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Body and Brains of Gamers Probed
ElvenMonkey writes "The BBC News is reporting about researchers at the University of Hull who are performing what they call the first scientific research into what actually happens when you play computer games, using a method called 'mood testing' (previously used on athletes.) Hardly surprisingly results so far show that we don't like losing, and that gaming puts you into an altered state. I can see it now.. computer games, the next designer drug."
EVER!!
I'm not sure I'd want to probe the bodies of computer gamers. Some of those players aren't in the best shape or display the best higiene
WTF? The article mentions nothing about bleeding eyes?!
Gaming, the next drug? Hardly.
But doing drugs WHILE gaming? Thats never going to go out of style.
This time they don't have to pay that girl on the corner of fifth and broad in camden!
This sig is o Unfunny o Funny
Well, I am glad that they finally figured out what most of us mother's have known for a long time. Have you ever tried to talk to your kid when they are playing a game? Or, have you ever heard a group of boys ages 11-14 play Halo? Yikes!!
Bah, anyone who's ever owned a Sega should know this already.
I'd like to see the brain readings when a console game gets started up. Nothing like seven unskippable splash screens in a row to really affect the enjoyment of a game.
It would be cool if it didn't suck.
>>computer games, the next designer drug
Just as well computer games arent addictive.
*cough evercrack cough*
Death to eXistenz! Death to the demoness Allegra Geller!!!11!
Body: fatter
Brain cells: fewer
Skin tone: paler
Wallet: less money
English skills: worse
Based on this, the researchers have hypothesised so far that the psycho-physiological impacts are similar to physical sports.
That if we have more games like Dance Dance Revolution, or VR games where we move... we'll be healthier on the whole?
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"computer games, the next designer drug"
not that far fetched considering they let burn victims play video games because it helps distract them from the pain.
Video games are a terific distraction from a lot of things.
I and a couple of friends occasionally have LAN parties over the weekend, along with a few beers and a good ole laugh. But I am really really bad at games (partly because this is the only time I ever play them), and I always get my ass whooped. Then the day after I am always depressed about being a loser. We can play constantly for 3 days and I wont win a single game - not even Hearts! So it doesn't really surprise me that losing is an emotional downer and winning is an emotional high. It's just like playing sports the only difference being the game played. They could have just studdied chess players or tennis players to get the same results.
How many of you have been immersed in a game of [whateverFPSyouPlay] and someone walks by and says something to you. You respond 2 minutes later, not realizing that much time had passed. Obviously an altered state of mind (or reality at that point). Show us something REALLY interesting, like how much fat is burned during an intense 5 hours of counterstrike. Show us if we have to worry about high bloodpressure from the games (disregarding inactivity and weight problems in the study).
Frankly, I don't really care what actually happens when I play computer games, since games are mostly for children. Real, adult men, especially those of high IQ, seem to be addicted to Wikipedia much more often than to games. What I would really like to know is what actually happens when I keep clicking Special:Randompage all day. Sorry, gotta go now!
Sincerely,
Pan Tarhei Hosé, PhD.
"Homo sum et cogito ergo odi profanum vulgus et libido."
Sex feels good! (Readers here will have to take my word for it)
What is after that?
Chocolate is addictive?
Feh.
... that talking to me while I'm playing is like talking to a robot, or a zombie. And depending on how well I did, I'm either in a good or horrible mood afterwards. It seemed a bit funny to me, but now I think I understand how she must feel.
method called 'mood testing'
After the title incuding the word "probe" I read this as "wood testing" and was very disturbed.
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umm really boss..playing doom 3 helps me do my job better ..no really..ohh about the explosions in the office i can explain that.
Maybe this kind of research could also shed some light on things like that: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/leicestershire/ 3934277.stm
i.e. "How do violent video games affect the gamer?"
I can see it now.. computer games, the next designer drug.
Well, they are addictive and fun.
- some web site I can't find right now. Damn.
Video games already are the best contraceptive on the market.
"Scientific testing of physiological and psychological responses, or "mood profiling", could help developers robustly plan which games will be hits."
While I believe this is very interesting I have a hard time understanding how they are going to map mood to design. Some people might be in the zone and very angry at the same time. Is that a good thing or a bad thing? Furthermore, this smacks of correlation only, not causation. Determining mood is like checking your horoscope: you might get correlation but is there really causation? Put another way, can you really reverse engineer a mood to figure out what characteristics of a game will be useful for other future games, and in turn, expect success? The causal chain is weak, if you ask me...
