Massively Multiplayer Research Articles

Exploring the association between the Proteus effect and intention to play massive multiplayer online role-playing games (MMORPGs)

PurposeMassive multiplayer online role-playing games (MMORPGs) are representative metaverse games that are thriving in academia and the industry. This study aims to develop an integrated model based on Yee's motivations and the Proteus effect to explore individuals' intentions of playing MMORPGs.Design/methodology/approachThe data were gathered by conducting an online survey (n = 441) for the players of World of Warcraft, an MMORPG. The collected data were analyzed with a structural equation model.FindingsThe outcomes of this research reveal that the Proteus effect positively influenced the intentions of the players to play the game via mediations of social, immersion, achievement motivations and enjoyment. Furthermore, the players influenced by the Proteus effect, which enables avatar embodiment and identification, exhibited a stronger intention to play MMORPGs.Originality/valueThis research is one of the first attempts to establish a theoretical framework involving the Proteus effect and Yee's motivations. In addition, the findings of this study imply that the Proteus effect should be considered when investigating the individual experience of metaverse games.

Joint modeling of playing time and purchase propensity in massively multiplayer online role-playing games using crossed random effects

Joint modeling of playing time and purchase propensity in massively multiplayer online role-playing games using crossed random effects

User Review Analysis of Microtransactions in Freemium Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Games Using Structural Topic Modeling

This study investigated player responses to microtransactions in freemium Massively multiplayer online role-playing games (MMORPG), specifically focusing on the game LostArk using English language review data. To this end, structural topic modeling was employed and the following six microtransaction-relevant topics were identified: microtransactions, developer issues, real money trade (RMT), random number generator (RNG) upgrade system, game content, and collectibles & adventure. The first four topics were classified as being "not recommended". However, the proportions of microtransaction-related topics were relatively lower than the other topics. Additionally, this study did not extract keywords related to unfairness and unethical issues in previous microtransaction research. The last two topics, game content, and collectibles & adventure were "recommended" topics, indicating positive functions of microtransactions such as enhancing the game experience by purchasing virtual items. Moreover, it was found that players who do not engage in microtransactions can still be satisfied through continuous game content updates. Additionally, an examination of the interaction effect between time and recommendation status revealed that while the frequency with which the six microtransaction-related topics were mentioned increased over time in the reviews, the ratio of recommendations to non-recommendations varied differently. This study contributes to game-related research by revealing players' authentic opinions on microtransactions in freemium MMORPGs, thereby providing practical implications for game companies.

Emotions and online gaming experiences: An examination of MMORPG gamers from India and the United States

Massively multiplayer online role-playing games (MMORPGs) constitute a genre of online games that has enjoyed phenomenal market success due to in-game purchases and push advertising. Despite the genre's popularity, little is known about players' experiences with these games. Using an Indian panel of 319 players and a U.S. panel of 425 players, we examined multiple game experiences and the impacts of each on players' satisfaction and replay intentions. Study 1 explored Indian players' positive and negative feelings; findings showed that positive feelings positively influenced flow, immersive, and social experiences, whereas negative feelings had no significant effects on other game experiences. Study 2 addressed U.S. players' game experiences as well as their satisfaction and replay intentions. While positive feelings and flow experiences positively affected players' satisfaction and replay intentions, immersive experience did not. Social experiences played a positive role in players' satisfaction but did not influence their replay intentions. Results highlight the importance of positive game experiences and carry managerial implications for game marketers and designers.

The Effects of an MMORPG on Thai EFL University Students’ Reading for Main Ideas

This study aimed to explore the effectiveness of using a massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG) as a tool for improving students’ English reading skills, specifically in identifying main ideas. The study employed a quasi-experimental method to gather comprehensive data, including pre-tests and post-tests consisting of 25 items each, to measure students’ performance before and after utilizing the MMORPG. Additionally, a 15-question questionnaire was used to assess students’ perceptions of using an MMORPG for reading instruction, and semi-structured interviews comprised of five questions were conducted to delve deeper into students’ experiences and opinions. A purposive sample of 35 students enrolled in an English reading course at a university in Nakhon Ratchasima, Thailand was selected for participation. The findings reveal a significant improvement in participants’ post-test scores compared to their pre-test scores (the results of participants’ post-test scores increased from the pre-test scores at 6.657, p = .000), indicating enhanced understanding of main ideas through MMORPG based instruction. Moreover, the majority of participants expressed enjoyment and enhanced learning experiences using the MMORPG approach. This research study has implications for course developers, emphasizing the importance of a systematic process in MMORPG design and exploring the pedagogical benefits of incorporating an MMORPG as an alternative teaching method for similar subjects.

