1. Screen Play: Children’s character customization in The Sims 2 & Little Big Planet
by Nicola Pallitt
PhD student
Centre for Film and Media Studies
blog:
SACOMM conference, Pretoria: 1 September 2011

2. Abstract 1
Digital games
semiotic domains
variety of options for customization
players can personalize gameplay.
Customization = common form of user control BUT little is known:
1. about this game feature (scholarly literature) and
2. how children employ such tools and choices in their gameplay to express their identities.
This paper offers a multimodal analysis of children’s character customizations in two games (Sims 2 & LBP)
Informed by configuration and gender performativity (Butler) as central concepts.

3. Abstract 2
More nuanced understanding of children’s gameplay
How games become a stage for performing gendered identities
Children’s configurative practices demonstrate how gameplay offers a distinct form of engagement which differs from other media
Television and laptop screens become virtual playgrounds where hegemonic discourses around gendered identities are a site of struggle and play, reaffirming identity in the process. 

4. Intro 1
*Digital games = ludic (i.e. playful) spaces children employ to express their identities
@ 1st glance children’s character customizations seem like quite an ‘ordinary’ activity and less serious (i.e. not 2win)
* Children’s customizations startlingly normative.
Literature on MMORG players often highlight the pleasures players derive from ‘gender bending’ & developing personas which are vastly different from their own in real life.
When children customize their characters in a face-to-face collaborative environment, a different dynamic is at work.
* The game becomes a stage for performing hegemonic, collective gendered identities and children regulate one another’s choices and gendered performances.

5. Intro 2
Large amounts of resources are put into making games engaging, little is known about the effect of specific game features such as customization (Turkay and Adinolf, 2010).
Even less is known about how children interpret and make meaning with such digital affordances.
“this ability to customize allows players to personalize their avatars/characters and control aspects of their play experience, possibly identifying more closely with the game and ‘taking ownership’ of it” (Turkay and Adinolf, 2010).

6. Intro 3
Why character customization?
Children enjoy it!
customization is a feature that even amateur players find familiar
researchers have not discussed customization in children’s gameplay
Hayes (2008) identifies customization as one of the IT-based practices motivated or associated with gaming that suggests the development of IT fluencies
IT-based practices – of which character customization is a part of and likely to be one of the earliest forms of children’s engagement with such practices – needs to be afforded more detailed research.

7. Avatar transformations 1 Barr, Biddle and Brown (2006) - avatar transformations in popular games as an act of in situ play rather than as part of a game or character analysis.
They use ‘transformation’ in accordance with activity theory: the avatar (object) as a tool used by the player (subject) to play the game, stating that:
“the player, as Subject, uses Tools, both those of the interface and fictional tools via the avatar, to transform the avatar, which is the Object of the activity” (2006:3).
Multimodal theory - transformation = a semiotic activity whereby semiotic resources are reshaped, giving rise to new meanings.
In the process of transforming resources, children are putting their own mark on them:
“Student’s texts can thus be analysed as traces of the choices made by them from the resources which were available to them, which they saw as pertinent at the moment of choice, in conformity with their interests vis-`a-vis the topic. The transformations which link their text to the text that constitutes the original resources are then the evidence of the work they engaged in, constantly guided by their interest.” (Jewitt, Kress, Ogborn, & Tsatsarelis, 2001: 129 – 130)

8. Avatar transformations 2
Burn and Carr’s (2006) investigation of categories of motivation in online gaming depended on a different approach:
Played Anarchy Online themselves to distinguish between the various motivations shaping the reading and making of signs in this online game.
“Constructed characters are the culmination of a series of choices, some of which apparently hinge on ludic or strategic considerations (thief, mage or fighter, bow or sword) and some of which reflect aesthetic or representational considerations – such as name, voice, colouring or outfit” (Carr, 2006:48).
It is these representational considerations that children make that are the focus of this paper:
how they negotiate representational choices or ‘technologically mediated signifiers’ (Burn & Carr, 2006:109) available to them in games (albeit the available options predetermined by game designers) according to their interest as sign-makers.

