I found this reading to be very interesting, and it held my attention the entire time I was reading this. It first caught my attention with the start of the digital conversation saying, “Bow Nigger”. If i was the player going against the opponent playing this game I would feel uneasy about stepping into the ring maybe. But as i continued to read it was then stated that his screen name had nothing to do with his ethnicity, its only a game, and that the player is probably hundreds of miles away and far beyond anything you could call in influence on his life. But was it a deeper story for the player?
In the reading it was stated that Raven seemed to have omitted any of the more mundane actions that you could envision your avatar doing. For example: there is no “bow” button. I feel as if this is an act of exploring creative narrative driven games. Bowing in these Jedi games are an act of respect, but truth is some people actually think that having to crouch down is silly, and some do it just because our peers say that’s what we should do to gain our respect.
I think this somewhat explores some of the arguments about narratives in video games, as was talked bout in class during the day of debate one. I think this was a narrative because of the approach that he chose to share the story in. He shared his experience with us as if he was actually there having to really take on this unfair player that comes across as maybe not so much of a good person because of all the bad behavior that goes on. See its like a narrative about a genuine battle of good vs evil, good guy and bad guy. I enjoyed this reading so much because it shows the interactions with the players and the concepts and events in real life that surrounds the game.
I was incredibly surprised when reading this piece at just how nonchalant Shanahan was about being racially targeted, and I’m honestly still struggling to understand how he can say it has nothing to do with race. I understand that for many people who spew so much hatred constantly, that slurs like this have become so watered down and meaningless that they’ll use it for anyone in any scenario (ex. calling people “fucking Jews” out of frustration in game chat rooms), but underneath that word is a specific hateful sentiment. That degree of anger had to arise from somewhere, and I believe the root of the insult itself is incredibly important whether or not it’s actually racially directed at someone. I truly think that Shanahan should take more of an issue with gameplay like this, but I do understand how he’s relating this to real life and taking it so calmly because of the context.
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I also enjoyed this reading because it was very relative and I’ve dealt with that situation many times and always had the same experiences as the player who ignored the ignorance because though i love games I’ve never took playing online that serious I’ve always done it to meet people and have fun which is what its for and plus its just so satisfying to beat the assholes who do it.
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