Development of a Unity–VISSIM Co-Simulation Platform to Study Interactive Driving Behavior

This paper presents the system development of a co-simulation platform aimed at studying driving behavior with multiple participants. The objective of this study was to create an immersive and interactive environment where different driving scenarios could be simulated and driver behavior could be recorded and analyzed. The platform integrated the Unity game engine with the VISSIM microscopic traffic simulator to create a hybrid simulation environment that combined the advantages of both tools. A virtual reality massive multiplayer online (VRMMO) module was developed to capture the interactions of the participants during the simulation experiments. The external control devices of this co-simulation platform were calibrated using the empirical data of a Controller Area Network (CAN-BUS) from actual driving behaviors. The main contributions of this study are the demonstration of the Unity–VISSIM co-simulation platform in simulating interactive driver behavior and the potential for its use in various research areas, such as intelligent transportation systems, human factors, driving education, and traffic safety analyses. The platform could be a valuable tool for evaluating the effectiveness of collective intelligence countermeasures in improving traffic systems, with relatively lower costs and risks.

Anger-Related Problems and Sleep Disturbances in Adolescents Playing Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Games

Anger-Related Problems and Sleep Disturbances in Adolescents Playing Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Games

The Stage and the Theatre: AltspaceVR and its Relationship to Discord

Immersive virtual reality (VR) has seen growth in usage over the last few years and that growth is expected to accelerate. Correspondingly, many VR-based online communities have begun to emerge, and several social VR applications such as AltspaceVR have gained significant popularity. However, virtual reality can be isolating. Users can meet and connect with people in VR, but inevitably, when a user removes their headset, their friends are no longer there. In this paper, we look at how communities in AltspaceVR, a popular social VR application, handle this challenge. We conduct fourteen interviews and over 70 hours of participant observation and find that AltspaceVR users and communities have turned to Discord to solve many of their needs, such as facilitating more ubiquitous communication, planning community activities and AltspaceVR Events, and hosting casual social discussion. By using the communicative ecology model for our analysis, we find that AltspaceVR, Discord, and the communities that intersect the two have formed a tightly-coupled communicative ecology, which we call the "stage" and "theater". Discord acts as the "theater," where actors and crew collaborate and communicate to prepare for the main event, all the while building important social bonds. AltspaceVR acts as the "stage," where those efforts manifest in ephemeral but high-value experiences that bring the community together. Finally, we compare the communities we studied with those found in massively-multiplayer online games (MMOGs) and provide insights regarding the design of social VR applications and online communities.

The influence of technology affordance on addictive use in MMOGs: from the perspective of virtual-domain perfectionism

PurposeThe rise and popularity of digitalization have made the addictive use in the virtual world more common, which has aroused wide attention from academia and public. Uncovering the underlying mechanism of addictive use is essential to address this serious issue.Design/methodology/approachBy utilizing the context of massively multiplayer online games (MMOGs), this study developed virtual-domain perfectionism of seeking excellence and avoiding failure from the dual process model of perfectionism and identified four affordances in MMOGs from the perspective of technology affordance. The authors surveyed 302 valid samples in MMOGs to empirically test the research model.FindingsThe results demonstrate that two processes of virtual-domain perfectionism influence addictive use positively in MMOGs. Technology affordances perform as the antecedents of virtual-domain perfectionism and conduct distinct impacts in MMOGs. Specifically, affordances of interaction and identity are positively related to virtual-domain perfectionism, while achievement affordance is unrelated to virtual-domain perfectionism. Immersion affordance is positively related to virtual-domain perfectionism of seeking excellence and negatively associated with virtual-domain perfectionism of avoiding failure.Originality/valueThis study identified virtual-domain perfectionism and specific MMOGs affordances. The research model provides insights into addictive use in MMOGs by leveraging context and combining lenses. Research findings help elucidate the role of virtual-domain perfectionism on the addictive use from MMOGs affordances with the corresponding technical features.

