[Via Lars Konzack]

As a counterpoint to lists warning against Top 1o Most Evil Games, many feel called to make a canon of the very finest specimens ever.
Here's Kjetil Sandvik's recent attempt:

• Spacewar (first real computer game)
• Pong (first commercial game)
• Colossal Cave Adventure (first text adventure)
• Asteroids (first commercial and succesful vectorbased game)
• MUD1 (First multi-user dungeon/dimension)
• Mario Bros (first character-based platform game)
• Madden NFL (first good licensed sport game)
• Pole Position (first good driving game)
• Pac Man (the ultimate arcade game)
• The Ultima-series (long, commercial and artistic succesful RPG-series)
• Microsoft Flight Simulator (first, pure and best simulator)
• Civilization (Ground-breaking God perspective/building game, marvelous gameplay)
• Tetris (A class of its own)
• Myst (first visually narrative CD-ROM)
• Doom (historically epoch-making technology/content)
• Tekken (most succesful martial arts games)
• Final Fantasy-series (Ground-braking adventure/RPG)
• The Sims (Again a class of its own)
• Grand Theft Auto (first and biggest in 3D freedom-of-movement, ironically, theme-based, show-off sound track)

posted by Jonas Heide Smith  # 29.11.04 0 comments  

David Thomas of Buzzcut comments on the recent debate sparked by the list of 10 Worst Violent Video Games published by the Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility.

He is not exactly impressed:

The net effect is to mask real efforts to improve the videogame rating and retail system, and to push to the side a fair dialog about the social impacts of games. The word I’m looking for, the context again, is propaganda. The ICCR has stooped to punditry to press their point of view. And as a result, the good in their mission is tainted with the stink of polemic politics.

posted by Jonas Heide Smith  # 29.11.04 0 comments  

[DANISH] - Here's yours truly speaking briefly about the study of multiplayer games on DR's P1 Morgen (fast-forward to around 17:10). All in honour of Other Players.
The interview was cut a little short, so the public was cheated of some planned thoughtful-yet-humorous responses such as my (probably eagerly anticipated) Tolstoy-Chess analogy.

posted by Jonas Heide Smith  # 25.11.04 0 comments  

At Edge Daniel C. Dennett describes his Law of Needy Readers:

On any important topic, we tend to have a dim idea of what we hope to be true, and when an author writes the words we want to read, we tend to fall for it, no matter how shoddy the arguments. Needy readers have an asymptote at illiteracy; if a text doesn't say the one thing they need to read, it might as well be in a foreign language. To be open-minded, you have to recognize, and counteract, your own doxastic hungers.

In other words, he agrees with Forster.
Interestingly, I really liked Dennett's book.

posted by Jonas Heide Smith  # 22.11.04 0 comments  

For the Danish speakers: The Spilforskning.dk network is having an open conference next Wednesday entitled 'Computerspillets Verden'.
I'll be speaking under the heading "Games and violence - what was the question again?".


posted by Jonas Heide Smith  # 18.11.04 0 comments  

As my illustruous office-mate has suggested spammer abuse of open comment systems on blogs represents a Tragedy of the Comments. Now, there's a paper wanting to be written...

[But of course somebody already did]

posted by Jonas Heide Smith  # 18.11.04 0 comments  

Quite a bit of confusion stems, I'm beginning to think, from the fact that when debating games it is easy to be unclear about one's level of analysis. Three levels tend to be intermingled:

A) The Core Game
This is the more or less hypothetical ideal game defined by what Salen & Zimmerman call the operational rules. This is the level on which chess, Pong, Gun-Fight etc. are zero-sum games.

B) The Game System
This is the game in its broadest sense including the game's matching system, the particularities of its communication features (if any), whether it is generally played against physically distant opponents etc.

C) The Concrete Game
This is any concrete instance of the game played by actual players who may have all sorts of utility functions. No matter what type of conflict is specified by the core game, players of a concrete game may feel that they "win" or "lose" by entirely different standards.

There is no magic circle, only different levels of analysis. But my point is that one must specify one's perspective. Claiming, for instance, that playing zero-sum games is bound to make players unable to cooperate (a hypothesis often aired) entails a disregard - or failure to acknowledge - of the fact that actually playing the game may be anything but a zero-sum experience.

posted by Jonas Heide Smith  # 15.11.04 0 comments  

DIGRA abstract deadline is approaching. Keyboard a-blazing and coffee a-steaming. Vancouver looks charming.

posted by Jonas Heide Smith  # 15.11.04 0 comments  

Today, photographer Michael Forsmark allegedly videotaped one of the Danish princes (the younger one) driving recklessly (and way too fast) with his two sons in the car. Forsmark reported this incident to the police who have been quick to comment that even if the accusations are true the prince may rest assured that he cannot be prosecuted since the constitution exempts him.
Let's look closer... the Danish constitution of 1953 says

Par. 3:
Legislative authority shall be vested in the King and the Folketing conjointly. Executive authority shall be vested in the King. Judicial authority shall be vested in the courts of justice.

Par. 13:
The King shall not be answerable for his actions; his person shall be sacrosanct...

