdom (2023).</span></figcaption>
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<p>Encouraging exploration in open-world games is a <a href="https://www.thesixthaxis.com/2015/12/02/opinion-why-the-waypoint-marker-should-go-away/">common challenge</a> in game design. Designers must <a href="https://mitpress.mit.edu/9780262527538/uncertainty-in-games/">evoke sufficient uncertainty</a> for players in order to <a href="http://www.digra.org/wp-content/uploads/digital-library/paper_428.pdf">encourage their curiosity</a>. Curiosity invites engagement, motivating players to explore and progress through a game.</p>
<p>Nintendo ran into this challenge while developing the vast open world of Breath of the Wild. During testing, players tended to travel from quest marker to quest marker with little deviation to explore the environment around them.</p>
<p>Their solution was to create a world which varied in height. As hills, mountains and towers obscure the player’s view, they are encouraged to climb or navigate them. Doing this gradually reveals <a href="https://www.gamedeveloper.com/design/enjoy-a-bit-of-fresh-insight-into-how-nintendo-built-i-breath-of-the-wild-i-#close-modal">what Nintendo calls</a> objects of “gravity” – interesting and exciting locations that draw the eye and invite exploration.</p>
<p>Tears of the Kingdom elevates its predecessor’s approach, providing a vast world filled with peculiarities and oddities that inspire curiosity. There are “SkyView towers” that take the varying height approach even further, launching Link far into the clouds above to give players an extensive – if terrifying – view of Hyrule’s landscape.</p>
<p>The new “sky islands” scattered above Hyrule provide players with even more vantage points. From these heights, the delights of the world below are revealed with new wonders to investigate.</p>
<h2>Encouraging curiosity</h2>
<p>Tears of the Kingdom’s quests deliberately shove players off the beaten path. There are minimal objective markers in the game, with Link instead frequently given vague directions to his goal. </p>
<p>When I played the game, I took a brief respite from adventuring at a restaurant for Goron (a huge rock-eating species), drawn in by a giant, glowing ham joint. There, I discovered the concerning story of a new rock-based cuisine which was having a strange hypnotic effect on diners. </p>
<p>I was told that its origin lay in a cave “just past the mine cart tracks”. My search led to the discovery of a new shrine (one of many puzzles) and a nearby SkyView tower before I found my objective.</p>
<p>Interactions like this emphasise the ambiguity of game’s story line, which is threaded with mysteries and uncertainties that again invoke curiosity. The game opens with the excavation of an ancient structure beneath Hyrule, complete with foreboding carvings and a strange red mist. These elements all hint ambiguously at the events to come. </p>
<p>Tears of the Kingdom doesn’t hand hold, with the narrative full of abstract and surreal moments that keep players guessing. Many familiar faces return, but time has passed since players have last seen them and they have changed. Players are left to fill in the gaps themselves.</p>
<h2>Link’s new abilities</h2>
<p>Link’s new skills are Tears of the Kingdom’s greatest evolution from Breath of the Wild. Though players already had the power to manipulate certain metal objects in the world, Tears of the Kingdom broadens this significantly. </p>
<p>Anything not glued down is now fair game and the glue is in players’ hands. Objects and more complex mechanical devices can now be stuck together into increasingly intricate creations to traverse, solve puzzles, or fight enemies with.</p>
<p>The same can be done with weapons and items in the inventory. I was able to fuse an entire log to the end of my sword and club baddies away with ease. I also glued a dismembered bat eye to the end of an arrow, to give it homing properties. </p>
<p>This ability to create and manipulate the world to such a degree opens a huge range of possibilities to explore. Can I attach a bomb to an arrow? Absolutely, this works incredibly well. Can I attach a bomb to my sword? Absolutely, but good luck with that.</p>
<p>The Legend of Zelda has always excelled in giving players a true sense of adventure and over the decades the franchise has become a mainstay of the action adventure genre. While creating uncertainty and evoking curiosity is fundamental for many game designers, Tears of the Kingdom is truly Nintendo’s masterclass.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/205797/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Matthew Higgins does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Tears of the Kingdom doesn’t hand hold, with the narrative full of abstract and surreal moments that keep players guessing.Matthew Higgins, Lecturer, Digital and Creative Technologies, University of PortsmouthLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2052292023-05-11T20:09:03Z2023-05-11T20:09:03ZHere’s why The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom is big news – even among those who don’t see themselves as ‘gamers’<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/525003/original/file-20230509-27-cooabm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C2%2C1914%2C1074&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom Press kit</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Early this morning, millions of people around the world rushed to their Nintendo Switch to play <a href="https://www.zelda.com/tears-of-the-kingdom/">The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom</a> and immerse themselves anew in this game’s vast, mythical kingdom of Hyrule.</p>
<p>This fresh release, a sequel to 2017’s <a href="https://www.zelda.com/breath-of-the-wild/">The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild</a>, has been long awaited by Zelda fans around the globe, and the subject of breathless coverage in both specialist gaming media and the <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2023/05/04/arts/zelda-nintendo-history.html">mainstream press</a>. </p>
<p>So, why is this game such big news – even among those who don’t necessarily see themselves as “gamers”?</p>
<p>I’m a game design researcher focused on creating and developing systems that allow games to be played by anyone – and there cannot be a better example of that than The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom. </p>
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<a href="https://theconversation.com/the-super-mario-bros-movie-dont-watch-it-for-the-story-but-for-how-it-successfully-represents-gameplay-203592">The Super Mario Bros. Movie: don't watch it for the story but for how it successfully represents gameplay</a>
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<h2>Who is this game for?</h2>
<p>This game situates itself in the action-adventure genre, but that descriptor only scratches the surface. It offers an unparalleled open world, both in size and detail, and is uniquely able to cater to a huge audience. </p>
<p>Want to explore and discover a breathtakingly beautiful world? This game has you covered. Want to absorb a rich story built up over many years? This game lets you do that. Want to test your mettle and take down tough foes? This game is for you.</p>
<p>From the limited game play footage already released, it’s obvious Tears of the Kingdom allows the player to use their critical thinking skills to overcome puzzles their own way.</p>
<p>Taken together, Tears of the Kingdom and Breath of the Wild suggest Nintendo is pioneering a model focused on inclusivity and approachability. Players can take things at their own pace. The open-world exploration, engaging storytelling, mind-bending challenges and serene atmosphere draw audiences ranging from franchise veterans to those completely new to games. </p>
<p>Accessibility and creativity combine to give players an unparalleled level of freedom. The puzzles around every corner of the kingdom of Hyrule make this game compelling for newcomers and old hands alike.</p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom – Official Trailer #3.</span></figcaption>
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<h2>What is The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom?</h2>
<p>Despite the franchise name, the game’s protagonist is the young knight Link (Zelda is the name of the princess he must help to set free). His task is to save the mythical kingdom of Hyrule by ridding it of the tyrannical overlord Ganon. In the previous game, Link must travel across the kingdom, seeking aid from the diverse species and tribes of the lands to uproot and vanquish Ganon.</p>
<p>From the promotional videos and early game play footage of the new game, we know Ganon has returned and Link must embark on a new adventure to defeat him. </p>
<p>To do so, players must navigate and explore new mysterious sky islands high above Hyrule, as well as the familiar sprawling landscapes of the previous game.</p>
<p>With the shift to the skies, Link has also received an updated suite of skills. He can now rewind time, ascend through ceilings, and – most importantly – combine items to create new and exciting weapons or vehicles.</p>
<p>This game allows you to combine real-world and in-game knowledge to literally invent your own solutions.</p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom – Official Trailer #2.</span></figcaption>
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<h2>Why was Breath of the Wild such a, well, game-changer?</h2>
<p><a href="https://www.zelda.com/breath-of-the-wild/">The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild</a> caused genre-defining waves when it was released in 2017, forcing many to rethink what an open world game is.</p>
<p>Most open world games at the time featured much more linear narratives, forcing players to experience the world one small area after another. Many blocked players from content until they have progressed further in the story. This denies players from the freedom and choice Breath of the Wild relishes in.</p>
<p>At its core, Breath of the Wild allows you to do what you want, when you want, without forcing you down a particular path. After brief tutorials, you’re off on your quest to find Ganon – but what you do between now and then is completely up to you. You can spend the entire time picking and cooking mushrooms, if you like.</p>
<p>Subtle environmental cues help deliver a gripping narrative, and there are plenty of side quests along the way. Players who want the story can seek it out, while those who’d rather skip it are free to wander around deserts, oceans, forests and plains on their own personal voyage.</p>
<p>Another reason this game garnered such a vast and loyal fanbase is it allows players to do as much or as little as they feel up to that day. </p>
<p>Had a hard week and just want to relax? You can take to the skies with your paraglider and soar around breathtaking landscapes or hop on your horse to explore the nooks and crannies of Hyrule. In the mood for a challenge? Try your hand at one of hundreds of expertly designed puzzles (many of which have more than one solution). Keen for some biffo? Battle one of Ganon’s minions or practise your skills with a new weapon.</p>
<p>Unplanned interactions between game characters, landscapes or puzzles abound. That’s how this game can keep surprising even those players who have sunk hundreds of hours into it.</p>
<p>“What would happen if I do this?” you ask. This game always has an answer.</p>
<h2>What do we know so far about Tears of the Kingdom?</h2>
<p>Building on the previous game’s focus on discovery, players in The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom will be spending a lot of time exploring the mysterious sky islands floating high above the land, bringing both new challenges and stunning scenery.</p>
<p>Players will have a range of new abilities that focus on invention and experimentation. Using the new “fuse” ability, you can combine a weapon with items found throughout the game to create new possibilities. Found a spiky metal ball? Why not stick it to the end of your sword and see what it does?</p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom – Mr. Aonuma Gameplay Demonstration.</span></figcaption>
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<p>The new “ultrahand” feature allows you to combine a huge variety of vehicle components and in-game objects to create vehicles. Found a wooden board drifting in the ocean? Attach some fans, a sail and voilà! You’ve got a powerboat.</p>
<p>This allows player to apply knowledge from the real world and the game world to come up with creative solutions.</p>
<p>This game is extremely approachable, yet has the depth to keep players interested for years to come. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/art-for-trying-times-how-a-philosopher-found-solace-playing-red-dead-redemption-2-142983">Art for trying times: how a philosopher found solace playing Red Dead Redemption 2</a>
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<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Padraic Heaton receives a research stipend as a part of his research at UTS.</span></em></p>I’m a game design researcher focused on creating systems that allow games to be played by anyone. There cannot be a better example of that than The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom.Padraic Heaton, Casual Academic, University of Technology SydneyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2035922023-04-12T15:05:56Z2023-04-12T15:05:56ZThe Super Mario Bros. Movie: don’t watch it for the story but for how it successfully represents gameplay<p>The first videogame I ever played was the arcade game <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pp2aMs38ERY">Donkey Kong</a>. Released in 1981, it took us into a blocky-looking world where a carpenter in overalls raced along platforms and up ladders in a building site to rescue a lady kidnapped by a large ape. Its humble hero, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mario">Mario</a>, went on to feature in scores of multi-million dollar grossing games, becoming an icon <a href="https://www.dukeupress.edu/recentering-globalization">as popular as Mickey Mouse</a>.</p>
<p>Having grown up in the 1980s, the new <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TnGl01FkMMo">Super Mario Bros. Movie</a> meant more to me than the average fantasy animation film. Watching <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yKxaYsn_F78">Mario and Donkey Kong have it out</a> on a massive screen – at a resolution so high you can see a single hair or wrinkle on these crisp-looking, toy-like characters – was remarkable. </p>
<p>Yet, it felt like the mission of this movie wasn’t just about creating flashy, fleshy cartoon characters or trying to tell a compelling story – it was about doing justice to the feel of these videogames that span decades and are still enjoyed by millions around the world.</p>
<h2>A film about jumping</h2>
<p>Story-wise, this is another of those PG-rated fantasy comedies that celebrate the 1980s and games culture. There’s a beta male baddy (Bowser, a fire-breathing dragon-turtle hybrid) and his army who must be defeated by a good-hearted guy (Mario) – helped by his brother (Luigi), a strong independent woman (Princess Peach), and a cast of zany allies. </p>
<p>But what makes the film worth watching is how it tips its hat to aspects of gameplay. </p>
<p>One of its biggest achievements is the unpretentious, funny recreations of moments from the videogames. Sometimes this happens by staging action-packed scenes that are <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yP-Qduvw9zY">framed from the same perspective as the videogame players</a>. For instance, seeing Mario and Luigi dash through a building site with the camera zoomed out to capture the entire screen from a side perspective is the filmmaker’s nod to the pleasures of platform games.</p>
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<p>The film also humorously reflects on player experience. Anybody who has enjoyed a Mario game might recall the disappointing feeling of falling down a pit after a failed attempt to reach a high platform. In the movie, Mario is initially inept at all of this. He is put through a funny 1980s montage of <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pKKBlSzMs4o">trial and error</a>, which reminds us how players got the hang of these games.</p>
<p>The emphasis on replicating gameplay may be the influence of Japanese games design superstar <a href="https://www.rollingstone.com/tv-movies/tv-movie-features/the-super-mario-bros-movie-shigeru-miyamoto-koji-kondo-nintendo-interview-easter-eggs-1234706449/">Shigeru Miyamoto</a>, the creator of Mario, who co-produced the movie.</p>
<p>Where other designers may have attempted to create a “proper” Mario movie by focusing on realism or a more sophisticated story, Miyamoto has long been adamant about seeing videogames <a href="https://shmuplations.com/miyamoto1989/">as toys</a>. Now he has created a true videogame movie. </p>
<h2>Games as toys</h2>
<p>Approaching games as toys is consistent with the long history of Kyoto-based games company Nintendo. It started back in 1889 producing playing cards, and even <a href="https://www.hobbydb.com/marketplaces/hobbydb/subjects/n-b-block-series">competed with Lego</a> before going on to revolutionise the videogaming medium with titles such as Super Mario Bros. in the early 1980s. </p>
