Читать книгу Control The Controller - Ciaran O'Connor - Страница 6
ОглавлениеIntroduction
It is likely that some degree of desperation has led you to read this book. You may have found yourself and others driven to distraction by someone else’s unstoppable commitment to their gaming device. Perhaps you yourself feel enslaved to digital gaming and are looking for some guidance out of an increasingly pixelated life. It is my hope and aim that your experience at the other side of this book is one of greater knowledge and confidence in overcoming either addicted or problematic video gaming.
For the loved ones and parents of addicted gamers, I would view this book as a window into the mind of the gamer: one through which you can begin to repair the broken connections within your household. For those of you who recognise that you play games to the detriment of your lives, I would see this book as a companion as you uncover and attend to the thoughts and desires buried beneath the gaming; this is an approach that aims to preserve and value your hobby, whilst preventing it from swallowing your world.
The threat that video gaming poses to our society has more to do with how frequently it occurs than how damaging it can be. With over 30 million people in the U.K. playing video games (Internet Advertising Bureau 2011) and, at a conservative estimate, 3 percent of those people playing to addictive levels (C. Ferguson 2011), the problem is considerably widespread. These somewhat restrained numbers would mean that around a million people in the U.K. alone are potentially playing in an unhealthy way.
The social problems associated with gaming have all come about in roughly the last 30 years and are evolving fast. While much of our healthcare system is beginning to come to terms with the prevalence of video game addiction, the gaming industry itself is morphing rapidly, offering new ways for people to become hooked. If you think that all addicted gamers are teenaged boys, then your perception is perhaps already dated.
To be addicted to gaming is to feel as if any time spent not gaming is somehow redundant. Conversely, all time spent gaming is either wildly exciting or, far more frequently, strangely empty. Life outside of playing recedes into being a background frustration – an obstacle to gaming – having to stop and eat is irritating, getting time off sick is a windfall and having your partner insist that you spend time with them does little other than irritate or enrage you.
The most painful casualties are nearly always the gamer’s immediate, personal relationships. Those who know and love someone who has become addicted will experience an alienation from the gamer; as the devices begin to dominate, the relationship becomes increasingly estranged. Usually someone in the household will try to intervene, attempting to control or limit the gaming. Parents and partners who have done so are often shocked, sometimes even frightened, by the explosive and even violent responses they are suddenly faced with; simply pulling the plug on a games console might send the gamer into an unrecognisable rage. As someone sinks deeper into gaming addiction they drift further and further from those that love them. As one addict described:
“Gaming became more important than my business succeeding. Gaming became more important than my children’s welfare. I had somehow got to the point of not wanting anything out of life other than to play that game. That’s the problem with being addicted to gaming... it becomes the most dominating thing in our lives while everything else falls apart around us.”
During seminars I have run with gamers, the most powerful indicator of there being a problem is the frequency with which they argue with their loved ones about how much they game. If they are unfortunate, they will be left: spouses will file for divorce, children will become estranged and parents will settle for their child being hidden away in their room for years on end.
The good news is that gaming addiction does not, it would seem, last. The evidence for this is, as we will discuss later, thin on the ground, but importantly, there is nothing to tell us that video gaming addiction is a life sentence. However, the nature of gaming is such that it is inherently an experience without intimacy. As a result, the risk for addicted gamers is a great loss of their close relationships before they are able to recover. When the controller is finally brought under control, who will be left?
This text provides a way of understanding the concepts of video game addiction, one which is heavily informed by my work as a psychotherapist as well as my own experiences of playing and designing video games. As a result, I write from a pro-game perspective; I do not want to write off the hobby as being fundamentally negative, but rather want to cherish what it has to offer and allow that to be enjoyed in a healthy way. I avoid describing games as inherently negative or pointless as I believe that this position alienates gamers who need help, forcing them to choose between their health and their hobby. In nearly all cases a middle road of balanced, mindful play can be found.
The first chapter will provide a realistic view of how damaging video game addiction can be, considering the worst case scenarios as well as more common outcomes.
Chapter two will look at how to recognise video game addiction by describing the most frequent and identifiable symptoms.
Chapter three takes us through some of the suggested causes of the condition, briefly considering ideas such as addiction being a disease, the addictive personality and how games themselves might be responsible. This section concludes by looking at the environmental factors that can lead people to hide away in compulsive gaming.
Chapter four is a pragmatic guide for the reader to respond to and resolve video game addiction. This section, while aimed at all readers, contains three additional sections at the end that provide more targeted advice for those suffering from addiction themselves, those that know such a person and finally mental health professionals that are working with the condition.
