Oliver, M. B. & Bartsch, A. (invited for publication). Appreciation of Entertainment: Importance of Virtue and Wisdom. International Journal of Arts and Technology.

Tamborini, R., Bowman, N. D., Eden, A., & Grizzard, M. (in press). Defining Media Enjoyment as the Satisfaction of Intrinsic Needs. Journal of Communication.

I haven’t yet read about hedonic vs. eudianomic pleasure, but I’ll look into this. Is this stuff from Homo Ludens (sitting on my shelf but yet to be read…), or is there someone else I should be reading?

Are you familiar with the distinction between hedonic pleasure qua enjoyment, and eudianomic pleasure via appreciation? It might be the case that some gamers ‘enjoy’ conquering challenges, but others ‘appreciate’ the deeper meaning of a game’s story.

Some newer media theory has gone in this direction…

I really appreciate your thoughts on this, and I’ll have to delve into them a bit more. BUT one thing – one feeling – that I cannot shake is the assumption that the narrative has any meaning whatsoever for the gamer.

This might sound a bit drastic, but consider the thought that video games might be thought to have more in common with a game of chess than a television show (the former involving a bounded set of rules and a clear goal, the latter involving narrative construction to create meaning in the audience). I’ve often wondered how much audiences actually care about the narrative of a game (and, consequenty, thier actions in a game environment) when they are playing. Might it be the case that simply we are interested in “doing x to defeat y”?

Perhaps this is less relevant in newer games as opposed to older games, but I often think of the 90s, when games were driven simply by graphics and gameplay – many older games still have no idea what the narrative behind Contra or Super Mario Bros. was, yet these games are fondly regarded as some of the best in the history of the medium.

Moreover, I even wonder the importance of newer games – and yes, even in RPGs. If one of the primary motivations for gameplay is/are challenge & competition, then what room is there for narrative considerations?

A thought excercise, maybe…I don’t think that I’d ever argue for the non-existence of narrative in games. But at the same time, there are scores of games with no narrative that are quite commercially successful, yet some games with great narratives that rate terribly.

OR, perhaps we need to reconsider our definition of narrative? It is also the case in video games that the user has an active hand in narrative construction…

* Only minor dishonesty required.

My roommate’s boy has an article coming out in this book – as the only other video game scholar I know, I was curious if it was something you were aware of…

http://www.amazon.com/Halos-Avatars-Playing-Video-Games/dp/0664232779

-C

Along similar lines to your example, I’ve been enjoying playing Borderlands in snippets here and there, but I suspect that as soon as I’ve fully leveled a character or two, I’ll call it quits unless I have a ton of friends still playing regularly. There may be a bazillion guns, but “rewards” in and of themselves only go so far to engage me.

The examples of games you’ve provided are interesting, where I think Bioshock is the most successful and nuanced example of incorporating a player into the game’s story. Personally I hold out for games that incorporate the narrative within the gameplay dynamics not only from the start, but, honestly, also as a marketing strategy aimed to lure players into a choose your own adventure, like Heavy Rain. Though these attract my attention more now, I’ve been a MMO-fan and supporter for years. I suppose I miss the investment in community-building by developers nowadays.