9. Avatar transformations 3
Burn (2003) – multimodal performance involves mediated dramatic display and opportunities for dramatic engagement.
Performance = the link between social motivation which inspires the making of the text, and the modes and media used to enact meaning making.
He refers to authors such as Laurel (1991) and Murray (1997) who consider games as a dramatic form.
In customizing their characters, children are simultaneously performing aspects of their social and cultural selves and social identities.
‘Multimodal performance’ is still quite an underdeveloped concept
Turn to: configuration from New Media Theory, gender performativity and performativity as citationality (Butler, 1993).

10. Character customization as configurative practice
New media such as digital games demand a new relationship to media - entails a “turn from consumption to participation, from interpretive to configurative practices” (Moulthrop 2004).
‘Configuration’:
emerged in the work of Aarseth (2001) and Eskelinen (2001), and more recently Moulthrop (2004), to describe the complexity of the active processes of both interpretation and interaction as the player literally constructs the game ‘on the fly’ through the practices of gameplay
Can broaden this term - configuration as a way of engaging with the game’s social and material conditions:
Children’s gameplay can be seen as configurative practice – a social and active process – and one can analyse these practices as they are produced in the process of play.
Games are not only configurable media - players are also configured in the processes of gameplay

11. Theoretical Framework
Configuration is also a social process, as children configure and negotiate their identities in the process of customizing characters during digital gameplay.
Gaming as configurative practice coupled with a multimodal approach to transformation (which involves citationality) to account for meaning-making in context can be combined with a theory of gender performativity (Butler, 1988).
I will therefore refer to children’s ‘configured performances’ which I see as encompassing these theoretical orientations and the relationship between them.
Children’s character customization choices are largely informed by social interests around gender and identity.

12. Methodology
As part of my PhD, I have observed and recorded children’s play with digital games.
The overall data set = video recordings of children playing games and talking about their games, although the bulk consists of gameplay footage.
I researched children playing games in two different settings:
an after-school Arts and Crafts club (Sep-Dec 2010)
15 days over 4 months
contact with 21 children in total (12 girls and 9 boys), years old
a holiday club (Dec 2010-Jan2011 & April 2011)
I spent 7 days over 2 weeks with the Dec/Jan holiday club
contact with 33 children (8 girls and 25 boys) , years old
I spent 5 days with the April holiday club where there were 19 children (5 girls and 14 boys) between 8 and 12 years old and one 4 year old girl
In total I collected 100+ hours of video data. For this paper I decided to focus on the children from the April holiday club.
NB: Parental consent obtained
PlayStation 3 and laptop games - Pairs of children signed up to play whichever games they wanted on a play schedule with 30 minute playing turns per pair
I tried to include a variety of age-appropriate games
More games were included as I learnt which games children were already playing at home, such as The Sims 2, which although is rated 13 (fpb), was played by quite a few of the children.
None of the children had played Little Big Planet before, probably due to it being a PlayStation 3 (PS3) exclusive which requires access to an expensive PS3 console.

13. The Children...
As a group, the children who attended the holiday club can be described as:
Suburban, from affluent families (club fees R 130 per day per child and a week’s attendance cost R 650).
i.e. financially well-off, middle to upper-middle class suburban homes (parents’ occupations: doctors, lawyers, university lecturers, a professional photographer, a graphic designer for one of the country’s restaurant franchises, business owners, consultants, etc)
Both parents work
From various primary schools in Cape Town
Besides for one four-year-old girl, the other children were all between 7 and 12 years old.

