tag:theconversation.com,2011:/us/topics/call-of-duty-4309/articlesCall of Duty – The Conversation2023-07-14T14:21:47Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2098032023-07-14T14:21:47Z2023-07-14T14:21:47ZMicrosoft and Activision: the big questions that will decide whether the US$68 billion deal goes ahead<p>Microsoft’s proposed US$68 billion (£52 billion) acquisition of video game maker Activision Blizzard should be allowed to go ahead, <a href="https://www.theverge.com/2023/7/11/23779039/microsoft-activision-blizzard-ftc-trial-win">according to</a> a US federal judge. After five days of gruelling testimony, Judge Jacqueline Corley ruled the merger is unlikely to result in a substantial lessening of competition across the markets for video game consoles, multi-game subscription services and cloud streaming. </p>
<p>The ruling paves the way for Microsoft to finally consummate the merger after nearly a year and a half of regulatory scrutiny. Yet US competition authority the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has taken the rare step of <a href="https://www.reuters.com/legal/us-antitrust-body-appeal-court-ruling-microsofts-activision-deal-2023-07-12/">appealing the decision</a>. </p>
<p>With the UK’s Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/e00d9878-a116-4d5b-ac37-20ac3c643b12">also blocking</a> the deal, it could still fail to conclude before an agreed completion deadline between the companies of July 18. So what are the main issues and how is this likely to play out?</p>
<h2>Cloud gaming</h2>
<p>Microsoft owns <a href="https://www.xbox.com/en-GB/">the Xbox</a> gaming console and makes games like <a href="https://www.minecraft.net/en-us">Minecraft</a> and <a href="https://www.ageofempires.com/">Age of Empires</a>. California-based Activision is one of the largest games makers in the world, with franchises like <a href="https://www.callofduty.com/uk/en/">Call of Duty</a>, <a href="https://diabloimmortal.blizzard.com/en-gb/">Diablo</a> and <a href="https://www.king.com/game/candycrush">Candy Crush</a>.</p>
<p>Cloud streaming is viewed by many as the future of gaming. <a href="https://www.xbox.com/en-us/play">Microsoft’s xCloud</a> streaming service competes with <a href="https://www.amazon.com/luna/landing-page">Amazon’s Luna</a>, <a href="https://www.nvidia.com/en-gb/geforce-now/">Nvidia’s GeForce Now</a> and <a href="https://www.playstation.com/en-gb/ps-plus/">Sony’s PlayStation Plus</a> – alongside several smaller services such as <a href="https://boosteroid.com/">Boosteroid</a>, <a href="https://gamestream.biz/">Gamestream</a> and <a href="https://ubitus.net/">Ubitus</a>. </p>
<p>Microsoft’s xCloud currently holds around <a href="https://www.theverge.com/2023/2/9/23591989/google-stadia-cloud-gaming-market-share-eu">60%-70% market share</a>, which is mostly attributed to the service being bundled with the popular Xbox Game Pass Ultimate subscription service. The next largest competitors, Nvidia and Sony, have around 10% to 20% share each. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/537501/original/file-20230714-28-fkxwoi.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Plane flying over Microsoft office block" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/537501/original/file-20230714-28-fkxwoi.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/537501/original/file-20230714-28-fkxwoi.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=468&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/537501/original/file-20230714-28-fkxwoi.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=468&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/537501/original/file-20230714-28-fkxwoi.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=468&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/537501/original/file-20230714-28-fkxwoi.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=588&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/537501/original/file-20230714-28-fkxwoi.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=588&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/537501/original/file-20230714-28-fkxwoi.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=588&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Microsoft’s cloud gaming platform currently dominates the market.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-illustration/microsoft-logo-on-modern-skyscraper-reflecting-1794721906">Irina Anosova</a></span>
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<p>So far, however, cloud gaming has struggled to take hold with consumers. Compared to video streaming, it is computationally more demanding. This makes it prone to latency, which degrades the user experience. Services have also struggled to successfully differentiate themselves by offering exclusive games. </p>
<p>The most notable failure to date is Google’s Stadia, which <a href="https://www.gamesradar.com/stadia-shutting-down-explained/#:%7E:text=Google%20Stadia%20is%20shutting%20down,the%20Stadia%20library%20of%20games.">shuttered in January 2023</a> after less than four years. Yet as a whole, the <a href="https://www.statista.com/outlook/amo/media/games/cloud-gaming/worldwide">segment is expected</a> to keep grinding upwards, capturing 6.2% of gaming in 2027 compared to 3.8% today, with revenues rising from US$4.3 billion to US$18.7 billion. </p>
<h2>Regulatory differences</h2>
<p>The proposed merger has already been approved in 40 countries, with ten regulators clearing the deal unconditionally, including Brazil, China, Japan, South Africa and South Korea. The <a href="https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/ip_23_2705">European Commission (EC)</a> was among those that cleared the deal with conditions. These related to ensuring Activision games wouldn’t be restricted to Microsoft’s <a href="https://www.xbox.com/en-GB/xbox-game-pass/ultimate">cloud gaming services</a> but could be played on any platform. </p>
<p>Key to the US and UK authorities taking a more restrictive view are the questions of what cloud gaming is, how it will develop over the next ten years and the extent of Microsoft’s dominance – especially after it integrates Activision’s portfolio.</p>
<p>The first key point of contention is whether cloud gaming constitutes a separate market or a mere method of distribution that is embedded in the broader distribution ecosystem. <a href="https://www.gov.uk/cma-cases/microsoft-slash-activision-blizzard-merger-inquiry">The UK</a> and US competition authorities both view cloud gaming as a “distinct market” that needs to be protected from a large technology incumbent. On the other hand, Judge Corley called it a “potential alternative delivery mechanism” that is embedded within console and PC gaming platforms and does not need to be treated as a separate antitrust market. </p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/537502/original/file-20230714-17-rbf648.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Portrait picture of Judge Corley" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/537502/original/file-20230714-17-rbf648.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/537502/original/file-20230714-17-rbf648.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=831&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/537502/original/file-20230714-17-rbf648.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=831&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/537502/original/file-20230714-17-rbf648.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=831&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/537502/original/file-20230714-17-rbf648.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1044&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/537502/original/file-20230714-17-rbf648.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1044&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/537502/original/file-20230714-17-rbf648.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1044&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Pro-merger: Judge Jacqueline Corley.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacqueline_Scott_Corley#/media/File:Judge_Jacqueline_Corley.jpg">Wikimedia</a></span>
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<p>I agree with her. Earlier this year I submitted <a href="https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/642e9e29fbe620000c17dde1/Cloud_gaming_Opinion_.pdf">a report</a> to the CMA titled Cloud Gaming Is Not A Distinct Market. My main point was that the cloud platforms both operate in very different ways and are deeply embedded in other distribution methods like console and PC gaming. </p>
<p>For example, a consumer can only stream games on Nvidia’s GeForce Now if they own them on a traditional distribution platform such as <a href="https://store.steampowered.com/publisher/valve">Valve’s Steam</a>. Equally, the vast majority of Micrsoft xCloud users access the service from their Xboxes, and <a href="https://www.catribunal.org.uk/sites/cat/files/2023-06/2023.06.12_1590%20Microsoft%20v%20CMA%20Transcript%20of%20CMC2.pdf">80% of them</a> access streaming to sample and play games while waiting for their downloads to finish in the background. </p>
<p>The second issue concerns whether Microsoft’s acquisition will harm consumers in cloud gaming. Paramount here are the various licensing agreements for all Activision games that Microsoft has offered to rival providers like GeForce Now and Boosteroid, conditional on the merger being approved. These contracts are ultimately what secured EC approval. </p>
<p>The CMA has traditionally taken a dim view of such licensing deals due to potential challenges around enforcing contracts, but Judge Corley also took a more positive stance. <a href="https://www.thebignewsletter.com/p/judge-rules-for-microsoft-mergers">She and the EC</a> both thought the deals would end up enhancing competition. In my view, making Activision games available on more cloud platforms could spur adoption by consumers. It might also end up benefiting other games makers. </p>
<h2>What next</h2>
<p>The next few days will be crucial. The terms of the deal stipulate that Microsoft must consummate the merger by July 18, or pay Activision US$3 billion in termination fees. Yet blocking the way are the <a href="https://www.reuters.com/legal/us-antitrust-body-appeal-court-ruling-microsofts-activision-deal-2023-07-12/">FTC appeal</a> and the CMA in the UK. </p>
<p>The CMA signalled it was willing to negotiate with Microsoft after the US ruling, but has <a href="https://www.reuters.com/markets/deals/uks-cma-says-new-restructured-microsoft-activision-deal-could-require-new-probe-2023-07-12/">since tempered</a> any expectations of a quick resolution. As it stands, Microsoft is taking its case to the UK Competition Appeal Tribunal. </p>
<p>It seems unlikely that all outstanding issues will be resolved by July 18. This begs the question of whether Microsoft and Activision will risk closing the deal anyway, which could see them forced to de-merge later. Alternatively they might feel they have to extend and renegotiate the terms. </p>
<p>In the midst of this drama, a <a href="https://www.ainvest.com/news/trade-desk-to-replace-activision-blizzard-in-nasdaq-100-index-23071000257692369fa02577/">notice has circulated</a> stating that Activision will get delisted from the Nasdaq-100 index as early as July 17. This suggests the firms may indeed be preparing to close the deal. We should soon find out if it is going to set a new high score for video game acquisitions or whether it is game over for Microsoft and Activision.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/209803/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Joost Rietveld was active as a consultant prior to entering academia and still advises some video game companies. This recently included Microsoft in relation to the Activision merger. This was paid work. The views in this article are entirely his own. </span></em></p>Microsoft’s takeover of the gaming giant is turning into a nailbiter.Joost Rietveld, Associate Professor in Strategic Management, UCLLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1807392022-04-14T13:19:57Z2022-04-14T13:19:57ZEsports: how the struggling hospitality industry could capitalise on this massive business<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/458153/original/file-20220414-26-u14lyb.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=6%2C2%2C1461%2C955&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The League of Legends world championship at the Staples Center Los Angeles in 2016.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Esports#/media/File:LOL2016WorldsFinalsArena.jpg">Patrick Knight/Wikipedia</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>During the pandemic, the sporting world ground to a halt. Global events such as the Olympics, Formula 1 racing, the UEFA Champions League and American basketball were all postponed.</p>
<p>As an alternative, Formula 1 launched a <a href="https://www.formula1.com/en/latest/article.formula-1-launches-virtual-grand-prix-series-to-replace-postponed-races.1znLAbPzBbCQPj1IDMeiOi.html">virtual grand prix series</a> featuring professional F1 drivers. Similarly, Leyton Orient football club organised an <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/newsbeat-51950136">online FIFA tournament</a>.</p>
<p>This competitive online video gaming is known collectively as <a href="https://britishesports.org/general-esports-info/what-are-esports-an-overview-for-non-fans/">esports</a> and brings excitement and competition at a time when traditional sporting events are unable to. The explosion in popularity during COVID-19 meant the global virtual audience of esports exceeded <a href="https://newzoo.com/insights/articles/viewership-engagement-continues-to-skyrocket-across-games-and-esports-the-global-live-streaming-audience-will-pass-700-million-this-year/">700m fans in 2021</a>.</p>
<p>At the same time, hospitality and tourism sectors experienced the opposite fate. Continual lockdowns led to a <a href="https://www.ons.gov.uk/businessindustryandtrade/tourismindustry/articles/coronavirusandtheimpactontheuktravelandtourismindustry/2021-02-15">sharp decline</a> and the almost complete shutdown of tourism activity for many months.</p>
<p>When professional sport resumed once again, the majority of matches and events were played <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/news/government-gives-green-light-to-resumption-of-compeitive-sport-behind-closed-doors">behind closed doors</a>. With no fans or tourists attending games, mass global events including the Tokyo 2020 Olympics received <a href="https://theconversation.com/tokyo-olympics-no-spectators-is-bad-for-business-but-hosting-could-still-bring-long-term-benefits-164249">little income</a>.</p>
<p>Mega sporting events normally lead to a <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1441352303700564">spike in spending</a> on food, drink, hotels, parking, concessions and merchandise. However, online viewership only meant cancelled travel plans and bookings to host cities.</p>
<p>So, with a fast-growing esport industry and a tourism sector just beginning to recover from lockdown, shouldn’t the hospitality industry be actively attracting esport fans? In our <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0261517722000449">research</a>, we wanted to look at how the industry can capture the esport fanbase and convert them into active tourists. We surveyed 549 fans of competitive esport video game <a href="https://www.leagueoflegends.com/en-gb/">League of Legends</a> alongside a 12-month observational study of active <a href="https://worldofwarcraft.com/en-gb/">World of Warcraft</a> players.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/m0zWiUGrzBk?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
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<h2>Esports, fans and live events</h2>
<p>At its peak, the League of Legends’ 2021 world championship had over <a href="https://escharts.com/tournaments/lol/worlds-2021">4m online viewers</a>. Yet, despite substantial online audiences, even pre-pandemic, only a <a href="https://newzoo.com/insights/trend-reports/newzoo-global-esports-market-report-2020-light-version/">small fraction of esport revenue</a> came from ticket sales, meaning few fans are willing to travel to live events.</p>
<p>There are some arenas that have generated large crowds, such as Korea’s <a href="https://senet.cloud/en/blog/top-esports-arenas-in-the-world">Sangam Stadium</a>. The <a href="https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2017/11/the-odd-appeal-of-watching-esports-live-and-in-person/">experience</a> for these spectators can be truly captivating. Huge immersive screens are set up to show the competitive game play between teams, amplifying the excitement and tension in the crowd.</p>
<p>However, by not actively seeking esport viewers, the tourism and hospitality industry risk alienating a growing global fanbase. This means the opportunities offered by the attractive and potentially lucrative market may be lost.</p>
<p>Esport teams such as <a href="https://navi.gg/en/">Na'Vi</a>; <a href="https://thealliance.gg/about/">Alliance</a>; <a href="https://t1.gg/">T1</a>; <a href="https://m.corp.kt.com/eng/html/promote/sports/game.html">KT Rolster</a>; <a href="https://opticgaming.tv/">OpTic</a> and <a href="https://fazeclan.com">FaZe</a> enjoy fierce rivalries playing Dota 2, League of Legends, and Call of Duty. Loyal fans and spectators are passionate about their favourite teams and <a href="https://newzoo.com/insights/trend-reports/newzoo-global-esports-market-report-2020-light-version/">branded merchandise</a> is becoming big business for esports.</p>
<p>There is an opportunity here for host cities to offer activities and events specifically for those attending competitive esport events. It is worth considering, for example, special <a href="https://rapidretail.co.uk/fan-zone-many-sports-clubs-investing/">team-specific</a> fan zones and social spaces to capitalise on the loyalty of passionate followers. They bring passion and excitement to a sporting event, making them unmissable events for those who consider themselves diehard fans.</p>
<h2>Building enthusiasm for events</h2>
<p>Esport is experienced online as a <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/16184742.2019.1630464">social community</a>. Yet, for the most part, it is consumed without any actual proximity to other spectators.</p>
<p>This means a potential spectator is more likely to be travelling alone or hoping to meet up with online friends in person for the first time. This makes buying tickets and travelling to an event a daunting prospect for many.</p>