<p>In most of Nintendo’s games, the end goal is not necessarily found in the stories – rather, these serve the pleasure of playing. In Super Mario Bros., for example, the damsel-in-distress narrative of Bowser kidnapping Princess Peach merely kicked off a game mostly about jumping.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a6Al_DShXX0">Other Mario adaptations for the big screen</a> have sought to translate gameplay with varying success. Take the 1993 <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GuXwMHF9y1Y&ab_channel=RottenTomatoesClassicTrailers">Super Mario Bros. live action</a> film, which was critically panned but has gone on to gain cult status. As a <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/1993/05/29/movies/review-film-plumbing-a-video-game-to-its-depths.html">reviewer in the New York Times</a> put it: “This bizarre, special effects-filled movie doesn’t have the jaunty hop-and-zap spirit of the Nintendo video game from which it takes – ahem – its inspiration.” </p>
<p>Gone, now, are the days of third-party licensing when cinematic game adaptations were left in the hands of external developers, resulting in <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nKqFEV9rA1U">output that could look very different</a> to the games themselves – such as Super Mario Bros. Super Show! from the late 1980s. This animated show was not particularly faithful to the games: Mario and Luigi had a different kind of Italian-American accent and a Princess Toadstool. The live-action segments also featured crasser and more adult iterations of the characters.</p>
<p>This time, however, Nintendo has worked with Universal Pictures to adapt the game, so the new animated movie is more faithful in brand continuity.</p>
<h2>Mario’s most successful cinematic appearance</h2>
<p>There are now entire TV series based on story-driven games, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eNF27c3-5Qw">whose scripts replicate the game almost verbatim</a>. For instance, the recent hit series The Last of Us saw fans cross-reference scene by scene with the original game. </p>
<p>In contrast, the Super Mario Bros. Movie looks like an attempt to make a film that works more like a game. And in spite of a <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/film/2023/apr/09/the-super-mario-bros-movie-review-game-over-for-this-lazy-animated-mess">lukewarm reception from critics</a>, the new film stands to be the most successful cinematic Mario appearance yet.</p>
<p>While the film has been downplayed by some as a “marketing machine” to sell Nintendo toys, critics overlook the fact that its success might be connected to how popular these toys already are. The games have <a href="https://www.theverge.com/2023/2/7/23589075/nintendo-switch-q3-2023-earnings-sales-console-third-bestselling">sold in the 100 millions</a>, which may explain the film’s ability to <a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/films/news/super-mario-bros-movie-box-office-b2317192.html">smash box-office records</a>. </p>
<p>This film will have gameplaying fans poring over frames to identify references to the games and “Easter eggs” – messages hidden for knowing watchers to look out for. Older and new fans alike will recognise <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=otZ-D3OJeW4">the GameCube jingle in Luigi’s ringtone</a>, and enjoy vintage gaming items such as the “hammer power-up” that are on sale in the film’s antique shop. </p>
<p>Many viewers will also recognise the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QilqLbynOsY">iconic musical motifs from the Super Mario Bros. levels</a>, and how the maps are reminiscent of Super Mario World. They will spot cutesy fan-favourites <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_o6yvb5E2Sw">Yoshi</a> and Toad.</p>
<p>The Super Mario Bros. Movie may indeed work to re-market Nintendo’s four-decade back catalogue of gaming classics to both nostalgic parents and kids. But in being driven by the very success of gaming culture, it defies critics looking at it as “just another movie”. Instead, they should see it as an extension of the videogame, and a celebration of how this expansive world makes people feel.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/203592/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Marco-Benoît Carbone does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The game that’s all about jumping comes alive in a film where the story is secondary to celebrating decades of Mario.Marco-Benoît Carbone, Senior Lecturer in Intercultural Studies, Brunel University LondonLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2030822023-04-12T11:21:12Z2023-04-12T11:21:12ZTetris movie: why the story of the game’s origins is legendary<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/519796/original/file-20230406-217-4qt847.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C1366%2C768&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">There have been numerous iterations of Tetris since the game was first introduced but the iconic shapes never change. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/110457687@N03/15538236401">Downloadsource.es/Flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/">CC BY-NC-SA</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>On my bedside cabinet, next to my alarm clock, is a jar holding my cufflink collection. One set contains seven odd cufflinks. They are bold in colour, now a bit scratched with flaking paint, but with clear geometric designs: a squat Z, S and T, an L, a J, a square and lastly, the ever useful long bar.</p>
<p>Even as a lecturer in games development, I don’t tend to wear my game affiliations that boldly but these cufflinks, the odd badge and my Minecraft waistcoat are exceptions. There are very few video game elements that I could describe so simply that even some non-gamers would recognise. But I am, of course, talking about the shapes, or the “tetrominoes”, from the nearly 40-year-old game of Tetris. </p>
<p>Alongside Pac-Man, Super Mario, and Sonic the Hedgehog, Tetris was one of the first video games to break into popular culture. How else can you explain the recent release of the <a href="https://www.apple.com/tv-pr/news/2023/02/apple-original-films-unveils-trailer-for-tetris-new-thriller-starring-taron-egerton/">Tetris movie</a>, starring Taron Egerton? Bizarrely, this film is based on what you think would be the rather dry legal arguments of the intellectual property rights of the game.</p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">The official trailer for the Tetris movie on Apple TV+</span></figcaption>
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<p>But within games lore, the tale of how Tetris came to be is legendary. </p>
<p>Alexey Pajitnov, a speech recognition researcher at the Soviet Union’s Academy of Sciences, developed a range of puzzle games in the early 1980s, by “borrowing” spare time on his workplace’s Electronika 60 computer. </p>
<p>The machine had no graphical display and so the games were displayed using text but Tetris still hooked many of Pajitnov’s colleagues. Soon it was on most computers in various Soviet organisations.</p>
<p>Pajitnov wanted to share his game, but this being the late Soviet Union era, he had little idea of how game publishing worked and his employers weren’t pleased about the “wasted” time on their expensive computer. Plus Soviet copyright law gave the state control over the software. </p>
<p>However, Pajitnov negotiated the rights to the Academy via his supervisor, who sent the game to Hungarian game publisher Novotrade. That led to Tetris seeing limited success behind the iron curtain.</p>
<figure class="align-left ">
<img alt="A bearded man wearing a white top and jeans stands smiling on a blue stage with his hands raised." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/519618/original/file-20230405-18-wj9exs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/519618/original/file-20230405-18-wj9exs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/519618/original/file-20230405-18-wj9exs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/519618/original/file-20230405-18-wj9exs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/519618/original/file-20230405-18-wj9exs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/519618/original/file-20230405-18-wj9exs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/519618/original/file-20230405-18-wj9exs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Tetris creator, Alexey Pajitnov.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/imaginecup/9271942618/in/photostream/">ImagineCup/Flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In Hungary, Robert Stein of Andromeda Software saw Tetris, liked it and approached Pajitnov about obtaining the rights. Pajitnov responded via fax that he was interested. Stein took that fax and without drawing up a contract, proceeded to sell the rights at the 1987 Las Vegas Consumer Electronics Show. </p>
<p>Tetris became a massive success, being ported to multiple platforms and winning multiple awards. But what then followed was a protracted legal battle which stretched across continents, involved several gaming companies and numerous iterations of Tetris itself. There were versions on the <a href="https://www.computinghistory.org.uk/det/1227/Amstrad-Plc/">Amstrad</a>, the <a href="https://www.computinghistory.org.uk/det/182/Acorn-BBC-Micro-Model-B/">BBC Micro</a> and the <a href="https://americanhistory.si.edu/collections/search/object/nmah_334638">Apple II</a> to name but three. </p>
<p>Eventually, in the late 1980s, Nintendo showed an interest in wanting to obtain Tetris for their upcoming <a href="https://www.nintendo.co.uk/Hardware/Nintendo-History/Game-Boy/Game-Boy-627031.html">Game Boy</a> console. Since then, it’s practically been ubiquitous. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A grey square Tetris cartridge propped up against a Nintendo Game Boy console" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/519611/original/file-20230405-16-nn8pa9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=53%2C8%2C6000%2C3979&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/519611/original/file-20230405-16-nn8pa9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/519611/original/file-20230405-16-nn8pa9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/519611/original/file-20230405-16-nn8pa9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/519611/original/file-20230405-16-nn8pa9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/519611/original/file-20230405-16-nn8pa9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/519611/original/file-20230405-16-nn8pa9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Nintendo’s Game Boy was released in 1989 and Tetris became the most popular game.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Game_Boy_and_Tetris.jpg">Sammlung der Medien und Wissenschaft/Wikimedia</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Quite simply, Tetris is one of the most engaging computer games ever devised. Some have tried to pin <a href="https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/Trauma%2C-treatment-and-Tetris%3A-video-gaming-volume-Butler-Herr/2382b9b18e1a9fafb228f94c3ab1b7504b5b3e7d">psychological aspects</a> to it. The slow ramping up of difficulty is not just due to the increasing speed but also because your failures stay to thwart you and victories are therefore fleeting. </p>
<p>For those of us old enough to have grown up with the first generation of home computers such as the <a href="https://worldofspectrum.org">ZX Spectrum</a>, Tetris is our “when I were a lad” type of game. I still remember the drama of the thumping and ominous beat of the music on the Commodore 64, forgoing the catchy Russian folk song of the original.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/Rpt-G3dRcek?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">What Tetris looked and sounded like on the Commodore 64.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>It was a time when you couldn’t rely on the Oscar winning performances of your voice actors, the ultra-realism of your graphics or a sumptuous orchestral soundtrack. It was beeps and limited colours of obvious pixels, so the gameplay had to grab you even more to get that “just one more go” kick. </p>
<p><a href="https://doom.fandom.com/wiki/Doom">Doom</a> is often cited as being the game featured across all platforms but I’d argue that Tetris really holds that crown. Having first played it on my <a href="https://www.commodore.ca/commodore-products/commodore-64-the-best-selling-computer-in-history/">Commodore 64</a>, I went on to play it on my <a href="http://theamigamuseum.com/amiga-models/amiga-1000/">Amiga</a>, many iterations on PC, then the Xbox 360. It’s available on the current generation of consoles, on phones and there is even a virtual reality version. All with the same essential gameplay. You can’t really mess with near perfection.</p>
<p>Having grown up with <a href="https://www.onrec.com/news/news-archive/what-is-8-bit-graphics-and-how-it%E2%80%99s-used-nowadays">8-bit graphics</a>, it’s fascinating to watch my students, born decades after Tetris, copying that retro style for their modern games design.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A computer game animation shows a platform set against a blue sky, where various coloured blocks are mounted up." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/519808/original/file-20230406-24-7ntf7e.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/519808/original/file-20230406-24-7ntf7e.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/519808/original/file-20230406-24-7ntf7e.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/519808/original/file-20230406-24-7ntf7e.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/519808/original/file-20230406-24-7ntf7e.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/519808/original/file-20230406-24-7ntf7e.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/519808/original/file-20230406-24-7ntf7e.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The 2012 game, Fez, was designed by Phil Fish.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Fez_%28video_game%29_screenshot_05.png">Polytron Corporation</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>When Phil Fish designed his game <a href="http://fezgame.com">Fez</a>, a successor to Tetris as a video game puzzler, he wanted to depict the remains of an ancient civilisation, but a video game ancient civilisation. </p>
<p>Look closely at the stone ruins of this long-dead race. They are made from recognisable, odd-shaped blocks: a squat Z, S and T, an L, a J, a square and lastly the ever useful long bar.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/203082/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Simon Scarle does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Cold war intrigue and an international legal fight were behind one of the most popular video games ever.Simon Scarle, Senior Lecturer in Games Development, Cardiff Metropolitan UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2010542023-03-06T17:15:28Z2023-03-06T17:15:28ZPikachu to depart: a brief history of the world’s favourite Pokémon<p>In the run-up to <a href="https://www.polygon.com/pokemon/23616619/pokemon-presents-day-2023-direct-announcements-all-trailers">Pokémon Day</a> – an anniversary created to celebrate the <a href="https://www.gamingbible.com/features/nintendo-pokemon-red-blue-and-green-how-the-nintendo-game-boy-hits-were-made-20210219">first Pokémon video game</a>, released on February 27 1996 – a small but significant piece of news was announced. </p>
<p>There is to be a new Pikachu character, named <a href="https://www.thegamer.com/pikachu-is-dead-long-live-captain-pikachu/">Captain Pikachu</a>. This Pikachu will partner with a new human, Professor Friede, in an animated series based on the most recent video game: <a href="https://scarletviolet.pokemon.com/en-gb/">Pokémon Scarlet and Violet</a>. </p>
<p>The pokémon has been a global marketing tool for Nintendo products for over 25 years. Fans are used to seeing Pikachu dressed in all manner of outfits, including 2019’s <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1roy4o4tqQM">Detective Pikachu</a>. </p>
<p>However, the announcement followed a seismic shift in the animated franchise. Pikachu’s longtime child partner, Ash, finally achieved his goal of becoming a Pokémon Champion at the end of 2022. As a result, the Pokémon Company confirmed that the character would <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/pokemon-ash-ketchum-pikachu-leaving-show/">bow out of the television series</a> in early 2023. </p>
<p>In response, fans on the social media platform <a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/pokemon/comments/zo0rmi/so_is_pikachu_still_gonna_be_the_mascot_now/">Reddit</a> asked what would happen to Pikachu. How could he possibly continue without Ash in future stories? </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/pokemons-ash-wins-world-championship-after-25-years-heres-why-the-franchise-is-still-capturing-fans-194788">Pokémon's Ash wins World Championship after 25 years – here's why the franchise is still capturing fans</a>
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<p>Without the iconic character, Nintendo would lose more than just an important piece of intellectual property – they would lose the heart of what makes the franchise so endearing, so it’s no surprise to see Pikachu’s return, albeit in a different guise.</p>
<h2>Why is Pikachu so popular?</h2>