14. The Sims 2 The Sims 2 is the sequel to The Sims.
Strategic life simulation game.
Although players can also build houses for their Sims or play with default characters or Sims families in the game, I will be focusing on how children play with the ‘Create a Sim’ feature.
See:

16. Little Big Planet
3rd-person perspective, action PlayStation 3 platform game.
Generic avatar is a sack person, referred to as Sackboy or Sackgirl.
Skin and attire are changeable, and new costumes can be collected as players progress through various levels.
See: AND

17. The Sims 2 and Little Big Planet
Children’s character customizations
2 examples of children’s character customizations from each game.
These microlevel interactions were chosen because they are entertaining for readers and demonstrate a variety of multimodal interactions and social exchanges.
Heidi is four years old, and her eight year old brother and his friend introduce her to Little Big Planet.
2nd Little Big Planet episode includes Tara (12 years) and Austin (9) playing the game, and Michael (12) providing instructions with Joey (8) commenting on the game.
This episode is interesting, as it features cross-gender play amongst children of different ages.
The Sims 2 examples feature a cross gender play episode and a
girls only one where the children are dressing their Sims.
I decided to provide these two examples for comparative purposes, as the boys and girls’ references suggest an awareness of gendered consumption in terms of clothes, movies and popstars.

18. Little Big Planet: Making Heidi look pretty
Allen and his friend Joey are eight years old. They take Allen’s four year old sister, Heidi, through the ‘Introduction’ level. Heidi is a mature little girl, who never cries for her mom at the club and plays with her brother and his friend. I monitor them closely because Heidi cries when the boys take over and do not let her play. Although she is not able to customize sack people because she struggles to navigate the menus, she enjoys playing the easier levels which involve running and jumping (much like Mario).
Allen helps Heidi with the controller, playing for her, while Joey plays using the second controller and thereby also controls Allen’s sackboy. Allen decides to change Heidi’s sack person into a sackgirl, commenting that the current sack person ‘looks more like a boy’. I encourage him by saying ‘yes, make Heidi’s character look pretty’ and I tell Heidi, ‘Allen is going to make her look pretty for you’ to prevent her from grabbing the controller from him. My request that Allen make Heidi’s sackgirl look ‘pretty’ played a big role during this interaction, but more important is the fact that Allen and Joey were quite eager to play along in the ‘pretty-ing up’ process. Heidi inherited the current sack person from two boys who played earlier. Her sack person wears a tuxedo and a green helmet with a skeleton face. Allen proceeds to make Heidi’s sackperson into a ‘pretty’ sackgirl.
Allen and Joey go through the existing costumes menu and find a sackgirl with a pink body and blue hair. Joey says, ‘There’s a girl, that’s a girl’. I ask Heidi whether she likes that one and she says, ‘But she’s too sad’, commenting on the sackgirl’s frowning expression. Allen shows his sister how to change her sackgirl’s expressions, saying ‘Watch this’ and makes the sackgirl smile. Joey grows impatient and directs Allen back to the task of customizing Heidi’s sackgirl by saying, ‘Come on! Finish it already.’ Allen asks Heidi what she wants her sackgirl to wear:
Allen: (to Heidi) Do you want something different? What do you want to wear? Do you want to wear a nice... do you want to wear a dress?
Heidi: Ja.
[Allen picks the ‘Fairy dress’]
Researcher: That’s a pretty little dress!
Again, as a researcher I appear to be influencing Allen’s choices by using the word ‘pretty’. He scrolls over ‘Lion’s tail’, ‘Bunny tail’ and ‘glasses’ but does not pick them. Allen asks Heidi, ‘What else do you want to look like?’ and I suggest ‘give her bunny ears’ which he does. Heidi says she wants a skirt. Joey asks, ‘What’s a skirt? What does it look like?’ referring to clothing options in the game which are mostly one-piece costumes. Allen does not answer and selects a red hair colour for Heidi’s sackgirl and then a lion’s mane. Joey disagrees with Allen’s choice and tells him, ‘That’s boy hair!’ Allen then chooses a pink scarf with blonde hair. I say, ‘That’s pretty’ and Joey says, ‘That’s better’. Now Heidi’s sackgirl is done and Allen gives her the controller. I remind her how to run and jump and Joey shows her how to change her sackgirl’s facial expressions.
Unlike Sims, sack people do not have different genders – being a sackboy or sackgirl depends on what you wear. This episode demonstrates how the two eight year old boys understand age-appropriate femininity. Allen and Joey customize a sackgirl for Heidi informed by their beliefs about ‘girliness’, the researcher’s prompt to make her character ‘look pretty’ and what they believe a little four year old girl would like her character to look like. Their costume choices are based on this criteria: a pink body, fairy dress, ‘cutesy’ bunny ears and a pink scarf with blonde pigtails. Allen is also performing the role of the caring brother and Joey assists him. Joey’s protest to him choosing the lion’s mane because it is ‘boy hair’ (something Allen often chooses for his own sackboy) reminds Allen that he is designing a character for Heidi and not himself and gendering her sackperson as cute and girly is the main aim.

