Set Of Games Research Articles

한국 비디오게임의 문화신학적 해석 ‘원더포션’의‘산나비’를 중심으로

In order to discover Korean culture and identity in modern society, this paper tries to analyze the game ‘SANABI’ of ‘Wonder Portion’ which was awarded the Indie Game Award in 2022, borrowing many traditional Korean images among Korean video games using the cultural and artistic analysis method shown in Paul Tillich's ‘Theology of Culture.’
 ‘SANABI’ is a pixel-art type side-view flatformer action adventure game set in the Korean cyberpunk genre, which represents modern capitalism and traditional images of Korea. In the main work, the main character shows overcoming the alienation, where essence and existence are separated, and completing his identity by facing the end of sacrificing to save his daughter. It shows that the theme of Korean culture is inherent in the establishment of complexity and identity.
 This defines Korean culture and its identity as a union representing universality and specificity as a culture, and overcoming alienation that restores the essence of the union's actions. Therefore, the theology that Korean Christian theology should pursue is suggested to be a K-theology with ‘Consilience’ that combines Christian theology with various cultures to create a new culture by understanding the ‘complexity’ of K-content.

Assessment of urbanization impact on cultural heritage based on a risk-based cumulative impact assessment method

Urbanization is inevitable in both developing and developed countries. However, this growth and transformation of the urban area can pose a significant threat to urban cultural heritage, which is a sensitive component of the urban environment. As cities modernize and change, a risk of irreparable loss of cultural heritage exists. Therefore, taking steps to protect and preserve these sites for posterity is crucial. To better protect urban cultural heritage, decision-makers must rapidly assess the impact of urbanization on cultural heritage while maintaining a balance between cultural heritage preservation and urban growth. This study developed a risk-based cumulative impact assessment (CIA) method that integrates a set of quantifiable indicators to address these issues. This method generates standardized assessment results based on game theory and set pair analysis theory. In contrast to other CIA methods, this risk-based approach effectively manages scientific complexity and uncertainties, thus enhancing the quality of the assessment results. This method was applied to 21 classical gardens in Suzhou, China. The results show that Suzhou classical gardens are impacted by urbanization. This study confirmed that adopting a risk-based CIA method that considers the impact of adverse urbanization on cultural heritage sites is an efficient approach. Successful implementation of the proposed method can provide decision-making support for different types of cultural heritage in other areas.

Counterfactual and seeing-to-it responsibilities in strategic games

The article studies two forms of responsibility in the setting of strategic games with imperfect information. They are referred to as seeing-to-it responsibility and counterfactual responsibility. It shows that counterfactual responsibility is definable through seeing-to-it, but not the other way around. The article also proposes a sound and complete bimodal logical system that describes the interplay between the seeing-to-it modality and the individual ex ante knowledge modality.

Don't stop me now: Psychological effects of interrupting a moving pedestrian crowd and a video game.

Interruptions are a part of our everyday lives. They are inevitable in complex societies, especially when many people move from one place to another as a part of their daily routines. The main aim of this research is to understand the effects of interruptions on individuals from a psychological and crowd dynamics perspective. Two studies were conducted to investigate this issue, with each focusing on different types of interruptions and examining their psychological (emotion, motivation, arousal) and physiological (heart rate) components. Study 1 examined interruptions in a video game setting and systematically varied goal proximity (N = 61). It was hypothesized that being interrupted in the later stages of goal pursuit would create a high aroused impatience state, while interruptions in the earlier stages would produce a low aroused boredom state. However, the results showed that the hypothesized groupwise differences were not observed. Instead, interruptions created annoyance in all conditions, both psychologically and physiologically. Study 2 investigated interruptions in pedestrian crowds (N = 301) and used a basic motivational dichotomy of high and low motivation. In the experiments, crowds (80-100 participants) were asked to imagine that they were entering a concert hall consisting of a narrow bottleneck. The low motivation group reported feeling bored during the interruption, while the high motivation group reported feeling impatient. Additionally, a motivational decrease was observed for the high motivation group due to the interruption. This drop in motivation after the interruption is also reflected in the measured density (person/m2) in front of the bottleneck. Overall, both studies showed that interruption can have significant effects on individuals, including psychological and physiological impacts. The observed motivational decrease through interruption is particularly relevant for crowd management, but further investigation is needed to understand the context-specific effects of interruptions.