<p>Pikachu was not necessarily destined for great popularity. He was not a standout “pocket monster” in Nintendo’s first Game Boy Pokémon title, Red and Green, but was one among 151 creatures that children could choose to play with. </p>
<p>The Pokémon video game was quickly followed by the <a href="https://www.pokemon.com/us/pokemon-tcg">trading card game</a> in October 1996, where players could pick from a range of cards to battle or trade with a friend. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.ign.com/games/pokemon-green-version">Early audiences</a> were entirely domestic as the game was not available outside Japan. However, when <a href="http://fj.webedia.us/features/father-pokemon-japanese-producer-masakazu-kubo-saluted-copyright-educator">Kubo Masakazu</a>, a comic book publisher and manga enthusiast, was hired by Nintendo to take Pokémon beyond the national market, he immediately saw the potential to build a global franchise and audience around one character: Pikachu. </p>
<p>Masakazu developed the animated television series and movies, focusing the stories on a trio of young travellers – Ash, Misty and Brock. Each traveller had a partner pokémon that would never be tucked away in a pokéball (devices in which pokémon are captured and stored), with personalities of their own. </p>
<p>As author Anne Allison described in <a href="https://www.ucpress.edu/book/9780520245655/millennial-monsters">Millennial Monsters</a> (2006), this new empire of entertainment (games, trading cards, a TV show and films) was based on Masakazu’s vision of harmony. This was shown in the way humans and pocket monsters live side by side, treating each other with kindness and love. The bond between Ash and Pikachu is at the heart of Pokémon’s global success.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.dukeupress.edu/pink-globalization"><em>Kawaii</em></a>, or cuteness, is a profitable Japanese cultural export and the Pikachu character personifies its success. Pikachu’s appeal lies in the character’s design, backed up by <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2G8V00SkTvY">his emotional resonance</a>, which is developed in the animated series and films. </p>
<p>Pikachu’s colour and frame are easily recognisable and can be <a href="https://screenrant.com/pokemon-pikachu-design-changes-red-blue-detective-movie/">redrawn in any style</a>. The name is catchy and repeatable, whether or not you are a native Japanese speaker. The character is small and huggable and helps children develop feelings of <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/1368879032000162220">attachment, nurturance and intimacy</a> when they play with Pikachu toys. </p>
<p>These visual features are reinforced by Pikachu’s personality and powers. He is loyal to Ash, brave in front of countless challenges and conveys emotions openly through facial expressions, noises and constant affirmation of who he is: “<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wY9gKpFmy64">Pika, Pika, Pikachu!</a>”</p>
<p>Famously, in the animated series, Ash’s Pikachu does not wish to evolve (the process through which a pokémon can change form, grow stronger and gain new abilities). This goes against the internal logic of the game where players must care for and evolve their pokémon to help them win more battles.</p>
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<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/uJcOjOwV9Zk?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Ash explains why Pikachu doesn’t want to evolve.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Therefore, Pikachu’s strength comes from his individual identity as the Pikachu, not a Pikachu. Ash’s Pikachu is unique. So while countless others have been encountered in the games and animated series, they are not the same as his Pikachu. Or, more importantly, they are not the same as our Pikachu. </p>
<p>The <a href="http://henryjenkins.org/blog/2010/06/transmedia_education_the_7_pri.html">multiplicity</a> of the character – that he is both the same as and different from other versions in the same entertainment universe – allows Pokémon to create new stories and scenarios without disrupting the overall backstory or inherent qualities of the Pikachu character. </p>
<p>This is how Pikachu has managed to be both the image of a global corporate brand and a distinctly familiar and individual partner on Ash’s journey. The children who grew up watching his adventures with Ash are now adults who can still reconnect with him because their relationship with the character was developed over multiple games, TV series and films. </p>
<p>Now that Ash is retiring, our Pikachu can too. His memory will continue in the minds of multi-generational fans while the <em>kawaii</em> Nintendo still wants to export will continue through the familiar design and distinct new personality of his successor: Captain Pikachu.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/201054/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Lincoln Geraghty does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Ash Ketchum is retiring from the Pokémon franchise, but this doesn’t spell the end of Pikachu.Lincoln Geraghty, Professor of Media Cultures, University of PortsmouthLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2007782023-02-28T16:04:03Z2023-02-28T16:04:03ZMicrosoft signs 10-year contract to bring Xbox games to Nintendo – here’s what that means for players<p>In a recently <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20230222031146/https:/twitter.com/BradSmi/status/1627926790172811264">deleted post</a>, Microsoft’s president, Brad Smith, tweeted the first details of a ten-year deal with Nintendo. </p>
<p>The deal involves plans to bring gaming franchise Call of Duty (COD) and other popular Xbox titles to Nintendo platforms. COD: Modern Warfare 2 was the <a href="https://www.videogameschronicle.com/news/modern-warfare-2-overtakes-elden-ring-as-2022s-best-selling-game-in-the-us/">biggest-selling game of 2022</a>, with the series generating over $30 billion (£25 billion) in the 20 years since its first release.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1629180356359495680"}"></div></p>
<p>In an <a href="https://twitter.com/BradSmi/status/1629180356359495680?t=-VQEeL9u772fgPjJ6JFD7A&s=19">updated tweet</a>, Smith added that these new deals are contingent on Microsoft’s planned $69 billion acquisition of the owners of the COD series – Blizzard Entertainment – as well as several popular titles such as World of Warcraft, Overwatch and Starcraft. </p>
<p>There are fears that such a high-level acquisition will cause market stagnation and allow Microsoft to form a monopoly on the gaming industry. The Blizzard acquisition has invoked several anticompetition lawsuits against Microsoft by antitrust authorities in the <a href="https://www.gov.uk/cma-cases/microsoft-slash-activision-blizzard-merger-inquiry">UK</a>, <a href="http://www.fosspatents.com/2023/01/european-commission-hands-down.html">Europe</a> and the <a href="https://www.videogameschronicle.com/news/the-ftc-sued-microsoft-to-stop-the-eu-accepting-a-settlement-over-activision-deal-its-claimed/">US</a>. </p>
<h2>What could this mean for Nintendo fans?</h2>
<p>Microsoft’s main gaming competitor, Sony, has been vehemently against the Blizzard acquisition and has <a href="https://mezha.media/en/2022/11/24/microsoft-offered-sony-a-10-year-deal-on-call-of-duty-sony-refuses/">refused to sign</a> a similar 10 year COD deal to the one offered to Nintendo. Game developer <a href="https://kotaku.com/microsoft-activision-call-of-duty-nintendo-switch-steam-1849862479">Valve also declined</a> a similar offer from Microsoft for its online gaming platform, Steam, saying a long-term commitment “wasn’t necessary”.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/Zxnx3W-HA18?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Call of Duty: Ghosts (2013) was the last COD game available to Nintendo players.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The last time Nintendo fans could play COD was back in 2013, with Call of Duty: Ghosts, which was graphically pared down for the Nintendo Wii U console. </p>
<p>Nintendo has been excluded from the franchise for nearly a decade mostly because of <a href="https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/EJ1097830.pdf">its ethos</a> of using old technology in innovative ways. This has allowed it to produce less powerful but extremely successful consoles aimed at everyone, not just “gamers”.</p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/512688/original/file-20230228-2323-z8f53e.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="An original Game Boy console in grey with red buttons." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/512688/original/file-20230228-2323-z8f53e.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/512688/original/file-20230228-2323-z8f53e.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=812&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/512688/original/file-20230228-2323-z8f53e.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=812&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/512688/original/file-20230228-2323-z8f53e.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=812&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/512688/original/file-20230228-2323-z8f53e.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1020&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/512688/original/file-20230228-2323-z8f53e.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1020&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/512688/original/file-20230228-2323-z8f53e.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1020&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">The original black and white display Game Boy.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/london-england-05052019-retro-hand-held-1671878158">seeshooteatrepeat/Shutterstock</a></span>
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</figure>
<p>For example, its 1980s handheld console, the Game Boy, featured a black and white screen when competitors were championing colour. The resulting cheaper production costs and <a href="https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2019/04/game-boy-20th-anniversary/">long battery life</a> helped the Game Boy sell more units <a href="https://www.gamegrin.com/articles/the-game-boys-competitors/">during its lifespan</a> than all other competing systems combined managed. </p>
<p>Although an effective strategy, this ethos has made releasing COD for its most recent console, the Nintendo Switch, nearly impossible, as its memory and processing power are much more constrained than modern systems such as the latest Playstation, Xbox and PC hardware.</p>
<p>The new Microsoft deal may be exciting for Nintendo fans, who have been starved of high-fidelity modern gaming for decades. Smith’s tweet describes “feature and content parity” with COD releases for other consoles.</p>
<p>From a technical perspective, there are only two ways this could be feasible. Firstly, they could release COD on the Switch via a game streaming service.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A phone shows the Stadia loading screen, in front of a computer screen with the website log in page." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/512441/original/file-20230227-14-kmzf6s.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/512441/original/file-20230227-14-kmzf6s.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=324&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/512441/original/file-20230227-14-kmzf6s.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=324&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/512441/original/file-20230227-14-kmzf6s.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=324&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/512441/original/file-20230227-14-kmzf6s.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=407&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/512441/original/file-20230227-14-kmzf6s.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=407&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/512441/original/file-20230227-14-kmzf6s.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=407&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Google’s Stadia went offline on January 18 2023.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/montreal-canada-april-6-2020-google-1700292286">dennizn/Shutterstock</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Brands such as Google’s Stadia have previously attempted to provide the latest games via streaming to users with low-end machines. Google hosted each game on a network of ultra-high-spec gaming computers and streamed the video and controls remotely to players. This circumvented the need for them to purchase expensive hardware and instead they paid for a monthly subscription service.</p>
<p>Several problems with this concept led to <a href="https://www.theverge.com/2022/9/29/23378713/google-stadia-shutting-down-game-streaming-january-2023">Stadia’s closure earlier this year</a>. The most obvious was a lack of high-speed internet infrastructure in the <a href="https://www.comparethemarket.com/broadband/content/global-broadband-index/">UK and the US compared to countries like South Korea</a>. If users cannot access a decent internet connection, they will not be able to consistently stream the HD video needed for an enjoyable gaming experience.</p>
<p>The other issue was latency, the time it takes from the player hitting an input to the result being shown on screen. For many popular titles such as COD, even a few milliseconds delay can adversely affect a player’s chances of winning.</p>
<p>It could be argued that current technology and internet infrastructure cannot support <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20230222031146/https:/twitter.com/BradSmi/status/1627926790172811264">Nintendo’s purported</a> “feature and content parity” with COD titles via streaming in western countries. This is, however, subjective to the player. Some more casual gamers may not care about these issues, so long as they are invited to the party.</p>
<p>Another possibility for Nintendo fans is a new COD game that runs directly on their Nintendo hardware. This could be an indicator of a more powerful Nintendo console on the horizon, on par with its competitors. There are already <a href="https://metro.co.uk/2022/10/17/ps5-pro-and-xbox-series-x-mid-gen-upgrades-being-sent-to-devs-rumour-17578463/">rumours of Xbox series X and PlayStation 5 (PS5) upgrades</a> coming soon.</p>
<p>Sony released a pro version of its console with more processing power and improved graphics, approximately halfway through the life cycle of the PS4. As both the PS5 and Xbox Series X are approaching their third birthdays, there is a good chance that Nintendo could pull a new gaming system out of the bag. </p>
<p>That system could be capable of running the latest graphically impressive COD titles – much to the rapture of Nintendo fans.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/200778/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Travis Ralph-Donaldson does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>There are fears that these high-level acquisitions will cause market stagnation and allow Microsoft to form a monopoly on the gaming industry.Travis Ralph-Donaldson, Lecturer, Faculty of Creative & Cultural Industries, University of PortsmouthLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/985182018-08-15T10:20:56Z2018-08-15T10:20:56ZFinding nostalgia in the pixelated video games of decades past<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/231779/original/file-20180813-2906-f0h17k.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Instruments of nostalgia and psychological well-being?</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/manitou-springs-cousa-september-6-2016-756724900">Brian Kenney/Shutterstock.com</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Every day, it seems, new ultra-high-resolution video games are released, <a href="http://recipp.ipp.pt/bitstream/10400.22/8209/1/DM_JoanaOsorio_2015_MEI.pdf">syncing with players’ social media accounts</a> and <a href="https://www.playstation.com/en-us/explore/playstation-vr/">ready for virtual reality headsets</a>. Yet old games from the 1970s and 1980s <a href="http://time.com/money/4352311/old-video-games-worth-money/">are still in high demand</a>. The Nintendo Corporation has moved recently to both quash and exploit that popularity, <a href="https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/bjbped/nintendos-offensive-tragic-and-totally-legal-erasure-of-rom-sites">shutting down websites hosting old games’ code</a> while planning to <a href="https://www.gamespot.com/articles/nintendo-switch-online-service-offers-20-free-nes-/1100-6458799/">release its own back catalog on a new platform</a>. </p>
<p>Fans of Nintendo-made games may end up OK, but fans of other legacy games may lose much more than a retro way to have fun: They could find themselves without a powerful link to their personal pasts.</p>
<p>Playing old video games is not just a <a href="http://time.com/5220092/steven-spielberg-on-the-glories-and-limits-of-nostalgia-ready-player-one/">mindless trip down memory lane</a> for <a href="https://www.wired.com/2015/08/geeks-guide-gamer-stories/">lonely and isolated gamers</a>. The <a href="http://www.theesa.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/EF2018_FINAL.pdf">average age of a U.S. gamer is 34</a>, and many popular retro game titles have been around for 20 years or more. It seems <a href="https://www.popmatters.com/141240-the-retirement-of-a-gen-x-gamer-or-my-8-bit-childhood-2496029806.html">Generation X-ers could be returning to their cherished childhood properties</a>. </p>