19. Little Big Planet: A vampire wedding and a skateboard honeymoon
Tara and Austin played the ‘Skateboard Freefall’ level over and over for 20 minutes, with Mark pointing at the screen showing them where to hold onto the skateboard in different places so they could go over the ramps in different ways and collect points. ‘Skateboard Freefall’ is a mini-game where players ride a massive skateboard down a ramp to the end of the course.
 Mark instructs them, ‘You’re gonna survive all the ramps except the last one and then you’re gonna flip like head over heels’. At one stage, Tara’s sackgirl and Austin’s sackboy are positioned close together on the front of the skateboard. Joey says, ‘It looks like you’re kissing.’ After playing this level repeatedly, Joey moans that it is getting boring. Mark suggests, ‘Make yourselves look different.’ Austin and Tara try on different costumes, including vampire teeth and the children amuse themselves by pulling vampire teeth faces, ‘This is how you look!’ Joey tells Austin, ‘That is your girlfriend.’ A little while later, he suggests, ‘Guys – get married!’
On this day at the club the children were quite interested in the wedding theme, due to outside game events. The previous day Tara had gotten into trouble for pinching the boys and one of the club organisers reprimanded her. Tara said, ‘Okay, I’ll kiss them next time.’ She started a game with the boys where she would play-kiss them if she caught them. On this day, the children decided to have a pretend wedding where Tara and Mark were going to get married. As they were about to pretend-kiss, one of the boys threw a water balloon at Tara’s face. Then there were tears and the ‘wedding’ was interrupted. The club organisers told me that two years ago they had pieces of material for crafts and Tara draped a white piece around her and ‘married’ one of the boys. When she decided she didn’t want to be married anymore, she draped herself in a piece of black material. It seems to be a regular event – at every holiday club the children stage a wedding, and Tara ‘marries’ one of the boys. This club history and the day’s events made its way into Little Big Planet...
 Mark tells Austin to choose the tuxedo. Initially, he protests and chooses the white fairy dress as a joke and they all laugh before he gives in and chooses the tuxedo. This prompted Joey’s suggestion for Austin and Tara’s characters to get married. Tara and Austin navigate their costume menus while in the pod:
Joey: Guys – get married!
Mark: Tara, go get dressed in that wedding thing.
Austin: ‘Cause I’m in a tux.
Mark: (to Austin) Go get yourself a top hat.
Joey: Get married! aah ah ah ha [makes a ‘cutesy’ sound effect]
[Austin chooses a little black hat and Tara dresses her sackgirl in the white fairy dress, but has also chosen a red cape]
Mark: He has a thing (referring to the top hat), you must get yourself a wedding veil.
Tara: Okay, I’ve got one.
Mark: No, not a red one. Put a wedding veil on. Stop it! (to Joey, who is making irritating voices. He proceeds to show Tara where the veil is on the Menu.)
 The red cape is gendered masculine (possibly owing to Superman) and Mark tells Tara to find a wedding veil instead. The children’s conversation also suggests gendered wedding clothing items that fit together such as a black tuxedo and a black top hat or a white wedding dress and a white veil. They do not ‘mix and match’ these items in any transgressive way, only initially where Austin jokes around by dressing his sackman in the fairy dress before he chooses the tuxedo.
After Mark has helped Tara find a veil, he says, ‘Now you must become a vampire - make your teeth vampires. And make yourselves happy – choose up arrow.’ The children laugh at Tara and Austin’s sack-bride and sack-groom as they play with changing their facial expressions. Austin’s sack-groom wears a skeleton skin under his tuxedo. Joey finds the combination disturbing and asks, ‘How can a human marry a skeleton?’ Mark reminds him that they are actually vampires, saying it is a ‘vampire wedding’. He tries to get Tara and Austin to make their bride and groom hold hands:
Mark: Wait – you hold L2, now you hold R2 and like make yourselves look like you’re holding hands. Just do it.
[Austin hits Tara’s sackgirl instead, the children laugh.]
Just hold hands! I want to see what they look like. No, just do it – move your hands down. Stop it Austin!
[Austin makes his sack-groom run around in the background, he does not want to hold hands with his sack-bride. Joey hums the wedding march. Austin gives in and comes closer and they try to make their hands touch. Tara hits Austin’s sackboy and they all laugh.]
Don’t! I want to see what it looks like.
Austin: I don’t.
Mark: Now go close, now do it.
Joey: You may kiss the bride!
Mark: Go a little further away. There we go. (But Austin runs away.) No, go in front of her, then she’s not able to hit you.
Joey: She must be a skeleton, then he can get married.
Mark is like a director and Tara and Austin are not too keen on performing a romantic wedding scene for him.
A little while later Joey says, ‘Come on, let’s go on holiday, I want to go on holiday.’ Austin first gives his sackboy a moustache and Tara chooses a white skin. Mark comments, ‘Whoah she looks freaky!’ Joey exclaims excitedly, ‘We’re getting married on holiday!’ Tara goes to the pod and selects the skateboard freefall level again. Joey says, ‘And then we choose the next level and that’s the holiday place.’ Mark says, ‘They’re two vampires getting married!’ The newly-wed vampire couple complete the ‘Skateboard Freefall’ challenge and Tara’s sack-bride wins first place. Austin says, ‘I don’t like you bride, why did you win?’ Joey laughs. Tara and Austin play the skateboard freefall level again. Mark says, ‘They’re going on their honeymoon!’
This episode illustrates the children’s policing of one another regarding gendered performances and heteronormativity. Tara and Austin (with help from Mark) transform their sack people into a bride and a groom. The gender boundary is not crossed – Tara must be the bride and Austin the groom. The vampire teeth may be seen as an attempt at making the wedding more playful, in contrast to the formal Western wedding costumes. Additionally, Tara and Austin hitting one another instead of holding hands shows that they are resisting Michael’s attempt at representing romance. At this age, the children are quite anti-romance in real life, but enjoy playing with this theme, especially in The Sims 2. Often, the girls at the club wanted to do things separately from the boys and did not want them to be around, such as when they played Sing It, claiming they were shy to sing in front of the boys. This episode demonstrates children’s age-related discomfort with relationships between boys and girls in their own lives. Additionally, when Tara gets first place in the skateboard freefall level and Mark says “I don’t like you bride, why did you win?” it is clear that Tara has transgressed a gendered boundary: girls are supposed to do what male players tell them to do and not beat them, because boys are ‘better’ at games.