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The altered state can last beyond the time playing the game. There have been times when I have played a game like Tetris (wonderfully addictive) for long hours on end. After turning it off and going about other activities, I find myself trying to fit thoughts into place - turning them this way and that. It's the "Gaming Zone" in which things are done almost without conscious thought.
One thing that makes this more obvious is to take someone who is used to playing alone and talk to them as they try to accomplish the same task in a game. Chatter can bring a gamer out of that altered state and frustrate the living daylights out of them. Unbelievable how hard it is to jump from platform to platform if someone is demanding some of your attention.
I was taking one day at a time, but then several days got together and ambushed me. (from a Rhymes with Orange comic)
Hell I started with the gateway drug, Space Invaders, and I've never looked back since!
"Talk minus action equals nothing" - Joey Shithead, D.O.A.
"Talk minus action equals
I don't see anywhere in the article where they claim that their results are any better than simply asking the player "Was this game fun to play?"
Said question is already asked of focus groups extensively during development of games.
The methodology the article provides isn't going to provide any better feedback to the developers than the way we already do it -- it just lets them put nice graphs and numbers up that tell us what we already know.
Yes, it is interesting to know that the psychological reactions to playing computer games are similar to the psychological reactions from playing real-world sports, but that doesn't give us a better process for making computer games than we have now.
Add to that the fact that often 75-90% of the game development has to be finished before you really have something playable that could be used for this testing. It is only after the majority of the game is done that user feedback actually becomes useful -- before that what you have is a pile of compiling code that only superficially resembles what the final product will be. Come up with a system that we can use on a game design document BEFORE we spend a year programming to the alpha stage of the game and you will have something useful.
Basically, I get the impression that the people behind the study don't really understand how computer games are actually made.
Personally, I stopped playing and reading about games quite some time ago, when my eyes started to hurt. However, I am still not sure if my eyes are just getting older or this is just the reaction to the Slashdot theme. So for those who don't already know--it has not been posted on the Slashdot frontpage as far as I know--you can still read the games articles using the classic theme. (Yes, I know that the URL seems strange, but I have found it in some AC comment and it appears to work just fine.)
Sincerely,
Pan Tarhei Hosé, PhD.
"Homo sum et cogito ergo odi profanum vulgus et libido."
This reminds me of the Star Trek the Next Generation episode of The Game. http://www.startrek.com/startrek/view/series/TNG/e pisode/68518.html In this episode the entire crew of the Enterprise gets addicted to a mind altering game.
One thing leads to another and I could see game developers reaching this level one day.
Science has reached the limits of what anal probing can tell us of gamers. But as long as they keep letting us...
if you go by the definition of "drug" as anything that alters your body chemistry nearly everything IS a drug.
;)) participate in it thereby rounding out the bell curve of addiction, where as heroin use is nowhere near as pervasive as sex. it attracts a certain personality and usually someone predisposed to addiction.
it's those with dependency problems that blow things way out of proportion AND attract the most attention. it'd be a sad day if video games start getting regulated like any other drug.
sex is addictive as heroin. yet it's not regulated (yet). the difference being that most normal people (/.ers excluded
it's nearly the same w/video games. they're not the problem, they're the symptom of something larger.
for a minute there, i lost myself...
Open up a new ward at the Betty Ford clinic.
You know, I have a secret.
I've never had the need to take any drugs, other than booze, because I'm a hardcore gamer. I get such a rush playing that I find myself totally walled off from reality while I'm fragging.
The rush I have is sort of like the one Alex has in "The Clockwork Orange" (the book is a lot deeper into the pleasure he's having but the movie version captures the soul of it, especially the scenes in the hospital bed in the end). I should add that I don't go around beating people up for fun, but I found that Anthony Burgess (and Stanley Kubrick) depicted the rush of pleasure in a way that almost mirrors my own.
Booze only hightens this effect and I don't even need more than a couple beers to sharpen my senses.
Mind you, I'm not a very good gamer and when I'm drunk I suck even more but the rush, OH, THE RUSH!
I confess, FPS games are my drug.
Ash nazg durbatuluk, ash nazg gimbatul Ash nazg thrakatuluk agh burzum-ishi krimpatul
This is your brain+body normally:
Hiya master! Want to go for a stroll! Look at the shiny things! Feel the spring in your legs!
This is your brain+body on games:
Ehrm... Mmm... Wha... Coffee... Brains... Brains... Drool...
Personal experience after three weeks of heavy gaming.
I choose to remain celibate, like my father and his father before him.
All they have to do is pawn the probes off as a new type of input device, and they would have an army of paying test-subjects.
Imagine games that reacted to your moods.
