Ethical Dilemmas in Developing Video Game Content

1
Ethical Dilemmas in Developing Video Game Content

• A. Phelps
• Golisano College of Computing and Information
  Sciences
• Rochester Institute of Technology
• amp_at_it.rit.edu andysgi.rit.edu

2
Issues in Game Development

• Traditional Computing
• Game Engine Engineering
• Programming / Compilers
• Graphics and Display
• Memory Management
• Sound Engines
• Artificial Intelligence
• Networking
• Database Representation
• User Interface Design
• Custom Input Hardware

• Non-Traditional Challenges
• Dealing with Artists
• Dealing with Writers
• Dealing with Musicians
• Playability
• Marketing Publishing
• Player Communities
• Online reputation and trust
• THE FUN FACTOR

3
The Game Programming Concentration

• Available to IT, CS, SE
• Some involvement with CIAS / Multi-Disciplinary
  Studies
• Students all have varying backgrounds

Undergrad Grad
OUR GRADUATES ARE CURRENTLY WORKING AT Microsoft
X-BOX, Electronic Arts, Vicarious Visions, Red
Eye Studios, SquareSoft, and many more!
4
The Educational Mission

• WHAT WE DO
• Prepare students for work in the games industry.
• Reduce the need for on the job retraining
  immediately on hire
• Produce well-rounded students capable of working
  with a game production team.

• WHAT WE DONT DO
• Play games all day
• Give less than 200 engineering effort
• Ignore relationships with formal theory in
  IT/CS/SE

If what you want is to play games, and somehow
go to school for it, this is really, really, not
the place for you. - my former student, 2002
5
Student Games

• Mega Monkey Mayhem M3
• Independent Games Festival 03
• Coursework from IT and CS
• Worked with J Bayliss for completion

Jason Winnebeck Geoff Goodwin Jon Hilliker
Peter Mowry
6
Student Games

• Shooters and SHMUPS
• Dave Parks left
• Aaron Cloutier right

7
Student Games

Promotional game for the IT Department Independent
Games Festival 2004 Summer project 2004
Team Freakout is Alex Cutting Eli
Tayrien Andrew Lorino Michael P Clark
8
Games Related Projects

• MUPPETS.RIT.EDU
• A system for students to learn to program
  visually, without modifying their curriculum. A
  game engine to teach how to build game engines
• APPLICATIONS IN
• Visualization
• Programming Education
• Simulation CSCW
• Virtual Theatre
• Published in ACM Queue February 2004.
• Published in Conference on Information Technology
  Education 2003, 2004. ACM.ORG
• Featured in a talk at the Computer Gaming
  Technologies Conference, Algoma University,
  2004.
• Featured on the Ready2Net University Research
  Broadcast, 2002. University of Hawaii.

9
Research in Game Effects

• Natural Effect Simulation
• L-System Explosion Trees
• Lighting and Rendering
• Cg from Shockwave3D

10
Games Related Projects
FILE SYSTEM VISUALIZATION CELLULAR
ATOMATA GENETIC ALGORITHMS MOLECULAR VISUALIZATION

11
But what do we build?

• War-sims?
• Addictive content?
• Repetitive Reproductions of Real-World Violence?
• Sexually explicit or exploitative material?

Then one-day, Mitch, they told him the stuff he
was making was killing people. And he cracked
he cracked severely. - Val Kilmer in Real
Genius
12
Who do we build it for?

• Older Gamers Are Now the Norm!
• 76 of online game-players are over 18
• 81 of US Game Purchases are made by an adult
• Do adults really know what they are buying?
• Are games the babysitters of 200X?

13
The Magic Question

• Do game companies have an ethical responsibility
  to produce less violent and/or less addictive
  content?
• - to my graduate class in History of
  Electronic Entertainment

14
The Response

• NO!
• Not one response said that game companies had any
  ethical or moral responsibility.
• Interesting thread on GotGame?

15
Differential with Society

• Columbine H.S.
• Ohio slaying and GTA
• EverCRACK and Shawn Woolley

16
But isnt that just

• Personal Responsibility?
• The Right of Free Speech?
• Capitalism Defined?
• Inability to take responsibility for societal
  repercussions of message?
• Inability to see corporate responsibility as
  anything other than shareholder profits?

17
Real Research?

• Almost none check out the serious games
  listserv, and writings by Amy Jo Kim
• Popular spin and media frenzy in place of fact
  and scientific method
• The only proven measures for game exposure
  involve hand-eye coordination and repetitive
  manual dexterity. There is very little social
  science literature at present.

18
Questions, Contact, Discussion

• Contact Professor Phelps
• amp_at_it.rit.edu
• http//andysgi.rit.edu student work and gaming
  concentration info START HERE
• http//www.corante.com/gotgame/ blog