<p>However, <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0261517722000449">local event providers</a> could do more by offering forums and discussion channels that could build enthusiasm and anticipation in the run-up to the event. These online spaces would also give fans a chance to seek advice and support on where to stay and what to do, making the transition from online to offline much less daunting.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A young woman playing a video game, smiling and enjoying herself." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/458160/original/file-20220414-26-wjdgid.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/458160/original/file-20220414-26-wjdgid.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/458160/original/file-20220414-26-wjdgid.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/458160/original/file-20220414-26-wjdgid.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/458160/original/file-20220414-26-wjdgid.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=425&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/458160/original/file-20220414-26-wjdgid.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=425&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/458160/original/file-20220414-26-wjdgid.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=425&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The tourism sector needs to encourage the online video game audience to attend big live events and capitalise on the potential spending.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/pretty-excited-black-gamer-girl-headphones-1430140211">Gorodenkoff/Shutterstock</a></span>
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<p>The esport calendar is dominated by prestigious <a href="https://www.lineups.com/esports/biggest-esports-live-events-in-history/">world championship competitions</a> such as League of Legends, <a href="https://starcraft2.com/en-gb/">StarCraft II</a> and <a href="https://crossfire.z8games.com/">Crossfire</a>. Much less enthusiasm is generated for smaller qualifying or regional competitions. In fact, they usually take place exclusively online.</p>
<p>Travelling internationally to competitions can be <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0261517722000449">less appealing</a> to many fans. The <a href="http://www.fortitudemagazine.co.uk/entertainment/sports/going-sporting-events-uk-becoming-expensive/34360/">cost of attending</a> large sporting events is high, particularly for esport’s predominantly younger audience.</p>
<p>Local events could offer an entry point to first time live event spectators – building a passion for experiencing esport competition in-person.</p>
<h2>The draw of star players</h2>
<p>Esport prize money and salaries are growing substantially. The winners of the biggest DOTA 2 esport tournaments have taken home over $5 million (£3.8 million) in <a href="https://www.statista.com/statistics/518010/leading-esports-players-worldwide-by-earnings/">prize money</a>.</p>
<p>This makes them <a href="https://readyesports.com/who-are-the-most-popular-esports-players/">big-time celebrities</a> by any metric, and their attendance at events can be a big draw for fans. Meeting and interacting with star players is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, and needs to be part of the esport promotional strategy.</p>
<p>Event organisers could offer some additional fan viewing opportunities to see players practise and warm up. This would give greater value to the live event experience versus watching online.</p>
<p>The growth in esports shows no sign of slowing down, but live events are yet to take off to the same extent as online viewership. If tourism and hospitality can attract even a small fraction of esport’s 700m online viewership, then this could be a significant new revenue stream for cities hosting these events.</p>
<p>Mega esport competitions could become mass flagship events in the sporting calendar. These events have the potential to book out whole stadiums, which benefits hotels, bars, shops and local tourism. In the wake of the pandemic, tourism everywhere is suffering. The hospitality industry needs to get creative and seek out new opportunities like esport, and tempt massive online audiences to experience their passions in the real world.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/180739/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>There are huge potential revenues for tourism in online video gaming’s massive fanbase – if they can be encouraged to attend live events in host cities.Jamie Thompson, Lecturer in Marketing, Edinburgh Napier UniversityBabak Taheri, Professor of Marketing, Nottingham Trent UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1749842022-02-14T11:50:47Z2022-02-14T11:50:47ZHow we made a video game based on medieval records<p>The year is 1498. The town of Aberdeen in north-east Scotland has fallen prey to a “strange sickness” that is the deadly <a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/20503689/">plague</a>. Disease is spreading in Europe, and people are afraid, but how can the sickness be stopped? </p>
<p>An aspiring young councillor called Robert Collison decides he must devise a way to protect the town, persuade the local governors to adopt his strategies and prevent more deaths. Can you help him succeed in slowing the strange pandemic that threatens to engulf the region?</p>
<p>This is the premise of a video game we created recently called Strange Sickness. But we are not computer game experts or designers: we are historians who based the game on our collaborative <a href="https://www.abdn.ac.uk/aro">research</a> into Aberdeen’s rich historical archive of medieval <a href="https://www.abdn.ac.uk/riiss/projects/aberdeen-burgh-records-project-97.php">burgh records</a>. </p>
<p>Setting up this experiment in merging historical records with digital storytelling, we enlisted the help of a video game designer and an artist. We learned a lot about computer games and the gaming industry, but most of all, we wanted to show that historians can offer a different type of authenticity than that marketed by popular video games seeking to transport people into recreations of the past.</p>
<p>Much of the conversation around popular historical games, such as <a href="https://www.ubisoft.com/en-gb/game/assassins-creed">Assassin’s Creed</a> and <a href="https://www.callofduty.com/uk/en/">Call of Duty</a>, is about issues of <a href="https://theconversation.com/even-in-the-colourful-world-of-video-games-most-players-demand-historical-accuracy-172307">accuracy and authenticity</a>. These games present a marketable illusion of being transported into a facsimile of the past – a facsimile which is impossible.</p>
<p>Of course we could say that of all ways of presenting history. None can recover the past, only interpret it through surviving sources. The difference with games is their promise of interactivity and immersion, to transport the player from the everyday into another world which they can shape through their choices and actions.</p>
<p>Often the approach to accuracy in games is a little ridiculous. Call of Duty games set in WWII emphasise the historical accuracy of details such as <a href="https://www.thegamer.com/call-of-duty-things-historically-accurate/">weapon design</a> while players navigate through Hollywood-style set pieces and kill hundreds of enemies. It is a peculiar form of accuracy which recreates equipment in exacting detail while allowing players, like ultra-violent superheroes, to transcend the historical setting of WWII. </p>
<p>History is not a window into the past, but something made by people looking at the past through whatever evidence survives. Rather than hiding this process behind a distracting – and potentially harmful – veneer of claims to historical accuracy, we wanted historical sources and the historian’s research process to be front and centre in Strange Sickness. We aimed for the game, as a form of history, to be perceived as our creation as historians.</p>
<p>We believed this would fit well with the culture of independent game development, with its focus on games made by smaller teams. This allows a greater focus on the style and authorship of individual creators than is normally possible in big-budget games made by huge teams of people.</p>
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<h2>Game on</h2>
<p>We approached the development process with the goal of bringing players face-to-face with historical sources, rare in video games. Working with game designer Katharine Neil and artist Alana Bell, our immediate focus had to be on the practicalities of getting the game made.</p>
<p>With her experience in the games industry to the project, Katharine helped shape our ideas in relation to the mechanics, characters, locations and themes that make a narrative game work. In conversations with Alana we identified the key historical criteria for the game’s visuals while leaving space for creative freedom and the demands of the game’s design.</p>
<p>Some of our original ideas had to go. For instance, the early idea to have all text in the game linked back to an explanation of its historical provenance proved unworkable from both a technical and game design standpoint.</p>
<p>But the foundation of our approach remained. The game that emerged kept historical sources at its core. It emphasised history as something authored rather than something simply found and revealed. To offer transparency on the game’s adaptation of historical materials we created a separate <a href="https://strangesickness.com/">game website</a>, linked at the start and end of the game. This provides a historian’s commentary about how key elements of the game were adapted from historical evidence, with links to primary and secondary sources online.</p>
<p>This offers a clear pathway from the game to the underlying research and sources for players who choose to follow it. Another way to emphasise how history is created is depicted within the game itself, where the town clerk writes down what ultimately become the <a href="https://www.aberdeencity.gov.uk/services/libraries-and-archives/aberdeen-city-and-aberdeenshire-archives/collaborative-projects#1868">records which survive today</a> in Aberdeen’s city archives.</p>
<p>For us, as long as the game offered a clear link to historical research and sources, emphasising the authored nature of history, we felt free to develop a fictionalised narrative and work to the needs of game design.</p>
<p>Presenting history in this way – as a transparent process of construction from the traces of the past – is more authentic than any attempt to create or claim a facsimile of the past, no matter how much time, money and explosions are involved.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/174984/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>At the University of Aberdeen William Hepburn works on a project funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council. He is a director of Common Profyt Games Ltd.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>At the University of Aberdeen Jackson Armstrong receives research funding from the Arts and Humanities Research Council. He is a director of Common Profyt Games Ltd.</span></em></p>Authentic use of history in games is not about claims to accuracy, but about transparency.William Hepburn, Research Fellow, Department of Divinity, History, Philosophy & Art History, University of AberdeenJackson Armstrong, Senior Lecturer in History, University of AberdeenLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1752022022-01-18T19:28:53Z2022-01-18T19:28:53ZMicrosoft purchase of Activision Blizzard won’t clean up gamer culture overnight: 5 essential reads about sexual harassment and discrimination in gaming and tech<p>Microsoft announced on Jan. 18, 2022, its <a href="https://news.microsoft.com/2022/01/18/microsoft-to-acquire-activision-blizzard-to-bring-the-joy-and-community-of-gaming-to-everyone-across-every-device/">intention to purchase</a> video game giant Activision Blizzard. The company, publisher of top-selling video games Call of Duty, World of Warcraft and Candy Crush, has been the subject of a series of sexual discrimination and harassment complaints. A day before Microsoft’s announcement, Activision Blizzard announced that it has <a href="https://www.ibtimes.com/activision-says-it-fired-dozens-over-harassment-allegations-3377285">fired “nearly 40 employees”</a> since July following an investigation into hundreds of reports from employees of misconduct.</p>
<p>California <a href="https://www.npr.org/2021/07/22/1019293032/activision-blizzard-lawsuit-unequal-pay-sexual-harassment-video-games">sued Activision Blizzard</a> in July 2021, alleging a “pervasive ‘frat boy’ culture” at the company and discrimination against women in pay and promotion. The suit prompted a <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/tech-news/activision-blizzard-workers-walk-sexual-harassment-lawsuit-rcna1525">walkout by company employees</a> who demanded that the company address the problem.</p>
<p>The turmoil is an echo of the infamous <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/08/15/opinion/what-is-gamergate.html">Gamergate</a> episode of 2014 that featured an organized online campaign of harassment against female gamers, game developers and gaming journalists. The allegations are also of a piece with a <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/2019/02/19/women-built-tech-industry-then-they-were-pushed-out/">decadeslong history of gender discrimination</a> in the technology field.</p>
<p>It’s unclear whether or how quickly Microsoft will address Activision Blizzard’s discriminatory culture. Regardless of what happens within the company, the problem of sexual harassment in gamer culture involves the industry as a whole, as well as players and fans.</p>
<p>We’ve been covering sexual harassment and gender discrimination in gaming – and technology generally – and picked five articles from our archive to help you understand the news.</p>
<h2>1. Gaming culture is toxic – but community norms can change it</h2>
<p>Things have not been getting steadily better. The shift to online activities caused by the pandemic was accompanied by an increase in online harassment and a decrease in the number of women and girls playing video games.</p>
<p>More than a third of female gamers have experienced harassment, and female players have <a href="https://theconversation.com/heres-what-itll-take-to-clean-up-esports-toxic-culture-143520">developed coping strategies</a> like hiding their gender, playing only with friends and shutting down harassers by outplaying them, according to University of Oregon professor <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=7IEXEiwAAAAJ&hl=en">Amanda Cote</a>. These strategies take time and energy, and they avoid rather than challenge the harassment. Challenging harassment is also fraught, because it typically sparks a backlash and puts the burden on the victim.</p>
<p>Shutting down harassment comes down to creating and supporting community norms that reject rather than allow or encourage harassment. Gaming companies can adopt practices beyond banning harassers that discourage the behavior before it happens, including reducing opportunities for conflict outside of gameplay, adding in-game recognition of good behavior, and responding quickly to complaints.</p>
<p>“If esports continue to expand without game companies addressing the toxic environments in their games, abusive and exclusionary behaviors are likely to become entrenched,” she writes. “To avoid this, players, coaches, teams, leagues, game companies and live-streaming services should invest in better community management efforts.” </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/heres-what-itll-take-to-clean-up-esports-toxic-culture-143520">Here's what it'll take to clean up esports' toxic culture</a>
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<h2>2. It’s not just players – fans are part of the problem</h2>
<p>Go to any sports stadium and you’ll see that the atmosphere that energizes players and fans alike comes from the fans. For esports the venues are streaming services, where fan reaction comes not from cheers and chants but in the form of online chat.</p>
<p>University of South Florida professor <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ay9uGpcAAAAJ&hl=en">Giovanni Luca Ciampaglia</a> and colleagues analyzed chats on Twitch, one of the largest streaming services that carries live esports. They found <a href="https://ojs.aaai.org/index.php/ICWSM/article/view/14885">a sharp distinction</a> in the language fans use when commenting on players, called streamers, depending on gender.</p>
<p>“When watching a man stream, viewers typically talk about the game and try to engage with the streamer; game jargon (words like ‘points,’ ‘winner’ and ‘star’) and user nicknames are among the most important terms,” he writes. “But when watching a woman stream, <a href="https://theconversation.com/can-online-gaming-ditch-its-sexist-ways-74493">the tone changes</a>: Game jargon drops, and objectification language increases (words like ‘cute,’ ‘fat’ and ‘boobs’). The difference is particularly striking when the streamer is popular, and less so when looking at comments on less-popular streamers’ activity.”</p>
<p>As with the games themselves, combating harassment and discrimination on streaming services comes down to community standards, he writes. The streaming services “need to examine their cultural norms to drive out toxic standards that effectively silence entire groups.”</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/can-online-gaming-ditch-its-sexist-ways-74493">Can online gaming ditch its sexist ways?</a>
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<h2>3. Collegiate esports leagues don’t reflect the population of video game players</h2>
<p>Esports is becoming a big business, with <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/esports-business-esports-growth-idUSFLM4K2cJ7">over $1 billion in revenues</a>, and collegiate leagues are an important component of the field. Just over 8% of college esports players and 4% of coaches are female. The low rates of participation are not a reflection of interest: <a href="https://www.sportsintegrityinitiative.com/gaming-gender-how-inclusive-are-esports/">57% of women ages 18-29</a> play video games that are in the esports category.</p>
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<span class="caption">Boise State esports coach Doc Haskell watches scholarship graduate student Artie ‘N3rdybird’ Rainn compete in a match.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://newsroom.ap.org/detail/EsportsScholarshipInequality/226671c6c6fb412a985dbad4cfe71eed/photo">AP Photo/Otto Kitsinger</a></span>
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<p>Female players <a href="https://theconversation.com/at-colleges-nationwide-esports-teams-dominated-by-men-154793">face overt hostility and harassment</a>, which discourages participation, according to SUNY Cortland professor <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=dYfhb9sAAAAJ&hl=en">Lindsey Darvin</a>. College teams often engage in tokenism by bringing on a single female player, and the <a href="https://apnews.com/article/esports-gender-inequality-scholarships-men-1823321276db40fea37dc8d9e5410643">vast majority of scholarships go to male players</a>. </p>