"Playing a game puts you into an altered state. It's like a runner's high, where sports athletes are aware they are doing well. They not sure what they are doing, but they know they are functioning at their peak." This seems to be a similar state to that of having sex, or so I've read. Could anyone confirm that?
Sincerely,
Pan Tarhei Hosé, PhD.
"Homo sum et cogito ergo odi profanum vulgus et libido."
When I used to play EverQuest, my wife said I was different when I played it. Edgy, aggrivated, and just plain mean, though I really saw it as any other thing: I was focused and she bothered/interrupted me frequently.
I'm glad I wasn't part of this. I don't think that I would have been believed as a gamer: decent tan, 210lbs (muscular, but not cut), eyes not sunken, perfect english skills, no twitches, and a bit of bling on the neck, wrists, and fingers. Not to say I am the only healthy and blinging gamer, but c'mon. I don't personally know any other gamers (read: people who play video games at least 4 hours a day every day) who go to the pool all the time or work out. Or go to the clubs dressed in last years income.
Halitosis - (n.) Halle Berry's Camel Toe.
One thing this study would like to accomplish is predicting how well a game will sell before development begins in order to minimize economic risk for the developer. I'd be surprised if any conclusive formula for a great game ever results from this study. Movies have been around for a while and I see no indication of someone having found a magic forumla to determine a movie's success either.
Every Sunday I fire up my Quake2 Xatrix server to play with friends that live local.
:D
Afterwards we all meet in a local boozer ( The boozer (be warned - real shitty web site design)
WELL! The discussions of the game get really heated "Camper" "No I wasn't, I had no health" "Yes you did, bloody camper" "No I didn't" "My mouse was playing up" "LAGGG" and are quite serious.
Great fun
-- Thou hast strayed far from the path of the Avatar.
English skills: worse
The effect can also be the opposite for those who are not native speakers of English.
Tetris altered my mind!
When I look at mass produced cookie cutter houses all I want to do is destroy them with my mind!
It's good to see more research into this to validate what every gamer knows. Every one has felt that FPS, (mine being AA:Ops), or other game where you just get some games where your on. (You movement in the game is extemely quick and accurate, your descision making the same, but you feel calm and relaxed). The more research that goes into this the better we will get at making games that serve a purpose, (and less at making games for things like supporting politics or teaching how to use food stamps). Hopefully as we learn the science behind the phychological effects of games we will learn where they can be applied to better ourselves.
I do security
Is this the research that will lead to Better Then Life video games.
it's true: http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?articleID=000CDC3 4-D80E-10FA-89FB83414B7F0000
I've never had the need to take any drugs, other than booze
The artificial drug-alcohol duality is tired, especially coming from druggies like you and me. Booze is a drug. End of sentence.
I don't even need more than a couple beers to sharpen my senses.
'Sharpen your senses' and 'booze' do not belong in the same sentence. In fact, short of seconal, I know of no better way to unsharpen my senses.
Anyone else find it odd that a self-proclaimed mother would use the name "enforcer999" online?
Jeez, maybe that little "M0rpH3uS69" punk I fragged the other day was actually the nice old lady down the street!
I mean seriously, how do you get funding? I could use some cash right about now.
I think this kind of research could prove valuable not just for the better planning of successful titles, as the article stated. Maybe this kind of research can also finally show that playing Doom/CS/UT/[Insert favorite FPS here] does not simply turn you into a shotgun-swinging psycho who runs around blowing people's heads off for fun. Maybe this can help put an end to using video games as a scapegoat for the results of a lack of parenting and tutoring.
...and then someone slams their pint on the table and yells, "ALRIGHT! That's it. You and me, on the net, right now!"
Please help metamoderate.
I'd love to see someone do a study on drinking and gaming. I've noticed I'm much better and first person shooters when I've had a few. I suck at racing games after drinking, though.
Sjhhgfbgfbyth? What does it mean? Anyway, I think goatsex is easier to remember.
Sincerely,
Pan Tarhei Hosé, PhD.
"Homo sum et cogito ergo odi profanum vulgus et libido."
This came out a while back in yahoo and somewhere else. LINK) Washington.edu. Basically they used VR to treat burn victims, who suffer a great deal of pain from their injuries. They seemed to think (this is from the news article I can't find) that normal off the shelf video games that immerse people (particularly mmorpgs I assume) have the same affect. Pretty cool stuff, trick your brain into not feeling pain.