20. The Sims 2 From ‘George of the Jungle’ to speedos and g-strings
Maggie (10 years) controls the mouse. On her left sits Carl (11), and Kathy (10) sits to her right with Johan (9) next to her. Mark (12), Maggie’s brother, sits on a chair behind them. I come over to them with my cellphone camera upon hearing hysterical laughter. They are customizing a male Sim. Carl has the game at home. His mom told one of the club organisers that his dad was supposed to ‘check’ the game and didn’t. The next morning Carl announced that he had sex three times that night. Mom was shocked. He told the researcher that he doesn’t really like this game and that it’s girly, but the following interactions demonstrate an unexpected enjoyment with this ‘dress-up’ part of the game amongst the boys. This concurs with literature on gender and gaming where ‘dress up’ and character customization is seen as ‘girly’, an activity mostly done by girls. It was curious to discover that the boys at the holiday club seemed to enjoy it just as much as the girls. They comment on Maggie’s selection of outfits for underwear, pyjamas, swimwear and sportswear and make suggestions for the purpose of humour and masculine display.
From ‘George of the Jungle’ to speedos and g-strings
The following interaction takes place as Maggie is navigating the underwear option:
Carl: (laughing, points at the male Sim’s bum in the mirror)
Researcher: You laughing at the leopard print? (leopard print underwear)
Johan: George of the Jungle – got to George of the Jungle.
(Maggie goes to the pyjamas and picks a red pair, ignoring Johan’s request.)
Mark: No, take... (Maggie chooses the black pants)
Johan: Choose the one on the...
Carl: left.
A short while later, Maggie goes through the swimwear options and this interaction takes place:
Carl: Swimwear! Speedos! Speedos! (he sees these as Maggie goes through the list of options. Maggie clicks on the green Speedo and the boys laugh. She then clicks on a blue pair, and then a blue and orange pair.)
Maggie: He looks like a nerd.
Carl: Look at his butt!
(Maggie chooses a black and orange pair, the boys laugh again. She clicks on a blue and black pair in the same style.)
Johan: Joh! Another g-string!
Maggie: It like makes it look like a (...)
(Maggie clicks on the red Speedo and turns the Sim around, the boys giggle at the Sim looking at himself. Maggie clicks on the red and orange shorts.)
Mark: Aw.
(Maggie goes to the sportswear and clicks the different colour tracksuits quickly.)
Maggie may be slightly uncomfortable with the boys invading her play and using ‘Create a Sim’ for masculine display amongst themselves, but she seems to be having fun with the boys’ interest in this dress-up part of the game. She clicks on the ‘funny’ options and even rotates the Sim so that they can laugh at him.
It should also be noted that the game allows a greater variety of outfits for female Sims compared to male Sims. Before this episode took place, Karl remarked that one of the pair of pants look like skinny jeans and that boys do not wear skinny jeans. He said, “These clothes are so gay!” Although Maggie is controlling the mouse and selecting different outfits, the boys comments are used to signal masculine display and protest to outfits they read as ‘girly’ such as skinny jeans and g-strings and speedos which they see as ‘nerdy’. In laughing at the male Sim’s ‘gay’ clothes, the boys are also rehearsing and displaying their understanding of ‘manliness’.
The Sims avatars which resemble Ken dolls do not suggest the stereotypical masculinity depicted in most commercial games. Burn and Schott (2004) describe the male protagonist (Cloud) from Final Fantasy 7 and they argue that he is a ‘heavy hero’ because he is “exaggeratedly attractive, good with his sword, and equipped with a mysterious myth of origin, combining ordinary mortal and supernatural forces, like Achilles” (2004:7). The boys at the holiday club reported playing war games such as Call of Duty and other age-inappropriate titles such as games from the Grand Theft Auto series. Male Sims are not soldiers or criminal anti-heroes and may be considered, in Karl’s words, ‘gay’ by comparison.

