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Boyer, Steven Andrew (2014) Playermaking: the institutional production of digital game players. PhD thesis. http://theses.gla.ac.uk/4925/ Copyright and moral rights for this thesis are retained by the author A copy can be downloaded for personal non-commercial research or study, without prior permission or charge This thesis cannot be reproduced or quoted extensively from without first obtaining permission in writing from the Author The content must not be changed in any way or sold commercially in any format or medium without the formal permission of the Author When referring to this work, full bibliographic details including the author, title, awarding institution and date of the thesis must be given Glasgow Theses Service http://theses.gla.ac.uk/ [email protected] Playermaking: The Institutional Production of Digital Game Players Steven Andrew Boyer BA, BS, MA Submitted in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Centre for Cultural Policy Research Department of Theatre, Film and Television Studies College of Arts University of Glasgow September 2013 © Steven Boyer 2013 2 Abstract This thesis investigates how the digital games industry conceptualises its audiences in both the United States and the United Kingdom. Drawing upon research focused on other media industries, it argues in favour of a constructionist view of the audience that emphasises its discursive form and institutional uses. The term “player” is institutionally constructed in the same way, not referring to the actual people playing games, but to an imagined entity utilised to guide industrial decisions. Using both desk research and information gathered from expert interviews with digital game development professionals, this thesis looks at how ideas about players are formed and held by individual workers, transformed to become relevant for game production, and embedded into broader institutional conceptions that are shared and negotiated across a variety of institutional stakeholders. Adapting the term “audiencemaking” from mass communication research, this thesis identifies three key phases of the “playermaking” process in the digital games industry. First, information about players is gathered through both informal means and highly technologised audience measurement systems. Institutional stakeholders then translate this information into player, product and platform images that can be utilised during production. The remainder of the thesis looks at the more broad third phase in which these images are negotiated amongst a variety of institutional stakeholders as determined by power relations. These negotiations happen between individual workers who hold differing views of the player during development, companies and organisations struggling over position and value across the production chain, and the actual people playing games who strive to gain more influence over the creation of the images meant to represent their interests. These negotiations also reflect national policy contexts within a highly competitive global production network, visible in the comparison between the US neoliberal definition of both the industry and players as primarily market entities and the UK creative industries approach struggling to balance cultural concerns while safeguarding domestic production and inward investment. Ultimately, this thesis argues that conceptions of players are a central force structuring the shape and operation of a digital games industry in the midst of rapid technological, industrial, political and sociocultural change. 3 Table of Contents Chapter 1 – Introduction.........................................................................................9 Thesis Organisation............................................................................................12 Chapter 2 – Conceptualising the Player.............................................................16 Introduction.........................................................................................................16 Media Effects......................................................................................................18 Active Audiences................................................................................................25 Media Industry Studies and Political Economy...................................................28 The Structure of the Digital Games Industry Production Network.................33 Digital Game Studies..........................................................................................40 Conclusion..........................................................................................................46 Chapter 3 – Playermaking: The Institutional Production of Digital Game Players....................................................................................................................50 Introduction.........................................................................................................50 Audiencemaking.................................................................................................52 Media Workers and Convergent Audiencemaking........................................53 Technologised Audiencemaking....................................................................57 The Digital Games Industry as Institution......................................................60 Playermaking......................................................................................................63 The “Audience” for Digital Games..................................................................65 The Problem of the “Audience” in Game Studies..........................................67 Audiencemaking Par Excellence....................................................................70 Conclusion..........................................................................................................72 Chapter 4 – Methods.............................................................................................74 Introduction.........................................................................................................74 Desk Research...................................................................................................74 Historical Analysis..........................................................................................74 Discourse Analysis.........................................................................................75 Institutional Analysis.......................................................................................77 Fieldwork.............................................................................................................78 Interview Design and Selection......................................................................79 4 Conclusion..........................................................................................................82 Chapter 5 – Quantifying Players: Institutional Measurement and Control in Digital Games........................................................................................................83 Introduction.........................................................................................................83 Games Industry Measurement Systems and Structures....................................84 Historical Context...........................................................................................84 Game-specific Measurement Structures........................................................87 Product Release Information..........................................................................88 Product Usage Information............................................................................94 Player Behaviour Information.........................................................................98 Metrics Fetishism, Social Engineering and Creative Measurement............102 General Player Reports................................................................................106 Measurement Implications................................................................................110 Cost..............................................................................................................111 Creative vs. Data..........................................................................................114 Big Data........................................................................................................116 Conclusion........................................................................................................118 Chapter 6 – “I Am First and Foremost My Audience”: Images and Models of Digital Game Players..........................................................................................120 Introduction.......................................................................................................120 Audience Image and Player Image..................................................................122 Labourers and Playbourers..........................................................................129 Product Image...................................................................................................137 Platform Image..................................................................................................140 Player Models...................................................................................................144 Media-Based Player Models.............................................................................148