I can certainly understand the cause of concern for the lack of dedicated servers being the main foundation what creates online pc gaming communities in th
e first place but it got me thinking further, thinking and questioning about forms of gaming communities in games today. What alternative forms are there? How are they created? What game systems are in place to create or encourage gaming communities and to allow easy accessibility to interaction with other players feeling like you apart of something? Looking and exploring this topic further you may start think that maybe the lack dedicated servers isn’t such a big deal for the COD experience after all.
is the achievement system which has created the current design ethos within contemporary games of instant gratification which cleverly hides the competitive nature of completion via encouraging silly bragging rights with your friends and indiscreetly gives gamers an incentive to connect with other players comparing achievements and sharing a interest in the same games. You could argue that this is a superficial approach for creating sense of community (like a vain fashion show with women end up fighting or chatting away cause they wearing the same shoes) compared to pc communities as they created within for the love and passion of a chosen played game, but then yet Xbox live’s focus is far more ambiguous appealing broader spectrum of audiences from casual gamers to hardcore, etc. That’s what I found interesting about Xbox live is its form and purpose as a service and its functions creating that service as a service is strong as functions and tools, right? I don’t think Xbox Live service directly creates gaming communities within itself but certainly provides functions and tools as service for game devs to create gaming communities or sense of completion and reward for players in many imaginative ways.These days retroperspective games are really popular and they have certainly have re-built a place within modern gaming within the few past years with digital distribution becoming more accepted and of course their evolutional push towards design of conventional game mechanics and patterns from their skilled developers but there’s one simple element/feature which I think make these games as vital and liberating as they were back in the day. In fact so important it could make or break a game
for the lack of… Here I announce it the “online scoreboard” yes I give you a few moments to take that in, yes an online scoreboard.I remember how back in the day, the scoreboard was the secondary feature just left in from being lazy port of the arcade version and these days, it’s the main hook for the overall playability wasting hours trying to beat my friends scores on titles like “Trails HD” and “Geometry Wars 2”. I find it amazing how such a small simple bit of functionality can create such intense completion and desire to learn the mechanics coming up with new ways to gain more points. Lately I’ve been playing “Trails HD” and it has this level editor feature which can be only shared among your friends list (no way to officially publish your levels publicly, not sure why they didn’t such functionality) and recently I saw this video made by the dev team “Red Lynx” showing their favourite made levels from users, have a watch: http://www.eurogamer.net/videos/exclusive-trials-hd-user-made-levels It’s quite cool to see “Red Lynx” are acknowledging the hard work that users have put into building some great tracks and coming up with alternative solutions for sharing content developing a small community and there are lots of videos on youtube with many users trying express and share their work. You could say that isn’t a gaming community as “Red Lynx” isn’t supporting it with forums and modding tools, etc and obviously it’s isn’t a type of game which you would associate with gaming communities as it’s no World of Warcraft but then again it’s a game for very different type of player wanting a different type of experience therefore it’s has to be different community to reflect that. Trails HD seems to have very insular but keen community although it isn’t very self-contained or organised but certainly reflects their indie roots as developers and of course the subject matter of the game being about extreme stunts and rock ‘n’ roll. It gives the game unique vibe or sense of character which makes it seem quite cute and friendly.
What I’m ultimately trying to say is that I believe that it’s down to developer’s creativity to use the tools at hand to create experience and form of community which correlates with that core experience as sense of community is a great gaming intervention as no one wants feel alone. I certainly would like to look further into gaming communities and their form as an industry we need to invent new type and styles of communities.
Jonesy
