Histories and foundations of Gaming

Games and the notion of play...started when scholars looked to see who had done what before them. This is about 8 years ago when the field called game studies began to take root.
Ludology.

Cybertext by Espinoza is the seminal foundation for game studies in academia. Reviewed here by Paul.

Play is different from gaming..
Here are key concepts and schemas of game theoryif you start with structure, play can come into it.
When computers were first in use, they were mostly brainiacs. However, with time, play, music got introduced into computers thus making them more adaptable. Play then elevated the status of the machine, placing it at a level where it was usable.
--------------------------------------

Hypertext links information in a page. Text-based adventure games--cybertext as first used by Espen J Aarseth. Ergodic--the concept of working with text to get something out of it.
The game offers you second chances, allows you to explore and take risks.

--------
Why is it that games...?
games require action, performance, involvement. Unless you act, no game can take place. Games are unlike movies that you can partake idly...
Characteristics of games: interactive, cyber, ergodic

Avatars give us the ability to become something other than who we are through games. While other elements such as drugs and alcohol can take us out of ourselves, games are different in that they do not altar us radically. We act with our faculty fully intact
The avatar is a representation of yourself inside of cyberspace. They are the adventurous figures that live the life in cyberspace.

Culture as play according to Huizinga

"To [my] our way of thinking, play is the direct opposite to seriousness"(5). This statement pretty much sums up my [heretofore] position on play. Some of you may recall as much from my introduction on the first day of class. However, there could not have been a better person to help me interrogate the place of play in the academy than Huzinger, because he begins off his argument by recognizing the place of play in general terms before advancing his own position on it.

Huzinger sets out to rehabilitate my conception of play as being of no sense by suggesting that play precedes society—it is "a significant function—there is some sense to it" (1). There is the element of civilization as play; of play as culture; play as nature or occurring from nature. And so it is imbued with tension, mirth, and fun (3) the last of which captures the essence of play. The dichotomy in play is that no matter the fun, there is in it the tenor of seriousness that defies logic. It appeals to the irrational (animalistic) aspect in man that then dates back to nature and play.

Characteristics:

• play as a social construction (4)
• play as a link between mind and matter (4)
• play as non-seriousness (6)—take for example, play as exacting laughter and abandon, while at other times serious (chess) but pleasurable nonetheless.
• play as beauty—brings to mind the athletic body—those Greek sculptured bodies
• play as voluntary (7) and this carries with it an element of freedom for it " can be deferred or suspended at any time" (8).
• play as a rite (now that erodes the freedom associated with play). That's because in this regard, play is bound up in myth, which elevates to a place of control and imposition as is wont to be with rituals.

Features—formal

• disinterestedness (9) as an interlude in our daily grind; a complement, a sideshow to allows us get on with the more serious aspects of our lives.
• play as festivals-->ritual-->sacred-->is of significance to humanity, who find in it the essence of their being.
• play as secluded and limited—"contains its own course and meaning" (9)
• play plays itself to the end (9)
• play becomes tradition in transmittal
• play within boundaries
• play as an ordered activity—containing rhythm and harmony
• tension—uncertainty
• play as bound by rules herein lies a paradox: it is free, voluntary and yet bound by rules. Breaking those rules renders one a spoilsport.

play is "a free activity that stands consciously outside "ordinary" life as being "not serious", but at the same time absorbing the player intensely and utterly. It is an activity connected with no material interest, and no profit can be gained by it. It proceeds within its own proper boundaries of time and space according to fixed rules and in an orderly manner. It promotes the formation of social groupings which tend to surround themselves with secrecy and to stress their difference from the common world by disguise or other means" (13).

Play and seriousness: absolute antitheses? ritual as play carries connotations? are priests in ritual solemn or playing? ritual transports people to different heights—making play superior to culture (in this sense) and yet inferior in another sense (18). In churches as congregants, we know that most acts are really symbolic and we attach a profound meaning to them. But we also know the priests are at play[ing] the part.

consciousness in play

make-believe

archaic ritual is sacred play at once indispensable for the wellbeing of the community and yet play nonetheless (25-26) without losing its potency, its holi-ness.

Exploring Gaming

I have just set up my blog for the Video games course.
I have every intention to begin gaming seriously when I get out of school. For now, I've gotta do what I gotta do, which is write those papers; create those avatars; meet those deadlines, etc. Soon, I suspect, I shall be preoccupied with finding that job that will allow me to spare money to invest in games. And once I get the job, oh, I'll invest every waking moment in it so I can accelerate to the top of the ladder (be it professorial or corporate).

Aha, it seems to be that games and gaming will forever be elusive for me.
But when it comes to being a good student, I am she.

Game on!