<p>In fact, emerging media psychology research, <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.17645/mac.v6i2.1317">including our own work</a>, suggests that video game nostalgia can make people feel closer to their past, their friends and family, and even themselves. </p>
<h2>The popularity of retro video games</h2>
<p>The earliest video game consoles emerged in the 1970s, <a href="http://www.digitalspy.com/gaming/retro-gaming/feature/a616235/magnavox-odyssey-retrospective-how-console-gaming-was-born/">marked by the 1972 release of the Magnavox Odyssey</a>. The arcade classic “Pong” was so popular in 1973 that <a href="https://www.vanityfair.com/culture/2011/03/pong-excerpt-201103">machines each collected about US$200 a week in quarters</a>. Many 1990s gamers remember fondly the “<a href="https://www.harpercollins.com/9780062276711/console-wars/">console wars</a>” in which major game developers would battle publicly – for example <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=65E53rNC1io">Sega claiming to do what “Nintendon’t.”</a></p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/65E53rNC1io?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">TV ads from the throwback days of the ‘console wars.’</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>It may be a bit of a surprise to find out how popular retro and classic games are. Older games feature pixel-based graphics that <a href="https://www.howtogeek.com/341543/why-do-old-game-consoles-look-so-bad-on-modern-tvs/">can look fuzzy on modern televisions</a> and can be <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ut3n8-9JM5o">frustrating to play for even experienced gamers</a>. Yet in 2016, Nintendo released a <a href="https://www.nintendo.com/nes-classic/">NES Classic Edition</a> console and <a href="https://venturebeat.com/2018/06/25/nes-classic-edition-in-stock-retail-june-29/">sold out all 2.3 million of them</a> in just three months. The company <a href="https://www.polygon.com/2018/5/13/17350662/nes-classic-edition-release-date-2018-for-sale">made more and began selling them in June 2018</a>. </p>
<p>Other similar retro consoles are popular too. A quick search of eBay and Amazon reveals hundreds of retailers selling original and refurbished older video game systems. These older games pale in comparison to modern games that immerse players in <a href="https://www.guerrilla-games.com/play/horizon">lush, photo-realistic and smoothly interactive worlds</a>. And yet they’re very popular. The people who play them are clearly getting something compelling – though it’s probably not graphics or a deep storyline.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/229691/original/file-20180728-106511-n0ir3t.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/229691/original/file-20180728-106511-n0ir3t.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/229691/original/file-20180728-106511-n0ir3t.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=445&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/229691/original/file-20180728-106511-n0ir3t.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=445&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/229691/original/file-20180728-106511-n0ir3t.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=445&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/229691/original/file-20180728-106511-n0ir3t.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=559&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/229691/original/file-20180728-106511-n0ir3t.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=559&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/229691/original/file-20180728-106511-n0ir3t.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=559&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Released in December 2016, ‘Super Mario Maker’ allowed players to create their own Mario levels, selling 6 million units worldwide. Mario-themed games have sold over 550 million copies since the character’s introduction, in 1981.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Nintendo</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>The psychology of nostalgia</h2>
<p>As a psychological principle, nostalgia can be best understood as a <a href="http://doi.org/10.1037/a0025167">bittersweet mix of positive and negative emotions</a> that arises when thinking of meaningful events in one’s own past, and <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/bs.aesp.2014.10.001">tends to be tied intimately to social relationships</a>. </p>
<p>So far, researchers have identified two ways to trigger nostalgia: external triggers and internal distress. External triggers might include things such as <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/09658211.2013.876048">smells</a> and <a href="https://doi.org/10.5130/csr.v19i1.3074">tastes</a> and even references to media content, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/0148-2963(96)00023-9">such as movie titles</a> or <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177%2F0146167213499187">music</a>. Internal triggers are brought about by feelings of <a href="https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.91.5.975">loneliness</a> or even <a href="https://doi.org/10.1037/a0030442">boredom</a>. </p>
<p>Regardless of the trigger, nostalgia has a number of psychological benefits. It can <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/15298868.2010.521452">help people feel better about themselves</a> and <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9280.2008.02194.x">make them feel less alone</a>. For these reasons, nostalgia <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/spc3.12070">can promote mental health and well-being</a>. Clinical studies have suggested that <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177%2F1471301218774909">nostalgia might help protect against dementia</a>.</p>
<h2>Nostalgia in video games</h2>
<p>Can video games really evoke nostalgia? Forums online <a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/retrogaming/">debate the issue furiously</a>, <a href="http://www.computerspielemuseum.de/1210_Home.htm">museums chronicle the history of video games</a> with an eye toward bygone days, and the topic comes up <a href="http://www.psychologyofgames.com/2013/11/the-psychology-of-video-game-nostalgia/">in popular podcasts</a>. </p>
<p>Players’ <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/08824096.2017.1383236">relationships with the characters they’ve played in the past</a> – Mario, Sonic and scores of others – can play an important role in invoking nostalgia. One reason for this is <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chb.2015.07.030">players have complex social relationships with those characters</a>, either by seeing them as their friends, or even as extensions of themselves. </p>
<p>In <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/ppm0000208">our own research</a>, we asked 582 participants, mostly from the United States, to respond to a survey on “how people think about certain gaming experiences.” Specifically, gamers were randomly assigned to write one of four essays: about past or recent video game experiences, playing either alone or with others. The essays were designed to help participants immerse themselves in the memories, so that they could later answer questions about the <a href="http://selfdeterminationtheory.org/">intrinsic psychological needs</a> satisfied by those experiences.</p>
<p>As we expected, people who wrote about the older memories experienced stronger feelings of nostalgia than the people who wrote about recent ones. Those essays about older, more nostalgic memories were also more likely to have discussions of challenge and enjoyment as core to their experience, and tended to recall memories from the writer’s childhood. Social memories essays were also more nostalgic, but only when those memories were associated with a greater sense of belonging with people from the past. Some of these essays, especially those about family and friends, were emotionally powerful – one participant wrote (edited slightly, to protect their identity) that “My dad died when I was 10 so playing Mario Kart with him is one of my best memories that I have.” </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/231526/original/file-20180810-2894-17maqpt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/231526/original/file-20180810-2894-17maqpt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/231526/original/file-20180810-2894-17maqpt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/231526/original/file-20180810-2894-17maqpt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/231526/original/file-20180810-2894-17maqpt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/231526/original/file-20180810-2894-17maqpt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/231526/original/file-20180810-2894-17maqpt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/231526/original/file-20180810-2894-17maqpt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">In our research on video game nostalgia, gamers made fond references to friends and family in their social memories of gaming.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/smiling-family-sitting-on-couch-together-364445456">wavebreakmedia/Shutterstock.com</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Nostalgic gaming and well-being</h2>
<p>Perhaps more interesting? Memories of video games were enough to induce nostalgia that, in turn, made those people feel a little closer to those around them right now. </p>
<p>The study has limitations – the largest being that participants did not get to play their older games, so we don’t know if their nostalgic memories would be the same if they actually replayed the games – but it helped us better understand gaming nostalgia and its potential effects. Our findings have also been corroborated by other research on gaming nostalgia, such as work on active players of “Pokémon Go.” In that study, playing the game resulted in feelings of nostalgic reverie, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/15213269.2017.1305280">which in turn was positively connected to resiliency</a>, or the ability to cope with challenging times in life. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/231527/original/file-20180810-2924-1ty4aw6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/231527/original/file-20180810-2924-1ty4aw6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/231527/original/file-20180810-2924-1ty4aw6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/231527/original/file-20180810-2924-1ty4aw6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/231527/original/file-20180810-2924-1ty4aw6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/231527/original/file-20180810-2924-1ty4aw6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/231527/original/file-20180810-2924-1ty4aw6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/231527/original/file-20180810-2924-1ty4aw6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Can ‘Pokémon Go’ be therapeutic? Emerging research suggests that the nostalgia that players attached to the game can help them cope with daily struggles.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/bangkok-thailand-july-22-2016-charmander-456596296">Wachiwit/Shutterstock.com</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Research into the psychology of video game nostalgia is relatively new. However, the results of this work suggest that games can be nostalgic, and that this nostalgia can be therapeutic. For example, we already know that <a href="https://doi.org/10.1089/cpb.2009.0010">playing games at work can aid in psychological recovery</a> from stress; it might be that playing nostalgic games could intensify this process. It could also be possible to use the popular video games of yesterday as health interventions to delay the onset of dementia, following a line of research showing video games to have <a href="https://doi.org/10.1109/SeGAH.2017.7939279">cognitive</a> and <a href="https://dx.doi.org/10.1089/g4h.2014.0005">physical</a> health benefits for older populations. </p>
<p>As gamers age, understanding gaming nostalgia will help us better examine the wide range of experiences that they have with one of the <a href="https://www.gamecrate.com/statistically-video-games-are-now-most-popular-and-profitable-form-entertainment/20087">most profitable and popular form of entertainment media today</a>.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/98518/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Tim Wulf receives funding (PhD Scholarship) from the foundation of German Business (Stiftung der Deutschen Wirtschaft). </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Nicholas Bowman does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>As retro video games become more popular, research suggests players could be looking for nostalgia – and the psychological benefits it brings.Nicholas Bowman, Associate Professor of Communication Studies, West Virginia UniversityTim Wulf, Ph.D. student in Media Psychology, University of CologneLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/756652017-04-18T10:45:51Z2017-04-18T10:45:51ZYoung gamers are inventing their own controllers to get around their disabilities<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/165289/original/image-20170413-25886-b40vc6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://ablegamers.org/">AbleGamers Foundation</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Nintendo’s latest gaming device <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-nintendo-switch-breaks-convention-but-lacks-a-killer-app-74083">is unique</a>. It can operate like a traditional home console, a tablet or a handheld gaming unit complete with miniature joystick. But for gamers with disabilities, the Nintendo Switch may still have many of the same problems as any other console. Yet some of these young gamers are inventing their own ways to get around the challenges of using devices not designed to meet their needs.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/13676261.2017.1313969?scroll=top&needAccess=true">We interviewed</a> 15 young people with disabilities to find out about their everyday gaming habits. The gamers in the study were living with various disabilities – including muscle diseases, cerebral palsy, and Asperger’s syndrome – that can often hinder or interfere with the gameplay.</p>
<p>For example, many games require users to quickly and repeatedly press buttons on their controllers. Intensively repeated actions can be hard to accomplish for people with a muscle disease, making it impossible for them to proceed in these games. The mere speed of some games can be another issue, as well as an abundance of information that some games throw up.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/165291/original/image-20170413-10077-1ec1wta.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/165291/original/image-20170413-10077-1ec1wta.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/165291/original/image-20170413-10077-1ec1wta.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/165291/original/image-20170413-10077-1ec1wta.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/165291/original/image-20170413-10077-1ec1wta.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/165291/original/image-20170413-10077-1ec1wta.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/165291/original/image-20170413-10077-1ec1wta.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Faster control.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://ablegamers.org/">AbleGamers Foundation</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The gamers in our study were using a range of strategies, including some particularly innovative ideas, to overcome these issues. Some games were ruled out from the start, perceived as too speedy, too hectic or harbouring too many difficult sections. Others could be managed with the help of a friend or assistant who can take over control of the game for a short period to complete the hardest tasks, a kind of vicarious gamer.</p>
<p>The gamers were also careful about who they played with, with some preferring to play only with people who knew them and didn’t make a big deal of their disabilities. They preferred to play with people who were relaxed about the occasional difficulties disabilities can create, and who didn’t react in a way that spoiled the fun.</p>
<p>But <a href="http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/13676261.2017.1313969?scroll=top&needAccess=true">in some cases</a>, our gamers had gone a step further and developed their own ways to control the games. For example, one gamer, paralysed from the neck down after an accident, invented a new soft keyboard that allowed him to keep up with the speed of his favourite games. A soft keyboard is an onscreen keyboard, replacing the hardware keyboard with a clickable image on the display.</p>
<p>By combining this with a headmouse, which translates the movements of the user’s head into proportional mouse pointer movements, he could use this soft keyboard to control the game. For example, by programming his computer to read one click from his headmouse as 15 from a normal mouse, he could sustain his pace in the games and keep up with other players.</p>
