This research investigates the responses of three individuals engaging with the Super Mario World (SMW) platform videogame glitches, and how they learned to solve the problem without formal help. This investigation was chosen because it explores connections between media literacy, critical thinking, and play in adults in the context of responding…

Massively Multiplayer Online Games (MMOGs) have received considerable attention in news headlines describing gamers who have died while engaging in excessive play. However, more common physical and psychosocial effects attributed to online video gaming are social isolation, increased aggression, and negative academic and occupational consequences.…

The growing interest in video gaming is matched by a corresponding increase in concerns about the harmful effects on children and adolescents. There are numerous studies on aggression and addiction which spark debates on the negative effects of video gaming. At the same time, there are also studies demonstrating prosocial effects. This paper…

We implemented a five-week family program called "Family Quest" where parents and children ages 9 to 13 played Quest Atlantis, a multiuser 3D educational computer game, at a local after-school club for 90-minute sessions. We used activity theory as a conceptual and an analytical framework to study the nature of intergenerational play, the…

There is intense interest in computer games. A total of 65 percent of all American households play computer games, and sales of such games increased 22.9 percent last year. The average amount of game playing time was found to be 13.2 hours per week. The popularity and market success of games is evident from both the increased earnings from games,…

This article is excerpted, with the permission of the editors and the publishers, from an edited book published by Peter Lang Publishing in conjunction with Eyebeam (www.eyebeam.org), a not-for-profit new media arts organization in New York City. It reproduces one of the book's four organizing "modules"--Games as Exchange--which focuses on new…