Heikki Tyni

Howdy pardner!: on free-to-play, sociability and rhythm design in FrontierVille

Despite their rapid evolution and wide popularity social games played on Facebook have so far gained relatively little interest among academic game researchers. A close reading of the Facebook game FrontierVille aims to provide some starting points for the study of social games. The paper starts by outlining the rationale behind the economy based on virtual object sales and examines how also the non-paying players are affected by the system. Second, the paper considers the different forms and functions of sociability present within FrontierVille. Finally, the study explicates how FrontierVille both allows flexible playing patterns and actively builds particular rhythms of play. All in all, the paper argues that design, economics and playing of social games are tightly interconnected and should be studied in relation to each other.

Dimensions of Hybrid in Playful Products

In this article we examine playful hybrid products located in the intersection of toys and games. By hybrid, we mean games and toys that utilize digital environments to provide added value to tactile, physical or material experiences. The paper aims to create a preliminary model for mapping hybrid dimensions. Our initial analysis paints a picture of a design space with varied degrees of hybridity. Comparing seven example cases lets us see how in some products the digital part of the experience is independent of the material side, while sometimes these sides are co-dependent. Further, in some cases the digital and material halves are intertwined to a synchronous experience, whereas in others they take turns. Our analysis is preliminary at this point and we conclude that there is much room for future research in the field of hybrid play products.

MurMur moderators, the talking playful seats

In this article we present the concept of MurMur Moderators, talking playful seats facilitating playful atmosphere and creativity at office environments. The article describes the design and technological composition of our first prototype, and our experiences exposing the concept to audiences at two science fairs in Italy (2013) and Finland (2014). This research has served as an informative pilot study, consequently directing our focus to the ways the accompanying narrative brings additional design value to the interactive seats. Our goal with the fairs was to investigate what are the preliminary audience reactions for the high level concept and how people interact with the initial prototype. The feedback was used for generating further ideas for ambient play and furniture-as-a-service, some of which carries on to future research and second prototype of the seat.

Goofy Mus, Grumpy Mur and Dirty Muf: Talking Playful Seats with Personalities

The article discusses the concept of MurMur Moderators, talking playful seats designed to facilitate playful atmosphere and creativity at office environments. The concept of MurMur Moderators consists of five different personalities, grumpy Mur, goofy Mus, mellow Muh, sensitive Mut and shy Mum. The article describes the experiences and reactions to two personalities, Mus and Mur. Further, a sixth personality, Muf, consisting of rejected, provocative features is detailed. Consequently, the paper discusses play preferences, affordances and thresholds in connection to adult play. These will be the focus of future research by the authors.

Extended or exhausted: how console DLC keeps the player on the rail

Downloadable add-on content (DLC) is the latest, and still evolving, formatting strategy in the long line of entertainment industry franchising practices, as it is used to persuade player-customers to buy their games new and to extend the lifespan of a video game by turning a single product into a full-fledged service. As skateboarding game Skate 3 demonstrates, the DLC model has raised also problems. While game companies are eager to turn their games into constant services, the ramifications of the new digital economy come as a surprise to many users.

Need to touch, wonder of discovery, and social capital: experiences with interactive playful seats

In this article we present findings from a design experiment of MurMur Moderators, talking playful seats facilitating playful atmosphere and creativity at office environments. The article describes the design and technological composition of our two prototypes, and our experiences exposing the concept to audiences at science fairs and an office environment. This research has served as an exploratory design study, directing our focus to the seats as primary and secondary play objects with a distinct narrative. Our goal with the initial exposure was to first investigate preliminary audience reactions for the high level concept and how people interact with the prototype. This was then supplemented by testing the concept in an office environment. The data we have collected gives us insight on the seats as primary and secondary play objects and how users touch, discover and socialize.

Understanding smart device tabletop games

The aim of this short paper is to understand smart device tabletop games as a part of the larger phenomenon of hybrid tabletop games. The approach taken is to create a loose typology of smart device tabletop games via analyzing the features of such games currently on offer and mapping them in the historical context of hybrid tabletop games. The process of creating a typology also helps us move towards understanding the nature of a wider hybrid gaming experience, not restricted merely to the delivery medium of the game.

Playful Furniture: Breaching a Serious Setting With Interactive Seats

Are shaggy seats which make cute noises playful or disruptive in a conference setting? This article pushes the limits of game scholars’ lusory attitude by breaching an academic seminar with a playful experiment. Five MurMur Moderator seats, interactive and interruptive furniture prototypes, were set up at a game research seminar where they were used as ambient elements during the presentations. The experience was evaluated by observation, accompanied with seminar tweets, and by conducting a small survey after the seminar. The experiences of the participants varied from enthusiastically positive to strong negative feelings. Through this experiment, we were able to explore the important issue of polarized attitudes of adults toward play and provide some food for thought for the future design of adult play.

Double Duty: Crowdfunding and the Evolving Game Production Network

As independent game makers strive to tackle the demands of game production without the help of a traditional publisher, a familiar game production environment has started to evolve. Adopting a game production studies perspective, this article focuses on crowdfunding as a new channel for independent game development and the shifts crowdfunding causes in the game production network. Two successfully crowdfunded case examples—Bloodstained (2018), a digital game, and Conan (2016), a board game—are used to illustrate changes crowdfunding causes in the traditional game production environment. In removing the publisher as an “unnecessary” middleman, crowdfunded productions need to take care of the many tasks that used to belong to publishers, such as marketing, partner sourcing, distribution networks, and customer relationships. As projects turn to emerging production network intermediaries, their significance—as well as that of the crowdfunding backers—provides evidence to classify the crowdfunding model as a new game production logic.