<p>Professional esports organizations are <a href="https://www.teamliquid.com/news/2021/01/13/aerial-powers-joins-team-liquid-as-streamer-and-diversity-ambassador">beginning to address the gender gap</a>. Colleges and universities need to follow suit.</p>
<p>“Colleges and universities that receive U.S. federal aid have an obligation to improve opportunity and access to participation based on Title IX policy, which prohibits sex discrimination in any education program or activity receiving federal financial assistance,” she writes.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/at-colleges-nationwide-esports-teams-dominated-by-men-154793">At colleges nationwide, esports teams dominated by men</a>
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<h2>4. Lessons from the tech field: Diversity and equity require women with power</h2>
<p>The roots of esports’ toxic culture lie in <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-tech-field-failed-a-25-year-challenge-to-achieve-gender-equality-by-2020-culture-change-is-key-to-getting-on-track-144779">decades of gender discrimination</a> in the technology field as a whole. That discrimination has proved stubborn.</p>
<p>“In 1995, pioneering computer scientist Anita Borg challenged the tech community to a moonshot: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3nImg8vPUe4">equal representation of women in tech by 2020</a>,” writes Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute professor <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=HzqQ2wYAAAAJ&hl=en">Francine Berman</a>. “Twenty-five years later, we’re still far from that goal. In 2018, fewer than 30% of the <a href="https://www.vox.com/2018/4/11/17225574/facebook-tech-diversity-women">employees in tech’s biggest companies</a> and 20% of <a href="https://research.swe.org/2016/08/tenure-tenure-track-faculty-levels/">faculty in university computer science departments</a> were women.”</p>
<p>Reversing discrimination is a matter of changing cultures within organizations. “Diverse leadership is a critical part of creating diverse cultures,” she writes. “Women are more likely to thrive in environments where they have not only stature, but responsibility, resources, influence, opportunity and power.”</p>
<p>“Culture change is a marathon, not a sprint, requiring constant vigilance, many small decisions, and often changes in who holds power,” she writes. “My experience as supercomputer center head, and with the Research Data Alliance, the Sloan Foundation and other groups has shown me that organizations can create positive and more diverse environments.”</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/the-tech-field-failed-a-25-year-challenge-to-achieve-gender-equality-by-2020-culture-change-is-key-to-getting-on-track-144779">The tech field failed a 25-year challenge to achieve gender equality by 2020 – culture change is key to getting on track</a>
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<h2>5. The myth of meritocracy is an impediment to equality</h2>
<p>The myth of meritocracy is a large part of the <a href="https://theconversation.com/women-in-tech-suffer-because-of-american-myth-of-meritocracy-94269">longevity of gender discrimination</a> in the tech field. That myth says that success is a result of skill and effort, and that women’s representation is a reflection of their abilities.</p>
<p>In the U.S., <a href="https://www.nawbo.org/resources/women-business-owner-statistics">women own 39%</a> of all privately owned businesses but receive only around 4% of venture capital funding, according to Brown University professor <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=Vj4crUIAAAAJ&hl=en">Banu Ozkazanc-Pan</a>. </p>
<p>“Yet the meritocracy myth, which <a href="https://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2982414">my research shows</a> has a stronghold in the world of entrepreneurship, means that women are constantly told that all they have to do to get more of that <a href="https://nvca.org/pressreleases/total-venture-capital-dollars-invested-2017-track-reach-decade-high/">$22 billion or so in venture capital funding</a> is <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/1042258717728028">make better pitches</a> or be more assertive,” she writes.</p>
<p>What the tech field calls meritocracy is in fact gender-biased and results in mostly white men gaining access to resources and funding. “By continuing to believe in meritocracy and maintaining practices associated with it, gender equality will remain a distant goal,” she writes. </p>
<p>Adopting <a href="https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2018/01/metoo-sexual-harassment-what-experts-say/">gender-aware approaches</a>, including setting concrete goals for gender balance, is key to correcting the imbalances caused by the meritocracy myth.</p>
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<em>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/women-in-tech-suffer-because-of-american-myth-of-meritocracy-94269">Women in tech suffer because of American myth of meritocracy</a>
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<p><em>Editor’s note: This story is a roundup of articles from The Conversation’s archives. This is an updated version of an <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-activision-blizzard-lawsuit-shows-gamer-culture-still-has-a-long-way-to-go-5-essential-reads-about-sexual-harassment-and-discrimination-in-gaming-and-tech-165293">article</a> originally published on July 30, 2021. It has been updated to include Microsoft’s intention to purchase Activision Blizzard.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/175202/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
Sexual harassment and discrimination in gaming and tech are not inevitable or permanent, write experts in the field. The solutions are positive community standards and women in power.Eric Smalley, Science + Technology EditorLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1667292021-09-08T17:26:42Z2021-09-08T17:26:42ZActivision Blizzard’s sexual harassment scandal is not a one-off for the gaming industry<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/419804/original/file-20210907-26-jf2tqc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C4399%2C2930&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The Activision Blizzard Booth is seen during the Electronic Entertainment Expo in Los Angeles. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">(AP Photo/Jae C. Hong)</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>A growing number of major digital gaming studios face allegations over their “frat boy” cultures. <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/23/style/women-gaming-streaming-harassment-sexism-twitch.html">These aren’t isolated accusations.</a> They reflect a culture of sexism and discrimination that senior management and human resources departments perpetuate and allow. </p>
<p>Activision Blizzard, maker of successful franchises like <em>World of Warcraft</em> and <em>Call of Duty</em>, has been <a href="https://aboutblaw.com/YJw">sued by the State of California</a> for alleged discrimination against female employees, sexual harassment and failing to take steps to prevent discrimination, harassment and retaliation. </p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/420020/original/file-20210908-23-1wn1hw4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A man in a dark jacket and white shirt" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/420020/original/file-20210908-23-1wn1hw4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/420020/original/file-20210908-23-1wn1hw4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=481&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/420020/original/file-20210908-23-1wn1hw4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=481&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/420020/original/file-20210908-23-1wn1hw4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=481&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/420020/original/file-20210908-23-1wn1hw4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=605&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/420020/original/file-20210908-23-1wn1hw4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=605&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/420020/original/file-20210908-23-1wn1hw4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=605&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">Activision Blizzard CEO Robert Kotick, who’s been harshly criticized by a group of employees for his response to the allegations.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(AP Photo/Nati Harnik)</span></span>
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<p>Following a company statement denying the claims, more than <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/tech-news/activision-blizzard-workers-walk-sexual-harassment-lawsuit-rcna1525">3,000 former and current employees</a> at Blizzard <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/paultassi/2021/07/27/heres-the-letter-1000-activision-blizzard-employees-signed-and-sent-to-their-managers/?sh=29fe93444542">signed a letter</a> calling the response “abhorrent and insulting.” </p>
<p>Employees staged a <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/jul/28/activision-blizzard-walkout-allegations-harassment-frat-boy-culture">walkout and virtual protest</a>. <a href="https://www.polygon.com/22608372/activision-blizzard-lawsuit-explainer-sexual-harassment-frat-boy-discrimination-gender-fired">The president of Blizzard and the head of HR resigned</a>.</p>
<h2>Ubisoft, Riot Games</h2>
<p>Last summer Ubisoft, maker of top games like <em>Assassin’s Creed</em>, also faced <a href="https://kotaku.com/ubisoft-ceo-and-others-blamed-for-institutional-harassm-1847306435">allegations of sexual harassment and misconduct</a>. Senior executives and the company’s global head of HR resigned.</p>
<p>And let’s not forget Riot Games, maker of <em>League of Legends</em>. Allegations of a sexist culture <a href="https://kotaku.com/inside-the-culture-of-sexism-at-riot-games-1828165483">emerged in 2018</a>. This led to a <a href="https://kotaku.com/over-150-riot-employees-walk-out-to-protest-forced-arbi-1834566198">company walkout</a> in 2019 and <a href="https://www.latimes.com/business/technology/story/2019-12-02/riot-games-gender-discrimination-settlement">class-action lawsuits for gender discrimination</a>. This January, <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/video-games/2021/02/09/riot-games-laurent-lawsuit/">Riot’s CEO was sued</a> for allegedly creating a hostile work environment and making unwanted sexual advances. </p>
<p>Data from the International Game Developers Association (IGDA) <a href="https://igda.org/dss/">Developer Satisfaction Surveys</a> show that these cases are not a one-off. There is a growing perception among the game developers surveyed that there’s no equity in the industry.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/418129/original/file-20210826-6105-elzkn5.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Bar graph showing perceptions of equal treatment over four survey years" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/418129/original/file-20210826-6105-elzkn5.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/418129/original/file-20210826-6105-elzkn5.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=463&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/418129/original/file-20210826-6105-elzkn5.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=463&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/418129/original/file-20210826-6105-elzkn5.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=463&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/418129/original/file-20210826-6105-elzkn5.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=582&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/418129/original/file-20210826-6105-elzkn5.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=582&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/418129/original/file-20210826-6105-elzkn5.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=582&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Is there equal treatment for all in the game industry?</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">IGDA Developer Satisfaction Surveys original data</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Survey respondents also regularly say that they have experienced inequities or witnessed them toward others. </p>
<p>In the 2021 Developer Satisfaction Survey, only 44 per cent had never experienced inequity and only 29 per cent had never witnessed an incident of inequity.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/418134/original/file-20210826-4978-1gvqtqq.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Bar graph of the types of inequity experienced by game developers" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/418134/original/file-20210826-4978-1gvqtqq.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/418134/original/file-20210826-4978-1gvqtqq.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=588&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/418134/original/file-20210826-4978-1gvqtqq.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=588&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/418134/original/file-20210826-4978-1gvqtqq.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=588&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/418134/original/file-20210826-4978-1gvqtqq.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=739&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/418134/original/file-20210826-4978-1gvqtqq.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=739&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/418134/original/file-20210826-4978-1gvqtqq.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=739&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Experiences of inequity reported in the Developer Satisfaction Surveys.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">IGDA Developer Satisfaction Surveys original data</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Companies are responsible for creating inclusive workplaces. The gaming industry is behind the curve in establishing and enforcing policies to prevent discrimination, harassment and exclusionary practices. </p>
<p>In the 2021 Developer Satisfaction Survey, eight per cent of respondents said that their companies had no equity, diversity or inclusion policies at all, and 22 per cent did not know if they did. Only one-quarter said that their companies had a safe space policy. </p>
<p>The numbers look better for policies on sexual harassment and general discrimination, but there is far from universal adoption. Worse, less than half of respondents said that there was a formal disciplinary process or a formal complaint procedure. </p>
<h2>Situation worsening</h2>
<p>Crucially, only 41 per cent of respondents felt that these policies were adequately enforced. Almost half were not sure. These numbers are worse than in previous survey years.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/418135/original/file-20210826-25-h84tmc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Bar graph of equity, diversity and inclusion policies in place at game studios" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/418135/original/file-20210826-25-h84tmc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/418135/original/file-20210826-25-h84tmc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=388&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/418135/original/file-20210826-25-h84tmc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=388&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/418135/original/file-20210826-25-h84tmc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=388&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/418135/original/file-20210826-25-h84tmc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=488&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/418135/original/file-20210826-25-h84tmc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=488&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/418135/original/file-20210826-25-h84tmc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=488&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Equity, Diversity and Inclusion Policies at Game Studios.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">IGDA Developer Satisfaction Surveys original data</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>This data helps to explain the concerns raised by developers in the recent gaming industry scandals. At best, issues are ignored or mishandled by senior management and HR. At worst, senior executives are complicit in misconduct and coverups. The Developer Satisfaction Survey data show an informal and often arbitrary environment where employees have limited leverage or recourse.</p>
<p>Ample evidence suggests companies won’t change on their own. Employees must keep up the pressure. </p>
<p>An Ubisoft developer <a href="https://kotaku.com/ubisofts-metoo-reckoning-two-months-later-1844717203">quoted in Kotaku</a> expressed demoralization: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>“I’m so jaded at this point that, no matter what they do, it’ll feel like lip service to me.” </p>
</blockquote>
<p>But others are speaking out. They are filing lawsuits, mobilizing their colleagues and, perhaps most importantly, unionizing. Unions give workers a voice and role in the regulation of their workplaces. The <a href="https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1019&context=mospub">momentum for unions</a> in the gaming industry is growing.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/the-advantages-of-unionization-are-obvious-so-why-dont-more-workers-join-unions-164475">The advantages of unionization are obvious, so why don't more workers join unions?</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>Not just talk, but action is needed</h2>
<p>As #Metoo becomes part of our daily discourse, it’s easy to think that equity issues are finally being appropriately addressed. </p>
<p>Companies seem to publicly advocate for equity. In response to scandals, organizations like Activision Blizzard, Ubisoft and Riot hire consultants, issue public commitments to equity, diversity or inclusion policies and fire problematic staff.</p>