Gaming and addiction are huge concepts, and ones that this book seeks to explore in some depth. At the same time, the goal is to make sure that the more practical information is made more immediate. Consequently there will be two types of call-out box that appear throughout the text. These are generally not central to the book, but may well be of interest and relevance to certain readers. The first type will be discussions – these will generally expose areas of thinking that are controversial or philosophical, providing a springboard for those readers who want to understand or question the issues on a higher or more abstract level. The second type will be definitions – these will be explanations of a term that might, for some readers, be unknown, conversely allowing readers who are unfamiliar with some of the ideas to establish a more practical understanding.
Throughout the book, I talk about the gamer as a nebulous, gender-neutral third-party. This generalised language feels like the clearest way to approach the issue – by addressing the part of the person that is, to varying degrees and shades, dedicating time to video games. Certainly not everything in this book will apply to any one gamer, and each and every gamer will buck the trends talked about here in some way.
My Background
My involvement with video game addiction is considerably varied. It includes working with addicts themselves, a background as a video game designer and, perhaps most importantly, being someone who grew up immersed in gaming.
As a psychotherapist, I have been in practice nearly 10 years at the time of writing this book. Part of the shifting landscape of my work is that, increasingly, clients’ lives are being experienced digitally, either through time spent on social media, browsing the internet, or playing video games. I offer a focus on this as part of my niche as a mental health practitioner. I offer support to clients who view much of their world, for better or worse, on a screen. Quite organically I have found many of these clients to be struggling with their gaming habits and, as a result, I formed a specific method for approaching and tackling this issue, much of which this book seeks to outline.
I will confess that I originally balked at the idea of writing this book. While I spend much of my life suited-up in the role of the ever-so-serious therapist, I also spend much of the rest of my life as a self-identified hardcore gamer – someone who worked for nearly four years as a games designer and who considers themselves to be extremely pro-gaming. A great deal of the time I was training as a psychotherapist, I was surrounded by people talking with bemusement and condescension about their clients’ gaming habits; the last thing I wanted to do was to add to what I saw as the already numerous voices eager to speak out against gaming.
A colleague, who works with many students that game to problematic levels, suggested I take on the issue. He argued that I would have a unique perspective. Although I disagreed, I did go out and begin to read the literature on the subject. What I quickly noticed was that much of what was out there was heavily set against video games. Frequently books will, both knowingly and inadvertently, treat games as the enemy. The result of this perspective being that you are either one of the people that is able to game without any problem, or someone who is addicted who should never go near a game again. This has the twofold effect of scaring off addicts for fear that they might lose their precious hobby, while offering no help for those who could, without being viewed as addicts, benefit from a more balanced and considered pattern of play.
This led me to the realisation that writing a book on gaming addiction was absolutely what I should do. I realised that I was in a strong position to comment: I could write a book about video game addiction that promoted gaming in a positive and affirmative light. I would present the first non-wrist-slapping guide to avoiding the pitfalls of harmful gaming.
Of the problematic and addicted gamers I have worked with, some of them have wanted the problem fixed, some of them have guarded their problem fiercely, and some did not see a problem. All of them have contributed to my understanding of the issue, as have other clients I have seen, many of whom have turned toward compulsion in order to manage the distress within their lives. The quotes from gamers I have used within this text have all derived from problematic and addicted gamers that I have either counselled or interviewed – each one adapted enough to preserve their anonymity. I am very grateful for everything they have given me in understanding the problem.
I see this book as being about helping people to get the most out of their hobby of video gaming, not the least. At the core of this book is a message that I would want gamers to hear: in overusing gaming, in making it stand in for what life lacks, you are doing gaming, yourself and those you love a disservice. Gaming is hugely enjoyable when it’s done with fun and abandon, but its soul is stolen away once it starts to be used to compensate for or distract from the world outside.
My Experiences as a Gamer
I have struggled to control how much I game through many periods of my life. Learning about how gaming addiction has affected others has often made me reflect on my own tussles. Over the years things have evened out for me, as they do for many problematic gamers. I would say that I now exist on a slow moving tide that moves between being highly engaged in games in a positive way, to relying on them to drown out other difficulties by playing unhealthily, before pulling back into a period of playing very little. Some time after completing these stages I will find a game I love, pick it up and soon be once again engaged. The process does not always move in strict order, and no longer do things reach a level that impacts on my functioning. I have become very conscious of the signs and know when to and how to exercise control.
I have been keen on gaming since I was a boy. I remember at 17 years old, shortly after having bought “Final Fantasy VII”, my mother asked me if I would be, ‘alright for a week on [my] own in the house’ while she went on holiday with her partner. I told her with considerable confidence that I would be.
I think at one point during that week I clocked 19 hours straight on my Playstation, minus a few frantic breaks when I was finally overwhelmed by the demands of my digestive tract. At the same time, when friends got in touch during that week, I would happily up and see them, with no negative feelings about leaving the game other than an excitement for when I returned. I look back on this as a period of happy and positive gaming.