Why viewers send paid gifts: The role of social influence on massively multiplayer online games live streaming

Virtual paid gifts from viewers are the main revenue source for the live streaming gaming industry, with massively multiplayer online games (MMOG) currently representing the most profitable game type. However, there is little understanding regarding what drives gifting behavior in the MMOG live streaming social environment. This study develops a research model for analyzing the antecedents of virtual gifts in the MMOG live streaming context, with monetary value used for quantification. This model builds on the theory of social influence and social impact literature, and it has been validated through an empirical study including 988,829 observations of real-time viewer data that were collected from the Douyu live streaming platform. Our study examines micro-, meso-, and macro-level social influences (i.e., self-presentation, parasocial relationship, and MMOG live streaming loyalty) on viewer gifting behavior and how the presence of others (i.e., social crowdedness of viewers on the live streaming channel) represents a contextual cue that moderates the effects of social influence on gifting behavior. The results reveal that self-presentation, parasocial relationships, and MMOG live streaming loyalty positively affect the monetary value of viewers’ paid gifts. Although the presence of others can strengthen the impact of parasocial relationships and MMOG live streaming loyalty on viewer gifting behavior, it negatively moderates the relationship between self-presentation and gifting behavior. This study theorizes the features of MMOG live streaming and extends the applicability of social influence theory and social impact theory to this context. Finally, we provide insights into how game practitioners facilitate viewer gifting behavior.

Interacting with real-person non-player characters to learn history: development and playing behavior pattern analysis of a remote scaffolding-based situated educational game

ABSTRACT This study developed an online role-playing history education game with real-person NPCs (Non-Player Characters). The game features real people playing NPC characters, and provides a multi-dimensional scaffolding mechanism with realistic story and historical scenes, allowing learners to engage in strategic planning and problem solving during a historical event to facilitate their history empathy and further promote their understanding of historical figures and feelings about historical events. A total of 60 participants were recruited online to participate in this study, with 30 in the experimental group (learning by game) and 30 in the control group (learning by general case discussion). This study explored learning effectiveness, flow status, activity anxiety, history empathy, usefulness of scaffolding, game fidelity, and gaming behavioral patterns. The results showed that the experimental group of learners’ history knowledge improved significantly under the history educational game activities. The game also promoted learners’ history empathy. Both groups had high flow. In addition, multi-dimensional scaffolding was noticed in the game at a high rate, and there was a high degree of usefulness. This study also coded videos of learners’ activity processes and further analyzed the behavioral patterns of learners’ collaborative learning.

Jeu de rôle en ligne : un espace de narrativité inscrit dans la mise en scène de soi et de la famille

AimThe purpose of this research is to study how the way in which players use their avatar in Massive Multiplayer Role-Playing Games (MMORPG) contributes to self-construction. This particular space leads the players to the creation of a specific narrative identity, nurtured by interactions and experiences shared with peers, onto which they project fragments of themselves and their personal history that will be staged through image, action, and language. MethodFour participants were recruited through a notice published on communication servers belonging to different communities of the same online game. The hypotheses were assessed through a series of two semi-structured remote interviews based on a grid of ten themes. ResultsThe results show that role-playing is used as a tool for rewriting personal history, enabling participants to heal, on the level of the fantasy, their individual and family wounds and trauma. In this study, we also noticed that digital transparency supports the spontaneity of communications thanks to its disinhibiting function. Thus, online role-playing games turn out to be a potential space of real creativity where participants can interact by trial and error without fear of failure, where they can be destroyed and can express their own emotions and desires without destroying the other, because it's just pretend. In this way, they develop their subjectivity and try to develop a better affective attunement in order to integrate into the virtual and material human community. Digital transparency also facilitates participants’ investment in online role-playing as a place of projection and staging of their psychic contents in a symbolic repetition where the family history, even the family romance, are reinterpreted and become factors of transformation, reconciliation, or emancipation. DiscussionNarrative identities are true reflections of the participants’ concerns and are invested during and outside game sessions. Through the position of narrator, the participants talk and develop meaningful friendships with other players. They try to give meaning to a shared subjective experience that they record as their own heritage as well as the group's collective memory. In this study, role-playing provides a form of containment for possible depressive affects and diverts attention from anxieties, like Pascal's entertainment. At first, this space could serve as a kind of technological substitute, a “prosthesis” for some players with defective psychic functions, who struggle to express their emotions and to bond with others. But over the years, they seem rather to seize upon the support provided by this “psychic orthosis” that links and connects to rewrite their own history, to seek out and to come to terms with others and themselves. ConclusionIn these overlapping potential spaces of creation, players try to orient their own lives by relying on the experiences they have been able to co-construct through a common narrative, presented as both foreign and unique to themselves. They may feel better equipped to face an intersubjectivity that could sometimes be experienced as disappointing or threatening.