<p>But behind closed doors, there is still a lot of work to be done to achieve proper accountability at companies that are historically homogeneous in their demographic makeup and structures. Companies must realize that a commitment to equity, diversity and inclusion on paper is worthless without real action and change.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/166729/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Johanna Weststar has received funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, the International Game Developers Association and the IGDA Foundation.</span></em></p>The gaming industry is plagued by accusations of discrimination and harassment. Companies must realize that a commitment to equity and diversity on paper is worthless without real action and change.Johanna Weststar, Associate Professor of Labour and Employment Relations, DAN Department of Management & Organizational Studies, Western UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1652932021-07-30T12:20:53Z2021-07-30T12:20:53ZThe Activision Blizzard lawsuit shows gamer culture still has a long way to go: 5 essential reads about sexual harassment and discrimination in gaming and tech<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/413846/original/file-20210729-17-16buhii.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C7%2C5184%2C3437&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">There's nothing inherently male about playing video games. Videogame culture, on the other hand, is decidedly anti-female.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/gamers-play-the-video-game-call-of-duty-wwii-developed-by-news-photo/868750534">Chesnot/Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>An updated version of this article was published on Jan. 18, 2022. <a href="https://theconversation.com/microsoft-purchase-of-activision-blizzard-wont-clean-up-gamer-culture-overnight-5-essential-reads-about-sexual-harassment-and-discrimination-in-gaming-and-tech-175202">Read it here</a>.</em></p>
<p>Sexual harassment in gamer culture burst back into the spotlight on July 21, 2021, with news of California’s <a href="https://www.npr.org/2021/07/22/1019293032/activision-blizzard-lawsuit-unequal-pay-sexual-harassment-video-games">lawsuit against Activision Blizzard</a>, publisher of top-selling video games Call of Duty, World of Warcraft and Candy Crush, and a <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/tech-news/activision-blizzard-workers-walk-sexual-harassment-lawsuit-rcna1525">walkout by company employees</a>. The lawsuit alleges a “pervasive ‘frat boy’ culture” at the company and discrimination against women in pay and promotion.</p>
<p>The turmoil is an echo of the infamous <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/08/15/opinion/what-is-gamergate.html">Gamergate</a> episode of 2014 that featured an organized online campaign of harassment against female gamers, game developers and gaming journalists. The allegations are also of a piece with a <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/2019/02/19/women-built-tech-industry-then-they-were-pushed-out/">decadeslong history of gender discrimination</a> in the technology field.</p>
<p>We’ve been covering sexual harassment and gender discrimination in gaming – and technology generally – and picked five articles from our archive to help you understand the news.</p>
<h2>1. Gaming culture is toxic – but community norms can change it</h2>
<p>Things have not been getting steadily better. The shift to online activities caused by the pandemic was accompanied by an increase in online harassment and a decrease in the number of women and girls playing video games.</p>
<p>More than a third of female gamers have experienced harassment, and female players have developed coping strategies like hiding their gender, playing only with friends and shutting down harassers by outplaying them, according to University of Oregon professor <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=7IEXEiwAAAAJ&hl=en">Amanda Cote</a>. These strategies take time and energy, and they avoid rather than challenge the harassment. Challenging harassment is also fraught, because it typically sparks a backlash and puts the burden on the victim.</p>
<p>Shutting down harassment comes down to creating and supporting community norms that reject rather than allow or encourage harassment. Gaming companies can adopt practices beyond banning harassers that discourage the behavior before it happens, including reducing opportunities for conflict outside of gameplay, adding in-game recognition of good behavior, and responding quickly to complaints.</p>
<p>“If esports continue to expand without game companies addressing the toxic environments in their games, abusive and exclusionary behaviors are likely to become entrenched,” she writes. “To avoid this, players, coaches, teams, leagues, game companies and live-streaming services should invest in better community management efforts.” </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/heres-what-itll-take-to-clean-up-esports-toxic-culture-143520">Here's what it'll take to clean up esports' toxic culture</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>2. It’s not just players – fans are part of the problem</h2>
<p>Go to any sports stadium and you’ll see that the atmosphere that energizes players and fans alike comes from the fans. For esports the venues are streaming services, where fan reaction comes not from cheers and chants but in the form of online chat.</p>
<p>University of South Florida professor <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ay9uGpcAAAAJ&hl=en">Giovanni Luca Ciampaglia</a> and colleagues analyzed chats on Twitch, one of the largest streaming services that carries live esports. They found <a href="https://ojs.aaai.org/index.php/ICWSM/article/view/14885">a sharp distinction</a> in the language fans use when commenting on players, called streamers, depending on gender.</p>
<p>“When watching a man stream, viewers typically talk about the game and try to engage with the streamer; game jargon (words like ‘points,’ ‘winner’ and ‘star’) and user nicknames are among the most important terms,” he writes. “But when watching a woman stream, the tone changes: Game jargon drops, and objectification language increases (words like ‘cute,’ ‘fat’ and ‘boobs’). The difference is particularly striking when the streamer is popular, and less so when looking at comments on less-popular streamers’ activity.”</p>
<p>As with the games themselves, combating harassment and discrimination on streaming services comes down to community standards, he writes. The streaming services “need to examine their cultural norms to drive out toxic standards that effectively silence entire groups.”</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/can-online-gaming-ditch-its-sexist-ways-74493">Can online gaming ditch its sexist ways?</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>3. Collegiate esports leagues don’t reflect the population of videogame players</h2>
<p>Esports is becoming a big business, with <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/esports-business-esports-growth-idUSFLM4K2cJ7">over $1 billion in revenues</a>, and collegiate leagues are an important component of the field. Just over 8% of college esports players and 4% of coaches are female. The low rates of participation are not a reflection of interest: <a href="https://www.sportsintegrityinitiative.com/gaming-gender-how-inclusive-are-esports/">57% of women ages 18-29</a> play video games that are in the esports category.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/413860/original/file-20210729-25-1kf5al0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A young woman wearing a face mask stares intently at a large computer screen while a man wearing a face mask stands behind her looking over her shoulder" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/413860/original/file-20210729-25-1kf5al0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/413860/original/file-20210729-25-1kf5al0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/413860/original/file-20210729-25-1kf5al0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/413860/original/file-20210729-25-1kf5al0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/413860/original/file-20210729-25-1kf5al0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/413860/original/file-20210729-25-1kf5al0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/413860/original/file-20210729-25-1kf5al0.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">Boise State esports coach Doc Haskell watches scholarship graduate student Artie ‘N3rdybird’ Rainn compete in a match.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://newsroom.ap.org/detail/EsportsScholarshipInequality/226671c6c6fb412a985dbad4cfe71eed/photo">AP Photo/Otto Kitsinger</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Female players face overt hostility and harassment, which discourages participation, according to SUNY Cortland professor <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=dYfhb9sAAAAJ&hl=en">Lindsey Darvin</a>. College teams often engage in tokenism by bringing on a single female player, and the <a href="https://apnews.com/article/esports-gender-inequality-scholarships-men-1823321276db40fea37dc8d9e5410643">vast majority of scholarships go to male players</a>. </p>
<p>Professional esports organizations are <a href="https://www.teamliquid.com/news/2021/01/13/aerial-powers-joins-team-liquid-as-streamer-and-diversity-ambassador">beginning to address the gender gap</a>. Colleges and universities need to follow suit.</p>
<p>“Colleges and universities that receive U.S. federal aid have an obligation to improve opportunity and access to participation based on Title IX policy, which prohibits sex discrimination in any education program or activity receiving federal financial assistance,” she writes.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/at-colleges-nationwide-esports-teams-dominated-by-men-154793">At colleges nationwide, esports teams dominated by men</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>4. Lessons from the tech field: Diversity and equity require women with power</h2>
<p>The roots of esports’ toxic culture lie in decades of gender discrimination in the technology field as a whole. That discrimination has proved stubborn.</p>
<p>“In 1995, pioneering computer scientist Anita Borg challenged the tech community to a moonshot: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3nImg8vPUe4">equal representation of women in tech by 2020</a>,” writes Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute professor <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=HzqQ2wYAAAAJ&hl=en">Francine Berman</a>. “Twenty-five years later, we’re still far from that goal. In 2018, fewer than 30% of the <a href="https://www.vox.com/2018/4/11/17225574/facebook-tech-diversity-women">employees in tech’s biggest companies</a> and 20% of <a href="https://research.swe.org/2016/08/tenure-tenure-track-faculty-levels/">faculty in university computer science departments</a> were women.”</p>
<p>Reversing discrimination is a matter of changing cultures within organizations. “Diverse leadership is a critical part of creating diverse cultures,” she writes. “Women are more likely to thrive in environments where they have not only stature, but responsibility, resources, influence, opportunity and power.”</p>
<p>“Culture change is a marathon, not a sprint, requiring constant vigilance, many small decisions, and often changes in who holds power,” she writes. “My experience as supercomputer center head, and with the Research Data Alliance, the Sloan Foundation and other groups has shown me that organizations can create positive and more diverse environments.”</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/the-tech-field-failed-a-25-year-challenge-to-achieve-gender-equality-by-2020-culture-change-is-key-to-getting-on-track-144779">The tech field failed a 25-year challenge to achieve gender equality by 2020 – culture change is key to getting on track</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>5. The myth of meritocracy is an impediment to equality</h2>
<p>The myth of meritocracy is a large part of the longevity of gender discrimination in the tech field. That myth says that success is a result of skill and effort, and that women’s representation is a reflection of their abilities.</p>
<p>In the U.S., <a href="https://www.nawbo.org/resources/women-business-owner-statistics">women own 39%</a> of all privately owned businesses but receive only around 4% of venture capital funding, according to Brown University professor <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=Vj4crUIAAAAJ&hl=en">Banu Ozkazanc-Pan</a>. </p>
<p>“Yet the meritocracy myth, which <a href="https://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2982414">my research shows</a> has a stronghold in the world of entrepreneurship, means that women are constantly told that all they have to do to get more of that <a href="https://nvca.org/pressreleases/total-venture-capital-dollars-invested-2017-track-reach-decade-high/">$22 billion or so in venture capital funding</a> is <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/1042258717728028">make better pitches</a> or be more assertive,” she writes.</p>
<p>[<em>Over 100,000 readers rely on The Conversation’s newsletter to understand the world.</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters/the-daily-3?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=100Ksignup">Sign up today</a>.]</p>
<p>What the tech field calls meritocracy is in fact gender-biased and results in mostly white men gaining access to resources and funding. “By continuing to believe in meritocracy and maintaining practices associated with it, gender equality will remain a distant goal,” she writes. </p>
<p>Adopting <a href="https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2018/01/metoo-sexual-harassment-what-experts-say/">gender-aware approaches</a>, including setting concrete goals for gender balance, is key to correcting the imbalances caused by the meritocracy myth.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/women-in-tech-suffer-because-of-american-myth-of-meritocracy-94269">Women in tech suffer because of American myth of meritocracy</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
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<p><em>Editor’s note: This story is a roundup of articles from The Conversation’s archives.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/165293/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
Sexual harassment and discrimination in gaming and tech is not inevitable or permanent, write experts in the field. The solutions are positive community standards and women in power.Eric Smalley, Science + Technology EditorLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1520602020-12-18T13:55:00Z2020-12-18T13:55:00ZIn Trump election fraud cases, federal judges upheld the rule of law – but that’s not enough to fix US politics<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/375743/original/file-20201217-19-iunq2b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=8%2C17%2C5982%2C3961&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Rudy Giuliani, lawyer for President Donald Trump, speaks on Nov. 19 at a news conference about lawsuits related to the presidential election. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/former-new-york-city-mayor-rudy-giuliani-lawyer-for-u-s-news-photo/1229689995?adppopup=true">Sarah Silbiger for The Washington Post via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>A healthy constitutional culture, in which the people and their leaders respect the authority of their Constitution, requires a baseline of trust in the government – a baseline that, in the United States, has eroded from <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2019/04/11/public-trust-in-government-1958-2019/">77% in the early 1960s to 17% today</a>.</p>
<p>This collapse of public confidence paved the way for a <a href="https://news.stanford.edu/2018/12/26/explaining-surge-populist-politics-movements-today/">populist form of leadership</a> that redirected public faith away from the institutions of government <a href="https://www.brookings.edu/blog/fixgov/2015/09/16/trust-in-trump-comes-from-lack-of-trust-in-government/">toward a more autocratic leader – Donald Trump – whom voters trusted to consolidate power</a>, <a href="https://www.voterstudygroup.org/publication/follow-the-leader">neutralize opposition and “drain the swamp” of the experts and bureaucrats he deemed responsible for the government’s malaise</a>.</p>
<p>In the past four years, President Trump has consolidated power to such an extent that the Republican Party has literally declined to adopt a party platform and effectively embraced <a href="https://www.npr.org/2020/08/26/905803785/todays-gop-is-donald-trump-s-party">the president as its alter ego</a>.</p>
<p>After losing the 2020 election by a <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/meet-the-press/nearly-all-votes-counted-2020-presidential-election-wasn-t-close-n1248608">comfortable margin</a>,<br>
Trump counted on the populist power he had accumulated to force the hands of Republican officials across the country to invalidate the election, <a href="https://apnews.com/article/barr-no-widespread-election-fraud-b1f1488796c9a98c4b1a9061a6c7f49d">despite no creditable evidence of widespread fraud</a>.</p>
<p>The gambit almost worked. Trump’s influence – made muscular by an energetic base poised to punish disobedient elected officials – <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/11/20/us/politics/republicans-congress-trump.html">quieted intraparty criticism</a>, <a href="https://apnews.com/article/election-2020-ap-fact-check-joe-biden-donald-trump-technology-5f71f47de73ae6257532fad04c1b3221">moved a legal team to launch a battery of meritless lawsuits</a> and inspired 18 state attorneys general to <a href="https://thehill.com/regulation/court-battles/529614-18-states-join-texas-case-seeing-to-overturn-biden-win">request that the Supreme Court overturn a presidential election</a>.</p>
<p>But that strategy ultimately failed, because Trump’s populist control did not extend to the federal courts. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/375747/original/file-20201217-23-j9gx22.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A protestor outside Giuliani's apartment building with a sign that says 'How many lawyers does it take to screw a democracy'" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/375747/original/file-20201217-23-j9gx22.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/375747/original/file-20201217-23-j9gx22.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/375747/original/file-20201217-23-j9gx22.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/375747/original/file-20201217-23-j9gx22.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/375747/original/file-20201217-23-j9gx22.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/375747/original/file-20201217-23-j9gx22.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/375747/original/file-20201217-23-j9gx22.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Lawyers who helped with Trump campaign lawsuits faced protests, like this one outside Rudy Giuliani’s apartment building in New York.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/participant-seen-holding-a-sign-at-the-protest-members-of-news-photo/1229685957?adppopup=true">Erik McGregor/LightRocket via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Cases need facts</h2>