Robust backward linear-quadratic differential game and team: A soft-constraint analysis

The robust design with model uncertainty is an extensively investigated research issue but traditionally focuses on forward stochastic system for which the initial condition is given as a priori. This paper makes a systematic continuation of this issue but in backward linear-quadratic context. That is, the state dynamics is evolved by a linear backward stochastic differential equation with terminal condition being specified, and cost functionals to be optimized are of quadratic forms. Three types of dynamic backward decisions, are introduced in both game and team setting in presence of drift uncertainty (disturbance). Specifically, in (Stackelberg) game setting, both cases for the follower or leader with unknown disturbance are discussed respectively; whereas in the team setting, the case with disturbance unknown to the leader is highlighted. For each of these three types, corresponding robust backward strategies are designed and associated optimal values for either leader or follower are given.

Poster 210: Stride Cross-over and Pelvic Rotation Contribute to Ulnar Collateral Ligament Injury Risk and Pitching Performance in Collegiate Level Baseball Players

Poster 210: Stride Cross-over and Pelvic Rotation Contribute to Ulnar Collateral Ligament Injury Risk and Pitching Performance in Collegiate Level Baseball Players

The Triumph of Human-Robot Interaction: Employing Humanoid Robot to Boost Grammar Acquisition and Retention Among Iranian Young EFL Learners

This paper examines the impact of employing an assistive humanoid robot in acquiring and retaining grammar among English as a Foreign Language (EFL) learners. To this end, forty-eight Iranian young male students (between 11 to 15 years old) were equally divided into three groups: RALL (Robot-Assisted Language Learning), GBLL (Game-based Language Learning), and the control group. While the teacher, the textbook, and teaching materials were identical in all groups, a set of similar games were played only in the RALL (with the participation of the NAO H21 robot) and GBLL groups. A 20-item grammar pre-test was taken at the beginning of the classes. Overall, a total of ten intervention sessions (each lasting for 60 minutes), 15 (each lasting for 90 minutes), and 15 (each lasting for 120 minutes) were respectively administered for the RALL, GBLL, and control groups. At the end of the treatments, the acquisition and retention of grammar were evaluated through immediate (at the end of class) and delayed post-tests (two weeks later), correspondingly. The results of descriptive statistics and ANOVA indicated that the RALL group outperformed the two groups in the immediate and delayed post-tests. The students in the RALL group had a very positive attitude toward robot presence in the class and scored higher on the post-test. This study suggests that RALL can be very beneficial in assisting teaching EFL classes. The results of the current innovative study can equally yield important implications for language education and social robotics fields and further contribute to providing clear evidence of the impacts of RALL on Iranian young learners’ English grammar acquisition.

Social accessibility in multiplayer games: Theory and praxis

In recent years, we have seen growing efforts towards facilitating the accessibility of games to people with disabilities. When it comes to multiplayer games, however, such efforts require not only facilitating the technical accessibility of the game (e.g., accessibility features) but also social inclusion in the game, what we refer to as social accessibility. Accessibility of multiplayer games is, hence, complex and multifaceted. While some advances have been made in terms of technical accessibility, much work is needed to facilitate social accessibility. This study had two goals 1) to propose a definition for social accessibility in multiplayer games, and 2) to present practical examples of how social accessibility can be facilitated in multiplayer games since these aspects were not showcased in the reviewed literature. The study suggests that social accessibility in multiplayer games is a combination of inclusive game design, in-game features, and social guidelines that aim to foster inclusive social structures, and multimodality in communications amongst players, while gaming or socially interacting with aspects of game culture. The study presents various in-game-features that could be used to facilitate social accessibility, such as pausing the game, co-piloting, and individualizable settings.

THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN DIGITAL GAME ADDICTION, EXECUTIVE FUNCTIONS AND IMPULSIVITY IN EARLY ADOLESCENTS

Privacy is what one can be in his or her private space without being disturbed by others. Privacy invasion is the unauthorized intervention of other people in the private area of the person. The current study was largely concerned with the association between digital game addiction, specific cognitive functions especially, three components of executive function (inhibition, set shifting and working memory) and impulsivity in early adolescents. Sampling consisted of 6th (55.1%) and 7th (44.9%) grade middle school students (36 females and 62 males). The mean age of the students was determined as 12.35 years (SD =0.75; age range, 10–14 years). Digital game addiction, inhibition, set shifting, working memory, and impulsivity were evaluated via Digital Game Addiction Scale (DGAS), Stroop Test TBAG Form, Trail Making Test (TMT), Wechsler Memory Scale-III Letter-Number Sequencing Subtest (WMS–III/LNS) and Short Form of Barratt Impulsiveness Scale (BIS-11-SF), respectively. According to the correlation analysis results, selective and complex attention, inhibition, set shifting, and impulse control were diminished with increasing digital game addiction. There is no significant relationship between digital game addiction and working memory. Consistent with the correlation analysis, structural equation model results revealed that digital game addiction significantly predicts inhibition, set shifting and impulsivity [x2 (15, N = 98) = 7.476, p > 0.5; x2/df = 1.246; RMSEA = .05; CFI = .95; GFI = .97]. As a results, it can be concluded that digital game addiction should be controlled in order to manage impulses and develop high-capacity cognitive skills in children.

Hang-Time HAR: A Benchmark Dataset for Basketball Activity Recognition Using Wrist-Worn Inertial Sensors.

We present a benchmark dataset for evaluating physical human activity recognition methods from wrist-worn sensors, for the specific setting of basketball training, drills, and games. Basketball activities lend themselves well for measurement by wrist-worn inertial sensors, and systems that are able to detect such sport-relevant activities could be used in applications of game analysis, guided training, and personal physical activity tracking. The dataset was recorded from two teams in separate countries (USA and Germany) with a total of 24 players who wore an inertial sensor on their wrist, during both a repetitive basketball training session and a game. Particular features of this dataset include an inherent variance through cultural differences in game rules and styles as the data was recorded in two countries, as well as different sport skill levels since the participants were heterogeneous in terms of prior basketball experience. We illustrate the dataset's features in several time-series analyses and report on a baseline classification performance study with two state-of-the-art deep learning architectures.

Reinforcement Learning With Dual-Observation for General Video Game Playing

Reinforcement learning algorithms have performed well in playing challenging board and video games. More and more studies focus on improving the generalisation ability of reinforcement learning algorithms. The General Video Game AI Learning Competition aims to develop agents capable of learning to play different game levels that were unseen during training. This paper summarises the five years' General Video Game AI Learning Competition editions. At each edition, three new games were designed. The training and test levels were designed separately in the first three editions. Since 2020, three test levels of each game were generated by perturbing or combining two training levels. Then, we present a novel reinforcement learning technique with dual-observation for general video game playing, assuming that it is more likely to observe similar local information in different levels rather than global information. Instead of directly inputting a single, raw pixel-based screenshot of the current game screen, our proposed general technique takes the encoded, transformed global and local observations of the game screen as two simultaneous inputs, aiming at learning local information for playing new levels. Our proposed technique is implemented with three state-of-the-art reinforcement learning algorithms and tested on the game set of the 2020 General Video Game AI Learning Competition. Ablation studies show the outstanding performance of using encoded, transformed global and local observations as input.

Symbolic Violence in the Language of Game Descriptions of Blackness: The Case of Pathfinder

The present article analyzes the impact of discourses surrounding Black ethnicities in tabletop role playing games. I use discursive thematic analysis to examine the descriptions of individuals represented as Black in the Pathfinder game setting, a game system related to Dungeons & Dragons. I critically analyze descriptions in the game materials that discuss in-game Black ethnicities. I demonstrate how the discourse represents a symbolic violence surrounding blackness. While the descriptions provide imagery and word use to highlight the positive aspects of the characters, the overemphasis signals stereotypes of a conceptual “other.” These characters then become examples of “good Blacks” that differ from “bad” individuals. The positive imagery provokes a stereotype threat, and a need to uphold this “good Black” mentality, lest one becomes the Other. While thinking of race and ethnicity in tabletop gaming continues to evolve, even advancements fall into tropes which reinforce symbolic violence.

