The Web of Game Culture
Introduction
Game culture is a large main topic that includes many subcultures and topics. This culture didn't occur suddenly, it has been exist for a long time because according to Huizinga the game existed before the culture. ?n other words culture developed by playing games. ?f we look at the game culture, we should look specific area such as 20th-21th century because mostly different branches that supporting the game culture emerged in this century. ?n this article some issues related with game culture like e-sport, relationships with other media and politics were mentioned.
E-sport
After the late 2000s e-sports became very popular and important for game culture itself. ?t still grows into a billion-dollar industry. The game industry is thus growing thanks to e-sport and that is why it is so important. Moreover, we can say it created a new profession. Now there are professional players and tournaments are organized for them and giving money prizes are awarded to players in the world, at the end.
Last October, the 2018 League of Legends World Championship finals drew more than 205 million simultaneous viewers. Back in August, The International – an annual tournament for battle game Dota 2 – split a prize pool of over $25 million. Even here in the Blizzard Arena, every Overwatch player receives a minimum salary of $50,000 along with health benefits and a retirement plan. Yet as the industry continues to infiltrate the mainstream, long-standing issues within gaming culture are coming into focus, threatening to undermine its potential. A 2016 convention for the streaming platform Twitch, for example, included a panel to discuss harassment, racism and under-representation in gaming. Everything went smoothly… until the event’s live chat feed erupted with racist bile directed at its speakers, all of whom were African or American. These eruptions are not uncommon. The problem is that players often see the spontaneity of these platforms as being invaluable to their personal brand, believing that ‘entertainment value’ should trump everything else – even in communities where toxic behaviour can lead to fines, suspension or the end of a career. Whether it stems from a disconnect caused by technology, unrecognised privilege or the current political climate, this open hostility towards people of colour, women and LGBTQ players is creating barriers that other pros simply don’t experience.[1]
Players who have come from different parts of the world in such game tournaments are competing with each other. When this kind of racist or disturbing events happen, all the people who follow this tournament are aware and see on the social media or Twitch and YouTube. Therefore, it spreads everywhere on the world. As players represent their teams and their countries, these behaviours both undermine their image. Thus, the view of the game culture is changing in a bad sense. ?n that case if we look closely there are bad aspects of esports as well as good sides.
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Relationship with Other Media
Nowadays, the point where the game culture comes from (the accessibility of the games, the place where people occupy their lives) is at an unprecedented level and this situation shows itself in other environments. This not just about the movies and series adaptations from games like Tomb Raider or Mortal Kombat. World of Warcraft and The Assassins Creed novels have been translated into many languages and are available in all bookstores. In addition to the periodicals on games in general, periodicals dedicated to specific games are also on sale. Besides the film adaptations of the games, high quality documentaries are also made about the games. Indie Game: The Movie is one of them. There are also documentaries for players like King of Kong in 2007 and game culture. If we look at the situation in general, the game industry and the film industry today have changed completely compared to 30 years ago. In the past, a supportive game was made in the movie (He-Man, A Nightmare on Elm Street, etc.) and today the movies try to take advantage of the series of games (Assassin’s Creed, Star Wars, The Witcher, etc.).
Games affect other sectors as well as affected by other sectors. For example, in the 1990s, George Lucas, the owner of Lucas Arts made some cinematographic video games such as The Secret of Monkey Island (1992), Sam and Max Hit the Road (1993), Full Throttle (1996), and Grim Fandango (1998). Thus, we saw the peak of the merger of the cinema and the gaming industry.
Another think is comics, manga and animation. Many video games have been adapted from comic books. Most of these adaptations are based on usually DC Comics’ and Marvel superheroes.
In Japan, the list is significantly larger, since video games have always been strongly associated with other Japanese media, especially animé and manga. Manga is the word in Japanese for comics or printed cartoons. Animé are Japanese animated films created according to a distinct aesthetic, influenced almost exclusively by manga. Video games, which have such a major importance in Japanese popular culture, appeal to a whole generation, named the “visual generation” (shikaku sedai) in Japan. The obsessive fans of these hobbies are called by the Japanese pejorative term otaku. Consequently, almost every popular manga and animé have been adapted into video games in Japan. [2] For instance, Pokémon Go was released in 2016 and had a great success.
In 1914, Winsor McCay lovingly crafted line-art animation in a masterpiece known as “Gertie the Dinosaur.” It was the first time someone had created a true character for the screen and had the character act out a little story. Thus, the history of animation started. We can see some games based on animations such as Ben 10 games or Powerpuff girls games.
To sum up, games and other entertainment sectors have become an integral whole.
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Politics
Some policies made in history brought us to this situation. For example, if the Germans had not fought in the second world war, if the Nazism had not existed or even the war itself had not existed, there would not have been many war games today. Recently, whether or not games should include politics is discussed. ?n many war games include propagandas. Usually we see the American side of war.
Video games are the newest in a line of forms of expression, and each new form of expression from stone monuments to the printing press eventually wades into consequential ideas, especially with regards to power and social norms. People put their expressions out there for other people to consume; a responsible consumer acknowledges the meaning put into it. ?f we look at in that perspective, it doesn't matter if it's politics in the game. The problem is, just to show that the right side is you and the wrong side is the other side. This kind of propaganda in the game damage the game culture.
?f we look at something like Bioshock for example, which is as political as it gets in games. It shows us a world where libertarian ideas have been taken to an extreme, that soared to unimaginable prosperity for some, and fathomless despair for others. However, as the story unravels, we begin to aware that the people who claim to fight for the downtrodden are in fact just feeding on their misery to make a grab for power themselves. The final boss is not Andrew Ryan, but Frank Fontaine. By the end of it it's lambasted basically all extreme forms of politics. It shows that having no compassion for the weak in an attempt to unleash the full potential of the best and smartest creates a lot of angry people, but also that those people are easily exploited by convincing them to fight for equality only to install yourself as their dictator. It's a highly political game, but it's not preachy.
Conclusion
Game culture has so many webs to connect with something. These things that mentioned above add strength to game culture’s power. As time goes by, new things will emerge. Thus, the game culture will continue to feed.
Bibliography
?Video Games and Their Relationship with Other Media-Page 4 by Martin Picard
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[1] https://www.huckmag.com/perspectives/reportage-2/esports-stars-diversity-gaming-culture/
[2] Video Games and Their Relationship with Other Media-Page 4 by Martin Picard