<p>Another gamer rebuilt the controller of his console so that he could steer the games with his feet. Instead of holding a controller in his hands, he used a set of big buttons laid out on the floor. In this way he could avoid the troubles caused by his body’s involuntarily muscle contractions (spasticity). These can cause sudden stiffness or tightness, in this case especially affecting his upper body, so it was easier for him to control the game with his feet rather than his hands.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/165294/original/image-20170413-25882-lsmtov.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/165294/original/image-20170413-25882-lsmtov.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/165294/original/image-20170413-25882-lsmtov.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/165294/original/image-20170413-25882-lsmtov.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/165294/original/image-20170413-25882-lsmtov.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/165294/original/image-20170413-25882-lsmtov.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/165294/original/image-20170413-25882-lsmtov.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Widening participation.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://ablegamers.org/">AbleGamers Foundation</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Safe haven</h2>
<p>Why is playing video games so important to these young people that they would go to the trouble of inventing these alternative controllers? Several of the gamers <a href="http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/13676261.2017.1313969?scroll=top&needAccess=true">we interviewed</a> said games were an especially valuable safe haven that helped them manage their everyday lives and the challenges they faced. The gamers talked about enjoying “a deep story” within the games, that it was “a way to "close off” other things, an “escape” or “salvation”. </p>
<p>This is similar to the experience of other gamers, but disability sometimes adds an extra twist. A game’s well-crafted universe can be particularly attractive when disabilities create issues in real life, for instance in periods when friends abandon you because you are using a wheelchair. Some gamers even said that a video game can be seen as a metaphor for a life full of everyday fights. One gamer, living with a deteriorating muscle disease, said that the games are constantly “reminding oneself that you need to fight to succeed, especially us with difficult diagnoses”. </p>
<p>Despite the importance of video games to young people with disabilities, the games industry has only partially acknowledged them. For example, a gamer can often adjust difficulty levels to match his or her wanted level of challenge. But with more flexible speed settings and available shortcuts in the games, many gamers with disabilities would find better options.</p>
<p>The games industry would also benefit from more diversity in the worlds of its game, with more figures with various disabilities. This would attract people to the games that today do not always feel at home with them, and help open the challenges and safe haven games can provide to even more people with disabilities.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/75665/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>David Wästerfors received funding from Research platform for disability research in Region Skåne, Sweden, together with Kristofer Hansson.</span></em></p>Video games can provide disabled people with a safe haven, if they can access it.David Wästerfors, Associate professor, Lund UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/741142017-03-07T15:08:03Z2017-03-07T15:08:03ZNintendo’s new Switch console says a surprising amount about the company’s history<p>Nintendo have always done things their own way. The company has always been an innovator and each new games console it releases, from the Gameboy to the Wii, is usually labelled novel or gimmicky. Things <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/insertcoin/2016/10/20/the-nintendo-switch-debuts-with-a-gimmick-thats-actually-worthwhile/#6d610c3f4067">are no different</a> with its latest offering, the Nintendo Switch, which is the first hybrid console that can be used as a home gaming centre or a portable handheld device. But if you look through the company’s bloodline of previous systems, you can find common themes and design goals that Nintendo has been refining for years and that still emerge in the Switch.</p>
<p>The new device consists of a tablet computer that can be used on its own or connected to a larger monitor and accompanied by a handheld controller more like a traditional games console. The two sides of the “Joy-Con” controller can be detached and reattached to the tablet for completely portable use, or used as separate controllers for two-player games, such as 1 2 Switch. </p>
<p>One of the things the Switch demonstrates is how far Nintendo has brought motion control since its first attempts at introducing the technology. Motion control is built into many aspects of some of the Switch’s key launch games, such as Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, and needs to be precise and easy to use. Luckily, the system is very intuitive, especially in portable mode. The way the game uses motion control also counters one of its previous issues in that it doesn’t require players to expend too much energy while relaxing with their video games.</p>
<p>Nintendo first attempted to directly map what we do with our hands on screen nearly 30 years ago with the 1989 release of Mattel’s Power Glove for the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES). It detected the rotation and position of your hand and whether or not your hand was clenched. In theory, people tend to like direct mappings of controls to their function as it makes our interactions with a device more intuitive and easier to learn. </p>
<p>In reality, the <a href="http://www.glixel.com/news/nintendo-flashback-the-disastrous-power-glove-w470178">Power Glove was a failure</a>. The glove was tracked using an ultrasonic sensor rather than the infrared sensors used for motion capture today. And using sound rather than light to track movement meant the signal was too slow and created latency issues that made the glove seem sluggish and unresponsive. </p>
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<p>But, despite its problems, the Power Glove was a clear indication that Nintendo supported a vision for this design space. Years later, once the technology had caught up, the company was finally able to implement its vision with the Wii. </p>
<p>This became Nintendo’s <a href="https://www.nintendo.co.jp/ir/library/historical_data/pdf/consolidated_sales_e1612.pdf">best-selling home console</a> in part because its motion control system was so successful it helped introduce people to gaming who had <a href="http://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=2212840&CFID=908182282&CFTOKEN=21607497">previously found other consoles inaccessible</a>. The Nintendo Switch builds on the motion control of the Wii by adding an infrared motion camera to the right-hand JoyCon, capable of recognising distance and shapes made by the hand nearby and making motion capture more portable.</p>
<p>Another instantly noticeable element of the Switch is the fidelity of the haptic feedback its controller provides. While it doesn’t quite have the finesse of the “Taptic Engine” found inside the latest Apple iPhones, the amount of information that is encoded into the haptic feedback of the Joy-Con controllers is impressive. </p>
<p>This is particularly noticeable when playing 1 2 Switch, which encourages players to face each other and not the screen, relying on the haptic feedback for guidance. In one game, I was required to balance up to four balls rolling around in a virtual box, and was easily able to detect their position using the haptics inside the Joy-Con controller.</p>
<p>Again, this technology has progressed significantly from the early days of haptic feedback. And again, it harks back to a pioneering attempt by Nintendo to introduce the technology with the <a href="http://www.ign.com/articles/2008/04/03/happy-birthday-rumble-pak">Rumble Pak add-on</a> for the Nintendo N64 console. In this case, the game would activate a small single motor with an offset weight attached to the end to produce the rumble effect.</p>
<p>Even what is perhaps the most unusual element of the Switch – the detachable controllers – has a precedent. Nintendo previously produced a mobile console with controllers that are separate from the main body with several of its “<a href="http://www.nintendolife.com/news/2010/02/feature_the_history_of_the_nintendo_game_and_watch">Game and Watch</a>” series of devices in the 1980s, most notably Donkey Kong 3.</p>
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<p>I think the Nintendo Switch has a lot of potential. There is something very powerful about just being able to lift it out of the dock and play the same game, anywhere. Nintendo have always focused on fun, playful, user-centric interactions, rather than being tempted to impress with graphical capabilities. When people are at the centre of design, even small issues can make or break a system. Maybe this time, though, with Nintendo’s pedigree, they have a winning mix.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/74114/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Brendan Cassidy receives funding from the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC). </span></em></p>The new ‘hybrid’ device is the culmination of many of Nintendo’s innovations to date.Brendan Cassidy, University of Central LancashireLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/740832017-03-06T19:23:22Z2017-03-06T19:23:22ZThe Nintendo Switch breaks convention but lacks a killer app<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/159511/original/image-20170306-933-qcp5k9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The Nintendo Switch is a modular gaming console, unlike any other on the market.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Nintendo</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>A little over <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com.au/nintendo-consoles-history-photos-switch-2016-10?r=US&IR=T#/#before-there-was-the-nes-there-was-the-color-tv-game-nintendo-first-dipped-its-toes-into-console-gaming-by-launching-five-of-these-japan-only-rectangles-between-1977-and-1980-1">10 years ago</a> Nintendo changed the game with the release of the original <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wii">Wii</a> console. Featuring motion controllers that allowed users’ arm and body movements to control their video games, the system was wildly successful going on to sell more than <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wii#Sales">100 million units</a> worldwide. </p>
<p>This was followed by 2012’s <a href="http://www.nintendo.com.au/wii-u">Wii U</a> console, which didn’t fare as well. With a large “second screen” controller packed in, part of Wii U’s goal was to provide asymmetric gaming, where the player with the larger GamePad had more or different options to those who might be playing with more traditional controllers. </p>
<p>Despite these grand plans and a steady diet of Nintendo staples, including numerous Mario and Zelda games, the Wii U failed to take off in the same way the Wii had. It still managed to sell <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wii_U#Sales">around 14 million units</a> by the start of 2017, with the last Wii U console rolling off the production line in <a href="http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2016-11-01-nintendo-to-end-wii-u-production-this-week">November 2016</a>.</p>
<p>Never one to shy away from innovation, 2017 brings the release of Nintendo’s newest console: Switch. And true to form, Nintendo has done things a little differently yet again, while using some of the same strategies they’ve employed previously. </p>
<p>As with previous generations, it’s likely that Nintendo’s console will be less powerful than its Sony and Microsoft peers. But that’s not the battleground Nintendo has chosen. It has gone for mobility and “out-and-about” connectivity in a similar vein to its <a href="http://www.nintendo.com.au/nintendo-2ds">DS</a> line of portables, or perhaps more closely, to a Sony <a href="https://www.playstation.com/en-au/explore/ps-vita/">PS Vita</a>. The goal here is to connect people in person through gaming. And it could pay off in spades.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/159522/original/image-20170306-898-1fqku52.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/159522/original/image-20170306-898-1fqku52.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/159522/original/image-20170306-898-1fqku52.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=296&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/159522/original/image-20170306-898-1fqku52.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=296&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/159522/original/image-20170306-898-1fqku52.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=296&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/159522/original/image-20170306-898-1fqku52.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=372&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/159522/original/image-20170306-898-1fqku52.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=372&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/159522/original/image-20170306-898-1fqku52.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=372&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The components can be combined into a more traditional controller.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Nintendo</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>In betweener</h2>
<p>The Switch itself has a “phablet” sized 6.2 inch touchscreen with controllers that snap onto the sides when in portable mode. But it also has a portable multiplayer trick up its sleeve. </p>
<p>Sliding off the controllers allows them to connect around a central connecting block as a single traditional controller. They both also contain an analogue stick and the regular diamond of buttons, so each side can be used by a different player.</p>
<p>While on the road, the console will try to conserve battery life where possible, with a claimed life of between 2 and 6.5 hours based on usage. Plugging the Switch into its dock allows it to charge and boost it’s processing power to act more like a traditional console with the action displayed on your TV. </p>
<p>While there is only a handful of games at launch, including the excellent <a href="http://www.metacritic.com/game/switch/the-legend-of-zelda-breath-of-the-wild">The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild</a>, further titles can be purchased on the eShop app-store. These will require installation on the device’s built in 32GB of memory, while titles bought on cartridges don’t require installation at all. </p>
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<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild is one of the flagship games on the Switch.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Nintendo</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Although 32GB isn’t a great deal of space to work with when referring to modern games, a MicroSD expansion slot allows for up to a planned further 2TB of storage to be added. The largest current MicroSD UHS card is presently 1TB, but it’s expected that 2TB cards will arrive in time.</p>
<p>With additional features like <a href="https://www.engadget.com/2017/01/13/nintendos-hd-rumble-will-be-the-best-unused-switch-feature-of-2/">HD Rumble</a>, which uses multiple haptic activators per controller, and the ability to connect up to eight Switches together for multiplayer gaming, Nintendo has a chance to do things no other console can.</p>
<p>But what it doesn’t have is its one social “killer app”, such as <a href="https://theconversation.com/au/topics/pokemon-go-29173">Pokémon Go</a>, which drove <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pok%C3%A9mon_Go#Downloads_and_revenue">millions of people</a> out into their local parks, or <a href="http://www.smashbros.com/en-au/">Super Smash Brothers</a>, which draws large crowds to <a href="https://smash.gg/">tournaments</a> around the world. </p>
<p>The game <a href="http://www.nintendo.com/games/detail/1-2-switch">1-2-Switch</a> currently comes closest as a party game, with its large collection of mini-games that have you doing everything from racing to eating sandwiches, having old-west style quick-draw competitions and milking virtual cows. But it remains to be seen how long these kinds of silly diversions will hold peoples’ attention. </p>
<p>And if it turns out that they don’t, then Nintendo’s recent love of indy gaming and a planned roster of <a href="http://www.theverge.com/2017/2/28/14764956/nintendo-indie-games-switch-yooka-laylee-stardew-valley">60 titles</a> in 2017 can still step in to shore up the wait between larger AAA releases.</p>
