An Auto-Ethnographic Project

 

History:

Commercial gaming began in the 1950’s as a niche interest, it then moved on to be a feature in social situations (restaurants and arcades), to home gaming systems like Atari and is now one of the biggest and most profitable industries in the world thanks to the infiltration of PC’s in the home throughout the past 15 or so years. The East Asian subcontinent is the largest gaming market in the world – the Asian Pacific region being worth an estimated $51.2 billion USD. Gamers in this region first used gaming as a method of stress relief (living in a high pressure society) but gaming, in particular ‘ESports’ has now become one of the largest ‘competitive’ sports in Asia, and is on track to become a medal event in the 2022 Asian Games.

 

Experience:

Emily G: The main gaming consoles I grew up with were Gameboys, Nintendo DS and PC games my mum would buy for us. In my early teens, we purchased a small Asian arcade system that has over 400 different games to choose from.

The mixture of Asian games we played definitely brought back some nostalgic feelings back from my childhood. Super Mario Bros specifically reminded me of playing the game at my grandparents place after school on the classic Nintendo 64. I enjoyed the interactive One Night, Hot Springs and the choice of selecting your own outcome that I compared to the app on the IPhone episode. The other games were a lot less engaging for me as they’re was so much information on the screen, yet little to no interaction the player has with it.

Chantelle: The games I grew up with in my childhood were mainly on Nintendo DS where I played Nintendogs and The Legend of Zelda. On other occasions I would play Guitar Hero on the Playstation 2 with my brothers and The Sims 3 on my laptop as I got older in my early teenage years. While playing the games chosen for this video, I was definitely thrown off in terms of what I was expecting it to be like, especially for “Dragon Awaken”. Compared to something like The Sims where it’s pretty easy to navigate and understand, this game had different screens everywhere, particular levels to unlock to be able to receive particular things as well and even at some stages the game would play itself as an automated response, which made it even more difficult to keep up with.

The simulation One night, Hot springs and Super Mario Bros were a lot easier on the eyes in terms of how much was going on at once. Super Mario Bros was just on the app on iPhone where a touch of the screen was all that was needed. One Night, Hot Springs, as a visual novel itself was slow in terms of it was more a storytelling game than anything. This game definitely helped me understand more on a couple of  different aspects in which I wasn’t aware about. This experience helped me as a cultural outsider understand more about the insiders (Maso, 2001) and the culture that surrounds Japan and its Hot Springs as well as creating a deeper understanding of Transgender individuals and discrimination they go through on a daily basis.

Emily B: The extent of my gaming knowledge is slim to say the least, I had a Nintendo DS at age 10 or 11 on which I played Nintendogs and Cooking Mama and then my sister pestered my mum into getting a Wii when I was about 14 so maybe I had missed my time but I had a crack at the Wii Sports every now and again and that was it. So for me, our topic of Asian Gaming was something that I had NEVER explored. I found the entire process of finding a game that was suitable to play quite interesting because I had never realised all of the limitations and factors to take into consideration; like a Mac or PC supported game, the thought of having to pay for extras or coins or whatever currency is used within the game never occured to me as something to think about until then. Through the research of finding the actual games themselves I realised just how different the gaming is in Asia to here in Australia. In Asian gaming there seems to be an abundance of games which are mostly more affordable and more accessible (meaning that owning a PC should do the trick rather than an expensive PlayStation or XBOX).

I found that when it came to actually playing the games I could be considered a beginners level at the very most if not a total noob. I find that kind of hand-eye coordination really hard and I tapped the screen or the keys completely out of time with the game and I didn’t even  know what action it was they were performing. I enjoyed the games like One Night Hot Springs because it was a slow paced and social game rather than just running full speed ahead swinging a sword like Sacred Saga and Dragon Awaken. My favourite game though was Mario Bros, even though I sucked at it, it was the easiest to understand.  

Emily K: I got my Nintendo DS when I was 10 years old and I spent most of my time before and after school playing all sorts of games. Super Mario was one of my favourite games and it remains a classic today. While playing super Mario on my phone I was reminiscing on those days I played on my DS and how much of a difference it is to play the game on another device. As much as I spent most of my time playing games in my youth, I have never experienced Asian gaming up until this year. This may be because I used my DS or Playstation more than a Mac or PC, or because I was never allowed to download games on our family laptop due to the “viruses” that would come with it.

Games like Sacred Saga and Dragon Awaken that we downloaded on our Mac software had too much going on so it felt less like a game and more like a challenge. I felt less reason to play them and assumed these types of games were for dedicated gamers, learning the ins and outs of the game. The most I ever got to playing a game similar to this was Sims; which my siblings and I played throughout our teen years. The Hot Springs simulation game was interesting to play as it reminded me of some of my DS games such as Nintendogs where you are in control of the storyline.

 

Researching the game:

Super Mario Run: Super Mario is a classic when it comes to gaming. The first appearance of Mario began in the 1980s in the game Donkey Kong on arcade. As time went on and new consoles came out, many variations of the game followed. From Nintendo 64 to the current Nintendo Switch, there has always been a Super Mario game to follow, whether an adventure game or Mario Kart. Super Mario Run was initially released in December 2016 which featured Mario in an endless scrolling stimulation on Apple iOS and Android devices. Ultimately, the app developed for iPhone and Android users allows individuals to play for free for the three levels in the first course. This allows users to get an understanding of the game before having to pay to be able to compete in the other levels in order to finish the game.

Here are a few features of the app:

• Nine special world courses
• No controllers, just use your hands to tap the screen
• Different playable characters
• Many ways to play
  • World Tour
  • Toad Rally
  • Kingdom Builder

Hot Springs: This game is a free visual novel that we were able to play through video game platform, Steam. The game play is roughly 30 minutes, as it has multiple alternate endings. The player takes on the role of the main character, Haru, who is a Japanese transgender woman who gets invited to go to the hot springs with her friends. It goes through the anxiety and struggles she faces as you get to choose the outcomes of her answers when the other characters conversate with her. Really great effective game that raises awareness of the issues transgender people face in Japan.

Sacred Saga: Online free to play fantasy game that the player is set to defend the ancient city of Athens. In this fighting-style game, you are rewarded with Sacred Armours that will increase your strengths and skills.

You can choose between selecting to play a Knight, an Archer or a Wizard as each character will have their own special abilities to use in combat. This was a demo-type game that we didn’t have much power to actually control the player, which didn’t let us experience the game to its full potential.

Dragon Awaken:  Is a game that we accessed on STEAM. This game is developed from the company Game Hollywood which is a China-based game developer, which is one of the largest web game developers. This game is recognised as a Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game (MMORPG), where it takes place in a Persistent State World, with thousands of other online players in the roleplaying environment. Dragon Awaken is a fantasy game where users assume the role of a hero that must defeat all evil from the world by completing quests and defeating enemies in combat (MMO, 2017).

There are a number of different key features which include:

• Automated fighting or manual response
• No fixed classes
• Levelling up, unlocking talents, + choose your own path
• Multiplayer to verse other players

Dragon Awaken is available both online and through the gaming platform STEAM. Both Windows and Mac user are able to access the game.