I suppose it is this latter clause which, by the semi-magic of Danish constitutional law is supposed to exempt the prince in question from legal responsibility.

Considering the relationship between royalty and ordinary citizens in a game perspective we can probably agree that game balance is skewed which basically translates into a lack of equity. Citizens are equal in the eyes of the law, err... except for a special group of citizens. Wonderful. In a medieval sort of way.

(Story in Politiken)

Update: The photographer is now being accused of actually provoking the prince (if indeed it was the prince) into speeding. Historian Steffen Heiberg is quoted as warning that a public trial would be nothing less than a scandal. Oh, a scandal! Well, in that case all charges should be dropped immediately.

Update: The photographer, it seems, was once accused of sawing off the head of The Little Mermaid. Baroque.

posted by Jonas Heide Smith  # 14.11.04 0 comments  

Okay, here's a little thought. Computer games differ from casually played analogue games in the sense that in the former case the computer processes the game rules while in the latter the processing is performed by human brains and negotiated through language etc. (as I believe Jesper has said somewhere).
This means that when you play a computer games online, say Age of Kings, no matter how you choose to perceive the game (as visual art, as Western mental imperialism etc.) you are still going to lose (or win) in a very concrete sense. In the eyes of the player community, and in the eyes of the game server, you've lost or won regardless of the way you perceive the game activity.

The interesting difference here is between players themselves processing the rules and some external system processing the rules (whether a CPU, a team of referees or whatever).
But, some esteemed colleagues object, by drawing this line you ("me" that is) are proposing that computer games are pristine, stable systems while in fact players take great effort to disrupt and "break" the game. I disagree with this objection. First of all, the vast majority of Age of Kings players conform completely to the rules of the game (and even the spirit of the game).
Those who try to break the game are statistical anomalies (and whether we care primarily about anomalies or majorities is a question of taste and disciplinary background).
But even for those players who really do subvert (if you will) the game the rigid nature of computer game rules is still interesting to keep in mind. I find it quite probable that this rigidness inspires deviance. This deviance may be motivated by A) a general dislike of rigid orders and/or B) a feeling that if some autocratic sovereign wants complete un-democratic control of the gamespace then surely anything not directly disallowed by the game code is allowed (or morally defensible). In the latter case the very rigidness of the computer game rules may go a long way towards undermining sportsmanship as opposed to the analogue (non-tournament) game situation where players cannot help but be aware that they are deeply responsible for upholding the game.
Computer game rules disenfranchise the player.

posted by Jonas Heide Smith  # 9.11.04 0 comments  

No wonder the construction of the new home for the Danish Broadcasting Association (ITU's neighbour) is dangerously over budget.
That's what happens when you forget to move the crane before you build...


posted by Jonas Heide Smith  # 6.11.04 0 comments  

The University of Copenhagen is hosting the next down-to-Earth but often pleasant public game seminar in our twice-a-year series. Program below:

To Kill or not to Kill – and other presentations on computer games research

Friday November 12, 2004
MODINET’s Conference Room 5.2.29a (old KUA)

PROGRAMME:
09.15-09.25: Welcome
09.25-10.05: Gitte Stald Perspectives on Fascination of Death and Violence in Games
10.05-10.45: Kjetil Sandvik Game Characters with Scruples?
10.45-11.00: Coffee
11.00-11.40: Susana Tosca To Kill or not to Kill: the Butterfly Effect in Blade Runner
11.40-12.20: Troels Degn-Johansson On Death and Destruction in Strategy Games
12.20-13.15: Lunch
13.15-13.55: Jesper Juul What the Game Means: About Grand Theft Auto 3
13.55-14.10: coffee
14.10-14.50: Charlie Breindahl Racing Games
14.50-15.30: Jonas Heide Smith Games, Peacocks, and the Theory of Conflict

posted by Jonas Heide Smith  # 4.11.04 0 comments  

Yep, GTA San Andreas is out and pushing aging consoles to the limit. As so often before my experience with single-player progression games is limited to brief experimentation but I did manage to drive a bicycle in front of a speeding train and drive recklessly to the inspiring, lofty tones of Rage Against the Machine. I am in no position to comment, but this muscle and fat thing... why?

Update: Check out the more thoughtful thoughts of one Mr. Silencio, AKA the Dr-to-be M. Sicart (or is that "Scart"?).


posted by Jonas Heide Smith  # 4.11.04 1 comments  

"The only books that influence us are those for which we are ready, and which have gone a little farther down our particular path than we have yet got ourselves."

—E. M. Forster
posted by Jonas Heide Smith  # 2.11.04 0 comments  

The State of Play II conference already have a stream archive of all presentations. Smooth.

posted by Jonas Heide Smith  # 2.11.04 0 comments  

I stumbled into Guild Wars the other night enjoying the thrill of almost meeting Ren and actually (re)slaying some undead aided by Mirjam's black magic.
And to think that I finally found a lighthouse. For some time that has been my personal quest whenever I enter a virtual world - to search for lighthouses. Hey, it gives you something to do.

posted by Jonas Heide Smith  # 1.11.04 0 comments