"Game stories have evolved from the simple kidnapped-girl plot of Donkey Kong to the complex novel-length tales of modern RPGs. In addition, the ability of the player to interact with and affect the story has created many new and different types of stories that are difficult if not impossible to por
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tray in other kinds of media. Although games are an excellent medium for many types of storytelling, their interactivity makes them far different from more traditional media such as books and film. Interactive stories themselves havemany unique and challenging issues that aren’t encountered when writing a more traditionally structured tale, which we’ll be discussing all throughout the rest of this book. Game writers also need to think about many other factors, such as the synthesis between the story and gameplay and how to maintain a proper pace when the story’s progression is, at least to a certain extent, controlled by the player." (Page 5)
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"This book is for people who are interested in creating their own computer games for the Windows platform. Using the easy but powerful The Games Factory 2 software, you will be able to make games quicker and easier than ever before, without any programming knowledge. Game creation is a lot of fun an
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d easier than you might have previously imagined; it really is simple to start making your own games. The Games Factory 2 software that we use in this book allows you to make many different types of games, such as card games, board games, puzzles, platform games, side-scrolling games, shoot ‘em ups, adventure games, and more. If you have always dreamed of making your own games, now is your chance." (Introduction)
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"This book offers a view of the cultural, family, and interpersonal consequences of mobile communication across the globe. Scholars analyze the effect of mobile communication on all parts of life, from the relationship between literacy and the textual features of mobile phones to the use of ringtone
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s as a form of social exchange, from the “aspirational consumption” of middle-class families in India to the belief in parts of Africa and Asia that mobile phones can communicate with the dead. The contributors explore the ways mobile communication profoundly affects the tempo, structure, and process of daily life around the world. The book discusses the impact of mobile communication on social networks, other communication strategies, traditional forms of social organization, and political activities. It considers how quickly miraculous technologies come to seem ordinary and even necessary; and how ordinary technology comes to seem mysterious and even miraculous. The chapters cut across social issues and geographical regions; they highlight use by the elite and the masses, utilitarian and expressive functions, and political and operational consequences. Taken together, the chapters demonstrate how mobile communication has affected the quality of life in both exotic and humdrum settings, and how it increasingly occupies center stage in people’s lives around the world." (Publisher description)
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"In the many studies of games and young people's use of them, little has been written about an overall “ecology” of gaming, game design and play—mapping the ways that all the various elements, from coding to social practices to aesthetics, coexist in the game world. This volume looks at games
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as systems in which young users participate, as gamers, producers, and learners. The Ecology of Games aims to expand upon and add nuance to the debate over the value of games—which so far has been vociferous but overly polemical and surprisingly shallow. Game play is credited with fostering new forms of social organization and new ways of thinking and interacting; the contributors work to situate this within a dynamic media ecology that has the participatory nature of gaming at its core. They look at the ways in which youth are empowered through their participation in the creation, uptake, and revision of games; emergent gaming literacies, including modding, world-building, and learning how to navigate a complex system; and how games act as points of departure for other forms of knowledge, literacy, and social organization." (Back cover)
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"The Encyclopedia of Children, Adolescents, and the Media presents state-of-the-art research and ready-to-use facts on the media's interaction with children and adolescents. With more than 400 entries, the two volumes of this resource cover the traditional and electronic media and their controversia
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l impact—for good and ill—on children and adolescents." (Publisher description)
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"[This book] is meant to be a resource for writers and designers and those who must work with us and who may want to talk intelligently with us at some point. This is not a book of rules that, if slavishly followed, will guarantee success. You’ll see that just about every time I try to lay down so
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me canonical law to follow, I immediately think of exceptions. Don’t be afraid to break any rules as you write, as long as you know exactly what they mean, and why they’re rules to begin with. Pablo Picasso knew this, as you’ll soon see. It is one of the continuing themes running through this book. Think of it as a book of ideas and of choices. With any luck, it will help you to generate ideas of your own. And you will feel more comfortable when choices present themselves as you write. Knowing which choices to make is not teachable. It’s part of that creative instinct we call talent whose secret voice guides us in our decisions every time we sit down at the keyboard. And anyway, they will be different for different people. Despite what writing gurus say, all stories are not identical. They are shaped by all those unique facets of the human beings who write them." (Introduction)
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"The 2000 Yearbook treats two themes, both of which relate to newer features of the media landscape: violence in video and computer games, and pornography on television and on Internet. Some articles in the Yearbook also discuss findings on audience perceptions of violence and sex in the media. The
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choice of these themes has to do with the marked increase in the availability of such content to children and youth via new media technologies. The Yearbook comes with two bibliographies: Research on Pornography and Sex in the Media and Research on Video and Computer Games." (Publisher description)
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