1. ETC Applied Research Team Final Presentation December 15, 2003

2. David JimisonShanna Tellerman Eben MyersBen Smith The Team Brenda Harger, Faculty Advisor

3. Original High Level Goal To research character and emotion in online games from a fresh perspective (Art & Drama) and to write a research paper that provides practical applications to game design.

4. Emergent Stories in Massively Multiplayer Online Games: Using Improvisational Techniques to Design for Emotional Impact

5. Distinct Medium of MMOGs

6. Defining Characteristic Hundreds or thousands of players simultaneously inhabit the same persistent game world.

7. Unique Features of MMOGs Play together Real-time Unscripted Potentially never-ending

8. Design Challenges Unpredictable player behavior 1,000 heroes Multiple play styles and skill levels

9. Stories Stories are important to human beings Satisfying stories have an identified structure

10. Stories and Games Linear stories tend to be used in linear games. Multi-linear stories are also used in games.

11. Emergent Stories Authored on the fly.

12. Improv Storytelling on the fly Real-time Unscripted

13. CROW Character Relationship Objective Where (setting)

14. Character External and internal characteristics –Physical body –Status –Given circumstances –Personality traits –Inner needs

16. Relationship Three types –Biological –Professional –Social

17. Objective Objective is a goal –Physical –Psychological –Combination Objective should be expressed as a verb

18. Where (setting) Time period and location for the story

19. CROW Web CROW elements are dynamic and interrelated Action should cause change in one or more elements of CROW Change in an element of CROW can affect other elements of CROW

20. Moments of Truth “...we rely on works of fiction, in any medium, to help us understand the world and what it means to be human... we lose consciousness of the medium and see neither print nor film but only the power of the story itself (and) think about what truth it has told us about our lives.” (Janet Murray, Hamlet on the Holodeck)

21. Moments of Truth An empathic connection to a universal feeling through a specific incident in a story

23. Moments of Truth don’t have to be profound.

24. Important Points MMOGs are a distinct medium Emergent stories can help meet the challenges of this medium Improv techniques (CROW and CROW web) create a foundation towards moments of truth

25. Challenges We’re not gamers We are 5 people writing together The scope of our topic and our ideas is huge

26. We’re not Gamers: Playing Games Together Individually Always discussed from a critical and analytical angle Aliens vs. Predator: Extinction * Animal Crossing * Def Jam: Vendetta * Earth & Beyond * Final Fantasy X * Grand Theft Auto III * Grand Theft Auto: Vice City * Halo * Ico * Jak & Daxter: The Precursor Legacy * The Legend of Zelda: The Windwaker * Max Payne * Metal Gear Solid: Substance * Metroid: Prime * No One Lives Forever 2 * Silent Hill 2 * The Sims * The Sims Online * Splinter Cell * Star Wars Galaxies: An Empire Divided * Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic * Super Mario Sunshine * Toontown Online

27. Point of View and Camera

28. Linearity

29. Reward Structures

30. We’re not Gamers: Talking to Gamers Surveyed ETC students One-on-one conversations

31. We’re not Gamers: Research Gamespot, Gamespy, IGN, Mobygames, and many others… Talked to designers at EA

32. We’re not Gamers: It’s a Strength Ultimately, being non-gamers meant we could bring an outside (artistic/dramatic) perspective to the topic.

33. We are 5 people writing together: Managing time together and apart Meetings/discussions Outlines Divided up writing Group editing

34. We are 5 people writing together: Communication

35. We are 5 people writing together: Greater than the sum of our parts

36. Huge Scope: Expanding the Scope First All games not just online games Breadth first study of video games

38. Huge Scope: Narrowing Down Looked for topic areas that were new and different.

39. Sparks

41. Deliverables: Written Words Paper Documentation of our thoughts/process

42. Deliverables: EA Workshop January 9 th Held at Maxis Open to all of the EA community Our objective: –Present our ideas in the form of practical applications that game designers can employ

43. Future Publications? We will take ideas from our paper and write them into different published forms. Conferences (ACE ‘04, ICEC ’04, GDC ’05) Magazines/Journals (Game Developer, Journal of Game Studies) Online (Gamasutra)

44. Special Thanks The Sims Online Jeff Lind - Dev. Dir./Team Lead Andrew Boyd - Designer Jessica Lewis - Associate Producer Earth & Beyond Chris Klug - Creative Director Sean Dugan – Writer The Sims 2.0 Lucy Bradshaw - VP Production/Dev. Lisa Dennis - HR Bob King - Animator Billy Hsu - Console Development LotR: Return of the King Eric Leive - Artist Jane Ng – Artist ETC Students/Alumni Jon-Paul Dumont Richard Colvin Jon Parise Nate Jones Ira Fey Ted Hung

45. …Questions?