<p>The legal assault on the election was spearheaded by <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/12/11/can-trumps-lawyers-get-trouble-frivolous-lawsuits/">attorneys who were willing to file suits</a> based on unsupported suspicions and beliefs to perpetuate the president’s populist regime by any means necessary. These groundless suspicions and beliefs – <a href="https://www.politico.com/news/2020/11/19/giuliani-trump-lawyer-conspiracy-legal-438225">bellowed loudly and often by the president and his entourage</a> – may have gotten traction in politics, but they got none in courts of law. The judiciary’s firewall withstood the populist bomb that President Trump detonated.</p>
<p>Apart from the fact that neither the president nor his enthusiasts could threaten the tenure of <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-federal-judges-with-life-tenure-dont-need-to-fear-political-attacks-from-trump-or-anyone-else-132305">unelected federal judges who are appointed for life</a>, judges are a different kind of public official, and the lies, bullying and bombast that work well in populist politics fall flat in courts of law. </p>
<p>When judges hear cases, they <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/rules/frcp">follow a uniform system of procedural rules</a> that enable them to evaluate the claims that the parties make and amass a body of information on which they rely to determine facts and ascertain truth. It’s a system that has served the judiciary well for generations, and served it well in the postelection cases that the courts decided in recent weeks.</p>
<p>Judges are lawyers who have been steeped in the rule of law for decades. It begins with three years of law school, where they “<a href="https://doi.org/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195183108.001.0001">learn to think like lawyers</a>” and are graded on their command of substantive and procedural law. Upon graduation, they must demonstrate their proficiency in law by passing a bar exam, and then practice law for years and typically decades before ascending the bench. </p>
<h2>‘Trump judges’ aren’t Trump judges</h2>
<p>Trump has been criticized for appointing an unprecedented 10 judges whose credentials and experience the <a href="https://www.huffpost.com/entry/trump-judicial-nominee-unqualified-kathryn-kimball-mizelle_n_5f91aa90c5b61c185f48092d">American Bar Association deemed so deficient as to warrant an “unqualified” rating</a>. But the <a href="https://news.ballotpedia.org/2020/12/05/trump-has-appointed-second-most-federal-judges-through-december-1-of-a-presidents-fourth-year/">vast majority of his 227</a> appointees possess the traditional qualifications needed to perpetuate the federal judiciary’s entrenched commitment to the rule of law.</p>
<p>Some of the <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-election-trump-judges/u-s-judiciary-shaped-by-trump-thwarts-his-election-challenges-idUSKBN28B60O">judges who dismissed the Trump election cases were appointed by the president</a>. That may have shocked Trump and his followers, but is unlikely to have surprised Chief Justice John Roberts. In 2018, Roberts <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/11/21/us/politics/trump-chief-justice-roberts-rebuke.html">called out Trump for attacking “Obama judges</a>.” </p>
<p>“We do not have Obama judges or Trump judges, Bush judges or Clinton judges,” Roberts said in a statement. “What we have is an extraordinary group of dedicated judges doing their level best to do equal right to those appearing before them. That independent judiciary is something we should all be thankful for.”</p>
<p>Some criticized Roberts <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/chief-justice-roberts-is-wrong-we-do-have-obama-judges-and-trump-judges/2018/11/23/ee8de9a2-ef2c-11e8-8679-934a2b33be52_story.html">as naïve or duplicitous</a>. After all, the data show that federal judges are influenced by their ideological preferences. Voters know this and choose a president who will <a href="https://www.annenbergpublicpolicycenter.org/most-americans-trust-the-supreme-court-but-think-it-is-too-mixed-up-in-politics/">appoint ideologically compatible judges</a>.</p>
<p>These critics, however, miss the mark. Yes, judges are subject to ideological influences in close cases, when the law is subject to conflicting interpretations, and judges tend to favor interpretations that align with their common sense and <a href="https://commons.stmarytx.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1037&context=lmej">policy perspective</a>. </p>
<p>But this does not refute Roberts’ point: Federal judges are trained to take law seriously and do their best to uphold the law as they understand it to be written. So when confronted with postelection fraud cases that were not close – that lacked factual allegations essential to proceeding with the case – <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/11/13/us/politics/trump-election-lawsuits.html">judges ruled against the president</a>.</p>
<p>As one judge said to Trump campaign lawyers, “<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/11/13/us/politics/trump-election-lawsuits.html">Come on now!</a>”</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/375752/original/file-20201217-13-1uzjacb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Chief Justice John Roberts and President Trump shake hands at the Feb. 4, 2020 State of the Union address." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/375752/original/file-20201217-13-1uzjacb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/375752/original/file-20201217-13-1uzjacb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=423&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/375752/original/file-20201217-13-1uzjacb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=423&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/375752/original/file-20201217-13-1uzjacb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=423&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/375752/original/file-20201217-13-1uzjacb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=532&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/375752/original/file-20201217-13-1uzjacb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=532&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/375752/original/file-20201217-13-1uzjacb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=532&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Chief Justice John Roberts, right, once chastised President Trump for saying that judges make rulings based on their politics. Here, the two shake hands at this year’s State of the Union address Feb. 4.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/president-donald-trump-shakes-hands-with-supreme-court-news-photo/1198673347?adppopup=true">Leah Millis-Pool/Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Facts and truth</h2>
<p>Thanks to those judges, the rule of law held firm against a populist assault. </p>
<p>Celebrating the triumph of the rule of law in the courts, however, obscures the reality that innumerable voters, public officials and lawyers who were ostensibly committed to that rule of law stood ready – for the first time in U.S. history – to <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/trump-broadens-his-efforts-to-overturn-election-outcome-11605800104">overturn a presidential election</a>.</p>
<p>In the past, the majority of Americans drew their conclusions from a <a href="https://www.cjr.org/special_report/the-fall-rise-and-fall-of-media-trust.php">common body of information</a> received from the same evening news and morning newspapers.</p>
<p>With the explosion of the information age and the decline of traditional media, that common body of information has disappeared, as the marketplace of ideas has been flooded with limitless information, <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/internet/2017/10/19/the-future-of-truth-and-misinformation-online/">the truth or falsity of which is increasingly difficult to assess</a>. The consequences are voiced by a nihilistic spy in the latest “Call of Duty” video game: “<a href="https://hero.fandom.com/wiki/Jason_Hudson">There is no truth – only who you choose to believe</a>.” And this, it would seem, has become the mantra for many public officials and their constituents.</p>
<p>Americans encountered a similar problem once before, during industrialization, when the nation was deluged with a flood of false and misleading information about new drugs, foods and consumer products – a problem that <a href="https://www.fda.gov/about-fda/fdas-evolving-regulatory-powers/part-i-1906-food-and-drugs-act-and-its-enforcement">the administrative state ultimately emerged to regulate</a>.</p>
<p>The trouble is that the government can’t regulate the marketplace of ideas the way it does the marketplace of goods and services – <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/08/does-the-first-amendment-protect-deliberate-lies/496004/#:%7E:text=Under%20U.S.%20law%2C%20many%20falsehoods,the%20Supreme%20Court%20in%201974.">the First Amendment won’t allow it</a>. In most cases, the government cannot prohibit you, media outlets or politicians from telling lies. </p>
<p>So the challenge is to reestablish a way to evaluate the reliability of information upon which we must depend for finding facts and ascertaining truth. Because if that can’t be done, the nation’s ability to elect its leaders and govern itself in an orderly and principled way will be lost. </p>
<p>The Constitution is fragile. It works because we the people will it to work, and that will is being tested, perhaps as never before. The judiciary passed its latest test. The American people will be tested again in the years to come – and the future of the democracy hangs in the balance.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/152060/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Charles Gardner Geyh 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>President Trump’s populist control of his party didn’t extend to control in courtrooms where he challenged election results. That’s where the rules of politics met the rules of law, and politics lost.Charles Gardner Geyh, John F. Kimberling Professor of Law, Maurer School of Law, Indiana UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1358092020-04-13T19:57:52Z2020-04-13T19:57:52ZGaming fosters social connection at a time of physical distance<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/325984/original/file-20200407-36391-1vq6esv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=4%2C4%2C2983%2C1993&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://unsplash.com/photos/qOG2wULJ9V0">Priyam Raj/Unsplash</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>As COVID-19 spreads around the globe, many of us feel we have no voice, no ability to affect change. There is nothing we can really do other than try to “<a href="https://theconversation.com/how-to-flatten-the-curve-of-coronavirus-a-mathematician-explains-133514">flatten the curve</a>”. </p>
<p>Recent news coverage has <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com.au/who-video-games-coronavirus-pandemic-mental-health-disorder-2020-4?r=US&IR=T">noted World Health Organisation support of gaming</a> as a way to escape from the daily reality of exponential curves and tragic news stories. This narrative reflects rapid change in how gaming is perceived.</p>
<p>It wasn’t long ago video games were still being <a href="https://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/talkingtech/2019/08/05/do-violent-video-games-really-drive-people-commit-mass-shootings/1924128001/">blamed for school shootings and real-world violence</a> without evidence. “Game addiction” was touted as a <a href="https://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/talkingtech/2019/08/05/do-violent-video-games-really-drive-people-commit-mass-shootings/1924128001/">new classification by the WHO</a> despite the assurances of <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6035022/">researchers and medical practitioners</a>. Indeed, games have long been blamed for society’s <a href="https://theconversation.com/games-blamed-for-moral-decline-and-addiction-throughout-history-123900">moral decline</a>.</p>
<p>Now suddenly, video games have become a darling of shelter-in-place and stay-at-home orders. They are a form of <a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-03-27/coronavirus-social-distancing-friends-online-animal-crossing/12080982">social engagement</a> that allow humans to safely follow our instincts to gather together in a time of anxiety. They allow us moments of escape and a sense of agency when we feel we have none.</p>
<h2>Gamers as loners</h2>
<p>The historical narrative around gamers describes them as anti-social, in service to the myth of the lone teenage boy playing in a basement, perched on pizza boxes in the dark, dimly outlined by the glow of the screen. </p>
<p>This stereotype was never true. Games have always been social, from the <a href="https://www.oldest.org/entertainment/board-games/">first multiplayer board game</a> in ancient Egypt to the <a href="https://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/3900/the_history_of_pong_avoid_missing_.php?print=1">installation of Pong!</a> in a bar in Sunnyvale, California, to the <a href="https://timeline.com/golden-age-video-arcades-940a177ccb30">arcades</a> and neighbourhood gatherings of the 1980s.</p>
<p>During COVID-19, people aren’t playing alone – they are using games to come together. Many are sharing their <a href="https://animal-crossing.com/">Animal Crossing</a> connect codes to <a href="https://www.inverse.com/gaming/animal-crossing-new-horizons-multiplayer-coop-party-play-airport">unlock multiplayer modes</a>, and gathering in massive multiplayer games on <a href="https://www.playstation.com/en-au/explore/playstation-network/your-psn/">PlayStation Network</a> (which had <a href="https://www.playstation.com/en-us/corporate/press-releases/2020/playstation-network-monthly-active-users-reaches-103-million/">over 100 million monthly users</a> before coronavirus hit) or <a href="https://www.xbox.com/en-AU/live">XBOX Live</a>. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/325980/original/file-20200407-18916-y6jkbf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/325980/original/file-20200407-18916-y6jkbf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/325980/original/file-20200407-18916-y6jkbf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/325980/original/file-20200407-18916-y6jkbf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/325980/original/file-20200407-18916-y6jkbf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/325980/original/file-20200407-18916-y6jkbf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/325980/original/file-20200407-18916-y6jkbf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/325980/original/file-20200407-18916-y6jkbf.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">Players can share codes to meet up on online islands and play Animal Crossing.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://images.unsplash.com/photo-1585857188908-5b6de3179683?ixlib=rb-1.2.1&auto=format&fit=crop&w=1350&q=80">Sara Kurfeß/Unsplash</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The free game <a href="https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/p/call-of-duty-warzone/9mwwnmh6z0jh?activetab=pivot:overviewtab">Call of Duty: Warzone One</a> <a href="https://ew.com/gaming/coronavirus-videogames-industry-impact/">has spiked</a> in terms of online multiplayer activity, drawing more than 15 million players online within days of its release. </p>
<p>The videogame industry is <a href="https://cowen.bluematrix.com/sellside/EmailDocViewer?encrypt=511852dd-fc31-49b8-8870-277abe4f1526&mime=pdf&co=Cowen&id=georg.szalai@thr.com&source=mail">expected to fare better</a> than other business sectors affected by coronavirus. </p>
<p>Players are finding not just an escape from the news of the pandemic or the same four walls of their home, but also social interaction, human contact, value in knowing there are others out there. It’s the reason the industry is rallying around <a href="https://venturebeat.com/2020/04/05/40-more-game-companies-join-whos-playaparttogether-coronavirus-awareness-campaign/">#PlayApartTogether</a>, a promotion organised by gaming companies on behalf of the WHO that has gained more than 4.7 billion consumer media impressions (or times online content is consumed) worldwide. </p>
<p>Similarly, opinion pieces are now challenging our prior notions around <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/06/opinion/screen-time-kids-covid.html">screen time</a> limits for children in isolation and the virtues of <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/17/technology/coronavirus-how-to-live-online.html">living online</a>.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1245018638773637123"}"></div></p>
<h2>We can be heroes</h2>
<p>As an academic and a researcher, I’m tracking stories of how these lockdowns are giving us a chance to bond with family members. I’ve seen a friend connecting in new ways with his 11-year old son, because they are both at home and playing Minecraft. </p>
<p>Several colleagues are pursuing active research into how games are helping people cope in this time of stress and panic, how they are sharing information, and how their interaction with games is a tool for social survival. </p>
<p>The use of Twitch, Amazon’s live streaming service for gamers, is <a href="https://www.theverge.com/2020/3/18/21185114/twitch-youtube-livestreaming-streamelements-coronavirus-quarantine-viewership-numbers">up 10% globally and as high as 66% in hard hit areas such as Italy</a>. The platform is also seeing users expand into non-game activities such as cooking classes, yoga or <a href="https://www.kotaku.com.au/2020/03/professor-calls-students-idea-to-teach-class-on-twitch-terrible-does-it-anyway/">university lectures</a>. </p>
<p>Games also give us a form of agency that is somewhat different than other media. They provide us a sense of control, the ability to be a hero or save the world. They give us the ability to explore, to compete, to solve. They can engage us in epic quests, allow us to solve mystery, conquer aliens, and more. </p>