This contrasts starkly with a period of ill health in my early twenties when I threw myself into playing another game in the same franchise – “Final Fantasy X-2” – to the extent that I started to lose confidence in most of my relationships. That was, on reflection, unhealthy and could have been handled differently; I don’t think I ever played for 19 hours, but the ease with which I was prepared to sideline the appeals of others was clearly wrong. For months my sole housemate would carry out her life behind me, barely noticed. Nobody should have to endure such brazen indifference within their own home.
The real difference between these two experiences was that the first was driven by a genuine love of the game I was playing, while the second was a sullen alternative to a situation that I didn’t want to face. Curiously and importantly, “Final Fantasy VII” was a wonderful game, one I remember fondly. “Final Fantasy X-2” was, in my opinion, a plodding rehash of things I’d seen before though it still provided a suitably numbing and lengthy series of goals that diverted my thoughts away from my life.
There is an important distinction here that is central to this book; one period of play was engaged and passionate, the other was escapist and deadening. When I have played games in an unhealthy way I have found that time spent not gaming has felt like wasted time. I became fixated on my in-game goals; everything else became a distraction. The more time I crammed in, the more I would obsess about making my life as efficient as possible in order to obtain the best results in the game.
These days I consider myself to be an exceptionally capable scheduler – well able to plan, account for time, finish on time and so on and so forth. Bizarrely, I would say that I learned most of this through over-gaming. Constantly, I would try to minimize all other activity in my life to create as much time as possible for gaming. I might have chores, homework and sometimes work with my father to be done, all of which I would rattle through at breakneck speed so that I could get back to my beloved ZX Spectrum, my Amiga 500, my Playstation (or Playstation 2) and more recently my Xbox 360. For those of you up to speed with gaming, you would be right to notice that I am behind the times. While being able to organise my time is clearly useful, the mindset that it sprang from was less than healthy; I needed to get my life out of my way so I could get back to gaming.
As an adult, I am aware that I still have the capacity to game problematically and I can see clearly how this hurts me. Now I know to break off a long stint of gaming some 20 minutes or so before I have to socialise or be with my family. If I don’t, then the irritation of having to leave whichever virtual world I’m in the process of saving will be vented onto those around me in caustic comments and acidic ripostes. I know to avoid gaming for more than a few hours in a day, even when on holiday and on top of my responsibilities. If I game longer than this, it becomes an empty, treadmill-like experience that will leave me in a foggy haze for the little of what remains of the day.
While I love gaming, I appreciate its potential to negatively impact my mood and make others around me feel unimportant. As a psychotherapist working with many people for whom gaming is a central part of their lives, I see this awareness and experience as an asset of mine. I know the struggle – to some small extent I’m still working through it.
The Appeal of Video Games
In order to be able to work with any addiction, it is important to find a way to empathise with the appeal of the behaviour. With gaming, this means understanding the fundamental appeal of games and discovering the particular nature of them that draws people to take part in the first place. Being both a gamer and someone that has created games for a living, this is a subject that has fascinated me for years and tells me a lot about what it is to be human.
The gaming industry has grown from nothing to a majority pastime in less than 50 years: a relative blink of an eye. There are many parents and mental health professionals that managed to get through an entire childhood without playing a single digital game. For such people, it is a huge but by no means impossible leap of empathy to understand how ‘young’ people today can commit whole days to running around virtual worlds or find themselves packing every spare minute with repeated check-ins on their non-existent kingdoms.
Even for those that are deeply immersed in the hobby, it might be hard to capture what draws people to dedicate such vast amounts of their precious time. What follows is an outline of the core appeals of gaming, as it is understood within the industry itself. The bedrock for this comes from the work of Richard Bartle (Bartle 2009), who developed the Bartle Test of Internet Gaming. While Bartle’s ideas are broadly considered dated within the world of game development, they nonetheless form the foundation of how the business has come to recognize what players look for in games:
Socializing: The internet has opened up endless possibilities for meeting up with others in order to play video games. This has proved to have colossal importance for gamers. Much of the reason for this comes from our basic desire to be with others. Games can enhance this by allowing players to assist, gift and form guilds with one another, making their friendships tangible and measurable. An example of a game which relies heavily on socializing would be “ Second Life”.
Creativity: In games you are given characters to develop, worlds to build and cities to decorate. As a result players are able to use games as a powerful medium for both self-expression and self-exploration. This offers the chance to simultaneously engage in ultimately frivolous acts of design and creation while also enabling the deeper processing of unconscious fears and struggles. An example of a game that heavily relies upon creativity would be “Minecraft”.
Accomplishment: Typically all progress made in games is clearly documented and reported though feedback. As a result, games offer a way for players to see ‘constant measurable growth’, allowing them to persistently explore the game with a concrete sense of improvement, something we might struggle to find in the outside world. As a result, the surmountable difficulty that games provide is an immense proportion of their appeal. An example of a game that heavily relies upon accomplishment would be “The Legend of Zelda”.