<p>The Nintendo Switch offers a lot of flexibility and potential, especially in its multiplayer aspects. But by choosing gameplay over hardware specifications, it may ultimately fail or succeed based on the depth and breadth of its software library and ability to cater to a wide variety of gamers.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/74083/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Alastair Lansley does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Nintendo has a history of innovation in the console market, and the Switch follows suit. But it trades power for flexibility, and it’s unknown yet whether that’s what gamers want.Alastair Lansley, Lecturer, Mobile Applications, Federation University AustraliaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/624202016-07-13T04:59:36Z2016-07-13T04:59:36ZWhat’s made Pokémon GO such a viral success?<p>Technology often needs a “<a href="https://www.techopedia.com/definition/7953/killer-application-killer-app">killer app</a>” to gain mass market appeal. </p>
<p>For the touch screen, it was the iPhone; for wearables, the Fitbit. Augmented reality games have been around for more than a decade, so what was it about Pokémon GO that allowed it to become a global phenomenon?</p>
<p>We believe it can be attributed to three core social components of the game: the blending of the virtual and the real, geo-location and the success of existing Pokémon culture.</p>
<h2>Smile for the camera</h2>
<p>The first time we heard about Pokémon GO was via a few Facebook posts with screenshots of Pokémon on the streets or sitting beside friends. This is the core strength of augmented reality apps, the ability to alter the physical world by adding virtual components.</p>
<p>Millions of dollars have been spent on technology for aligning the physical world and virtual contents. <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/29488965_Trends_in_Augmented_Reality_Tracking_Interaction_and_Display_A_Review_of_Ten_Years_of_ISMAR">Tracking issues</a> have taken up 20% of the research effort in the augmented reality community around the world for the past decade.</p>
<p>Microsoft’s latest augmented reality headset, the <a href="https://www.microsoft.com/microsoft-hololens/en-us">Hololens</a>, uses a series of cameras to physically map out the entire environment around the user to accurately place virtual objects. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/130332/original/image-20160713-17950-1ow6n19.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/130332/original/image-20160713-17950-1ow6n19.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/130332/original/image-20160713-17950-1ow6n19.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=356&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/130332/original/image-20160713-17950-1ow6n19.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=356&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/130332/original/image-20160713-17950-1ow6n19.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=356&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/130332/original/image-20160713-17950-1ow6n19.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=447&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/130332/original/image-20160713-17950-1ow6n19.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=447&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/130332/original/image-20160713-17950-1ow6n19.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=447&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A collection of Pokémon as seen via Pokémon GO.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/tofu_mugwump/">Flickr/Topher McCulloch</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Pokémon GO does not have this level of sophistication. When players come across a Pokémon character in Pokémon GO, the game superimposes it over the camera view. </p>
<p>We tested the feature and noticed we needed to play around with the phone to get the perfect angle for the screenshot. So although the tracking may not be sophisticated, a user can, with minimal effort, quickly make the Pokémon appear as if they are part of the physical world.</p>
<p>Some players get creative with these poses, which are shared widely on social media platforms. We believe the “shareability” of these images contributes hugely to the success of the game.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.snapchat.com/l/en-gb/">Snapchat</a>, the phenomenally successful messaging application with more 100 million users, also taps into the social “shareability” of images that blend the virtual and the real. </p>
<p>Gather some teenagers in a room together and it will not be long before the room will be filled with giggles and cries as they swap “snaps” with augmented features overlaid over theirs via <a href="http://www.wikihow.com/Get-Effects-on-Snapchat">Snapchat Filters</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/130321/original/image-20160713-17947-1jsyqvy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/130321/original/image-20160713-17947-1jsyqvy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/130321/original/image-20160713-17947-1jsyqvy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=413&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/130321/original/image-20160713-17947-1jsyqvy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=413&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/130321/original/image-20160713-17947-1jsyqvy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=413&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/130321/original/image-20160713-17947-1jsyqvy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=519&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/130321/original/image-20160713-17947-1jsyqvy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=519&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/130321/original/image-20160713-17947-1jsyqvy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=519&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Using lenses (Face Effects) with Snapchat images.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.wikihow.com/Get-Effects-on-Snapchat">WikiHow</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/">CC BY-NC-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Although there has been keen research interest in augmented reality as a means of treating <a href="https://www.technologyreview.com/s/419653/treating-cockroach-phobia-with-augmented-reality/">phobias</a> and the pain associated with <a href="http://www.livescience.com/43665-virtual-reality-treatment-for-phantom-limb-pain.html">phantom limbs</a>, to date there has been little research focus on the psychological aspects of our fascination with blended imagery.</p>
<p>Researchers studying the customisation of avatars, a graphical representation of a person’s alter ego or character in computer games, have found that the ability to manipulate <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Nicolas_Ducheneaut/publication/221516323_Body_and_mind_A_study_of_avatar_personalization_in_three_virtual_worlds/links/02e7e51700e6644711000000.pdf">physical features such as hair colour</a>, or to superimpose <a href="http://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=2087850">animal features over human forms</a>, is critical for an avatar to appeal to a user.</p>
<p>There are clear parallels here to the success of augmented reality app features such as Snapchat filters. Pokémon GO screenshots also seemingly tap into this desire for a personal connection to the virtual world.</p>
<h2>Pokémon GO, you go!</h2>
<p>Pokémon GO requires you to walk around to hunt down Pokémon. This aspect of the game is not new, as similar games in the past have utilised this, including Niantic’s own <a href="https://www.ingress.com/">Ingress</a>. In fact, Pokémon GO uses the same Ingress platform. </p>
<p>Many see this as a positive example of games that encourage people to exercise. We see it more as a social success as it highlights the power of an augmented reality platform as a shared, social experience. </p>
<p>The success of this aspect of the game can be gauged by following the various reports of organised Pokémon GO <a href="https://www.facebook.com/events/1338692826144959/">events</a> with thousands of registered participants. </p>
<p>Virtual reality, by comparison, is a very personal experience. There have been many previous attempts at introducing social interactions into a virtual reality environment. <a href="http://secondlife.com/">Second Life</a> was released in 2003 and after a decade had more than <a href="http://www.lindenlab.com/releases/infographic-10-years-of-second-life">1 million users</a>.</p>
<p>Pokémon GO has already dwarfed this user count within 48 hours of release. Reports suggest it has eclipsed the daily user counts of major social network and dating services such as <a href="http://fortune.com/2016/07/11/nintendo-pokemon-go/">Tinder and Twitter</a>.</p>
<h2>A money earner</h2>
<p>A final aspect of the success of Pokémon GO is undoubtedly its ability to tap into an established pop culture phenomenon. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.pokemon.co.jp/corporate/en/data/">According to Nintendo</a>, as of the end of May 2016, it had sold more than 280 million units of Pokémon-related software, earned box office revenue of 76.72 billion yen (about A$967 million), and shipped over 21.5 million cards (as of September 2015).</p>
<p>The company estimates the total worldwide market size of the Pokémon franchise to be more than 4.8 trillion yen (about A$60 billion).</p>
<p>With a market this big, there was an eager community of Pokémon fans waiting for an app such as Pokémon GO to launch.</p>
<p>There are clear parallels here to another smash hit smartphone game, <a href="http://www.glu.com/games/view/kim-kardashian-hollywood">Kim Kardashian: Hollywood</a>. This game traded on the celebrity credibility of the Kardashians and used social gaming methods and the promise that you might even become one of Kim’s friends, at least within the confines of the game.</p>
<p>A March <a href="http://www.forbes.com/sites/natalierobehmed/2016/03/08/no-kim-kardashian-probably-didnt-make-80-million-from-her-iphone-game/#1933c4e58b3d">Forbes article</a> estimates that Kim Kardashian: Hollywood has earned the star around US$20 million (about A$26 million).</p>
<p>Given the success of Pokémon GO, Nintendo executives can be assured that the Pokémon franchise’s level of success, and its share price, is set to <a href="http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-07-13/will-pokemon-go-be-the-savior-of-troubled-nintendo/7588852">continue upward</a>. </p>
<p>This ability to tap into the established worldwide community of Pokémon fans was the final ingredient necessary to establish Pokémon GO as the “killer app” for augmented reality gaming.</p>
<p>So to make a killer app, just add social.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/62420/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Thuong Hoang receives funding from the Victorian State Government and Microsoft through their contributions to the Microsoft Research Centre for Social Natural User Interfaces (SocialNUI).</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Steven Baker receives funding from Victorian State Government and Microsoft through their contributions to the Microsoft Research Centre for Social Natural User Interfaces (SocialNUI). </span></em></p>Augmented reality games have been around for more than a decade, so what was it about Pokémon GO that allowed it to become a global phenomenon?Thuong Hoang, Research fellow, The University of MelbourneSteven Baker, Research Fellow, Microsoft Centre for Social Natural User Interfaces, The University of MelbourneLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/321882014-09-26T05:33:36Z2014-09-26T05:33:36ZWhy Nintendo is still the games master at 125<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/60079/original/dpfxsj7m-1411665030.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Cute but formidable.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/jdhancock/7629235266/in/photolist-cCaPR5-cDY8YA-cFzRPE-cDqMBf-cEw1W9-cEZah5-8SXcLJ-cCNgsj-8HesC6-8EY3x">JD Hancock</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>In the world of video games few companies have as long or vivid a history as Nintendo, which turns 125 years old this week.</p>
<p>Founded in 1889 as a producer of toys and playing-cards, the company is quite distinct from the typical perception of Japanese firms that have become global players, those that constitute large conglomerate firms with manager-CEOs and headquarters in Tokyo. Over 300 miles away from Tokyo, the company has a secretive and insular corporate culture at its headquarters in the ancient Japanese capital of Kyoto, retaining a unique status in the country’s business scene. The company was headed for more than 50 years by visionary owner-entrepreneur-CEO <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/20/business/global/hiroshi-yamauchi-who-helped-drive-nintendo-into-dominance-dies-at-85.html?_r=0">Hiroshi Yamauchi</a>, who stepped down from the position in 2002 and died last year.</p>
<p>Nintendo began developing electronic toys in the 1960s, initially in response to consumer demand from <a href="http://www.denofgeek.com/games/12221/the-top-5-greatest-light-gun-games">shooting games using lightguns</a> fitted with optical sensors. As early as 1964 Nintendo began to hire experienced hardware engineers from well-known consumer electronics firms, and conducted joint R&D with firms like Sharp and Mitsubishi Electric. Those engineers initially hired to develop baseball pitching machines and toy transceivers were subsequently reassigned to develop arcade games.</p>
<p>Nintendo’s first fully-fledged entry into the home video game market was the Famicom console (known in the west as the <a href="https://www.nintendo.co.uk/Corporate/Nintendo-History/Nintendo-Entertainment-System/Nintendo-Entertainment-System-627024.html">Nintendo Entertainment System</a> or NES), released in Japan in 1983. More than 61m were sold over its lifetime, making it the best-seller of its time.</p>
<p>The company’s position was solidified with the <a href="https://www.nintendo.co.uk/Corporate/Nintendo-History/Game-Boy/Game-Boy-627031.html">GameBoy</a> in 1989, the world’s first portable game console. The Gameboy was so popular that when a full colour version was released nine years later it was still a massive hit despite the extent to which technology had moved on. More than 118m units were sold worldwide.</p>
<p>The next-generation, 16-bit successor to the 8-bit NES was the Super Famicom (or <a href="https://www.nintendo.co.uk/Corporate/Nintendo-History/Super-Nintendo/Super-Nintendo-627040.html">SNES</a>) in 1990, selling 49m units to outsell fierce competition from rivals Sony and Sega. By this time Nintendo was a household name in Japan, the US and Europe.</p>
<p>Nintendo’s dominance in the 1980s and early 1990s is in part due to its original and enormously successful hit games and franchises such as [Donkey Kong](http://www.mariowiki.com/Donkey_Kong_(game) (1981) and <a href="http://nintendo8.com/game/629/super_mario_brothers/">Super Mario Brothers</a> (1985) and <a href="https://www.nintendo.co.uk/Games/Nintendo-Characters-Hub/The-Legend-of-Zelda-Hub/Nintendo-UK-s-The-Legend-of-Zelda-Hub-627606.html">Zelda</a> (1986) and <a href="http://www.pokemon.com/uk/">Pokemon</a> (1996). Unlike the otherwise troubled relationship between Japan’s computer hardware and software industry – where hardware companies neglected software innovation to such an extent that software was considered something of a “necessary evil” – Nintendo CEO Yamauchi was well aware of its importance, nurtured in-house talent, and was quoted saying that hardware was the necessary evil of the video game industry.</p>
<p>The outcome of the strategy was best represented by <a href="http://www.mariowiki.com/Shigeru_Miyamoto">Shigeru Miyamoto</a>, a Kyoto native, Nintendo’s chief game developer and the creator of Donkey Kong and Super Mario Brothers. With a keen interest in comics (<em>manga</em>), Miyamoto led a cartoonist club at high school and studied industrial design at Kanazawa College of Art before he joined Nintendo. </p>
<p>When he was assigned to develop an arcade game for the US market in 1980, he realised that the then wildly popular <a href="http://www.johnjohn.co.uk/html/spaceinvaders.html">Space Invaders</a> and Pac-Man arcade games had as aims simply to erase objects from the screen. This led Miyamoto to develop games with a greater depth of gameplay, creating the lead character of Donkey Kong (an everyman in overalls who would later become the world renowned Mario) in a cartoonish style and with a cartoonish storyline (saving damsel from giant rogue ape) to match. With Miyamoto’s efforts, Nintendo established the position of game designers in the industry specialised in developing complex characters and storylines, which had previously been an afterthought by programmers.</p>
<p>Competition intensified during the 1990s from competitors like Sega and Sony, and it was only with the <a href="http://www.mariowiki.com/Wii">Wii console</a> in 2007 that Nintendo regained its inventive edge. With the poor performance of its predecessor <a href="http://www.mariowiki.com/Nintendo_GameCube">GameCube</a> console (2001) against Sony’s PlayStation 2 (2000) and Microsoft’s Xbox (2001), Nintendo had dropped to a distant third in the console market in the early 2000s. By then, owing to hardware advances including CD-ROMs and 3D graphics chips, console manufacturers ploughed a furrow of providing faster, more powerful systems to provide an ever more realistic visual experience. </p>