<p>Australian charity <a href="https://checkpointorg.com/checkpoint-playaparttogether-challenge/">CheckPoint</a>, which provides mental health resources for gamers and the gaming community, is gathering stories of online connections during social isolation. They suggest gamers create an “interactive story” on their social media timeline, reach out to gamers they’ve lost touch with or try boardgames via an online <a href="https://www.tabletopsimulator.com/">tabletop simulator</a>. </p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1246109148749668355"}"></div></p>
<p>Although no one is suggesting games can give us real-life pandemic solutions, they can <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/25/opinion/pandemic-game-covid.html">simulate a pandemic and help us explore response strategies that rely on cooperation</a>. We can temporarily inhabit an alternate universe where we <a href="https://www.sciencealert.com/plague-inc-develops-a-game-version-in-which-you-save-the-world-from-a-virus-pandemic">save the world from outbreak scenarios</a>. They remind us we have agency and effect, that we can continue to strategise until we come up with winning solutions, and that there are often numerous ways to win.</p>
<p>Longer term, games can help more young people engage in science, technology, arts or maths <a href="https://www.neafoundation.org/ideas-voices/ionfuture/">careers</a> or <a href="https://www.nsta.org/publications/news/story.aspx?id=57938">studies</a>, and even <a href="https://books.google.co.nz/books?id=XX5xDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA137&lpg=PA137&dq=gapp+lab+utah&source=bl&ots=uhaPdGgGyL&sig=ACfU3U1ZgadGd2MqtZlx9uWOPMqGh_NDIQ&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjinvmd7bvoAhVFU30KHZR_D-0Q6AEwCXoECAoQAQ#v=onepage&q=GApp%20lab&f=false">engage both patients and doctors in research on health and well-being</a> in new ways. All these outcomes seem critical to our long term future in ways they didn’t just a few short weeks ago.</p>
<p>COVID-19 may be the turning point when the world realises playing video games is potentially a form of empowerment that brings people together to solve real world problems. It may be a critical moment where we reflect on the importance and power of play.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/135809/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Andrew Phelps receives funding from the Tertiary Education Commission of New Zealand in support of his efforts to explore applied immersive gaming and its use in applications ranging from health, education, simulation, and entrepreneurship. He has also received funding in the past from other relevant agencies and organizations both in New Zealand and the United States in support of his academic research. </span></em></p>No longer seen as gaming loners sitting in basements on stacked up pizza boxes, video game players are finding meaningful social connections despite physical isolation.Andrew M. Phelps, Professor, University of CanterburyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/738262017-03-07T11:07:56Z2017-03-07T11:07:56ZHow the US military is using ‘violent, chaotic, beautiful’ video games to train soldiers<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/158809/original/image-20170228-29933-1wd8txf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">'Counter-Strike' has sold over 25 million units, making it one of the most popular first-person shooters of all time.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://c1.staticflickr.com/5/4044/4177962038_fe0dcb9174_b.jpg">Miyaoka Hitchcock/flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/">CC BY-NC</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Violent video games have become embedded within American culture over the past several decades and <a href="http://nyupress.org/books/9781479805228/">especially since 9/11</a>. First-person shooters, in particular, <a href="http://fortune.com/2017/01/31/electronic-arts-sales-rise/">have become increasingly popular</a>. </p>
<p>These games – in which players are positioned behind a gun – have turned <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4229070/">a generation of kids into digital warriors</a> who fight terrorists and battle alien invaders. Many play first-person shooters for pure, innocent enjoyment. Some like achieving objectives and being a part of a team. And, for others, it simply feels good to eliminate an enemy – especially someone who’s trying to harm them.</p>
<p>For the U.S. military, the rise of first-person shooters <a href="https://www.hachettebookgroup.biz/titles/corey-mead/war-play/9780544031562/">has been a welcome development</a>. In recent years, the military has encouraged many of its soldiers to partake in the thrill of violent video games <a href="https://undertheradar.military.com/2016/05/6-military-video-games-used-to-train-troops-on-the-battlefield/">as a way to continue combat training</a>, even when not on active duty. (In fact, using games to teach military tactics has been a longstanding practice in the U.S. military: Before video games, troops <a href="http://www.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/a550307.pdf">were encouraged to play military-themed board games</a>.) </p>
<p>The games allow soldiers to take their combat roles home with them and blur their on-duty responsibilities with their off-duty, noncombat routines and lives. </p>
<p>But what effect have these video games had on U.S. soldiers? How accurately do they depict military life? And do they actually help recruit, train and retain troops?</p>
<h2>From battle screen to battlefield</h2>
<p>As part of a study, we interviewed 15 current and former members of the U.S. military who were between 24 and 35 years old to understand the role violent first-person shooter games played in their recruitment and training. </p>
<p>The majority of interviewees told us it was important to stay in the mindset of a soldier even when not on duty. To them, first-person shooters were the perfect vehicle for doing this. </p>
<p>Game preferences varied among the soldiers we interviewed, but popular titles included <a href="http://guides.gamepressure.com/ghostreconadvancedwarfighter2/">“Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter 2”</a> and <a href="http://www.arma2.com/">“ARMA 2</a>,” which a current member of the Army said was “one of the most hardcore assault experiences in gaming.”</p>
<p>Meanwhile, an Iraq War veteran described “<a href="https://www.callofduty.com/blackops2">Call of Duty: Black Ops 2</a>” and “<a href="https://www.callofduty.com/modern-warfare-remastered">Call of Duty: Modern Warfare</a>” as “the ultimate first-person shooter experiences ever” and “intensive and highly realistic approaches to tactical combat. The choice of attacking with stealth or unleashing an all-out frontal assault full of mayhem is yours. It’s violent, it’s chaotic, it’s beautiful.” </p>
<p>In this, the Iraq War veteran seems to say that video games can reflect real-life combat situations, <a href="https://resources.sei.cmu.edu/asset_files/Presentation/2015_017_001_442344.pdf">an attitude that others share</a>.</p>
<h2>Altered realities</h2>
<p>But it’s tough to make the case that games <a href="https://net.educause.edu/ir/library/pdf/ffpiu018.pdf">accurately simulate</a> what a soldier’s life is really like. First, military tours of duty are not solely made up of hard-charging, chaotic battles, like those in first-person shooters. The majority of soldiers won’t participate in any full-frontal combat operations. </p>
<p>Second – and, most importantly – in the digital world there are no legal and ethical considerations. When things go wrong, when innocent people are killed, there are no ramifications. If anything, the games warp these real-world consequences in the minds of players; in 2012, psychologists Brock Bastian, Jolanda Jetten and Helena R.M. Radke were able to use brain scans <a href="https://www2.psy.uq.edu.au/%7Euqbbast1/Bastian%20et%20al%20JESP%20in%20press.pdf">to show</a> that playing violent video games had the potential to desensitize players to real-life violence and the suffering of others.</p>
<p>In a 2010 article for the Brookings Institution, political scientist Peter Singer <a href="https://www.brookings.edu/articles/meet-the-sims-and-shoot-them/">quoted</a> a Special Forces soldier who was involved in the production of “America’s Army 360,” a video game developed to recruit and train enlistees.<br>
“You lose an avatar; just reboot the game,” the soldier said. “In real life, you lose your guy; you’ve lost your guy. And then you’ve got to bury him, and then you’ve got to call his wife.”</p>
<p>Indeed, journalist Evan Wright wrote in his book “<a href="https://books.google.com/books/about/Generation_Kill.html?id=Phvvf-niiWUC">Generation Kill</a>” that solders were on “intimate terms with the culture of video games, reality TV shows and internet porn.” </p>
<p>Real-life combat, however, was something entirely different.</p>
<p>“What I saw was a lot of them discovered levels of innocence that they probably didn’t think they had,” Wright wrote. “When they actually shot people, especially innocent people, and were confronted with this, I saw guys break down. The violence in games hadn’t prepared them for this.” </p>
<p>Thus video games might suck soldiers in – offering a tantalizing taste of the glory and excitement of battle. But they do little to prepare them for the types of threats that actually exist on the battlefield. </p>
<p>“When I really think of the government seeing that as training, I laugh,” one of our interviewees told us. “But I also feel a bit uneasy.”</p>
<h2>Militarizing legions of gamers</h2>
<p>Regardless of their effectiveness as training tools, violent video games can certainly act as a valuable tool for connecting the military with potential recruits. In addition to influencing the decisions of gamers to pursue military service, they can also be used to promote the geopolitical goals of the military.</p>
<p>Journalist <a href="http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2013/10/playing-war-how-the-military-uses-video-games/280486/">Hamza Shaban</a>, in a 2013 article for The Atlantic, described just how deep the Army’s relationship had become with the commercial gaming industry, creating what he dubbed a “military-entertainment complex.” According to Shaban, the games that emerged from this relationship – an exciting, simplified, easy-to-play version of warfare – encouraged gamers to consider a career in the military. </p>
<p>Meanwhile, games such as “<a href="https://www.alelo.com/case-study/tactical-iraqi-language-culture-training-system/">Tactical Iraqi</a>” and “<a href="http://store.steampowered.com/app/9460/">Frontlines: Fuel of War</a>” teach players and potential recruits about the discourse of modern-day warfare. Missions include battling Islamic militants, winning over potentially hostile populations and establishing pro-Western, pro-democratic societies. They engage with the <a href="https://www.crcpress.com/Insurgency-and-Counterinsurgency-in-Modern-War/Romaniuk-Webb/p/book/9781482247657">fundamentals of insurgency and counterinsurgency</a>, present the dangers of improvised explosive devices and highlight the military usefulness of weaponized drones.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/155617/original/image-20170206-23486-ioyv6g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/155617/original/image-20170206-23486-ioyv6g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/155617/original/image-20170206-23486-ioyv6g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/155617/original/image-20170206-23486-ioyv6g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/155617/original/image-20170206-23486-ioyv6g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=533&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/155617/original/image-20170206-23486-ioyv6g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=533&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/155617/original/image-20170206-23486-ioyv6g.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=533&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">First-person shooter games can recruit civilians.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">RebeccaPollard/Flickr</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>However, to some of the soldiers and ex-soldiers we spoke to, the value of playing first-person shooters amounted to little more than propaganda.</p>
<p>“The idea of us training using these games is a bit of a [disaster],” one said. “What the U.S. seeks to achieve through the use of these games is not entirely within their control. It might be a cheap way of getting us involved … but it’s hardly ‘training.’” </p>
<p>Another called first-person shooters “more like brainwashing than anything.” </p>
<p>“But you have to be pretty stupid to buy into all this,” he added.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/73826/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Two researchers interviewed military members and vets to see what role first-person shooters played in their lives – before, during and after their enlistments.Scott N Romaniuk, Postdoctoral Fellow, University of TrentoTobias Burgers, Doctoral Candidate, Freie Universität BerlinLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/629892016-08-01T09:03:37Z2016-08-01T09:03:37ZFive ways to reboot your brain this summer<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/132233/original/image-20160727-21591-1qka6ul.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://www.shutterstock.com/cat.mhtml?searchterm=video%20game&prev_sort_method=relevance2&prev_sort_method=undiscovered&thumb_size=mosaic&inline=134414039&keyword_search=1&safesearch=1&sort_method=popular&page=1">Minerva Studio/Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>During the summer school holidays, the social rhythm of life can become as crazed as a <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WT5uAIPFft8">Keith Moon drum solo</a>. So it’s important to remember to switch off from time to time. Indeed, this is much more important to us than we may think, and science has some surprising things to say about which activities are best to help us recharge in the often limited time we have available.</p>
<p>Here’s my rating of a number of popular restorative activities.</p>
<h2>Video gaming</h2>
<p>Just because we like something, doesn’t necessarily mean it’s good for us. While playing video games is tremendous fun and can enhance <a href="http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0042698911002872">certain neurological processes</a>, it can also <a href="http://www.nature.com/nrn/journal/v12/n12/full/nrn3135.html">drain them</a>. Our capacity to focus on a given task is what psychologists call <a href="http://link.springer.com/referenceworkentry/10.1007%2F978-0-387-79948-3_1290">“directed attention”</a>. </p>
<p>Directed attention, or concentration, is a little bit like a muscle. Through constant use, it gets tired and must be rested to be restored. Over time, as directed attention depletes, your ability to think, make good decisions and calculate, will also decline until you can restore some of your energy. If you’re already mentally tired, playing a few hours of a hyper-stimulating shoot-‘em-up will suck up your mental energy like milkshake up a straw, leaving your brain as mushy as the ice-cream they whizzed to make it.</p>
<p>** Video-gaming – great fun, but 2/10 for mental restoration.
** </p>
<h2>Reading & TV</h2>
<p>I’ve just <a href="https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/1108162/footnotes/">published a book about this stuff</a>, so you might expect me to sell the idea of reading as restorative. But, just like watching TV, the attention required to read 200 pages of War and Peace is heightened by the extra mental work, not only of following the plot and remembering your Bolkonskys from your Rostovs, but also of weeding out all of the distractions that compete for your attention as you turn the pages: screaming children, traffic noise, tweets, humming radiators, squawking seagulls. All take mental work to ignore. Eventually, this leads to <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Directed_attention_fatigue">directed attention fatigue</a> – that feeling you have when you’ve watched ten straight hours of Breaking Bad, and you just … can’t … take … any more.</p>
<p>** Reading & TV – informative, educational, pleasurable, but only 4/10 if you want to be mentally restored.
**</p>
<h2>Competitive sports</h2>
<p>A wide variety of sports are effective at restoring us mentally. Psychologists have begun to theorise about why sports such as tennis are so good at relieving symptoms of stress. The human brain’s resources are competitive. If you’re at home, stressed and worried, the fact that you are doing nothing means that those stress signals pumping out of your limbic system (the brain’s emotional core) are given free reign over access to your mental resources. </p>
<p>So anything like tennis, that requires you to focus, concentrate and synchronise your body’s movement across all four dimensions will – among other things – drain energy from the limbic system because it is required in, say, the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Primary_motor_cortex">primary motor cortex</a>. Feelings of stress and anxiety will struggle to compete for resources in the brain, and as such will diminish. The work will still require your mental focus, but your brain will be flooded with so many great neurotransmitters, you probably won’t notice.</p>
<p>** Tennis, football etc. Restorative function 6/10 – but who cares, you’ll feel great, anyway.
**</p>
<h2>Walking</h2>
<p>In recent years, the field of environmental psychology has blazed a trail in our understanding of what <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-being-in-nature-makes-us-appreciate-our-bodies-and-reject-unrealistic-beauty-standards-63145">exposure to green spaces can give us</a>. There have been hundreds of trials over the years that demonstrate everything from the effectiveness of having <a href="http://willsull.net/resources/270-Readings/ChangChen2005.pdf">indoor plants in your workplace</a>, to how access to green spaces can <a href="http://www.outdoorfoundation.org/pdf/EnvironmentAndCrime.pdf">lower crime rates</a>, as well as the extraordinary discovery that <a href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21431424">walking in a forest can lower your blood pressure</a>. </p>
<p>A famous trial in 2008, actually tested the speed and depth of restoration among <a href="http://pss.sagepub.com/content/19/12/1207">walkers in urban and rural areas</a>. The result comes as little surprise: the subjects who had access to green environments were more mentally restored and were able to tackle more complex cognitive tasks. The effect was so potent that even when the trial subjects only looked at pictures of natural environments, the results were the same.</p>
<p>** Walking in a green space, allowing your mind to wander, restores directed attention quickly and effectively. 8/10.