This article has recently been linked from Slashdot. Please keep an eye on the page history for errors or vandalism.
xXx-juggalo-xXx: fuk!!1 enforcer999 iz a sniper bitch!
enforcer999: Don't swear, Jason! And don't call your mother a bitch!
xXx-juggalo-xXx: wtf mom! you play cf?
enforcer999: That's right, kiddo! And *you* are up past your bed time! Turn off that computer right now!
xXx-juggalo-xXx: fuk!!
enforcer999: pwn3d!
My own personal jesus christ.
Some of those pictures were pretty good. Specifically the ones without Ceren in them.
If you thought Counter-Strike was good, try mushrooms.
"I can see it now, games as the next designer drug" (paraphrased)
That was an episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation....
Innocent people shouldn't be forced to pay for inferior software development.
--"Code Complete" Microsoft Press
"Hardly surprisingly results so far show that we don't like losing, and that gaming puts you into an altered state. I can see it now.. computer games, the next designer drug."
What does that say about regular sports then? As much as the media and certain senators harp on about videogame violence, altered states and behaviorial programming, real life sports causes more property damage and more lives lost than any video game ever has on a year to year basis, yet the most you'll see on THAT is a 30 second segment on the news or a Real TV clip. Football riots, eggball (football), Hockey... The home team wins or a bad call is made and boom! You instantly have a million in property damage, 15 dead, and 45 injured... And that's just one of several incidents per year. These are people losing and winning.
Why there even needs to be a study is beyond me... Videogames are pretty sedate compared to that.
You need a FREE iPod Nano
Video games already are the best contraceptive on the market.
There is a mistake in your argument. A contraceptive is used during sex. It should read as follows:
Video games are the best way to not get laid.
hahahah
Its only a matter of time until we start seeing class action law-suits against video game companies about how they designed their games to make you feel high and get addicted.
can't sleep. clowns will eat me.
Your obviously not a mother....
"...computer games, the next designer drug."
Endorfun was a psychedelic puzzle game designed to stimulate endorphin production in humans. I don't know if it actually worked, but at least they tried.
So now the observation of the individual is useless? It doesn't matter how valid an observation is, only who made it, when, and with what goals in mind? Geez, people have a right to an observation, regardless of status or authority don't they?
Get me a meat pie floater!
to understand the mind of a gamer, go to the failmath archives, scroll past the top article with the camgirl (or try to :/ ) and read the article "player or playa?".
Wait, this study is by MSRC? But I thought that when Microsoft "funded" research, it always favored Microsoft products. So, is this going to say that games on windows and xbox are the best, and that ps2 games have a TCO of $1billion? Or perhaps they are brainwashing the gamers of the world, as these "probes" are really bi-directional...
/sarcasm
warning: This post is likely to contain gobs of dripping sarcasm. Consume at your own risk.
Namely, the Fragdolls. So hawt!
http://fragdolls.blogspot.com/
Mod +3 for "Groping"
::signature space for rent::
Have you heard of that new drug called "Snow Crash"?
ph33r the new doom playing initiated way of transhumanism!!!
Or where those Computergames invented by jews to enslave us all?
I think gaming is good, a tremendous stress reliever if you dont take it too seriously. Some people are not good losers and unforunately thats their problem they must have to deal with. I never get moody or mad when I play FPS online. I may get frustrated by idiots buts it not like you dont have tonnes of servers to find a better group of people or check out IRC for people that love equal teams and friendly competition.
I used to play competitively on the ladders in Quake3 we were one of the #1 teams. And it was always refreshing have to try to hold #1 while it switched places back and forth. It can be stressful only if you allow winning and losing to be the goal of the game instead of playing, trying your best and having fun. Winning is not everything especially in a game where you know many of the best opponents spend huge quantities of their time honing their skills so it's not like you need to worry about it. People do what they will and to take anything too seriously is bad for ones health.
1: The good outcome. Gaming companies get an idea as to the reason why their games suck through overly expensive studies that could've easily been avoided by talking to people. Frankly, I don't quite understand why they give projects to people who don't play games because these people have no vision for creating games.
2: Much like how advertisers use certain kinds of mind control to get people to buy their products by programming people into fulfilling their needs with a companies products, companies will learn to use games to addict players further in some of the same, yet different, ways. Doom3 had a lot of scary stuff in it and if you really wanted to pick it apart, you could find they were using 3 or 4 different techniques (lighting, heartbeats, low hz backround noise, ect) throughout the game. Say they were to, in the same way, made a game that could use the same kinds of techniques to creat an extremly addictive environment. Say everquest 10x as addictive?
Hopefully, they'll go for number 1. Games can be fun and not addictive, or addictive and not fun.
Candy-Coated Knowledge
If you want to talk about a game that puts you into an altered state while playing, I have 3 letters for you:
Rez
I think that kind of search is ultimately fault. There is no universal high for everyone ...