<p>Instead, with the Wii Nintendo left this path and focused on playability through a user-friendly interface. The wireless, motion-sensing controller was devised to direct action on the screen, and games were developed specifically to exploit the potential of this innovative controller. More intuitive to non-gamers, it could be used for example as a fishing rod for a fishing game, a tennis racket for a tennis game, or a variety of other ways. The Wii helped Nintendo to create games that appealed to women and the elderly – including sports, fitness, even yoga – ignoring typical games based around combat simulation and rejecting the conventional wisdom that video games are the domain of testosterone-driven hardcore (and inevitably male) gamers. </p>
<p>In a sense, with its emphasis on games playable by every member of the family, the company paved the way for their current popularity and reach of social games among casual players. Although the company has yet to make an entry into the market, its influence is felt in non-violent, cartoonish avatars and icons adopted by many social games.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/32188/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Hiro Izushi does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>In the world of video games few companies have as long or vivid a history as Nintendo, which turns 125 years old this week. Founded in 1889 as a producer of toys and playing-cards, the company is quite…Hiro Izushi, Senior Lecturer in Innovation, Aston UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/265352014-05-09T14:27:05Z2014-05-09T14:27:05ZNintendo can’t take the gay out of gaming without a fight<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/48179/original/xqm4wrq2-1399640668.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Tomodachi Life: make friends, fall in love but stay straight.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/bagogames/13765655663/in/photolist-mYqzQK-cqrjdh-cqrius-cqriP7-cqrjLq-cA2jbo-cA2j3w-cA2iL5-cA2jow-cA2iTy-cA2jCq-cqri8j-cqrgkY-cqrh7J-9wFWTw-9rdURB-9rdUPT-89rpkA-cA2jvN-cA2jJu-cqrgCh-cqrjwq-cqrhPm-cqrhv1-cqrgSo-duYMSW-bvyQj9-bvyPNb-duT5Mn">BagoGames</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Nintendo is facing a storm of criticism over its decision not to allow gamers to play as gay characters and form same-sex relationships in the life-simulation game Tomodachi Life.</p>
<p>There has been disquiet and outrage from a number of quarters despite Nintendo’s statement that Tomodachi life is meant to be a “whimsical and quirky game” and not a “social commentary”. This defence in fact seems to have only served to fan the flames ahead of the game’s release in Europe.</p>
<p>The reaction is understandable in terms of discrimination, but also because of the deep attachments that gamers develop with their online characters.</p>
<p>I have been researching video game play for more than two decades and I’ve always found issues surrounding character formation, sexuality, and gender in gaming of great psychological interest. </p>
<p>In one of our <a href="http://online.liebertpub.com/doi/abs/10.1089/cpb.2007.0020">studies</a> we found that 57% of gamers had gender-swapped their game character at some point. The practice was more common among women than men. Gender swapping enabled gamers to play around and experiment with various aspects of their in-game character in a way that just isn’t possible in real life. For others it was just fun to see if they felt any different playing as a different gendered character.</p>
<p>In most instances, the gamers had the opportunity to choose a gender and develop other aspects of their character before they began to play. Choosing to gender swap may have had an effect on the gamers’ styles of play and interaction with other gamers. Whatever the reasons, it was clear from our research that the development of gamers’ online characters and avatars was important to them.</p>
<p>One of the reasons for the importance of online gaming identities may be because it subverts traditional <a href="http://www.participations.org/volume%203/issue%201/3_01_hortonwohl.htm">parasocial interaction</a>. This is when people develop a one-sided relationship in which one party knows a great deal about the other but the same cannot be said in reverse. The most common example of the phenomenon is the relationship between celebrities and their fans.</p>
<p>A <a href="http://online.liebertpub.com/doi/abs/10.1089/cyber.2011.0311">study</a> led by Nicholas Bowman, from West Virginia University, argued that playing video games challenges this concept because the distance between players is reduced or even removed once they enter their virtual environment. The study claimed that online gaming encourages the “psychological merging of a player’s and a character’s mind” and is critical in the development of character attachment. In this context, the sexuality of a character for a player may be of fundamental psychological importance.</p>
<p>This appears to be confirmed in another <a href="http://online.liebertpub.com/doi/abs/10.1089/cpb.2007.0137%5D(http://online.liebertpub.com/doi/abs/10.1089/cpb.2007.0137">study</a> which presented a scale to assess the connection that gamers felt towards their character. This revealed a significant relationship between character attachment and self-esteem, addiction, game enjoyment and time spent playing games.</p>
<p>But despite this strong bond, there is a <a href="http://gac.sagepub.com/content/4/3/228.short">relative lack</a> of gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender representation in video games compared with music, film and television.</p>
<p>Nintendo is not the only culprit but Tomodachi Life has attracted attention because players get to live on an island, take on a character and act out an online life. They make friends, fall in love and can get married. <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/may/07/nintendo-miiquality-campaign-gay-tomodachi-life">Tye Marini</a>, a gamer from the US, has started a campaign because he wants to marry the avatar of his real-life fiancé. He says some content in the game is only accessible to characters who get married so either has to change his character’s gender or miss out. </p>
<p>We do have to wonder why the gaming industry is so far behind in this respect. There was for a long time a chronic under-representation of women in games and many people, myself included, argued that this alienated female gamers. This eventually led to developers introducing strong female characters into video games, such as Lara Croft. Maybe the appearance of GLBT characters and role models within games will increase over time but I’m not holding my breath.</p>
<p>Already a big seller in Japan, it remains to be seen whether Tomodachi Life will be as successful in Europe and the USA when it is released in June. Nintendo’s decision not to allow gay relationships to form within Tomodachi Life appears to be ill-judged, ill-informed, and outdated.</p>
<p>Games in which identity content can be generated by its users needs to reflect the world in which the gamers’ live. In short, there should be no compromise when it comes to allowing gamers’ to choose their sexuality within the game.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/26535/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Dr. Mark Griffiths has received research funding from a wide range of organizations including the Economic and Social Research Council, the British Academy and the Responsibility in Gambling Trust. He has also carried out consultancy for numerous gaming companies in the area of social responsibility and responsible gaming.</span></em></p>Nintendo is facing a storm of criticism over its decision not to allow gamers to play as gay characters and form same-sex relationships in the life-simulation game Tomodachi Life. There has been disquiet…Mark Griffiths, Director of the International Gaming Research Unit and Professor of Gambling Studies, Nottingham Trent UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/184342013-09-20T05:30:29Z2013-09-20T05:30:29ZHow Hiroshi Yamauchi and Nintendo changed the world<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/31661/original/7w8j5vnx-1379608087.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The face that launched a thousand games.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Hawaii Kawaii</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The death of Hiroshi Yamauchi marks the end of an extraordinary career that spanned 53 years, during which the Nintendo president not only changed a company but left his mark on the very nature of the videogames industry.</p>
<p>Yamauchi joined Nintendo in 1949 as president. Thereafter, a small outfit that produced playing cards became a toy company during the mid-1960s and eventually grew into a global videogame corporation.</p>
<p>Yamauchi’s crucial contribution to the “Nintendo difference” is in building a reputation for promoting family-centric play. Videogames series such as Pokemon, which has sold nearly 220 million units, and the Mario games, which have landed the company 500 million sales, are two of the most well-known success stories in this respect.</p>
<figure class="align-left zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/31662/original/595294sh-1379608631.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/31662/original/595294sh-1379608631.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/31662/original/595294sh-1379608631.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=312&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/31662/original/595294sh-1379608631.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=312&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/31662/original/595294sh-1379608631.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=312&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/31662/original/595294sh-1379608631.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=392&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/31662/original/595294sh-1379608631.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=392&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/31662/original/595294sh-1379608631.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=392&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Wii are family.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">adam melancon</span></span>
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<p>Yamauchi’s approach was perhaps best exemplified with the launch of the Wii console - even though it didn’t enter the market until after he retired. The Wii was explicitly defined as a console open to families which had motion control and accessibility embedded into its very design.</p>
<p>This thinking can be traced back to Yamauchi. Nintendo’s first console was known as the Nintendo Entertainment System in the West but was originally christened the Famicon - short for “family computer” - in Japan.</p>
<p>In 1993, Nintendo proved its commitment to family-centrism during the controversy over the game Mortal Kombat. The company’s main rival Sega released a version of the game that featured blood and violent finishing moves. Nintendo cleaned up the guts and gore and sold a less violent version of the game to its console customers. Sega outsold Nintendo 3:1 in the US. Nevertheless, the furore around the game unleashed an unprecedented debate about videogame violence across the US political establishment.</p>
<p>The “Nintendo difference” also extends to matters of videogame design and aesthetics. For example, the Nintendo 64 was the first console to be released with four controller ports to encourage split-screen family gaming. It also saw the introduction of crucial innovations within contemporary console design in the form of the analogue stick, with the game Mario 64 ushering in 3D gameplay.</p>
<h2>Gaming on the go, gaming for all</h2>
<p>Perhaps the greatest legacy of Yamauchi’s Nintendo corporation, however, is the explosion of accessibility in gaming. The Gameboy, launched in 1989, and Gameboy Colour 1998, together shifted nearly 120 million units and marked the beginning of the proliferation of mobile technology and the growth of ubiquitous gaming.</p>
<p>Crucial to Yamauchi’s vision for handhelds was an association with the aim of opening up the games market to women and children. Searching for a game to demonstrate the importance of handheld play, Nintendo acquired the licence to Tetris - a social phenomenon that sold more than 35 million copies - and bundled it with the Gameboy in the US.</p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/31663/original/cqn65n97-1379608758.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/31663/original/cqn65n97-1379608758.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/31663/original/cqn65n97-1379608758.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=449&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/31663/original/cqn65n97-1379608758.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=449&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/31663/original/cqn65n97-1379608758.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=449&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/31663/original/cqn65n97-1379608758.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=565&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/31663/original/cqn65n97-1379608758.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=565&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/31663/original/cqn65n97-1379608758.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=565&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Game changer.</span>
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<p>Tetris was highly accessibile. This could clearly be seen not only in its aesthetic design but also in its simplistic controls. It was thus the perfect fit for the handheld but also broadened the appeal, particularly among women, who have increasingly become a crucial part of the videogaming market.</p>
<p>In a similar way, the release of Pokemon in the late 1990s on Gameboy was also crucial, demonstrating that compelling games could be sold to adults and children alike.</p>
<p>The importance of this drive towards accessibility for our understanding of the relationship between gender and play cannot be overestimated. Nintendo was at the vanguard when consoles were moving out of the bedroom and into the living room, shifting the demographics of play from primarily men and boys to families, with significant growth in engagement by women and girls.</p>
<p>The development of handheld games machines also opened up what may be termed the “private space for play”. On a handheld device, failure is not displayed publicly, so less experienced players - frequently identified by Nintendo as girls and women - felt more confident when starting out in gaming.</p>
<p>Cumulatively, the legacy of Yamuachi’s time at Nintendo is nothing short of extraordinary. During his time he oversaw the transformation of the videogames industry from niche to global, building Nintendo into a major corporation with iconic characters. Nintendo and Yamauchi, and their contribution to the growth of ubiquitous gaming, are why we all have at least one game in our pockets at any one time today.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/18434/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Nick Robinson receives funding from the Swedish Research Council.</span></em></p>The death of Hiroshi Yamauchi marks the end of an extraordinary career that spanned 53 years, during which the Nintendo president not only changed a company but left his mark on the very nature of the…Nick Robinson, Associate Professor in Politics, University of LeedsLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/105822012-11-23T03:57:33Z2012-11-23T03:57:33ZWhen the price is not right: technology price gouging in Australia<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/17561/original/vd5tb87b-1352781120.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">When it comes to IT products, Australian consumers pay more than their American counterparts.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">AAP</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Apple Inc. has often portrayed itself as the champion of consumers, with its advertising campaigns on <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HhsWzJo2sN4">“1984”</a>, <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ImE8ZyoKUaQ">“Think Different”</a>, and <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4ECN4ZE9-Mo">“Rip, Mix, Burn”</a>. However, this reputation has been called into question after Apple refused to appear before the Parliament’s inquiry into <a href="http://www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_Business/Committees/House_of_Representatives_Committees?url=ic/itpricing/index.htm">IT Pricing in Australia</a> and explain its pricing policies in Australia. </p>
<p>Apple is not alone. <a href="http://www.theaustralian.com.au/australian-it/it-business/adobe-answers-husic-on-it-pricing-inquiry/story-e6frganx-1226433994831">Adobe</a>, Amazon.com, Nintendo, <a href="http://www.smh.com.au/technology/technology-news/it-price-wars-government-no-white-knight-20120829-24zpl.html">Lenovo</a>, and others have come under criticism for price discrimination in Australia. Furthermore, there has been a concern that information technology companies have engaged in a deliberate strategy of <a href="http://www.technologyspectator.com.au/it-price-inquiry-committee-slams-tech-giants-stonewall-strategy">stonewalling</a> the Australian Parliament.
