Assignment 2

Assignment 1 rd Its not a rough draft I just didn’t rename it

Austin Frisby

Dr. Bailie

English 2089

8/1/2019

Gaming Discourse

Video games and the gaming industry is very diverse that people outside this industry might not know. Video games are made by a lot of different developers and are designed to be in one or more subcategories of games. There are lot of ways to develop and reasons for developing video games as there are to play them. Some people want to play games casually, for the fantasy, the story, the visuals, and many more reasons. Another way to play video games would be competitively, to try to be the best at a game that they enjoy. Once someone makes that decision they start to play with a consistent group of people where they are all trying the best at a game. It starts to create a group that not only plays together but takes it a step further and they become their own discourse community.

In my case it was a group of friends, who were all fans of the Call of Duty (COD) franchise and decided to take it a step further. We all, the four of us, collectively thought that we were good players and wanted to test our skill. Some of the people in the group watched Youtube videos of people playing COD competitively, the equivalent of amateur matches, and discovered how we could form our own team and find games against other teams that want to play in a more competitive setting. I was around during the start of us getting into competitive but didn’t participate/play with the group until a few months after. Once I joined the group there was a readjusting period because the three of them had already form there own chemistry/discourse and I was new member trying to find my role in the group.

The discourse of the group had already been established once I joined but what shaped it was by another discourse community. To get into competitive gaming for COD, since only a few games in the franchise offered a ranked playlist, you would need to go through a reliable third-party website to find games and to ensure fairness during matches. For us we used a website gamebattles.majorleaguegaming.com to fulfill this role. This website offers an automatic way to keep simple statistics, like win loss record, and a way to ensure the fairness by disputing results if you found that the other team was cheating. A little on how the site works is that you can find or post a game with the rules and gamemode that you want. Once a game is found the website give both teams information about the other a way to invite/communicate with them in game. Then after the game is played both teams have to manually enter the results of the match and then it shows up in the teams win loss ratio.

How is this site a discourse community? The main goal of the site is to provide a way to find games between other teams and they want them to be fair too. One way they work to ensure fairness is that it gives teams an indication on how good another team might be. This indication is based on your teams rank on the ladder and it gives an up arrow for a team that is significantly higher on the ladder and a down arrow for a team significantly lower on the ladder compared to your team. This site also has a committee with different members of the gaming community that rules on any disputes teams may have to ensure that the rules were followed and if not correct the results of that match. Another feature this site has, its more annoying than helpful, is that it sends you an email whenever your team finds a game. It is a way to communicate to every member that is supposed to be in that game a chance to be notified if their own team fails to do so. The site also sends out an email to the person who submitted a claim on a dispute based on how the committee rules on it (most of the time teams already know how the committee will rule if they have the proof so this is more on the annoying side). This site does have some specific terminology that it uses. As mention earlier “ladder” is referring to a league. Ladders vary based on region and team size. It’s a way to see where you rank compared to other teams of that size and in your region. Some other terminology would be “gamebattles(gb) variant”, “CWL Variant”, and “MLG rank”. For gamebattles variant it is a pre-made set of rules for different gamemodes that the site provides. CWL variant is also a pre-made set of rules for gamemodes but that are the same rules that COD professional players play with in tournaments. Most of the time gb variant and CWL variant were very similar but with a few tweaks made by the site. MLG ranking refers to your own personal rank and how your total win loss ratio compares to other members on the site. The website has other video games on there to find competitive matches for, not just COD, and all that gets taken into account to determine your rank. To join you had to have an email and be able to link your xbox live account or PSN account to your profile. The site had a system in place to kind of police the members on the site and this was done by the committee. If a person or team disputes a lot of games, were they say they win but actually lost, and they don’t provide proof of them winning then they get suspended from the site and after multiple repeated uses actually banned from the site. This also plays into the different level of experience between members of the site, when we first started out the more experience teams would do that to us if we beat them and early on we didn’t know how important it was to obtain proof of a win so those teams would take advantage of us to boost their record.

