Gaming News: Online Gaming News and Video Gaming // Current

^#1

Guy Marries Video Game, We Don't Judge

That Nene Anegasaki, she's a charmer. She's also a video game character from extreme dating sim Love Plus, now wedded to... more

pjacobs51
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Brad Pitt prepares to enter a 'Dark Void'

A major Hollywood star is jumping into the video game to major movie fray. Word is that Brad Pitt has secured the rights to... more

MediaJor
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Church Simulator 'Mass: We Pray' Revealed To Be 'Dante's Inferno' Publicity Stunt

Once again, Electronic Arts has exploited Christians to help promote its upcoming video game adaptation of Dante's Inferno.... more

remanns
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PSLS Presents – Kevin Shortt, Ubisoft Montreal

At this year’s London MCM Expo PlayStation LifeStyle managed to talk to Kevin Shortt, the lead script writer for Avatar: The... more

Trexman89
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puiaovidiuion
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Sony Announces Current PSN User Base Figures

The PlayStation 3 is not the only one to have recently turned three, the PlayStation Network also shares the same birthday,... more

Trexman89
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Although often seen as an inconsequential feature of digital technologies, one's self-representation, or avatar, in a virtual environment can affect the user's thoughts, according to research by a University of Texas at Austin communication professor.

In the first study to use avatars to prime negative responses in a desktop virtual setting, Jorge Peña, assistant professor in the College of Communication, demonstrated that the subtext of an avatar's appearance can simultaneously prime negative (or anti-social) thoughts and inhibit positive (or pro-social) thoughts inconsistent with the avatar's appearance. All of this while study participants remained unaware they had been primed. The study, co-written with Cornell University Professor Jeffrey T. Hancock and University of Texas at Austin graduate student Nicholas A. Merola, appears in the December 2009 issue of Communication Research.

In two separate experiments, research participants were randomly assigned a dark- or white-cloaked avatar, or to avatars wearing physician or Ku Klux Klan-like uniforms or a transparent avatar. The participants were assigned tasks including writing a story about a picture, or playing a video game on a virtual team and then coming to consensus on how to deal with infractions.

Consistently, participants represented by an avatar in a dark cloak or a KKK-like uniform demonstrated negative or anti-social behavior in team situations and in individual writing assignments.

Previous studies have demonstrated these uniform types to have negative effects on people's behaviors in face-to-face interactions. For example, Cornell researchers Mark Frank and Tom Gilovich showed that dark uniforms influence professional sports teams to play more aggressively on the playing field and in the laboratory. Peña's research demonstrates how these effects operate in desktop-based video games, and sheds light on the automatic cognitive processes that explain this effect.

"When you step into a virtual environment, you can potentially become 'Mario' or whatever other character you are portraying," said Peña, who studies how humans think, behave and feel online. "Oftentimes, the connotations of our own virtual character will subtly remind us of common stereotypes, such as 'bad guys wear black or dress up in hooded robes.' This association may surreptitiously steer users to think and behave more antisocially, but also inhibit more pro-social thoughts and responses in a virtual environment."

According to Peña, these findings can be particularly useful to video game and combat simulation developers.

"By manipulating the appearance of the avatar, you can augment the probability of people thinking and behaving in predictable ways without raising suspicion," said Peña. "Thus, you can automatically make a virtual encounter more competitive or cooperative by simply changing the connotations of one's avatar."

Source:

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/11/091110211037.htmAlthough often seen as an inconsequential feature of digital technologies, one's self-representation, or avatar, in a virtual... more

pjacobs51
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129 comments

10 days ago

^#8

Is Firefox headed to Playstation 3?

Mozilla is apparently in talks with Sony about bringing Firefox to the Playstation 3. It could make for a pretty cool partnership.

admillios
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3 comments

1 day ago

^#9

The ASUS G51J-A1 Gaming Notebook: Great Performance, Full HD, Good Price

The $1,499 ASUS G51J-A1 gaming rig is a powerful machine packing an Intel Core i7 processor and Nvidia’s GeForce GTX 260M... more

KTBradford
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0 comments

7 hours ago

^#10

You can animate for DC Universe Online

~y2009m11d20-Sony-joins-with-Mass-Animation-to-launch-DCU-Online-Animation-Contest-on-Facebook Sony and Mass Entertainment join... more

WesleySmith
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17 hours ago

^#11

Black Friday deals: GameStop

Arguably the biggest shopping day of the year, Black Friday, is now one week away. To help you find the best video game deals near... more

Xander756
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16 hours ago

^#12

Did airport slaughter scene get Modern Warfare 2 banned in Russia?

I'll admit, I don't play a lot of video games. Nor do I blog about video games. I do, however, love to blog about Russia. And so it caught my eye this week when the two crossed paths. It was reported yesterday that Russia has apparently banned the sale of the game Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2. The deal is this: the game takes place in a world where Russia is ruled by extreme nationalists. At one point in the game, you're an undercover Army officer who participates in a bloody slaughter of civilians at an airport. It's perpetrated by a Russian extremist cell and the scene begins with its leader telling everyone "No Russian."

Paul Tassi at True/Slant played through the level and described it as such:
"You walk out into the security gate at an airport, with lines full of people swarming to get through to their flights. I cocked my head while playing, as did all the civilians who turned to stare at us, and before I knew what was happening, Makarov and his men opened fire. My jaw hit the floor as I watched them mow down about thirty people in under five seconds. But then the level actually begins, and it’s one of the most disturbing things I’ve ever taken part in. The game forces you to walk at a snail’s pace through the airport, so you get the full effect of what’s happening. All around you, fleeing civilians are being mowed down by Makarov’s team, and you witness some crawling away trying to hide, and some sitting up against walls, nursing their wounds....The entire time the scene was unfolding, I was just thinking in my head “This is the Mumbai Massacre, I am playing the Mumbai Massacre.”

The Russians understandably took umbrage to the scene and yesterday the internet was afire with reports of the game's banning. Today, however, Activision says the game has not been banned in Russia, but that the controversial scene has been removed. I haven't found anything about the game in a cursory look through the English-language Russian press, but if you see anything send it our way.

FROM THE NEWS BLOG: http://blogs.current.com/news/2009/11/17/did-airport-slaughter-scene-get-modern-warfare-2-banned-in-russia/

SOURCES: http://news.cnet.com/8301-17852_3-10399131-71.html
http://trueslant.com/tassi/2009/11/16/reflecting-on-modern-warfare-2s-airport-massacre/
http://features.csmonitor.com/innovation/2009/11/17/modern-warfare-2-not-banned-in-russia-according-to-activision/I'll admit, I don't play a lot of video games. Nor do I blog about video games. I do, however, love to blog about... more