Cheating
&
Modding
in
Video
Games:
A
Place
of
Social
Liminality
Please join us in the Collaboration Space for a talk on Cheating and Modding by English PhD student Jennifer Rickert! Read below for more details... see you there! Abstract
Gamers are well aware of cheating. Whether through build-in cheat codes, script editors, or even console commands,they know what it means to cheat; or at least they think they do. Despite the programmed affordances for cheating in the code of many video games, the concept itself remains socially constructed and abstract, resisting precise definitions as to which practices constitute cheating, and which can be understood as “modification”. My paper bridges understandings and performances of cheating acts in video games with concepts of game modification.
Drawing from Ian Bogost, Katherine Isbister, and Jesper Juul, I explore the practice of cheating in video games, from the Game Genie through to the emergence of popular video game modification (e.g. The Sims). This practice exists in a liminal state, where some mods are not only socially accepted, but also a developer-encouraged aspect of the gaming experience (e.g. World of Warcraft, Fallout 4), while others are shunned as undesirable, non-immersive, or outright cheating. I explore the boundary at which the alteration of game design or interactivity evolves from a modification to a cheating act, arguing for a reconceptualization of game modification as a socially sanctioned version of cheating.
If cheating is defined as any action which goes against the intended design, difficulty, or socially perceived ethos, how far can cheating or modification go before the player is no longer playing the same game? No one plays the same version of Monopoly, yet we continue to call it by the same name.
Bio
Jenn Rickert is
an
interdisciplinary-trained
academic,
currently
in
the
English
PhD
program,
who
specializes
in
the
study
of
people,
technology,
and
culture.
Currently,
her
research
focuses
on
gender,
power
structures,
and
social
dynamics
surrounding
competitive
gaming
communities,
particularly
within
World
of
Warcraft.
She
is
also
interested
in
gaming
cultures
(more
broadly),
identity,
embodiment,
gamification,
gaming
narratives,
world
building,
storytelling,
cultural
reciprocity,
and
human-technology
interactions.
Her
research
interests
and
object-texts
have
included
3D
printing
of
archaeological
artifacts
&
semiological
meanings
(MA
thesis),
modification
&
cheating
in
(video)games,
emotion
and
game-investment,
microtransactions/DLCs,
role-playing
(traditional
&
non-traditional),
paratext,
video
game
lore
&
narrative,
and
Twitch.