**</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/132237/original/image-20160727-21558-1s8nhab.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/132237/original/image-20160727-21558-1s8nhab.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/132237/original/image-20160727-21558-1s8nhab.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/132237/original/image-20160727-21558-1s8nhab.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/132237/original/image-20160727-21558-1s8nhab.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/132237/original/image-20160727-21558-1s8nhab.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/132237/original/image-20160727-21558-1s8nhab.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">The king of exercise.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.shutterstock.com/cat.mhtml?people_number=&commercial_ok=&search_cat=&searchterm=jogging&people_ethnicity=&anyorall=all&searchtermx=&color=&media_type=images&photographer_name=&search_source=search_form&use_local_boost=1&language=en&lang=en&version=llv1&ref_site=photo&autocomplete_id=&orient=&people_gender=&show_color_wheel=1&people_age=&safesearch=1&prev_sort_method=relevance2&sort_method=popular&page=5&inline=359568020">lzf/Shutterstock</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Running</h2>
<p>Bruce Lee called running <a href="http://www.workoutlikebrucelee.com/bruce-lee-fitness/">“the king of exercise”</a>. He was not wrong. Runners can get all the “green space” benefits of walking, coupled with the neurological benefits of competitive sports. But the benefits continue: running is included among the kinds of exercise that actually <a href="https://theconversation.com/running-makes-you-smarter-heres-how-61454">make you smarter</a>. Runners’ highs are, unsurprisingly given their name, most potent for runners (as opposed to cyclists, say). </p>
<p>Finally, endurance running is believed to effect a process in the brain called <a href="http://bscw.rediris.es/pub/bscw.cgi/d4434612/Dietrich-Functional_neuroanatomy_altered_states_consciousness.pdf">“transient hypofrontality”</a> whereby portions of the prefrontal cortex basically deactivate, meaning brain function slows down. As a result, one’s sense of time, self and consciousness all melt away as other neural circuits fire up. This extreme flow state is the kind of mental reboot that cannot be bought anywhere at any price.</p>
<p>** Learn to run, for about an hour in a green space, and you’ll achieve 10/10 for restoration, stress relief, improved intelligence and zen-like levels of calm. You might even enjoy it as much as slaying some baddies in Call of Duty.
**</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/62989/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Vybarr Cregan-Reid receives funding from Arts Council England. </span></em></p>Five popular activities rated for their restorative power.Vybarr Cregan-Reid, Reader in Environmental Humanities and Author of 'Footnotes: How running makes us human', University of KentLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/356422015-01-07T06:15:34Z2015-01-07T06:15:34ZWhat Call of Duty can tell us about US foreign policy<p>The latest instalment of wildly popular videogame Call of Duty, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sFu5qXMuaJU">Advanced Warfare</a>, shows the narratives of today’s games can reveal the motives behind real-world politics. </p>
<p>Over the past decade, fictional videogame adversaries have expanded to regularly include those of Middle Eastern, Chinese or even North Korean origin, reflecting the changing times. However there is another internal element within the US state – a military-industrial complex – that is little studied. Its key role in shaping foreign policy is made explicit through the narratives of military games. </p>
<h2>Spaces for thinking differently</h2>
<p>There is a growing desire to understand the so-called “<a href="http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/American_exceptionalism">exceptionalism</a>” of US foreign policy that has become more apparent following the September 11 terrorist attacks in 2001. This is the idea that the US is so uniquely vulnerable and threatened that its responses should not be constrained by the international laws that govern other states. Why does the US react in this way – and is it justified in doing so? </p>
<p>Videogames offer a lens through which to examine US attitudes and to understand contemporary US foreign policy. Military games tend to depict the US as threatened, for example the narrative of <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CQZEjVYYUMY">Homefront</a> is of the US having been invaded by North Korea, whose troops carry out atrocities against civilians. In the [Call of Duty: Modern Warfare series](http://callofduty.wikia.com/wiki/Modern_Warfare_(series), the US is threatened by nuclear weapons and subjected to full-scale invasion. In these examples, that sense of US vulnerability is realised: the feared invasions and attacks occur and the enemy forces are beyond reason and cannot be negotiated with. </p>
<p>Games with this line of narrative affirm the stance that the US should not be bound by the rules that constrain others. In these aspects, the military video games precisely underscore the sentiments behind an exceptionalist US foreign policy.</p>
<h2>The subversive military</h2>
<p>Yet military games also depict ambiguities in the role of US military power that play into another trope. In his farewell address to the nation in 1961, then US president Dwight D Eisenhower warned the US public of the dangers of what he termed the “<a href="http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/eisenhower-warns-of-military-industrial-complex">military-industrial complex</a>”. Sociologist C Wright Mills had earlier conceived of a “<a href="https://www.csub.edu/%7Eakebede/SOC502Mills2.pdf">power elite</a>” in which American power was concentrated within political, military and industrial institutions, capable of turning the US into a “permanent war economy” such that “virtually all political and economic actions are now judged in terms of military definitions of reality”.</p>
<p>A military-industrial complex is a prominent theme in many videogames, films and television programmes – for example the <a href="http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Film/TheBourneSeries">Bourne</a> series of films (and books), the film <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AoNT6u3mQew">Enemy of the State</a>, and television series <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0285331/">24</a>. It is presented as an insidious power within American politics, an alliance between political and military elites that echoes Mills’s concerns. </p>
<h2>Enemies within</h2>
<p>Perhaps the clearest example of this narrative within games is <a href="http://uk.ign.com/games/tom-clancys-splinter-cell-conviction/xbox-360-902601">Splinter Cell: Conviction</a>. With a similar conspiracy-laden story to the Bourne films, the game places you in the role of ex-Special Forces operative Sam Fisher, tempted out of retirement by his former handler with the promise of information about why and how Fisher’s daughter was killed. It is revealed that his daughter is in fact not dead but held captive by members of a secret US government counter-terrorist unit, Third Echelon, as leverage to control Fisher. The plot also includes a private military contractor (“Black Arrow”) which colludes with Third Echelon to overthrow the liberal president Patricia Caldwell (America’s first female president) and her desires to downscale the US military.</p>
<p>The game <a href="http://callofduty.wikia.com/wiki/Call_of_Duty:_Modern_Warfare_2">Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2</a> spins a narrative that involves a conspiracy of convenience between a hawkish US military general and a Russian ultra-nationalist with similar motivations to enhance his country’s military credibility, who conspire to have Russia invade the US. Both are seen as out-of-date products of the Cold War, whose overwhelming desire to maintain their nations’ military capabilities lead to all out global war.</p>
<p>The latest Call of Duty game, Advanced Warfare, places the player in the role of a former US Marine working for a private security corporation, Atlas, fighting the KVA terrorist network. Set in the near future of 2054-60, initially the game conforms to a typical post-9/11 narrative arc: fighting terrorists in Nigeria, the US and Greece. As the game unfolds, however, it becomes clear that the terrorists and Atlas are collaborating. Atlas is protecting the considerable political and economic gains it has made through largely replacing the US armed forces and profits from the insecurity that the terrorists cause. It is up to the player/character, Jack Mitchell, to reveal the conspiracy.</p>
<h2>Saying the un-sayable</h2>
<p>There is a common but paradoxical trend among military games – that they are frequently criticised for celebrating war, their narratives in fact provide a means to critically reflect on the nature of war in the 21st century. Here the portrayal of the integral role played by the military-industrial complex in demands for a US exceptionalist foreign policy provides a quite different explanation to official justifications for going to war.</p>
<p>We must re-examine the foundational myths that US exceptionalism is the product of American ideology – bound up in notions of “beacon of democracy”, “God’s country” or a nation with a “unique destiny”. If instead it is the product of a military-industrial complex that serves to justify war under the cloak of exceptionalism, then this raises very serious implications not only for the academic scholarship – or lack thereof – in this area, but also for the veracity of justifications offered to the public.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/35642/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 latest instalment of wildly popular videogame Call of Duty, Advanced Warfare, shows the narratives of today’s games can reveal the motives behind real-world politics. Over the past decade, fictional…Nick Robinson, Associate Professor in Politics, University of LeedsLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/272952014-05-29T05:21:24Z2014-05-29T05:21:24ZDon’t blame Call of Duty for teenage suicide<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/49675/original/rnbr894f-1401291242.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">There is no evidence that Call of Duty causes suicide.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/campuspartymexico/4883943564/sizes/l">campuspartymexico</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>A British coroner has sparked anxiety among parents by linking Call of Duty, one of the most popular video games in the world, to teenage suicide.</p>
<p>John Pollard says Call of Duty has “<a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2640431/Coroner-probes-Call-Duty-video-game-four-teenagers-regularly-played-went-kill-themselves.html">figured in recent activity before death</a>” in three or four of his inquests and that parents should not let their children play the 18-rated game.</p>
<p>Teenage suicide is a tragedy for any family and those affected will naturally want reasons why their loved ones have taken their own lives. There are hundreds of scientific studies on suicide and many risk factors have been identified, including psychological, environmental and genetic or biological factors. Conditions such as mental illness and substance abuse can also heighten the risk. </p>
<p>There have been very few studies examining the relationship between suicide and videogame playing and those that have don’t necessarily implicate the games as triggers.</p>
<p>A <a href="http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1943-278X.2011.00030.x/abstract?deniedAccessCustomisedMessage=&userIsAuthenticated=false">2011 US study</a> of 30,000 teenagers reported that those who spent more than five or more hours a day playing video games were slightly more likely to have thought about suicide. A similar finding was also reported in a <a href="http://online.liebertpub.com/doi/abs/10.1089/cyber.2009.0227">large national German</a> study of more than 15,000 teenagers in 2010.</p>
<p>But these studies highlight a correlation – not causation. No study published on this matter has demonstrated causality. They have only been able to show, at best, that there may be an associative link among those that play excessively every day.</p>
<p>One of the major problems with research in this area is that studies typically fail to take into account all the other types of suicide and violence that people are exposed to on a day-to-day basis. That includes suicide and violence on the news, in films and television and the suicide and violence people witness in their own lives and local community. </p>
<p>What’s more, academic journals tend to only publish studies that show statistically significant findings. That means they are more likely to publish a study that suggests a link between playing video games and subsequent suicide or aggression rather than those that do not.</p>
<p>While there’s a growing body of research (particularly in the US) claiming a link between violent video games and behaviour, most of it doesn’t follow players over long periods of time.</p>
<p>Much of the research has also been experimental and carried out in non-ecologically valid settings, such as in the laboratory. In fact, all of the measures used to assess “aggression” are proxy measures that are not related to actual violent actions because it is unethical to try and induce actual anti-social and violent acts within a research experiment. </p>
<p>As a result, I don’t think any scientific research shows a proven link between videogame playing and subsequent suicidal or violent behaviour (and certainly none showing the link between gaming and suicide).</p>
<p>The press is currently referring to four teenage suicides in particular in the wake of Pollard’s comments. All four teens are alleged to have played Call of Duty but there is nothing in the reports suggesting causation. </p>
<p>However, if the papers are to be believed, all four teenagers were excessive game players. My own <a href="http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/ben/cpsr/2012/00000008/00000004/art00012">research</a> has shown that excessive (and particularly addicted) videogame players often play excessively as a way of escaping other negative aspects of their lives. If excessive gaming is symptomatic of other underlying emotional, family or social problems, I wouldn’t be surprised to find increased levels of suicide among this group because they are already experiencing negative problems to begin with. </p>
<p>The teenagers may have had an inherent trait towards playing violent videogames that meant they sought out games such as Call of Duty. Videogames may have had an influence in informing how they might have done something or given them ideas but they are highly unlikely to be the root cause of suicide. If I played Call of Duty all day, every day, I really don’t think it would heighten the risk of me becoming suicidal. </p>
<p>I must have watched and read about thousands of suicidal events (both fictional and real) and I have played violent videogames – but it hasn’t changed my behaviour in any way (at least I don’t think it has). Saying that, I’m a father to three screenagers and I don’t let them play violent videogames. Just because I don’t personally think the evidence shows there’s a link, that doesn’t mean there isn’t any effect. It’s that science has failed to demonstrate a conclusive cause.</p>
<p>This is not about putting the blame on the game. At best, playing videogames like Call of Duty might be a minor contributory factor to suicide. But it shouldn’t be a scapegoat.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/27295/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>A British coroner has sparked anxiety among parents by linking Call of Duty, one of the most popular video games in the world, to teenage suicide. John Pollard says Call of Duty has “figured in recent…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/189762013-10-14T05:34:31Z2013-10-14T05:34:31ZRealistic war games have collateral damage of their own<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/32903/original/njzyf78c-1381502011.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Where are all the Parisians? Call of Duty avoids hurting people by simply pretending they don't exist.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Call of Duty</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The Red Cross has <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-24318061">called</a> for makers of videogames to more actively embed and interrogate the laws of war by, for example, punishing players for killing civilians or using torture to gain information. However, attempts to explore war in a more sophisticated way in video games are often greeted with criticism from the media. It seems like the industry just can’t win.</p>
<p>Understanding that calling for simplistic solutions such as confronting players who fail to play by the real life rules of war with a “game over” screen is not likely to hold much sway, the Red Cross has suggested that games should be designed which open up spaces for reflection on the realities of warfare and the ethical minefield which is the contemporary battlefield.</p>
<p>The charity is in part right. Military videogames do tend to avoid the portrayal of civilians and avoid any sense that war yields civilian “collateral damage”.