Coming back to the team that I was, kind of still am, apart of that we formed a discourse community between us. Our goal was to be the best that we possible could be and later that evolved into trying to win every game we play. Early on we discovered that we actually sucked at COD when it comes to the competitive scene, so our goal quickly became getting better and developing good chemistry/teamwork. I stopped shortly after and when I came back, they had won a couple of games and had adapted to the play style required for competitive, but they had a significant losing record on the team. The goal changed from just getting better to win a game occasionally. After a year and a new COD game came out the goal became to try to win every game. The group had a text group chat where we let each other know when we were getting on or send information about a strategy they came across. During our first year we would talk to each other through xbox live chat to communicate with each other in game. As a group we developed some of our own terminology. Most of them were map callouts which are places we gave a name to on the map to let other members know if an enemy was spotted there or other important information. One specific callout location was “top boat”, the map was a ship, referring to the upper level of the ship and there were two sides so to distinguish we based it off our spawn location for that round. The specified version would be “top our boat” or “top their boat”. Another phrase we used was “right off the RIP” referring to the beginning of the round. Later on, we developed more terminology like “garden” which refers to points gathered from non-killing actions. It was used in a way to say that if someone had a lot of these points that they weren’t doing anything even though those actions were important. There was a very steep barrier to join the group. To join you had to be good at the COD, committed to playing, and be available to play somewhat frequently. Then to stay there had to be good team chemistry and being able to find a role that fit with our team. A few people did try to join our team, but it never stuck. One person was good but wasn’t around enough to play and could never find a role for them. The other wanted to play with us but was never serious about joining. Later on it got harder for people to join us since we had so much experience together with terminology and knowing what each member was going to do that other people struggled to fit in.

Being apart of this gaming group meant a lot to me. I was friends with everyone in the group before but after it strengthened my friendship with them to the point where we lived in the same apartment. It had also made me realize how much gaming competitively means to me. When I first started out, I was gaming casually and more into single player rpgs. While I still look for these single player games, I found that I like trying to be really good at online multiplayer games and that kind of directed me to what I play today. Our group did kind of disband halfway through our second generation of COD, life happened and COD not being what it once was along with many other factors, we still game together just not in a very competitive environment. It is a discourse community that is on its last legs and like every year there is going to be a new COD this year. Who knows this could be the resurgence of the group with the false hope that this years COD will be better and be everything we want but until that day comes its looking like the end.

For my narrative, about the gaming group that I am in, going to start off introducing videos/different reasons to game and then get into the competitive side that I am/was apart of and game franchise

Next would be the formation of the group since it was created relatively recently and get into how I join/became apart of this group. Also the goal of this group would be mentioned here.

Then talk about the website and how it is used to communicate information to our group. That being our specific genre for communication. Here would also be the membership to be on the site (some of the rules). Also this is part of the spread of information requirement of a dc

Go more into our specific group aspect of being a dc in a dc. Talk about and give examples of our specific group lexis referring to a recorded video that I have. Talk about our communication, genre, and spread of information. Talk about the requirements for membership.

Conclude with a description of what being apart of this group means to me. Finally leading into the larger video game stigma in general (maybe?)

The ripper narrative

It was a good narrative told in a clear and interesting way. It was laid out but not explicitly in a way that covers the criteria for a discourse community. Very clearly stated why and how they joined this discourse community and what it means to them.

Ana narrative

wow. It was a really personal narrative that had real life consequences. Its shows how discourse communities that don’t have national influence can still affect a persons life in a negative way.

1. For the ripper narrative the writers motivations for going their d.c. is that they were fascinated by the unknown and an interest in cold cases. The the Ana narrative the writers motivation for joining the group is their strive for perfection and wanting to be their best self.
2. For the ripper narrative the writer expressed that joining this d.c. had a lot of influence on his future career path. For the Ana narrative the writer expressed that joining this group had effected their life negatively to the point where they were on the brink of death
3. The Ana paper is just as good as the ripper paper because it can show how influential a d.c. can be in daily life and how much control it can have over one person.
4. I think that the document for assignment 2 will be different than assignment 1 because 2 will be more emotional than logical used whereas assignment 1 it was more logical than emotional. Assignment 2 will be more personal and allow for it to be more opinionated.

One of the forms of primary research that could be done for my discourse community would be interviewing some of the members from the group. Some of the questions that I could ask them would be, why did they want to start gaming competitively? What did forming/being apart of the group mean to them? What did they think the group goal was? Then have a few more question along those lines about the group and some of the things they remember about at our peak.

