Matthew Wells - Game not Over: End-User Programming and Game System Modding as Models for Extending Community Engagement

elpub:4609 - ELectronic PUBlishing, June 20, 2018, Connecting the Knowledge Commons: From Projects to Sustainable Infrastructure - https://doi.org/10.4000/proceedings.elpub.2018.21
Game not Over: End-User Programming and Game System Modding as Models for Extending Community Engagement

Authors: Matthew Wells

    In certain digital gaming subcultures, specific games are extended and enhanced by players who create “mods”, or modifications, that add new artwork, new scenarios, and even new rules. “Modders” meet in online communities that foster engagement through the discussion and self-publication of mods, and these can keep interest in a given game going years after it is released. Most importantly, modding allows players to challenge and subvert dominant discourses, and to foster cultures of inclusivity. These DIY efforts could be adapted by academic publishers, particularly those focused on design research, to encourage sustained engagement with scholarly materials. This article discusses the history of modding, provides examples, and sketches one online modding community in detail. It then makes the argument that modding is a form of end-user engagement of the sort advocated by scholars such as Gerald Fischer, and compares modding to other online academic publishing efforts, such as webtexts.


    Volume: Connecting the Knowledge Commons: From Projects to Sustainable Infrastructure
    Section: Long Papers
    Published on: June 20, 2018
    Accepted on: June 20, 2018
    Submitted on: June 20, 2018
    Keywords: games, modding, mods, programming, [ SHS.INFO ] Humanities and Social Sciences/Library and information sciences

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