Competition: Video games offer us a pure and safe way through which to gain superiority over others. Games that pitch us head-to-head come with the inherent excitement and fear of proving ourselves relative to someone else. Once again, this aspect of games has been greatly enhanced through the connectivity of the internet, which enables worldwide competitions and leagues to be accessible from our bedrooms. An example of a game that relies heavily upon competition would be “Tekken”.
Immersion: Out of all of these aspects of gaming, this is the one that is perhaps the most unique to video gaming. The others could be attributed to many games that existed thousands of years before the first computer, but digital games allow us to become immersed to a powerful new level. Whole worlds and histories can be explored and interacted with. Players are able to exist through alter-egos in environments that look and sound increasingly real, and where the narratives are becoming ever more compelling. An example of a game that heavily relies upon immersion would be “The Elder Scrolls Online”.
While video gaming has brought together these appeals in new and concentrated forms, they are all sources of enjoyment that we can understand on a broad, historic and human level. Where a child might turn to “The Elder Scrolls” to become immersed today, they might have used a novel a century ago. Where an adult might prove themselves in a game of “Fifa”, they might have once opted for an actual game of football.
A difference between these more time-honoured pastimes and video gaming is that the latter frequently ends up being played addictively. Whether, for any given individual, this propensity to addiction might have expressed itself in the absence of games remains unknown; as a society we have seen the power of video games to become addictive and we are, as a whole, concerned.
Discussion: The Fear of the New
Much accessible literature on the subject of gaming addiction presents the picture of a digital plague that is sweeping through our younger generations via modems. In 2010 the BBC ran a “Panorama” episode on the subject, arguably presenting games as a genuine danger to our youth. This is, admittedly, far sexier and news-worthy than the reality whereby, out of those people that game regularly, at least 9 out of 10 of them will do so with no adverse effects (Gentile et al 2009). Furthermore, what studies have been carried out imply that gaming addiction will tend to naturally resolve itself (King 2013a) with no lasting effects.
In more recent years, both The Sun and The Daily Mail have carried out articles that have compared gaming addiction to alcohol and hard drugs (Pafitt 2014). The former headline, in 2014, stated, ‘Gaming as addictive as heroin’. Not only are the bold claims made very questionable, they also run the risk, in my opinion, of alienating addicted gamers from getting help. If we are to exaggerate the dangers of gaming, we will not be taken seriously by those suffering from gaming addiction.
Historically, society has had a tendency to exaggerate the dangers of new technologies. Socrates decried the invention of writing, declaring that it would ‘create forgetfulness in the learners’ souls’, and that people would ‘appear to be omniscient and will generally know nothing’ (Plato). Current fears about new technology are not limited to video gaming. As social media, the internet and mobile devices are all continuing their inexorable march toward the forefront of our lives, alarmist concerns for our mental wellbeing follow close behind. This is no surprise. Bad news sells – we are hardwired to prioritise being vigilant for things that might hurt us. Given a choice between a positive article and an article that contains a scare, we are almost always going to be more interested in the latter.
The historian Melvin Kranzberg rightly pointed out in his first law of technology that, “Technology is neither good nor bad; nor is it neutral” (Kranzberg 1986). To argue for games being a ‘bad’ or even a ‘good’ thing is to take part in a futile and never-ending debate. We are best off accepting the presence and importance of new technologies before establishing how best to make use of them.
The Evolution of Video Game Addiction
It is not enough for us to simply accept that some people will become addicted to games, regardless of the games themselves. There is plenty of evidence, both anecdotal and based in research that tells us that certain games lead to harmful play more than others. The absolute top suspect routinely comes out as being MMOs (see below for a definition). “Everquest”, one of the first and biggest such game, became widely known as ‘Evercrack’. Similarly “World of Warcraft” has, unfairly or fairly, earned itself the nickname of ‘World of Warcrack’. These references to the hardest of hard drugs go a long way to revealing the effect that games of this genre have had on users. Research has shown that the second and third gaming genres most likely to induce excessive play are FPSs and RTSs respectively (Nagygyörgy 2013). All of the above gaming types are largely popular due to their social and/or competitive nature – something that was enhanced dramatically with the advent of the internet. Today gaming is changing again, and with it the nature of gaming addiction.
A Brief Guide to Gaming Genres
Massively Multiplayer Online Roleplaying Game (MMORPG or MMO)
These include the likes of “World of Warcraft”, “Eve Online” and “Guild Wars”. All such games rely upon huge open worlds in which you can engage in a near endless series of quests that constantly progress you while simultaneously linking you to a wide network of other gamers. Research and common opinion agree that this type of game is by far the most prone to being used addictively.