21. The Sims 2 No Avril, ‘gangsta’ or tarty clothes
When an all-girl group of children customized a female Sim character, they made different judgements about the clothing options. Their comments about the different outfits reveal more about peer taste and being in agreement about what they think is acceptable as ‘pretty’ as opposed to just being ‘feminine’. They reject outfits they label as ‘Avril’ (a white shirt, black tie and skirt they refer to as ‘Avril’ after the popstar Avril Lavigne who used to have a ‘skater girl’ image) and ‘gangsta’ perhaps because they view these as a bit ‘butch’, although Maggie is a self-professed tomboy who hates pink Nintendo DSes and enjoys skateboarding at the club. Similarly, they mark other clothing options as ‘tarty’ and in the end, they settle for very conventional, gender neutral clothes: a pair of jeans and a T-shirt. Not only do they resist images they associated with subversive female identities, but in agreeing on these they are also performing their own group gendered identity as pre-adolescent and innocent pre-sexual girls. They dismiss options that are too girly or ‘baby-ish’ as well as those that are ‘tarty’ and opt for the in-between. They are performing dress as an aspect of identity that they see as reflecting their own ages and interests. Additionally, the girls’ choices can also be seen as a form of resistance against hyper-sexualised female characters in games such as those from the Tomb Raider series featuring Lara Croft with her disproportionate Barbie doll figure. Although the Sim avatars also look like Barbie and Ken dolls, owing to lack of genital details, the girls prefer dress-up with the Sims to playing dress-up with Barbie dolls which they see as childish. Unlike the boys who would bring Lego Star Wars toys and cars to the club, the girls never brought Barbie dolls or any other toys.