Virtual Gaming as A Contemporary Research Trend for Mental Health Professionals

As technology continues to be a part of our life, online gaming has claimed the hearts of millions of people as a favourite leisure activity. Among them online role-playing game provides people the opportunity to play a desired role, be it a king, princess or warrior. This article aimed to provide an insight into what role-playing game is, and why it has become so popular in recent years, with the help of existing literature. This article also attempted to point out the need to research more in the field of gaming as the existing literature is not sufficient to cover the vastness of the topic. The digitalization of games from physical form to online form has changed the way games has been viewed, played, and understood. Due to the popularity of online games, there is a significant change in the research around online games, especially role-playing games. There is still more research needed in Indian context about online games as it has become a popular source of entertainment throughout all the ages and also become a huge source of economy.

Bridging anthropological theory: Accumulating and containing wealth in World of Warcraft landscapes

Human ingenuity responds to changing environments and resources with technological sophistication and variations in accumulative behaviors. While anthropologists look to the past and to processes of globalization to sketch these shifts in the natural world, there is a growing awareness that these transformations also occur in digital online worlds. I argue that archaeology’s attention to materiality provides useful analysis and directions for ethnographic video game analysis. I use research from the massively multiplayer online role-playing game World of Warcraft: Warlords of Draenor, where players marshal social and economic resources in both the natural and digital worlds. In constructing reputations and accumulating prestige, players integrate online and offline resources, traversing the tangible/digital divide in their pursuit of achievement. Archaeological perspectives and theories of aggrandizement, containment, systems, landscapes, and ontological materiality provide opportunities to expand ethnographic video game research and debates into new directions.

Player Experience and Enjoyment: A Preliminary Examination of Differences in Video Game Genre

Introduction Player experience is the interaction between individual qualities and game attributes. It is becoming a popular topic to understand why individuals are interested in different video games. The current literature offers a range of different scales that measure similar player experience factors but often lack published validity analysis. The Player Experience Index is an empirically validated measure based on the means-end theory. The current study used this measure to analyse player experience factors and enjoyment among single-player shooter, single-player role-playing, massively multiplayer online shooter, and massively multiplayer online role-playing video games. Methods Analyses were based on a sample of 145 participants who completed an online survey. Results Results indicated that player experience factors were related to enjoyment, with differing results based on video game genre. It was also found that greater levels of enjoyment were reported by participants who preferred single-player mode of play compared to massively multiplayer online play mode, and participants who preferred single-player role-playing games indicated greater levels of enjoyment than the other three groups. Discussion While there was an uneven and small sample size for each video game category, the findings of this exploratory study highlight that further research is warranted. Future research should consider analysing the player experience for currently available and marketed video games to better understand how player experience influences enjoyment in the rapidly evolving gaming industry and its role in gaming design.

Reviewing the potentials of MMOGs as research environments: A case study from the strategy game Travian.

Massively Multiplayer Online Games (MMOGs) provide many opportunities for scientists. Previous research ranges from personality trait prediction to alternative cancer treatments. However, there is an ongoing debate on whether these virtual worlds are able to represent real world scenarios. The mapping of online and offline findings is key to answering this question. Our work contributes to this discussion by providing an overview of the findings from network-based team and leadership research and by matching them with concrete results from our MMOG case study. One major finding is that team size matters. We show that high diversity in the type of teams is a major challenge, especially when combined with the immense amount of data in MMOGs. In our work, we discuss these issues and show that a well-grounded understanding of the data and the game environment makes it possible to overcome these limitations. Besides the team size, the aggregation periods play an important role. Regarding MMOGs as research environments, we show that it is important to pay close attention to the specific game-related contexts, the incentive structures, and the downside risks. Methodologically, we apply support and communication networks to show the influence of certain group-based measures (e.g., density, transitivity) as well as leadership-centered characteristics (e.g., k-core, group centrality, betweenness centralization) on team performance. Apart from our findings on centralization in communication networks, we are able to demonstrate that our results confirm the theoretical predictions which suggest that the behavioral patterns observed in MMOG teams are comparable to those observed in offline work teams.