The Attitude and Depth of Female Players in the Otome Games and the Discussion of Current Gender Issues and Future Prospects

With the rapid economic development of the world after 2000, games, as a way of entertainment for people in real life, occupy the main entertainment life of people with the characteristics of simple, quick, and highly entertaining. In the East Asian market, based on the particularity of East Asian female players, mobile games are developed exclusively for women in terms of various senses, game Settings, and plot development, so as to meet the fantasy and demand of some East Asian women for perfect love partners. But the ballyhooed development of the Otome game unavoidably can receive partial male dissatisfaction in society. In the market, there is relatively little research on the social factors behind womens preference for virtual boyfriends and the Otome games, as well as the research on players emotional and psychological activities. Most of the research is from the perspective of theory and market analysis. It is difficult to really have a mental and emotional connection with female players of the Otome games. Only by starting from the players themselves and exploring their real thoughts, attitudes, and in-depth levels can we draw relevant conclusions and look forward to the future of the Otome games.

Exergaming in older adults: the effects of game characteristics on brain activity and physical activity.

Exergames are increasingly used in rehabilitation settings for older adults to train physical and cognitive abilities. To meet the potential that exergames hold, they need to be adapted to the individual abilities of the player and their training objectives. Therefore, it is important to know whether and how game characteristics affect their playing. The aim of this study is to investigate the effect of two different kinds of exergame (step game and balance game) played at two difficulty levels on brain activity and physical activity. Twenty-eight older independently living adults played two different exergames at two difficulty levels each. In addition, the same movements as during gaming (leaning sideways with feet in place and stepping sideways) were performed as reference movements. Brain activity was recorded using a 64-channel EEG system to assess brain activity, while physical activity was recorded using an accelerometer at the lower back and a heart rate sensor. Source-space analysis was applied to analyze the power spectral density in theta (4 Hz-7 Hz) and alpha-2 (10 Hz-12 Hz) frequency bands. Vector magnitude was applied to the acceleration data. Friedman ANOVA revealed significantly higher theta power for the exergaming conditions compared to the reference movement for both games. Alpha-2 power showed a more diverse pattern which might be attributed to task-specific conditions. Acceleration decreased significantly from the reference movement to the easy condition to the hard condition for both games. The results indicate that exergaming increases frontal theta activity irrespective of type of game or difficulty level, while physical activity decreases with increasing difficulty level. Heart rate was found to be an inappropriate measure in this population older adults. These findings contribute to understanding of how game characteristics affect physical and cognitive activity and consequently need to be taken into account when choosing appropriate games and game settings for exergame interventions.

Blood Sugar Balance

Blood Sugar Balance (BSB) is an accessible web-based game, created as an extension of our federally funded type 2 diabetes curriculum for high school biology classrooms. Modeling of complex systems and diseases, like metabolism and type 2 diabetes (T2D), is especially difficult and deeply impactful when executed in an engaging way. Blood Sugar Balance integrates environmental factors, biological factors, and personal choices to model glucose metabolism and understand the impact and risk factors for type 2 diabetes. Players earn points during gameplay by ensuring their game character maintains healthy blood glucose levels throughout the play period by regulating them. Players must make choices about food, exercise, and the release of hormones from the pancreas to manage blood glucose levels. Game settings can model the stages of type 2 diabetes as well as environmental factors that limit access to food, exercise, and health care options. Gameplay is fast and engaging, allowing exploration of factors that impact the final score. For example, how might accessibility to insulin impact the final score while playing at the type 2 diabetes setting? Here we describe the development of Blood Sugar Balance and the integration of data analysis into the accompanying NGSS-aligned lesson plan.

Directed lexicographic rationalizability

Using lexicographic probability systems as representations of players’ beliefs, we define the solution procedure of directed lexicographic rationalizability. We show that the procedure characterizes the family of self-admissible sets (Brandenburger et al., 2008) in finite games. A corollary of this result is that comprehensive rationalizability (Heifetz et al., 2019) yields a self-admissible set.