First Person Shooter (FPS)
One of the more addictive gaming genres, though not as addictive as the MMORPG, these games involve a character-eye view down the barrel of a gun. They typically offer a lengthy single-player game (one that can be enjoyed alone) and a very deep range of competitive, online game modes. Games of this genre would include “Call of Duty”, “Battlefield” and “Killzone”.
Roleplaying (RPG)
Named after the dungeon-crawling pen and paper game “Dungeons and Dragons”, this genre has grown to encompass any game that involves a levelling system (whereby your character gets more powerful with their successes) and a sense of being immersed in a fantasy setting. In contrast to MMORPGs games such as this are more story-focused and can generally only be played alone. Games of this genre would include “Final Fantasy”, “Skyrim” and “Dark Souls”. As with MMORPGs, these games are all known for their relative complexity and the commitment required from gamers in order to be enjoyed fully.
Real Time Strategy (RTS)
Another gaming genre that is prone toward being played addictively, the real time strategy game involves staging a battle with either a squad of men or a vast army, typically viewed from an aerial perspective. Real Time Strategies are highly competitive games that are frequently played against other players online. “Starcraft, Empire: Total War” and “ Company of Heroes” are typical RTSs.
Match Three
The only exclusively ‘casual’ genre in the list. These games involve moving objects round on a board in an attempt to create lines of three that share the same colour. Match Three games are pleasingly intuitive to play and tend to create dazzling effects and cascades with relatively little skill on the player’s behalf. “Candy Crush Saga”, “Bejewelled Blitz” and “Fluffy Birds Flash” are examples of Match Three games.
Multi-player Online Battle Arena (MOBA)
Increasingly popular in recent years, the MOBA is an online team-based game against another team of online players in which both sides try to fight past each other to reach opposing objectives. MOBA games and their communities are highly competitive environments. Examples of this genre would be “League of Legends” and “DOTA 2”.
While video game addiction may be nearly as old as video games, the ways in which it is commonly understood inevitably lag someway behind. This is largely because of the baffling speed at which video games are evolving. “XCOM: Enemy Unknown”, which was released in 2012, provides a powerful description of this evolution. The game was a remake of the original “UFO: Enemy Unknown” from 1994; they had taken an old title and updated it with the latest in both graphics and game design. The difference between the two versions is a startling testament to how far the industry has progressed. The ‘90s version was a pixilated, washed out, 2D experience from a fixed perspective. The game could only be played on a (then) powerful, home computer, requiring you to take time out to find the disk, watch it load and then commit time to it. The reboot had a fully 3D look, with each character and set brought to life with shadows and realistic animations. Additionally, the game was not only playable on home computers and consoles but also on a portable tablet. The new “XCOM” was a radically more visually immersive game that you could quickly enjoy on the bus to work in the morning, a vastly different experience from the original. As fast as we become accustomed to video games within our world, the reality of their relationship with us advances at a far quicker rate.
These kinds of improvements to technology haven’t necessarily led to better games, as any old-school, mid-thirties gamer will no doubt vehemently tell you, but it has led to a startling increase in the level of immersion of which modern games are capable. “Red Dead Redemption”, the 2010 award-winning game from Rockstar, was testament to the immersive power of recent games. The cowboy simulator brought the Wild West to life with sweeping vistas from the border of Mexico, wind that softly howls and picks up dust and foliage around you and all manner of wildlife scurrying to and fro as you pound your horse across the dusty plains. It is difficult to play this game for more than a few minutes and not be swept into its world.
Up until about 10 years ago, the games industry was increasingly dominated by games such as this, known as Triple A games – the blockbusters of gaming. These titles had big names behind them, required vast teams and vast amounts of money to make and were then pushed out for a one time charge of £40/$60. This business model capitalised on the presence of consoles and gaming-capable PCs being in nearly everyone’s home – a far cry from the early ‘90s and ‘80s when most gamers would need to hang out at their local arcade with a pocket full of change to play anything half-decent.
Definition: Triple A Title
Triple A denotes a top of the range game that has been released as a purchasable product (often a boxed product) at a high price point (£40 in the U.K. or $60 in the U.S.). Triple A is historically the best of the best in video gaming and was where the industry saw most of its revenue. Recent developments in freemium games have seen a gradual shift in this area, however. Triple A games are by definition only made by extremely large and wealthy studios. “Call of Duty: Black Ops”, “GTA V” and “Final Fantasy XIII” are examples of Triple A titles.
A large portion of the public’s perception of video gaming and video game addiction is stuck around this period. The gamer is still seen by many as the sickly, single, male youth hunched over a console. Public opinion on video gaming is neatly captured by Warner Brothers’ “The Big Bang Theory”. This sitcom describes the plight of three young(ish) socially inept and far from Adonis-like males, all of whom are slavishly hooked on geek culture in all its forms, video games being no exception. Interestingly, the series explores gaming addiction by having Penny, the great looking blonde from across the hall, discover MMOs only to sink into a compulsive pit of greasy hair, burger-stuffing and sullen ugliness. The episode’s joke goes a long way to expose perceptions of the addicted gamer. How could a good-looking woman with common sense ever end up addicted to video games?