Massive online multiplayer games as an environment for English learning among Iranian EFL students

Research has shown that massively multiplayer online role-playing games (MMORPGs) have the potential to offer language learning opportunities. However, there is a dearth of research exploring student attitudes about the potential of these games for language learning. We used the language learning principles framework proposed by Brown and Lee (2015) to explore the attitudes of informal Iranian EFL gamers about the potential of the MMORPG environment for language learning. Using a mixed-methods approach, data collected by means of a questionnaire (N = 500) and semi-structured interviews (N = 20) showed that participant attitudes aligned with eight language learning principles (i.e. autonomy, transfer, reward, self-regulation, identity and investment, interaction, languaculture, and agency). The findings of the study highlight the potential of the MMORPG environment for language learning. Parents and EFL teachers should consider the potential affordances of the MMORPG environment as an alternative or complement to formal English language learning environments.

Legal and Ethical Issues of Reverse Engineering the Video Game

A massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG) is a type of online video game that allows many players to participate in the game simultaneously; Players can interact with each other worldwide to cooperate or compete (Gose, 2014). Reverse engineering could enable the company to improve the efficiency and quality of the game product (CSCHEAFER, 2020). Video game companies could examine the strength of a game system while finding competing companies’ weaknesses in terms of security, interoperability, and performance (NC State University, n.d.). The author will analyze intellectual property laws to help understand how to protect the video game industry when implementing reverse engineering. Additionally, the author will explain how a video game companies could strengthen the legal and ethical frameworks for protecting the legal rights of the video game industry, such as the sale, distribution, licensing of games. When a company spends time and money to develop a new game, it should put itself into other inventors’ shoes to think about whether it is ethical and legal to reverse engineer others’ products without significantly hurting their economic benefits and intellectual property rights (GeeksPrep, n.d.). Moreover, this paper will illustrate the moral obligation of companies and the importance of minimizing the risk of harm to companies and inventors during reverse engineering products.

Using literature-based discovery to develop hypotheses for the moderating effect of massively multiplayer online games

Background: Empirical studies have shown that the relationship between psychological flow state and game addiction tends to be weaker in massively multiplayer online (MMO) games compared with non-MMO games. However, a theoretical explanation for the moderating effect of MMO games is lacking in the literature. This paper uses interview data and a method for generating hypotheses, literature-based discovery (LBD), to identify potential moderating factors and develop theories about this relationship. Methods: The proposed method involved text mining 2,829 abstracts to generate a keyword list of potential underlying moderating factors. Interview data from three domain experts confirmed the usefulness of LBD. Instead of arriving at game addiction primarily through flow, the interview data revealed that different cognitive pathways may lead to game addiction in MMO games. Results: Specifically, the identified keywords led to three explanations for the observed moderating effect: (1) social interaction in MMOGs may prevent the progression from flow to game addiction or induce positive peer influence; (2) game performance typically measured using a score- or point-based system in non-MMO games offers an extrinsic motivation that is more in line with flow theory; and (3) intrinsic motivation and escapism may be more important drivers of MMO game addiction. This paper summarizes the domain experts’ views on the usefulness of LBD in theory development. Conclusions: This paper uses literature-based discovery (LBD) to demonstrate how the pathways to game addiction in MMO games differ from non-MMO games. LBD is a method for generating hypotheses seldom used in the social science literature.

Blockchain Meets Metaverse and Digital Asset Management: A Comprehensive Survey

Envisioned to be the next-generation Internet, the metaverse has been attracting enormous attention from both the academia and industry. The metaverse can be viewed as a 3D immersive virtual world, where people use Augmented/Virtual Reality (AR/VR) devices to access and interact with others through digital avatars. While early versions of the metaverse exist in several Massively Multiplayer Online (MMO) games, the full-flesh metaverse is expected to be more complex and enabled by various advanced technologies. Blockchain is one of the crucial technologies that could revolutionize the metaverse to become a decentralized and democratic virtual society with its own economic and governance system. Realizing the importance of blockchain for the metaverse, our goal in this paper is to provide a comprehensive survey that clarifies the role of blockchain in the metaverse including in-depth analysis of digital asset management. To this end, we discuss how blockchain can enable the metaverse from different perspectives, ranging from user applications to virtual services and the blockchain-enabled economic system. Furthermore, we describe how blockchain can shape the metaverse from the system perspective, including various solutions for the decentralized governance system and data management. The potential of blockchain for security and privacy aspects of the metaverse infrastructure is also figured out, while a full flow of blockchain-based digital asset management for the metaverse is investigated. Finally, we discuss a wide range of open challenges of the blockchain-empowered metaverse.