<a href="http://parlinfo.aph.gov.au/parlInfo/search/display/display.w3p;db=COMMITTEES;id=committees%2Fcommrep%2Fbef11fc9-4248-404c-bd88-1879f279d8c0%2F0004;query=Id%3A%22committees%2Fcommrep%2Fbef11fc9-4248-404c-bd88-1879f279d8c0%2F0000%22">CHOICE Australia</a> has provided compelling evidence to the inquiry that Australian consumers suffer from significant and unjustified price discrimination - particularly in respect of music downloads from iTunes, PC games, console games and computer software. For instance, Apple has been selling AC/DC’s complete collection on iTunes for $229.99 in Australia - but only $149 in the United States.</p>
<p>Given <a href="http://www.smh.com.au/technology/technology-news/aussies-gouged-on-tech-prices-inquiry-hears-20120730-23991.html">the evidence presented to the inquiry</a>, there is a need for a range of legislative and regulatory changes to help stop unjustified price discrimination against Australian consumers of digital products. In particular, there is a need for reforms to copyright law and disability law, as well as action under Australian consumer law and competition law.</p>
<p><strong>Copyright law and consumer rights</strong></p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">Ed Husic MP discusses the IT pricing inquiry on The Drum.</span></figcaption>
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<p>Since Federation, Australian consumers have suffered the indignity and the tragedy of price discrimination. From the time of imperial publishing networks, Australia has been suffering from cultural colonialism. <a href="http://purl.library.usyd.edu.au/sup/9781920898458">John Keating complained in the Australian Parliament</a> that import monopolies resulted in “blackmail”.</p>
<p>In respect of pricing of copyright works, Australian consumers have been gouged, ripped-off, and exploited. In <a href="http://www.austlii.edu.au/cgi-bin/sinodisp/au/cases/cth/HCA/1977/52.html">the Cook Books case</a>, Justice Lionel Murphy lamented that parallel importation restrictions were being used to raise the prices of copyright works: “Copyright is being used to manipulate the Australian market.”</p>
<p>Digital technologies have not necessarily brought an end to such price discrimination. Australian consumers have been locked out by technological protection measures; subject to surveillance, privacy intrusions and security breaches; locked into walled gardens by digital rights management systems; and geo-blocked.</p>
<p>In the <a href="http://www.austlii.edu.au/cgi-bin/sinodisp/au/cases/cth/HCA/2005/58.html">Sony Mod-Chip case</a>, Justice Michael Kirby feared that digital rights management systems also had an anti-competitive effect:</p>
<p><em>“In effect, and apparently intentionally, those [technological] restrictions reduce global market competition. They inhibit rights ordinarily acquired by Australian owners of chattels to use and adapt the same, once acquired, to their advantage and for their use as they see fit.”</em></p>
<p>The <a href="http://parlinfo.aph.gov.au/parlInfo/search/display/display.w3p;query=Id%3A%22committees/commrep/28ce1b90-91fd-436d-aef7-7d087bc1f764/0001%22">Australian Recording Industry Association</a> appeared before the Committee, and made an emotional case about the threat posed to the music industry by copyright piracy.</p>
<p>In response, Ed Husic MP observed: “If you are on the one hand trying to pitch at an emotional level to stop piracy, what do you reckon consumers think when you then use price discrimination to justify the way the costs are structured here in Australia?”</p>
<p><strong>Amazon.com and access to knowledge</strong></p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">Cory Doctorow discusses E-Book Pricing at Bloomsbury’s London Office.</span></figcaption>
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<p>There has been much concern about the ownership of digital products bought from Amazon.com. Linda Morris captured this sentiment with her piece, <a href="http://www.smh.com.au/technology/technology-news/no-such-thing-as-ownership-when-its-an-ebook-20121102-28phs.html">“No such thing as ownership when it’s an e-book.”</a>, in which the position of readers was compared to that of tenant farmers.</p>
<p>In a pithy submission, <a href="http://www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_Business/Committees/House_of_Representatives_Committees?url=ic/itpricing/subs/sub076.pdf">Andrew Leigh MP lamented</a> the technological restrictions on the Amazon Kindle. He emphasised the need to take into account larger considerations about access to knowledge: “Access to the world’s knowledge is as important as access to the world’s music, and Australians have a right to be treated equitably by Amazon.com.” </p>
<p>The author <a href="http://craphound.com/context/Cory_Doctorow_-_Context.xhtml">Cory Doctorow commented</a> upon the problem of digital rights management (DRM) in respect of Amazon: “The Kindle is a "roach motel” device: its license terms and DRM ensure that books can check in, but they can’t check out". He laments: “Readers are contractually prohibited from moving their books to competing devices; DRM makes that technically challenging; and competitors are legally enjoined from offering tools that would allow readers to break Kindle’s DRM and move their books to other devices.”</p>
<p><strong>The book famine and disability rights</strong></p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">Ruth Okediji interviews Chris Friend of the World Blind Union (WBU)</span></figcaption>
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<p>Article 30 (3) of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (2006) provides that ‘States Parties shall take all appropriate steps, in accordance with international law, to ensure that laws protecting intellectual property rights do not constitute an unreasonable or discriminatory barrier to access by persons with disabilities to cultural materials’.</p>
<p>In June 2012, <a href="http://www.hreoc.gov.au/about/media/news/2012/62_12.html">the disability commissioner Graeme Innes</a> encouraged the Australian Government to address this issue. He observed that only 5% of all books produced in Australia are published in accessible formats such as large print, audio or braille, while in developing countries it is just 1%. He commented: “People with a print disability throughout the world are currently experiencing a "book famine”, yet the Australian government has failed to take action that could change the situation.“ He observed: "Australia could lead the change to international law in this area and, at little cost to us, provide the opportunity to read to millions more people with print disability throughout the world.”</p>
<p><a href="http://parlinfo.aph.gov.au/parlInfo/search/display/display.w3p;db=COMMITTEES;id=committees%2Fcommrep%2F8b3e43fb-82a1-4d21-9a70-1a1ef2e6ea25%2F0001;query=Id%3A%22committees%2Fcommrep%2F8b3e43fb-82a1-4d21-9a70-1a1ef2e6ea25%2F0000%22">Wayne Hawkins, the disability policy advisor for ACCAN</a>, appeared before the committee. He commented that “there is a significantly higher impact on vulnerable consumers and particularly consumers with disability”.</p>
<p>He observed that “the assistive technology that people like myself—people who are blind—use such as the braille readers, braille displays, are considerably more expensive in Australia”.</p>
<p>It is time the legislation was introduced to put an end to these discriminatory practices under copyright law, and related fields. </p>
<p>There needs to be greater effort to pass a <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/07/26/blind-treaty-2012_n_1706543.html">Copyright Treaty for the Blind</a> at the World Intellectual Property Organization.</p>
<p><strong>Consumer law and the digital economy</strong></p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">Rod Sims of the ACCC on consumers, competition, and regulatory issues.</span></figcaption>
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<p>In 2012, the current chairman of the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission Rod Sims <a href="http://www.accc.gov.au/content/index.phtml/itemId/1050215">emphasised that one of his key priorities was addressing the challenges of the digital and online economy</a>. </p>
<p>Sims observed: “The two main challenges – for the ACCC - are: 1. Ensuring consumers enjoy the same protections in the digital and online economy as they do elsewhere; and 2. And, crucially for competition, ensuring the digital and online economy produces the benefits of new and innovative competitors to challenge incumbents that it promises, and that this promise is not eroded by anti-competitive conduct.”</p>
<p>The ACCC have been involved in a number of high-profile consumer law disputes with <a href="http://www.austlii.edu.au/cgi-bin/sinodisp/au/cases/cth/FCA/2012/646.html">Apple</a>, <a href="http://www.hcourt.gov.au/cases/case_s175-2012">Google</a>, and <a href="http://www.austlii.edu.au/cgi-bin/sinodisp/au/cases/cth/FCAFC/2012/20.html">Optus</a>. The Commission also made some cautionary remarks about <a href="http://www.theage.com.au/technology/technology-news/warning-to-firms-on-facebook-comments-20120812-242vr.html">Facebook and advertising standards</a>. The ACCC has also taken firm action against companies <a href="http://www.accc.gov.au/content/index.phtml/itemId/1084336/fromItemId/142">engaging in misleading and deceptive carbon price hikes</a>.</p>
<p>The ACCC should build upon its success investigating cases of misleading and deceptive advertising by IT companies by also considering issues of price, the terms of access to a particular product or a particular service and the need for international warranties.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.afr.com/p/technology/accc_to_fight_tech_vendors_9wEo3HsjuRgdZfTHohQ4WO">Rod Sims has warned</a> that the ACCC will take legal action if vendors lie about the reasons for price discrimination against Australian consumers.</p>
<p><strong>Competition Law, Mergers, and Conspiracies</strong></p>
<p>In light of alleged overseas conspiracies involving price fixing by Apple and large multinational publishers, there is clearly a need for the ACCC to investigate whether there have been any such restrictive trade practices in respect of information technology products in Australia.</p>
<p>On the 11th April 2012, <a href="http://www.justice.gov/atr/cases/applebooks.html">the United States Department of Justice</a> filed an antitrust lawsuit against Hachette, HarperCollins, Macmillan, Penguin and Apple Inc. over the pricing of e-Books. The Department alleged that the defendants had conspired to raise retail prices of E-Books in violation of Section 1 of the Sherman Act. <a href="http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702304444604577337573054615152.html">United States Attorney-General Eric Holder noted</a>: “As a result of this alleged conspiracy, we believe that consumers paid millions of dollars more for some of the most popular titles.” </p>
<p>There is also a need to consider the impact upon consumers and competition of mergers of large content providers - such as that between the record companies <a href="http://www.themusicnetwork.com/music-features/industry/2012/09/20/why-the-accc-approved-the-universalemi-deal/">Universal and EMI</a>; the publishers <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/10/29/us-pearson-idUSBRE89S0C120121029">Penguin and Random House</a>; and <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/10/30/disney-buys-lucasfilm-star-wars-7_n_2045632.html">Disney and Lucasfilm</a>.</p>
<p><strong>The Trans-Pacific Partnership and Parallel Trade</strong></p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">The Trans-Pacific Partnership.</span></figcaption>
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<p>Parliament should make reforms to copyright law, disability law, consumer law, and competition law in order to address the problem of discriminatory IT pricing in Australia.</p>
<p>In addition, there is a need to ensure that trade agreements such as the proposed <a href="https://theconversation.com/a-mercurial-treaty-the-trans-pacific-partnership-and-the-united-states-7471"><em>Trans-Pacific Partnership</em></a> do not harm the interests of Australian consumers in obtaining a fair price for digital products.</p>
<p><a href="http://digitalcommons.wcl.american.edu/research/21">Sean Flynn</a> of Information Justice has warned that the United States Trade Representative has been pushing for parallel importation restrictions. He notes: “The issue of parallel trade arises because rights owners desire the ability to segment markets and determine their own prices and policies for entry into each market”.</p>
<p>There is a need to ensure that the Australian Parliament’s IT Pricing inquiry is not undermined or subverted by the <em>Trans-Pacific Partnership</em>.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/10582/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Dr Matthew Rimmer is an Australian Research Council Future Fellow, working on Intellectual Property and Climate Change. He is an associate professor at the ANU College of Law, an associate director of the Australian Centre for Intellectual Property in Agriculture (ACIPA), and a member of the ANU Climate Change Institute. Dr Matthew Rimmer receives funding as an Australian Research Council Future Fellow working on "Intellectual Property and Climate Change: Inventing Clean Technologies" and a chief investigator in an Australian Research Council Discovery Project, “Promoting Plant Innovation in Australia”. </span></em></p>Apple Inc. has often portrayed itself as the champion of consumers, with its advertising campaigns on “1984”, “Think Different”, and “Rip, Mix, Burn”. However, this reputation has been called into question…Matthew Rimmer, ARC Future Fellow and Associate Professor in Intellectual Property, Australian National UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.