Natural Language Processing for Games Studies Research (original) (raw)
Related papers
Natural Language Processing in Game Studies Research: An Overview
Simulation & Gaming, 2012
Natural language processing (NLP) is a field of computer science and linguistics devoted to creating computer systems that use human (natural) language as input and/or output. We propose that NLP can also be used for game studies research. In this article we provide an overview of NLP and describe a few research possibilities that can be explored using its tools and techniques. We discuss these techniques by performing three different types of NLP analyses of a significant corpus of online videogame reviews. First, using techniques such as word and syllable counting, we analyze the readability of professionally written game reviews finding that, across a variety of indicators, game reviews are written for a secondary education reading level. Next, we analyze hundreds of thousands of user-submitted game reviews using part-of-speech tagging, parsing and clustering to examine how gameplay is described. Our findings in this area highlight the primary aesthetic elements of gameplay according to the general public of game players. Finally, we show how sentiment analysis, or the classification of opinions and feelings based on the words used in a text and the relationship between those words, can be used to explore the circumstances in which certain negatively-charged words may be used positively, and for what reasons in the domain of videogames. We conclude with ideas for future research including how NLP can be used to complement other avenues of inquiry.
Natural Language Processing in Game Studies Research
Simulation & Gaming, 2012
Natural language processing (NLP) is a field of computer science and linguistics devoted to creating computer systems that use human (natural) language as input and/or output. The authors propose that NLP can also be used for game studies research. In this article, the authors provide an overview of NLP and describe some research possibilities that can be explored using NLP tools and techniques. The authors discuss these techniques by performing three different types of NLP analyses of a significant corpus of online videogame reviews: (a) By using techniques such as word and syllable counting, the authors analyze the readability of professionally written game reviews, finding that, across a variety of indicators, game reviews are written for a secondary education reading level; (b) the authors analyze hundreds of thousands of user-submitted game reviews using part-of-speech tagging, parsing, and clustering to examine how gameplay is described. The findings of this study in this area...
Foundations of Digital Games, 2015
In this paper, we endorse and advance an emerging bottom-up approach to game studies that utilizes techniques from natural language processing. Our contribution is threefold: we present the first complete review of the growing body of work through which this methodology has been innovated; we present a latent semantic analysis model that constitutes the first application of this fundamental bottom-up technique to the domain of digital games; and finally, unlike earlier projects that have only written about their models, we introduce and evaluate a tool that serves as an interface to ours. This tool is GameNet, in which nearly 12,000 games are linked to the games to which they are most related. From an expert evaluation, we demonstrate that, beyond being an interface to our model, GameNet may be used more generally as a research tool for game scholars. Specifically, we find that it is especially useful for the scholar who wishes to explore a relatively unfamiliar area of games, but that it may also be used to discover unforeseen cases related to topics that have already been thoroughly researched.
Developing a methodology for corpus-based computer game studies
Journal of Gaming and Virtual Worlds
Video games have become a huge success in contemporary pop culture, both as ludic devices and as narrative instruments. Because of their immense popularity they are also the didactic means in which a number of social constructs are spread and perpetuated. This is particularly true in the case of Diablo and World of Warcraft, two games produced by Blizzard Entertainment Inc. This study uses a hybrid method to study both games as texts, combining Fairclough's (2003) approach to critical discourse analysis and Corpus Linguistics. The main corpus was compiled by gathering texts about the characters in these two computer games, and their accompanying visual representations, from a) official Blizzard websites and b) user-edited websites and forums. Further data was gathered through the application of a questionnaire about male and female characters in these two games to fifty participants, and by playing each game and recording in-game interactions with non-playing characters and with other players. The linguistic data was examined using a concordancer, and then analysed following Fairclough's (2003) approach. The devised methodology places a strong emphasis in the correlation between linguistic and visual data. Through this correlation and analysis it was determined that there is a strong discourse of gender difference operating within these two games.
Associating Automatic Natural Language Processing to Serious Games and Virtual Worlds
Journal For Virtual Worlds Research, 2011
We present our current research activities associating automatic natural language processing to serious games and virtual worlds. Several interesting scenarios have been developed: language learning, natural language generation, multilingual information, emotion detection, real-time translations, and non-intrusive access to linguistic information such as definitions or synonyms. Part of our work has contributed to the specification of the Multi Lingual Information Framework [ISO FDIS 24616], (MLIF,2011). Standardization will grant stability, interoperability and sustainability of an important part of our research activities, in particular, in the framework of representing and managing multilingual textual information.
Characterizing and understanding game reviews
Proceedings of the 4th International Conference on Foundations of Digital Games - FDG '09, 2009
Game reviews are one of the primary forms of videogame journalism and are also one of the prevalent forms of discourse about games. How can we characterize them and better understand the role they might play in helping create and shape our understanding of games? This article reports on the results of a study that analyzed and deconstructed a selection of game reviews from popular online websites. Our findings show that game reviews are rich and varied in terms of themes and topics covered and that considering them purely as "shopping guides" ignores the broader role they play in the discourse of games. We found that game reviews often include game design suggestions, hypothesize about the intentions and goals of game creators, and offer advice to readers on how to approach and best enjoy particular games. More generally, game reviews can also help preserve videogame history by contextualizing the links and historical connections that exist between games.
Social Media Content Review of MMORPG Games: Reddit Comment Scraping and Sentiment Analysis
Social media is a system that provides access from one-way information sharing to two-way and simultaneous information sharing, introducing Web 2.0 as a service to users. Social media is a set of dialogues and exchanges that people have with each other on the Internet. Reddit is which can call an important audience in these environments. Popular topics and content are available, such as science, sports, gaming, music, food and drink, and photography. After the release of MOBA games, there has been a serious decrease in playing time of the MMORPG genre. The research aims to sentiment analysis of content created on the MMORPG subreddit channel on Reddit. In my study, I focused on sentiment analysis of MMORPG games, which have been very popular for years. Possible reasons for that were tried to be evaluated relative to players' opinions. Sentiment analysis was performed based on posts from the 'MMORPG' subreddit on Reddit. Negative, positive, and neural structures are explained. Frequency analysis of often used words is also included.
2020
This paper argues for the examination of lexical patterns within videogames. In particular, it posits that researchers should examine lexical patterns across large representative samples from a variety of games in order to make more generalizable claims about how discourses around social identities are (re)produced. I thus argue for the use of a method called corpus linguistics. I demonstrate that corpus approaches to videogames can reveal fruitful information about how language is used within games of the same genre. This paper is designed to illustrate applications of corpora to the language of videogames. Throughout this paper, I outline the fundamental aspects of this method, primarily due to the dearth of literature which combines this method with videogame texts. In this paper, I demonstrate the validity of corpus approaches to videogame language via an analysis of the representation of gender. I argue that male and female social actors are represented in different ways, with ...
A game-based corpus for analysing the interplay between game context and player experience
Affective Computing and …, 2011
Recognizing players' affective state while playing video games has been the focus of many recent research studies. In this paper we describe the process that has been followed to build a corpus based on game events and recorded video sessions from human players while playing Super Mario Bros. We present different types of information that have been extracted from game context, player preferences and perception of the game, as well as user features, automatically extracted from video recordings. We run a number of initial experiments to analyse players' behavior while playing video games as a case study of the possible use of the corpus.