22. Discussion
The examples may demonstrate children’s character customization as an instance of IT fluency, as they are able to use these digital affordances, but even more importantly is the fact that they do so to express gendered identities. However, these configured performances are more complex. The children’s representational choices can also be seen as motivated by storytelling, as seen in the vampire wedding example, but what they all have in common is that they are instances of gendered performances where they use the affordances of character customization in the different games to perform their beliefs about gender. It is notable that these performances suggest defining gender in terms of difference: my four year old sister’s sackgirl needs to look different to my sackboy, the bride and the groom need to look like that which they are meant to represent, male Sims cannot wear ‘girly’ clothes, and female Sims need to display a particular, conservative type of femininity.

23. Conclusions
It may be dangerous to over-essentialize about children’s creative practices with technology and citing such instances as examples of larger IT fluencies – this only suggests questionable transfer models of literacy. Additionally, both The Sims 2 and Little Big Planet have very active online communities which allow for creative production in the form of user-generated content. Character customization may be an inroad to such interests for some children, but is not a predictor that such higher level forms of engagement will take place later on for these children or in different contexts. It is important to distinguish between in-game customization and production which involves user-generated content and interacting in online forums and so forth where the ‘affinity spaces’ (Gee, 2009) surrounding these games support such interests. For the children at the holiday club, character customization and related gaming activities does not extend beyond playing the occasional casual game online. Gaming is confined to collaborative, face-to-face experiences and engaging in ‘networked publics’ (boyd, 2010), often assumed by proponents of game literacy (Buckingham & Burn, 2007), is largely absent. The children’s gameplay suggests a preoccupation with the social meaning of games which is about gendered performances and displaying such interests to peers.
Pelletier, Burn and Buckingham (2010) discuss practices of textual appropriation in computer games made by young people (14 year old girls in particular) and how the games they make, as instances of production work, make reference to popular media texts. They look at practices of media production rather than consumption. In relation to this paper, one needs to question whether children’s character customizations are merely ‘consumption’. On the other hand, Pelletier, Burn and Buckingham (2010) warn that we need to move beyond notions of creativity which are reductively skill based or unhelpfully celebratory, as a response to media production activities being routinely described as ‘creative’ in the field of educational practice, especially in relation to the use of digital media. However, they mention Vygotsky’s thoughts on creativity, where the central focus of younger children’s play involves the imaginative transformation of cultural resources using semiotic tools. I think the children’s character customizations need to be considered as such and as instances of age-related gameplay. In the process of configuring their play, they are also negotiating gendered identities. Additionally, concepts such as configuration and performance may be more suitable to explaining children’s character customizations than debates around IT fluency, creativity, consumption or production.

24. Thank you  Conclusions References
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Ludography