In real life, news brings war into the living room through civilian deaths. But games try to avoid controversy by making sure civilians are simply absent from their battlefields. In the recent Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3, the player is fighting on the streets of Paris with tanks, heavy weaponry and inevitably causes widespread destruction of buildings. Yet there are no civilians in this fictional Paris and no apparent collateral damage.</p>
<p>Even more problematic is the role of interrogation and torture in videogames. Torture is integral to both the story and gameplay in big titles such as Call of Duty: Black Ops and Splinter Cell Conviction. Only by breaking the rules of real warfare can the player gather mission critical information which unlocks the narrative. The games are set up so that mission critical information is yielded quickly and reliably - the message of the game is clear, namely that interrogation and torture are effective and justified for the greater good.</p>
<p>In this case, a constructive approach to the Red Cross’s complaint might be to develop a game in which torture either yields inaccurate information or no information at all, or if it took a significant time to yield information from a victim. This is how gameplay mechanics can open up spaces for reflection.</p>
<h2>It’s in the game</h2>
<p>However, it is important to emphasise that the Red Cross critique misses the rich tapestry that is contemporary gaming. At one level, there are already a number of games by politically motivated activists that do offer spaces for social critique and reflection on the nature of contemporary war. Perhaps most successful of these is <a href="http://www.newsgaming.com/games/index12.htm">September 12</a>, in which the player can undertake remote strikes on an unnamed middle eastern village. However, these invariably result in the death of civilians, resulting in the mourning of friends and family who then morph into terrorists. The message of this game is even more clear than that of Call of Duty - the war on terror cannot be won by military action which will only escalate the violence.</p>
<p>The highly successful Metal Gear Solid franchise also contains a narrative that is strongly critical of contemporary war. Players who kill their opponents are punished with almost certain death. The game is in fact much easier if the player avoids shooting and operates with stealth. Thus Metal Gear Solid and its (albeit limited) ilk suggest that imaginative design can open up very different ways of playing and experiencing war.</p>
<h2>Who can’t handle the truth?</h2>
<p>So games that force us to think about war do exist but that doesn’t necessarily mean we are ready to play them. Historically, when games try to engage with the issues raised by the Red Cross, the political and social reaction has been vociferously critical. An infamous example is Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2’s airport massacre sequence. Here the player is a counter-terrorism operative working under cover in a terrorist cell. It was rightly <a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/8342589.stm">criticised</a> because regardless of whether you choose to shoot civilians in the airport or not the consequences are the same - the player is killed by terrorists.</p>
<p>The game would have been more interesting if you could have turned your gun on the terrorists with consequences for the story. It could have explored more complex issues such as how far the player would go to prevent greater catastrophe. Yet given the media furore, the lesson is that it is perhaps easier to remove civilians altogether.</p>
<p>In another controversy, the proposed game <a href="http://www.g4tv.com/thefeed/blog/post/694612/soldiers-respond-to-six-days-in-fallujah-controversy/">Six Days in Fallujah</a> set out to explore ethical questions around one of the bloodiest battles of the Iraq war. The game was almost immediately embroiled in a political maelstrom and Konami, its proposed publisher, ultimately withdrew, suggesting that games were not yet ready to handle such controversy</p>
<p>So while the Red Cross is right to raise concerns with videogames, there are some clear indications that the industry is already taking steps to reflect on these issues. For their attempts to work, we need to be socially and politically ready to accept the consequences. Can we trust the player with their finger on the virtual trigger? Perhaps more importantly, can we trust the media and social commentators to desist from sensationalist reporting about games which allow for the possibility of civilian massacres? The nature of the earlier reporting on Six Days in Fallujah suggests that the players and industry may be rather more ready to meet the Red Cross’s call than the media.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/18976/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 Red Cross has called for makers of videogames to more actively embed and interrogate the laws of war by, for example, punishing players for killing civilians or using torture to gain information. However…Nick Robinson, Associate Professor in Politics, University of LeedsLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/152322013-06-21T05:33:38Z2013-06-21T05:33:38ZGamers want epic tales, not just violent short-cuts<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/25935/original/gsfznx34-1371724253.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C1920%2C891&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A grand narrative is more important than bloodlust</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">jit</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Battlefield 3, a video game developed by Electronic Arts (EA), has caused a <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-21274482">stir</a>. The debate of violence in computer games has become not just a regulatory issue but a political one too. Perhaps understanding why developers create such games might help deal with this debate better.</p>
<p>Joe Nandhakumar and I have been speaking to game developers in London and Dundee, a hub for games development, about why and how they create violent games. Our detailed results will be published later this year. The hope in conducting this study was that we could find a way of building games that meets gamers’ need for action and excitement without the need for violence.</p>
<p>The answer to <em>why</em> game developers make such games is simple - violence sells and violent games make more money. To understand the answer <em>how</em> they make them, it is important to understand game design. The main aim of game design is to create an engaging experience for the player. Some essential elements of that experience are mechanics (rules of play), aesthetics, technology (interaction, control system) and story. The aesthetics and interaction systems of today are such that games are made to be cinematically impressive and immersive.</p>
<p>Based on those factors, it is not difficult to see why violent games sell. To make the game more immersive and more impressive, it becomes acceptable to make violence stronger and more essential to its existence.</p>
<p>We found that the story element of game design played a key role in the design of a violent game. The mechanics, aesthetics and technology elements were spin-offs from the story. What was particularly characteristic of the stories the game designers drew upon was that they constituted epic accounts of war stories that were potent, gripping and compelling. They served as prime generators of design ideas. </p>
<p>In one example we looked at was Age of Empires III, which is based on the Siege of Malta that occurred in 1565 when the Ottoman Empire invaded the island of Malta. This epic event served as a meaning structure or interpretive scheme that contributed to the designers’ legitimation of the game project. The historical accounts of the Siege of Malta were taken as self-justifying – no reflection or probing of the event was needed. They became a potent context that shaped the violent content. By establishing a “cast iron” context or back-story to the violence, this interaction between the context and content generated an air of irrefutable acceptability among the designers.</p>
<p>This insight challenges the research into the effects of violent games, which tends to claim that it is the level of graphical realism in computer games that is so harmful and addictive to children. Actually, it could be the epic accounts or stories that are presented in the material that are the most captivating and compelling element. If that is indeed the case, then the success of the Call of Duty series, which is primarily based on World War II, is hardly surprising. </p>
<p>The gaming industry continues to grow and become an increasingly significant part of the creative industry sector and our everyday culture. We need to be more active and thoughtful then in finding a balance between sales and our values around what constitutes acceptable forms of entertainment.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/15232/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Patrick Stacey 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>Battlefield 3, a video game developed by Electronic Arts (EA), has caused a stir. The debate of violence in computer games has become not just a regulatory issue but a political one too. Perhaps understanding…Patrick Stacey, Lecturer, Assistant professor in computer game development and information systems. Co-director of Highwire CDT, Lancaster UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/108812012-11-20T19:42:12Z2012-11-20T19:42:12ZCall of Duty: Black Ops II – why the series hits the target every time<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/17835/original/zqp47g6p-1353387042.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Black Ops II was one of the most-anticipated games of 2012, and it's had the sales figures to match.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Activision</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Last week, the first-person military shooter game <a href="http://www.callofduty.com/blackops2">Call of Duty: Black Ops II</a> hit the shelves. The release marks the fourth year in a row that a game in the Call of Duty series has had the <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/11/16/activision-callofduty-idINDEE8AF0AU20121116?irpc=932">“biggest entertainment launch of the year”</a>, grossing <a href="http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/envelope/cotown/la-et-ct-new-call-of-duty-grosses-500-million-on-first-day-20121116,0,1876675.story">more than US$500 million</a> in its first 24 hours on sale.</p>
<p>Its predecessor, <a href="http://www.callofduty.com/mw3">Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3</a>, grossed <a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2073201/Modern-Warfare-3-hits-1-billion-16-days--beating-Avatars-record-day.html">US$1 billion worldwide within 16 days</a>, beating James Cameron’s <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avatar_%282009_film%29">Avatar</a>, the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_highest-grossing_films">highest grossing film of all time</a>, by a day. Black Ops II is poised to potentially break that record again.</p>
<p>For many who aren’t familiar with these games, though, their popularity can seem somewhat alarming. Are they simply a disturbingly popular product of the <a href="http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/military-entertainment_complex">military-entertainment complex</a>, or is there more to their popularity?</p>
<p>Although it was always a popular series, Call of Duty didn’t rocket into ubiquity until November 2007, when <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Call_of_Duty_4:_Modern_Warfare">Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare</a> was released.</p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare helped make the Call of Duty series one of the biggest in gaming history.</span></figcaption>
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<p>Modern Warfare was the videogame equivalent of the <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0325980/">first Pirates of the Caribbean film</a>, or the early Harry Potter books – a game that did extremely well critically, that caught on with consumers in a big way, and that ultimately assured the success of future instalments in the franchise.</p>
<p>There have been five Call of Duty games on consoles and PC since Modern Warfare, all of them smash-hits.</p>
<p>The game launched at a time when the term <a href="http://kotaku.com/5954303/congratulations-ea-you-just-released-your-10th--military-shooter-in-5-years">“military shooter”</a> normally meant a game which was set during World War II – a setting that gamers had long since <a href="http://www.bit-tech.net/blog/gaming/2009/09/21/i-m-so-sick-of-world-war-ii/">grown tired of</a>.</p>
<p>The solo campaign in Modern Warfare saw the player switching between six different playable characters, but focusing primarily on Seargent John “Soap” MacTavish, a new member of the British Special Air Service.</p>
<p>The game was set in the “near future” of 2011, following a fictionialised conflict that <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Call_of_Duty_4:_Modern_Warfare#Plot">echoed real-world events</a> in numerous ways.</p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">Call of Duty: Modern Warfare’s plot was hailed as a critical success.</span></figcaption>
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<p>But while the solo campaign was <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20071107003804/http://www.gamepro.com/microsoft/xbox360/games/reviews/145468.shtml">lauded as excellent</a>, Call of Duty’s popularity has never been tied to its qualities as a single-player game. In fact, some 30% of people who played Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare on Xbox 360 while connected to the internet <a href="http://kotaku.com/5125969/some-call-of-duty-4-stats-to-boggle-the-mind">never even completed the first mission</a> in the solo campaign.</p>
<p>In 2007, online multiplayer gaming was still a novel concept for many. Although the Xbox and Playstation 2 consoles had both allowed online play, the next generation of consoles (including the Xbox 360 and the Playstation 3) had launched with a much greater focus on online multiplayer, and ultimately provided much better experiences for consumers who were now far more likely to have broadband internet connections.</p>
<p>Modern Warfare was launched just when many console owners were ready to be wowed by online gaming.</p>
<p>To explain the appeal of Call of Duty’s incredibly popular multiplayer to an audience that has never played it is a difficult task. Indeed, to non-gamers, the idea that a game can achieve such popularity by making the act of killing friends and strangers extremely fun may seem somewhat vulgar.</p>
<p>But Call of Duty has always had two major things going for it: the snappy responsiveness at the heart of its ultimately rather simple combat, and a fun reward structure.</p>
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<p>Many of the game’s detractors – and there really are a <a href="http://kotaku.com/5858720/a-dozen-reasons-to-hate-call-of-duty-games">great many of them</a> – have written Call of Duty off for its lack of complication, its singular focus on sprinting around maps, hurling grenades and gunning people down without needing to be strategic.</p>
<p>This is a rather reductive way of looking at what the games achieve, but it’s accurate … to a point. The simplicity of the systems that govern Call of Duty’s action means it’s easy for a player to jump in and start enjoying the game immediately.</p>
<p>The system for connecting to an online game couldn’t be easier, and allowing players to pick and choose their own weapons and “perks” (which make your character better at certain tasks such as reloading, sprinting, or surviving being shot) can make for a highly personalised experience.</p>
<p>It’s an incredibly responsive game – tapping the left trigger on the controller zooms your gun into iron sights, while at the same time subtly shifting it immediately towards your nearest opponent. This makes the combat, on a moment-by-moment basis, incredibly satisfying … when you’re playing well.</p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">Weapon proficiencies are one of the reward systems that allow players to customise their gaming experience.</span></figcaption>
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<p>The reward structure, which has been copied repeatedly by most online shooters that have followed, is a genius idea.</p>
<p>Using a gun in any of the online modes unlocks, essentially, better versions of that gun – your first ten kills with a weapon may net you a new scope for it, or you may “level up” after a game and unlock a new “perk”.</p>
<p>You’re constantly being given things while you play Call of Duty, and each new good action you perform – whether it’s a kill, completing an objective, or assisting someone else – awards you with experience points.</p>
<p>It’s the same model that many of the most popular mobile games operate on. Angry Birds, for instance, works because it constantly rewards you with new levels.</p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">Call of Duty’s popularity is due partially to the responsiveness of its rather simple combat system.</span></figcaption>
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<p>Since Modern Warfare, publisher Activision has made a concerted effort to make sure gamers have the option of upgrading to a new Call of Duty every single year, a model that has always worked well for sports franchises such as EA Sports’ FIFA (soccer), Madden (NFL) and PGA Tour (golf) games.</p>
<p>By splitting the efforts between multiple studios – games produced on odd years are headed up by <a href="http://www.infinityward.com/">Infinity Ward</a>, while games on an even year, including Black Ops II, are developed primarily by <a href="http://www.treyarch.com/">Treyarch</a> – Activision has been able to maintain a strict annual release schedule.</p>
<p>As of right now, Activision has ten developers dedicated to Call of Duty, whether leading their own games, assisting with others, or developing downloadable content maps that are sold after release.</p>
<p>It would be fair to suggest this development model has turned many off the games – which some argue have <a href="http://www.slashgear.com/sales-mean-nothing-call-of-duty-has-gone-stale-17257477/">failed to evolve</a> – but it’s a strategy that keeps working. </p>
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<p>The popularity of Call of Duty, then, comes down to a combination of smart design, a somewhat cynical (but incredibly effective) publishing cycle, good grace, and the fact Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare appeared at just the right time to capitalise on the new online multiplayer market.</p>
<p>The success of that game has allowed for a huge marketing budget – one that allows for advertisements filled with celebrities (see video above), <a href="http://www.polygon.com/forums/call-of-duty-black-ops-2/2012/11/13/3639874/on-the-call-of-duty-black-ops-2-review-event">lavish review events at Californian resorts</a>, numerous <a href="http://www.promodigious.com/2012/04/29/futuristic-weapons-leak-for-next-call-of-duty-game/">marketing stunts</a> and utter saturation of the Call of Duty brand.</p>
<p>Whether or not this strategy will last indefinitely is questionable – oversaturation eventually <a href="http://www.g4tv.com/thefeed/blog/post/711783/guitar-hero-franchise-just-on-hiatus-according-to-activision/">forced Activision’s Guitar Hero brand into hiatus</a> – but the sales figures for Black Ops II suggest Call of Duty is likely to remain the most popular and powerful franchise in videogames <a href="http://www.vg247.com/2012/11/19/sledgehammer-hiring-for-ps3-xbox-360-call-of-duty-title/">for a while yet</a>.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/10881/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>James O'Connor 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>Last week, the first-person military shooter game Call of Duty: Black Ops II hit the shelves. The release marks the fourth year in a row that a game in the Call of Duty series has had the “biggest entertainment…James O'Connor, PhD Candidate, Videogame studies, Flinders UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.