While the perceived image of addicts as awkward young men still bears some relation to the majority of addicts, the market has changed dramatically in the last 15 years. The nature and accessibility of games today has opened up a new wealth of consumers who use games in a whole new range of ways, many of these being less than healthy. I saw one lady in her 40s who struggled to control how much she played on her mobile phone. This individual by no means fit the stereotypical description of the gaming addict, yet she described the game as having ‘taken away [her] self-control’. She depicted herself as wanting to:
“...play it at any opportunity I had, any time I had a spare minute, and sometimes even when I didn’t. When my friends pointed out that I was playing it in a pub during a night out I realised that things had gone very wrong.”
These developments in gaming have new kinds of gamers; some of them are addicted in new ways. We are, as ever, struggling to catch up with the changes.
“Flappy Bird” is perhaps one of the games that most powerfully accentuates this enormous shift in how gaming technology is being used. Ten years ago it would be hard to believe that within a decade, a single, unknown independent developer in Vietnam would end up pulling his solo project from the market because he was concerned that his game, bringing in $50,000 a day, was proving too addictive. Compare a game such as “ Flappy Bird” to a Triple A game such as “The Last of Us”, a game released in the same year with armies of staff, years of production and whose background code dwarfs that of “Flappy Bird” thousands of times over. There is clearly a colossal gulf between the production standard of these titles and yet these smaller, infinitely cheaper games are weighing in with heavyweight profits. While “The Last of Us” was a profitable game, many Triple A studios, such as THQ, that were flourishing some 10 years ago, have now disappeared. The market has greatly diversified to benefit the new wave of ‘casual’ games, taking much of the power away from the former giants of the industry and drastically changing who games and how they game.
This is all hardly surprising. “Flappy Bird” made a lot of money but its income is paltry compared to the unthinkable profit of other similarly simplistic games on the market at the moment. “Candy Crush Saga” is and has been for some time, the most astonishing example of the triumph of the (comparatively) small-budget, mobile game. This game’s developers – the U.K.-based King – were at one point reportedly pulling in over $3.5 million a day from a 2D game where you push sweets about. That’s far over 50 times what “Flappy Bird” was doing (BGR 2014). And he thought his game was worryingly addictive. So what happened?
The Rise of Casual Gaming
Today’s gaming market has split into what is loosely referred to as casual and hardcore gaming – definitions that have further sub-divided and merged into a wide plethora of different gaming styles. This has led to a diversifying in the ways that people play; changes that even the game design industry struggles to keep up with. Most notably, these changes are created by the rise of mobile gaming and the free-to-play model.
Definition: Mobile Gaming
All gaming that is carried out on a portable device. While this primarily refers to smartphones and tablets, it can also include handhelds such as the PS Vita and Nintendo 3DS. Mobile gaming offers a far higher level of access to gamers and is best suited to short bursts of play. Consequently games designed for these platforms tend to favour more frivolous, snack-able formats.
To clarify the language here: hardcore gaming is typically on a console or a PC, involves playing for several hours, sometimes days at a time, and normally centres on some kind of killing/violence/carnage in a fantasy or military setting. This is still largely the domain of men, with only around a fifth of such games being played by women (Williams 2009). Hardcore games include the likes of “Call of Duty”, “Skyrim” and “Titanfall” and are, certainly historically, a realm dominated by the Triple A titles.
Casual games, on the other hand, are typically played on mobile devices or through internet browsers. These are frequently disposable, colourful games that centre on nurturing, building and decorating as well as puzzle and quiz games. “Farmville”, “Clash of Clans” and “Candy Crush Saga” are all arguably examples of this broad style of game. Recent reports suggest that women have taken the lead in this market, playing marginally more than men (Sky News 2013). A telltale sign of casual gamers is that they can spend hours playing such games and still not self-identify as gamers. To them, a couple of minutes here and there pushing sweets in “Candy Crush” doesn’t equate to being a gamer, even when a couple of minutes here and there totals more than a fifth of their waking hours.
Mobiles have, in an incredibly short space of time, completely changed the experience of being either in a city or on public transport. Mobile gaming forms an important part of that shift. Phones are out in force wherever you go, and a great many of those screens are busy housing some form of video game. My gamer’s eye is always caught by the distinctive green expanse of someone tending to their clan in “Clash of Clans” or the ponderous swipes of a sweet pusher.
