Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley door pickup 10am - 7pm 3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
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  • Open Daily: 10am - 10pm
    Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm

    3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
    612-822-4611

Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm
3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
612-822-4611
Game Worlds Get Real: How Who We Are Online Became Who We Are Offline

Game Worlds Get Real: How Who We Are Online Became Who We Are Offline

Valkyrie, Zek

Hardcover

Games & Activities GeneralAmerican Art - Asian-AmericanGeneral Sociology

ISBN10: 144085128X
ISBN13: 9781440851285
Publisher: Praeger
Published: Jul 14 2017
Pages: 256
Weight: 1.35
Height: 1.00 Width: 6.20 Depth: 9.30
Language: English

This book explores how after 20 years of existence, virtual world games have evolved: the social landscapes within digital worlds have become rigid and commodified, and play and fun have become rational and mechanical products.

Twenty million people worldwide play Massively Multi-Player Online Role Playing Games (MMORPGs). Online role-playing gaming is no longer an activity of a tiny niche community. World of Warcraft--the most popular game within the genre--is more than a decade old. As technology has advanced and MMORPGs became exponentially more popular, gaming culture has evolved dramatically over the last 20 years. Game Worlds Get Real: How Who We Are Online Became Who We Are Offline presents a compelling insider's examination of how adventuring through virtual worlds has transformed the meaning of play for millions of gamers.

The book provides a historical review of earlier incarnations of virtual world games and culture in the late 1990s, covering the early years of popular games like EverQuest, to the soaring popularity of World of Warcraft, to the current era of the genre and its more general gaming climate. Author Zek Valkyrie--a researcher in the areas of gaming culture, digital communities, gender, sexualities, and visual sociology as well as an avid gamer himself--explores the evolution of the meaning of play in the virtual game world, explains how changes in game design have reduced opportunities for social experimentation, and identifies how player types such as the gender switcher, the cybersexual, the explorer, and the trial-and-error player have been left behind in the interest of social and informational transparency.

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