Doing reading 06, Week 18 (6)

Today I will be discussing the common themes I noted that correlated in several different annotated bibliographies. These themes can be seen throughout my bibliography reviews and will help me in the future when writing my literature review in the future.

Theme 1: Online community.

I identified a theme that focused on the explanation of the Mmorpg's community. There was several mentions of how large this community of players is and how players can be from multiple points in the world to form one big player base. This also included how they interacted with each other and formed connections like Parties and Guilds.

"An MMORPG is a communal World online where many players can participate in different activities to further their goals and exploration."

" PvP is the driving force to why players quarrel, in this way if players quarrel between guilds it is expected that the whole guild takes action to fight alongside their guild partner."

Theme 2: The effects on mentality

During the review of my annotated bibliographies I came across a lot of articles mentioning the possible effects on mental health within the players which included both positive and negative effects while playing MMORPG's.

"The MMORPG genre can produce a type of feeling related to social Identity which means that the individual’s knowledge that they belong to a group and community keeps them loyal to said community, for MMORPG’s this is essential to the success of the game."

"Delwiche wrote to be cautious of the possibility of becoming addicted to the games"

Theme 3: The Gameplay design and Mechanics.

 There was a common theme focused on the dynamics of how MMORPG's are run. Several Academic Articles referenced the mechanics of MMORPG games and how they have developed over the years. I found that in many of these articles development was mentioned as well. 

There was several correlations through the writings on how the game rules worked and the various different play styles of MMORPG's. I found that a lot of these papers included a long explanation on those elements.

" Two classifications in the activities and play styles of the game are known as (PvE) which stands for Player versus Environment and (PvP) which stands for Player versus Player."

"These text based adventure games played through typing a command which was two words and having your character carry out those commands all through text in response to a prompt from the game."

Theme 4: Inside the game world

I found that the theme of exploring the story of a given game popped up a lot throughout each bibliography this included how it worked in tandem with imagination and game-play in order to immerse the player. Several of the focuses for this theme also mentioned role-playing into the world.

" There is also several role-play servers for those who would like to stay in character."

" Students could also visualise themselves in the role of game developers and scientists due to the independence of safe environments."

Theme 5: Challenges for both players and developers.

This theme focused on the issues I found throughout my bibliography that both players and developers had to go through regarding the MMORPG experience. Several of them include scamming or the general gaming system.

" Scammers can also use the environment of the game in order to tempt players into falling for their trap."

" These class types help to contribute to a party system where different skills are needed to band together."

(My Theme outlines which can be found here)