In The Fix, a somewhat melodramatic ‘we’re-all-doomed’ discussion on addiction by Telegraph writer Damian Thompson, is the astute observation that a crucial ingredient for addiction is access – and phones are all about access. You can push sweets on the toilet, under the meeting table, in bed, over your lover’s shoulder, even in a real sweet shop. Thompson argues that our evolutionary impulses to seek out rewarding behaviour backfire on us badly in situations where there is no limit to the supply of rewards. He cites the use of gin in 18th-century England, heroin use in Vietnam and sugary foods in modern, Western society, all instances where we are missing a natural ceiling to how much ‘goodness’ we can get and are subsequently going all out in getting far too much for us to handle (Thompson 2013).
By this reckoning, mobile gaming will be off the charts. As of yet, there is evidence that mobile gaming is hugely popular, but little to say that it is, as yet, proving dangerously addictive – two very different things as we will discuss later. At the same time, the reports of people sinking vast quantities of money and time into seemingly cute and innocuous mobile games are slowly trickling in to form a new, bigger picture of gaming addiction (Rogers 2014).
There are a couple of developments in the world of mobile gaming that are particularly cruel in their appeal to potential addicts, namely appointment gameplay and the free-to-play business model. Both of these are already eliciting vast amounts of time and cash from the public and, given the propensity for video games to become the object of addiction, it is important that we make ourselves aware of the potential that this more recent form of gaming has to consume our lives.
Appointment Gameplay
Casual (and thereby most mobile) games typically follow the appointment model of gameplay. This simply means that there is a real-time delay between the action and the reward, the classic example from “Farmville” being that once you have planted your seeds (action), you need to wait a few minutes, sometimes a few hours, before you are able to return and harvest your crops (reward). This style of gameplay is prolific on mobiles and sets up gamers for a new and accessible trap within which they can find themselves addicted.
As with most successful games, the appointment system is anything but ‘instant gratification’. In fact, it is, by design, the opposite. I’ve noticed that you can often spot an academic, non-gamer talking about games by their frequent references to concepts such as ‘instant gratification’ and ‘constant rewards’ – it doesn’t take long playing any successful game (beyond the tutorials which are always full of rewards) to realise that games, certainly at a more dedicated level, are predominantly about failure and denial (Juul 2013). In appointment-based games you are forced to wait; playing “Clash of Clans” I frequently had to wait days, sometimes even weeks for certain rewards to filter through. In addition, you are regularly denied the option to continue playing after you have performed a certain number of other actions, ranging from laughably trivial to downright invasively difficult.
Many people I encountered in the world of game design hate the appointment gaming model with a passion, seeing it as the anathema of good gaming. Much of the hatred is that this withdrawal of gameplay from the user is seen as a move solely designed to force people into choosing between paying and waiting. In my opinion and experience, this model of design is inherently attractive to a certain type of player. Whether there is a payment scheme or not, they are going find considerable enjoyment in this system.
Because appointment dynamics work around brief periods of gameplay followed by longer periods of waiting, it makes an excellent fit with mobile players. When I was designing these types of games our audience was primarily seen to be female, Japanese commuters in their late 30s and early 40s. This demographic was considered to be spending much of their time either travelling through urban environments or working hard in high-powered, demanding and/or oppressive jobs. Appointment gaming on their mobile phones offered them a way to turn the hiatuses in their day into colourful, rewarding bursts of gaming. The knock-on effect being that they could spend the next stretch of work/travelling/meetings covertly looking forward to their next ‘visit’ to the game when they could pick up their rewards. They might feed their baby cow before an important meeting, knowing that by the time said meeting had ended, they could check in to see it fully grown and rewarding them with a pail of milk.
This is a stark example of a form of gameplay that is becoming increasingly common, particularly with the rise of always-on, always-connected portable devices such as tablets and smart phones. Increasingly we are offered a way to fill in ‘gaps’ in our day. Every aspect of phones and tablets is designed to create a sense of attachment and pleasure in the user, leading to the simple act of holding and checking the phone acting as a comforting and rewarding act in itself (Thompson 2013). Not only this, but due to the widely accepted behaviour of looking at one’s phone more than one’s surroundings, it is relatively easy to wrap many hours of this type of gameplay into a working day without anyone ever even knowing that you’re doing so, including you. This goes some way to explaining the infrequency with which such casual gamers see themselves as being gamers. All in all, appointment gameplay, especially on mobiles, is an increasingly ripe source of addiction.
Historically, the days of shelling out £40 – £50 on a single, complete game and then going off and enjoying it at no further cost are diminishing. Sales figures point to an acutely sharp decline in the number of big gaming publishing houses producing Triple A titles (Robinson 2013). That said, “Grand Theft Auto V” became the fastest selling game of all time in 2013 and the end of the previous year saw the release of Sony and Microsoft’s next generation of consoles, so we can safely say that we will continue to see this sales model over the next few years, at least.