.... ...
... ... but I think with games it is a bit more complicated ...
.... ....
.... ... just a rush of jumping that tripple with the quad ....
..
(sure there are real drugs, but even that is different for each)
But returning to games
I know why I love Ghost Recon, Chr of Riddick or Rainbow Six, and I know why I put down Halo or Unreal....
they are all top rated shooters
I know why I like GTA and why not True crime
they are just the same genre
I also clearly know why NFSUG (or HP) or Toca gives me the rush and why Burnout2 or Project Gotham Racing 2 leaves me bored after 5 minutes
I could continue forever with Silent Hill vs Suffering or could cite any other game from my shelves
I think it is just taste which is also constantly changing
Sure there is best seller recipe like Coke
Also: why not any comparison ? Why don't they write why my wife gets high on DDR MAX and me on GTA
Why do I fall asleep on KOTOR and played Invisible war almost nonstop
anyway, people are just animals, they go after the dominant leader... I am sure there is a high percentage of gamers who finish a game just to impress and prove and not for the real high they feel during the play
the high you get during the racing games, that I never intend to finish/beat
I know while I play games I get a certain high
Stop nagging our kids god damnit!
In Soviet Russia, gamers probe you!
If only I had beowulf cluster of gamers.
I'm a probed gamer, you insensitive clod!
I thought several solutions where developed to fix the progress-bar-frozen-at-100% problems. I've seen load bars that go fast, then, as they approach the end, start decelerating. I've also seen progress bars that get around the problem of virtual progress bar freezing by showing many progress bar traversals.
Addicted Gamer: *psst* Hey man, you got any HL2 or D3? Dealer: Yeah man, $20 a pop, you in? AG: Totally man! Whoever said this stuff wasn't addictive was outta their gourd! D: Alright, have a good fraggin' night man, don't get gibbed too much or it'll be a bad trip.
Flat Screen TV for F
Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi has been writing about this since the seventies.
The thing that unfortunatly happens when this research is applied to videogames, it is seen as either unique to gaming or a negative when it is neither. When I was a kid, I would get so wrapped up in books that my parents would talk to me and I wouldn't hear them. Them damn books! Those kids with blank stares on thier faces as they read these "stories" with their "words" and encouraging kids to "think." Where's Jack Thompson when we REALLY need him???
http://www.popularculturegaming.com -- my blog about the culture of videogame players
Jennifer Jason Leigh! Anywho, this movie is several years old and deals with video games in a similiar fashion to the topic at hand...well worth watching.
...TV rots your brain, while doing things on the computer, even games, stimulates and causes emotions and reactions... now no one can bitch since they spend more time infront of the TV then I do playin games. (Alot of time learning to map tho)
DarkMantle I been bored, so I started a blog.
is there a -2 mod?
Oh, god, yes. Just what's better than one status bar stuck at 100%? How about approximately 20 of them in a row. Thank you, MS Office setup, for completely throwing the purpose of progress bars out the window!
It would be cool if it didn't suck.
Something most people aren't aware of, is that for most of human history - drugs, hard drugs, were all legal and available. It wasn't until they were made illegal that refined versions were created. Immediately after prohibiting a substance, the suppliers will attempt to maximize profit and minimize risk. This gives you crack, heroin, hell, even moonshine. From what I can tell, society was no worse off then, although some religious people might have had higher blood pressure.
If VIDEO GAMES are ever regulated because people lack the responsibility, disipline, and self control to participate in society, we are in very bad times. It is YOUR life. Not the states. You are supposed to be FREE. With freedom comes RESPONSIBILITY.
Social symptoms my ass. Prohibition is about control, nothing more, nothing less. Well, at least we don't have a drug problem anymore!
Thankfully, unlike the marijuana and poppy growers of old, the entertainment industry is a powerful lobby - there's not much to worry about when a game franchise like GTA has revenues in the hundreds of millions (billions?). Just look at booze and cigarettes; but remember, drug dealers are evil.
..don't panic
This, Sir, is what I call a pure genius. Your brilliant satire gets ignored and stays on the level of Score:1 but a guy posting an obvious reply in the form of your quote followed by his answer "no" instantly gets moderated as Score:5, Funny. I admire you, Sir. I wish there were more people on Slashdot on such a high intellectual level as yourself. Thank you for making this place so much more enjoyable even when your hilarious work keeps getting ignored by the vulgar rabble we call Slashdotters.
As someone who has to deal withj anxiety problems, games are the perfect relaxation. They take my mind off all of my anxious thoughts and let it only focus on the demands of the game.