Modding as a basis for developing game systems

Scacchi, Walt

doi:10.1145/1984674.1984677

Cited by 12 publications

(8 citation statements)

References 14 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Unclassified

Order By: Relevance

“…Our activity can be characterized as a project-based learning activity and emphasizes in the challenging balance between production and process [1]. Related studies [6] [7] have proved the value of game prototyping in SE. While these studies address the issue of creative development of computer games, they do not explicitly explore how these activities are experienced by participants and can be potentially improved.…”

Section: Related Workmentioning

confidence: 96%

See 1 more Smart Citation

An Empirical Examination of Behavioral Factors in Creative Development of Game Prototypes

Giannakos

Jaccheri

Morasca

2013

Entertainment Computing – ICEC 2013

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

In the last few years, several learning programs, workshops, technologies, and activities have been introduced and applied to game prototyping activities. The research goal of this work is to investigate how participants experience game prototyping activities. This paper presents a one-day intensive course consisting of both learning and hands-on sessions with open source software (OSS) tools, tangible materials, and sensor boards for creative development of games prototypes. The intensive course program was developed using the empirical experience of the instructors from numerous prior programs. We present the results of an empirical examination regarding participants’ attitude towards the program. A group of 12 MSc/PhD students, teachers, and designers participated in the program in our empirical evaluation. We used a survey grounded in motivational factors for technology and open-ended questions to obtain both quantitative and qualitative data from the participants. Quantitative statistical analysis indicates that, in our study, participants’ satisfaction and activity’s usefulness are the most influential factors for participants’ intention to attend similar activities in the future. Qualitative analysis suggests improvements on how to prepare the participants, introduce the software used in the courses, and enrich the variety of the materials in our program

show abstract

Section: Related Workmentioning

confidence: 96%

“…Modding, the practice and process of developing game mods, is typically a "Do It Yourself" (DIY) approach to game development [6] by reusing game software. For this purpose, well known and validated Software Engineering (SE) theories and techniques for development and innovation can be applied to game development.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

An Empirical Examination of Behavioral Factors in Creative Development of Game Prototypes

Giannakos

Jaccheri

Morasca

2013

Entertainment Computing – ICEC 2013

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…They found that untagged mods are the least popular. Scacchi [51][52][53] gives an overview of the types of mods and the modding community, and describes modding as an open source approach to extending closed source software. We are the first to conduct a large-scale study of the release schedule and bug reports of game mods.…”

Section: Related Workmentioning

confidence: 99%

Building the perfect game – an empirical study of game modifications

et al. 2020

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Prior work has shown that gamer loyalty is important for the sales of a developer's future games. Therefore, it is important for game developers to increase the longevity of their games. However, game developers cannot always meet the growing and changing needs of the gaming community, due to the often already overloaded schedules of developers. So-called modders can potentially assist game developers with addressing gamers' needs. Modders are enthusiasts who provide modifications or completely new content for a game. By supporting modders, game developers can meet the rapidly growing and varying needs of their gamer base. Modders have the potential to play a role in extending the life expectancy of a game, thereby saving game developers time and money, and leading to a better overall gaming experience for their gamer base.In this paper, we empirically study the metadata of 9,521 mods that were extracted from the Nexus Mods distribution platform. The Nexus Mods distribution platform is one of the largest mod distribution platforms for PC games at the time of our study. The goal of our paper is to provide useful insights about mods on the Nexus Mods distribution platform from a quantitative perspective, and to provide researchers a solid foundation to further explore game mods. To better understand the potential of mods to extend the longevity of a game we study their characteristics, and we study their release schedules and post-release support (in terms of bug reports) as a proxy for the willingness of the modding community to contribute to a game. We find that

show abstract

“…According to Scacchi (2011), modding is a way to learn to work with others as a person who creates a mod trains to work in a team and to manage a group project. During the experiments of El-Nasr and Smith (2006), the students first learnt to divide the tasks among groups of two and share their skills.…”

Section: Collaborating To Learn and Learning To Collaboratementioning

confidence: 99%