From the wings, however, the free-to-play model has blossomed, initially being a hit on mobiles and social networks, and now being increasingly popular on PCs. Free-to-play games are, shockingly, actually free-to-play, with additional features, resources, power-ups and customization available to all gamers… provided they are prepared to pay. Typically these virtual goods will be inexpensive and transient; you pay a seemingly insignificant amount of money, get a temporary boost that you can use once or twice in the game and then it’s gone. A common combination is to offer a free-to-play game with an appointment system, such that players are frequently asked to wait in order to progress, but have the option to pay in order to speed things along. Some powerful examples of current free-to-play games are “Candy Crush Saga” (whose otherworldly revenue we have already mentioned), “Planetside 2” and “World of Tanks”.
Free-to-play relies partly upon a small number of users making frequent, minimal purchases. More importantly, it relies upon an even smaller number of users, termed ‘whales’, sinking an inordinate amount of money into virtual goods. It is widely understood that in order to make a game such as this profitable, there needs to be an infinite number of huge purchases that a minority of gamers can make without them running out of content to play through. This is typically achieved by pitching said gamers against one another, culminating in an arms race where, arguably, only the developers are victorious. “Clash of Clans” is an excellent example of a game that uses this model, with some users dropping literally thousands of dollars a month into the game (Rigney 2012).
The sinister undertone of the free-to-play business model is that it potentially depends upon pathological or addictive gaming in order to reach financial success. This is a growing concern, particularly in Japan, where they have begun to create laws to catch some of what they consider to be more devious mechanics within free-to-play games. Increasingly, attention is drawn to the huge amounts of money that users can easily pump into these games. For many players, this is a potential criterion for addiction – increasing numbers of gamers are finding that their need to compensate for what is missing in their lives through their gaming is now resulting in a hefty financial cost, much like pathological gambling.
These new forms of gaming, appointment and free-to-play, are arguably not problematic in themselves, much the same as hardcore gaming. Someone stealing several hours of their day to play “Clash of Clans” on their tablet is not a problem, per se, and we need to be aware that the bulk of the existing (although potentially outdated) research out there points the finger at the young male playing online hardcore games as the most frequent of the video game addicts. However, if that person fails to pick up their daughter because they need to raid that last bit of gold, or finds themselves unable to heat their house because they have spent increasingly more on virtual gems to grow their clan, then there is a serious issue that needs resolving. For those few that can’t control the way they interact with these new forms of gaming, they will need to address their lifestyle just as any hardcore gamer would.
Is This Just About Men?
While it is less and less the case that gaming is a male only pastime, boys that game to addicted levels still outnumber the equivalent girls by a whopping 50 percent (Gentile et al 2009). This forms part of a wider picture described by thinkers such as Sax and Zimbardo who believe there to be a large-scale disillusionment in the young men of today; both these writers consider video games to be one of the core reasons for this.
Games are still largely made by men for men. Women still feature relatively scarcely in game design teams. I remember a woman joining our team after about a year of my working as a game designer in Brighton. This particular artist was, by virtue of her gender, a novelty. If one is to discount certain, more female-populated roles such as art, HR and marketing teams, you are left with programming and design, two areas of the industry that are almost entirely populated by men. Exceptions exist, such as Robin Hunicke of “The Sims”, but these roles are nearly all taken up by males, a situation that is, gradually and thankfully, changing. As a result of the gender skew in development, there is a bias toward games fulfilling exclusively male fantasies, which explains the dominance of action and violence in hardcore gaming.
There is a further concern that the lack of male role models for young men has caused their mass flight into gaming. As the character of Tyler Durden said in “Fight Club”, “We are a generation of men raised by women, the last thing we need is another woman” (though that was all the way back in the ‘90s). Is it the case that many guys grow up without having a clear sense of how to be a man? Robert Bly in Iron John poetically tells us that ‘soft’ men today have lost touch with the sense of the primitive ‘wild man’. He describes the few fathers that are present in households as being bumbling fools in the background (Bly 1990) – an image that is repeated time and time again in primetime sitcoms (“The Simpsons”, “Malcolm in the Middle”, “Modern Family”, “My Family”). Zimbardo certainly links this to gaming addiction, saying that “guys become confused about what acceptable male behaviour is” and find themselves, post feminism, struggling to direct the violent fantasies that naturally occur for them (Zimbardo 2012). The hack and slash of video games, in Zimbardo’s opinion, offer an outlet for these feelings and become all consuming.
Games offer a primarily male nirvana – a playground of violence and heroics that has no tangible consequences. Being young has, over the centuries, probably become harder as much as it has become easier, but the ways in which we are able to manage and cope with this have changed dramatically. For boys, the classic hardcore form of gaming is a tailor-made outlet. For women the gaming industry is quickly developing to catch up with their interests. As a result it is prudent to consider video game addiction as being a pan-gender issue.
