CHAPTER ESSENTIALS

• In the 1880s, the seeds of the modern entertainment industry were planted via coin-operated contraptions. First appearing in train depots, hotel lobbies, bars, and restaurants, these leisure machines would find a permanent home in the penny arcade (p. 330).

• The most prominent of the mechanical machines, pinball, gained mainstream acceptance and popularity after World War II with the addition of the flipper bumper, an innovation that transformed it into a challenging game of skill, touch, and timing (pp. 330–331).

• cathode ray tube (CRT) screens provided the images for analog television as well as the displays for early computers, on which the earliest video games appeared. Computer science students developed these games as novelties in the 1950s and 1960s, but because computers were massive mainframes at the time, distributing the games was difficult (p. 331).

• Magnavox released Odyssey, the first home gaming system, in 1972. That same year, computer engineer Nolan Bushnell formed a video game development company called Atari. Atari’s first creation was Pong, a simple two-dimensional tennis-style game with two vertical paddles bouncing a white dot back and forth. Pong quickly became the first big arcade video game. In 1975, Atari began successfully marketing a home version of Pong through an exclusive deal with Sears, thus establishing the home video game market (pp. 331–332).

• By the late 1970s and early 1980s, games like Asteroids, Pac-Man, and Donkey Kong filled arcades and bars, competing with traditional pinball machines. After Pac-Man, the avatar became the most popular figure of player control in a video game. Though the console and the computer have superseded arcade gaming, the industry still attracts fun-seekers to chains, malls, and casinos (p. 334).

• Through decades of ups and downs in the digital gaming industry, three major console makers emerged: Nintendo, Sony, and Microsoft. Nintendo’s Wii is now the best selling of the three major console systems (pp. 334–335).

• With multiple players joining in digital gaming through the Internet, gaming has become a contemporary social medium. The social dimension of gaming is especially apparent in online fantasy sports and massively multiplayer online role-playing games (MMORPGs). In fantasy sports leagues, real-life friends, virtual acquaintances, or a mix of both draft teams and use actual sports results to determine team standings. World of Warcraft, the most popular MMORPG, counts more than eleven million players around the globe (pp. 337–339).

• Many players get to know one another without ever meeting in person. Most online games facilitate player interaction by enabling two types of groups: PUGs (short for “Pick-Up Groups”) and guilds or clans (pp. 344–345).

• Sites that cater to communities of play fit into three categories. Some collect and share user-generated collective intelligence on gameplay. Others are independent and operate as community organizers for gamers. Still others are maintained by the industry and are primarily devoted to distributing promotional material provided by hardware manufacturers and game publishers (pp. 345–346).

• As gaming technology continues to develop, future experiences will likely be more immersive, portable, and inclusive. Games are still largely considered entertainment, but they are also being used in workforce training, in military recruiting, for social causes, in classrooms, and as part of multimedia journalism (pp. 346–347).

• In a 2011 study of third through eighth graders in Singapore, one in ten were considered pathological gamers, which is in line with statistics from other countries. These findings are not entirely surprising, given that many digital games are addictive by design. Just as habit formation is a primary goal of virtually every commercial form of digital media, cultivating obsessive play is the aim of most game designs (pp. 347–348).

• There are three main pay models for the video game industry: the boxed game/retail model (relying on brick-and-mortar stores and online retailers), the subscription model (gamers pay a monthly fee for downloaded games and access to games played online), and the free-to-play model (offering free casual games on mobile devices but charging for extras) (pp. 349–351).

• Development, licensing, and marketing constitute the major expenditures in game publishing. The largest part of the development budget (the money spent designing, coding, scoring, and testing a game) goes to paying talent, digital artists, and game testers (p. 351).

• Independent gamemakers deal with two types of licensing. First, they must pay royalties to console manufacturers (Nintendo, Sony, or Microsoft) for the right to distribute a game that uses the manufacturers’ systems. They also pay licenses for intellectual properties—stories, characters, personalities, and music used in their games (p. 354).

• The marketing costs of launching a digital game often equal or exceed the development costs. The successful launch of a game involves online promotions, banner ads, magazine print ads, in-store displays, and the most expensive of all: television advertising (p. 354).

• In 1993, Senator Joe Lieberman conducted a hearing that proposed federal regulation of the gaming industry. In response to this threat, the industry founded the Entertainment Software Rating Board (ESRB) to institute a labeling system designed to inform parents of sexual and violent content that might not be suitable for younger players (pp. 354–355).

• Though most retail outlets voluntarily chose to observe the ESRB guidelines, the ratings did not have force of law until 2005, when California tried to make renting or selling an M-rated game to a minor an offense enforced by fines. The law was immediately challenged by the industry and struck down by a lower court as unconstitutional. California petitioned the Supreme Court to hear the case. In a landmark decision handed down in 2011, the Supreme Court granted digital games First Amendment freedom of speech protections (pp. 355–356).

• As more critics and gaming journalists spoke about the need for improvement in the portrayal of women and minorities in games and gaming culture, a building backlash came to a head, beginning in 2014 under the name #GamerGate (pp. 342–343, 356–357).

1. Question 10.1

   Why were the first video games developed at major research universities?

2. Question 10.2

   Why is bit rate useful for charting the evolution of gaming consoles?

3. Question 10.3

   How does online fantasy football differ from the classic video game?

4. Question 10.4

   What is an example of a Web site that addresses gamers as citizens of a virtual community?

5. Question 10.5

   On what grounds did the Supreme Court grant video games First Amendment protection?

• DESCRIBE the treatment of female figures on the covers of the top ten best-selling video game titles at your local gaming store.

• ANALYZE the information by looking for patterns: Do the game covers represent an invitation or a warning to potential female gamers? Which consoles seem more female friendly? Female neutral? Female hostile?

• INTERPRET these patterns’ meaning. What do these images say about gamers’ values and attitudes?

• EVALUATE your findings. Consider how problems with the treatment of women on game covers might be addressed. Who is to blame for troubling depictions of women?

• ENGAGE with the media playground. Participate in blogs and forums on gender relations in the gaming community. Share what you discovered in your study of gaming covers.