Interplay of noise, memory and entangling operator in quantum Stackelberg-Bertrand duopoly game

In this work, we make an attempt to understand how noise, memory and entangling operators collectively decide the profit of the firms Here we have studied the quantum version of Stackelberg-Bertrand duopoly game using modified EWL scheme in both correlated and uncorrelated noise channels. When this game is analyzed for amplitude damping channels following interesting results are obtained: Firstly, decoherence in channel 2 effects the profit function of the firms more than that of channel 1. Secondly, in the case of correlated noise memory prevents the death of entanglement at maximum noise. Finally, the profit function of the firms depends upon noise, memory, strategies, and entangling operator in any given game setting.

Influence of Device Performance and Agent Advice on User Trust and Behaviour in a Care-taking Scenario

Monitoring systems have become increasingly prevalent in order to increase the safety of elderly people who live alone. These systems are designed to raise alerts when adverse events are detected, which in turn enables family and carers to take action in a timely manner. However, monitoring systems typically suffer from two problems: they may generate false alerts or miss true adverse events.This motivates the two user studies presented in this paper: (1) in the first study, we investigate the effect of the performance of different monitoring systems, in terms of accuracy and error type, on users’ trust in these systems and behaviour; and (2) in the second study, we examine the effect of recommendations made by an advisor agent on users’ behaviour.Our user studies take the form of a web-based game set in a retirement village, where elderly residents live in smart homes equipped with monitoring systems. Players, who “work” in the village, perform a primary task whereby they must ensure the welfare of the residents by attending to adverse events in a timely manner, and a secondary routine task that demands their attention. These conditions are typical of a retirement setting, where workers perform various duties in addition to keeping an eye on a monitoring system.Our main findings pertain to: (1) the identification of user types that shed light on users’ trust in automation and aspects of their behaviour; (2) the effect of monitoring-system accuracy and error type on users’ trust and behaviour; (3) the effect of the recommendations made by an advisor agent on users’ behaviour; and (4) the identification of influential factors in models that predict users’ trust and behaviour. The studies that yield these findings are enabled by two methodological contributions: (5) the game itself, which supports experimentation with various factors, and a version of the game augmented with an advisor agent; and (6) techniques for calibrating the parameters of the game and determining the recommendations of the advisor agent.

Manipulating free will beliefs using online video games

Research in social psychology and experimental philosophy has investigated lay people’s free will beliefs (FWB). Using different approaches (i.e. experimental manipulations and vignette studies), they investigated how FWB relate to other concepts, and whether changing FWB has an impact on downstream processes such as social behavior. However, both approaches have shortcomings. While experimental manipulations used in social psychology suffer from demand effects, vignettes used in experimental philosophy are often highly abstract. Across two pre-registered studies, we developed a new approach by merging them in an online video game setting. Using this novel, experience-based FWB manipulation, we found that decreasing FWB impacted variables such as perceived control and responsibility in both studies. While the experience-based manipulation influenced participants’ beliefs in free will within the context of the experience (“Within the context of the scenario, would the agent believe in free will?”) in the first study, this manipulation effect did not transfer to participants’ general FWB (“Do you believe in free will?”) in the second study. Overall, our findings suggest a way forward in studying laypeople’s beliefs in free will.

Application of Variational AutoEncoder (VAE) Model and Image Processing Approaches in Game Design

In recent decades, the Variational AutoEncoder (VAE) model has shown good potential and capability in image generation and dimensionality reduction. The combination of VAE and various machine learning frameworks has also worked effectively in different daily life applications, however its possible use and effectiveness in modern game design has seldom been explored nor assessed. The use of its feature extractor for data clustering has also been minimally discussed in the literature neither. This study first attempts to explore different mathematical properties of the VAE model, in particular, the theoretical framework of the encoding and decoding processes, the possible achievable lower bound and loss functions of different applications; then applies the established VAE model to generate new game levels based on two well-known game settings; and to validate the effectiveness of its data clustering mechanism with the aid of the Modified National Institute of Standards and Technology (MNIST) database. Respective statistical metrics and assessments are also utilized to evaluate the performance of the proposed VAE model in aforementioned case studies. Based on the statistical and graphical results, several potential deficiencies, for example, difficulties in handling high-dimensional and vast datasets, as well as insufficient clarity of outputs are discussed; then measures of future enhancement, such as tokenization and the combination of VAE and GAN models, are also outlined. Hopefully, this can ultimately maximize the strengths and advantages of VAE for future game design tasks and relevant industrial missions.