Another thing I could do would be a survey or the questions from above but in writing and it could be sent out to the entire group since the group contains me and 4 others it would be easy to distribute and get feedback.

summer-sample-paper-2089

 

If I wanted to add some primary research to my narrative I could interview some of the members of my group. I could also make a survey and send them out to all the members of the group

This “document” is from a portion of a video that I had transcribed showing the interactions between members of a discourse community I’m apart of, that being a competitive gaming group

[waiting in pre-game lobby]

A: London, Ardennes, Texas

R: Who hasn’t ready (up)

A: They haven’t, the entire other team

R: [After a few minutes of waiting] Why would you join and not ready up

A: Maybe they have to fix their classes?

R: Dude look at this guy’s message…  they want us to put the match ID in our clan tag or else their reporting.

A: What? Oh ok

R: I said why, you don’t have to. It’s not required. They ready up so it doesn’t matter. I have never seen a team threaten to report unless they up match ID in.

[Match 1 on London Dock starting]

J: Alrighty

A: The smoked A. There here. In A window.

R: Ope Jack I’m sorry. I can’t see they smoked me. Coming to window now. [J gets kill] nice.

A: On bomb last one, coming out.

R: Nice Jack you got it

J: uhh.

[round 1 won]

A: We’re going B

R: I got your stairs

A: Can you shoot back here Jack

J: Dude I’m just planting

R: 2 on stairs. I killed one. I got stuck. One on stairs still

A: I got one their spawn.

R: Stairs still

[Round 2 won]

J: I can’t believe they all went mid like that

R: They sent 2 mid and left one back B

J: Oh im almost fully streaked

A: They didn’t smoke it [A]. I got nothing

R: Mid, I’m super weak, he was in beer.

J: [Dies] Oh behind me. Lights and Beer.

R: Got beer

J: Probably back to maintenance. No? Stay up Reece

A: I’m nading it.

R: He’s still on it.

J: He went left

A: No

R: How is he not dead

A: What is this joke

R: yep you see him

A: We’re in a constant one shot battle

J: and you hit him with the nade too, didn’t you?

[A dies, Round 3 lost]

Everyone: aw oooh [and makes fortnite references as to how this guy lives]

J: It’s alright I have my streaks. I didn’t see anything over here. I’m getting it down

A: I naded fire entrance reeece. Ohh they jumped down.

R: that was me. Mid boxes super weak

A: Our spawn

R: Their spawn

A: Our spawn, I’m trapped

R: I got the one their spawn.

[Everyone dies]

J: really poor shot there on my part

R: I mean we’re just getting beat by one guy and he’s fully streaked so that hurts

J: It’s alright I am too.

[Round 4 lost]

R: Man you have a lot of points

J: Dude the garden is very healthy right now

R: Friz’s garden, I mean Jacks garden is… [everyone laughs]

J: Habit dude

R: I just default to friz dude

A: I didn’t see anyone cross

J: One lights weak

R: He pushed you Jack

J: Really?

R: No, he did come in though. Their on [B] bomb. They might push through fire, I’m going to wrap back through our spawn

J: I might do something crazy here

A: I’m in beer by the way

J: [other team planted bomb] I’m going to streak it

R: one is on our spawn box

J: one is in maintenance

R: one is deep their spawn

A: aww maintenance weak. Go now start defusing. Aww you didn’t get in time jack

R: what!

A: it’s ok he died so he didn’t get the points

[Round 5 lost, down 2-3]

3. A competitive gaming group, apartment roommates, high school friend group, colts fan base, Reds fan base, rt community

4. Competitive gaming group to be able to play games competitively and improve my skills, apartment roommates they are my friends and cheep rent, high school friend group just happened, rt/ah community enjoy their content, colts and reds fans of both teams

5. For the competitive gaming group there is not one consistent document used by the community. It has not changed the way I write outside of this community.

6. This community doesn’t really use writing, communication happened verbally the majority of the time sometimes by text or through xbox live messaging.  With that being said the ideology of the group was to just win every game and get better after a lose. I do embrace this ideology.