In the days of epidemic prevention at home, many people rely on playing games to relieve their boredom. An industry report shows that in the first quarter of this year, the "home economy" represented by online games broke the time and space restrictions, enriched the digital cultural life and became one of the industries that rose against the trend.
Undeniably, online games have a huge market in China. According to the report released at the 2019 China Game Industry Annual Conference, the number of game users in China has increased from more than 100 million to more than 600 million in the past decade, and games are becoming a more mainstream social way and cultural demand. Our attitude towards games should not simply and rudely say "no", but try to make it bring more positive effects to our lives.
Application scenarios are more diverse.
During the Spring Festival this year, an epidemic prevention popular science game "Eliminating Coronavirus" quickly gained the love of netizens as soon as it was launched. For every ordinary person, mastering scientific epidemic prevention knowledge and skills is the greatest support for epidemic prevention work, and this way of playing games to support epidemic prevention shows us that games, a purely recreational activity, can also be given more positive social value. As Cheng Wu, vice president of Tencent and CEO of Tencent Pictures, mentioned in an internal letter issued during the brand upgrade of tencent games: "Our attitude towards games determines the width of future industries and the temperature of future games."
In fact, today, games have become one of the favorite and most accepted forms of entertainment for hundreds of millions of young users. The values of a phenomenal game work are likely to affect the growth of a generation. This also puts forward a realistic requirement for game developers, that is, how the game conveys correct values to users, especially young users.
Tencent, which has created explosive games such as the glory of the king, launched the "Dream Pursuit Plan" two years ago, with functional games as the starting point, hoping to explore more value and application of the game. Cheng Wu said that the existence scene of games is no longer limited to entertainment, but has been widely used in many fields such as education, medical care and public welfare, providing brand-new solutions for many social problems.
For example, game developers are trying to integrate boring learning into games. This game can completely record most of each student’s operations in the game process like a video recorder. The guardian can use it to check the actual operations of the students in the game and replay their game process like a movie. Together with the game log written by the students, the final game report, interviews, observation materials and other materials, the students can be deeply and comprehensively analyzed.
Games can also be used in health recovery. In foreign countries, a smoking cessation game was once very popular. On the one hand, it can help people receive all kinds of information continuously for days, weeks or even months in an entertaining way, thus gradually changing people’s healthy behavior. On the other hand, reward correct behaviors (such as taking medicine on time) and encourage players to compete with others to see who has changed the most (such as losing weight). By monitoring and comparing the progress of ourselves and others, we can help people to strengthen exercise, improve their diet, relieve depression and better control the symptoms of diabetes or asthma.
The book Gamification Thinking: A New Force to Change Future Commerce says: Human beings will face a prospect of gamification. Games are not only a fun for a group of people to indulge in, but also a medium for human beings to express themselves and create meaning in the future, which is one of the foundations of the next generation of human civilization. He also pointed out that in the future, entertainment will be gamified and education will be gamified.
In this regard, experts believe that scholars and game developers need to work together to make the best games. The "best" here should not only be "fun", but also make the game works play an entertaining role, which not only brings joy to players, but also enables them to gain growth strength from it.
Especially for young users, game developers should pay more attention to studying how to integrate the essence of Chinese cultural values such as patriotism, honesty and friendliness into game development, into specific gameplay and game interaction, and subtly influence the growth of young people in an entertaining way. According to insiders, this is a challenging but very meaningful undertaking.
Nourish creation with traditional culture
The game can also be done with connotation, cultural taste and popularity. In recent years, Tencent cooperated with the Forbidden City to create a small game called "Forbidden City: Pocket Palace Craftsman", in which more than 1.5 million young people "built" the Forbidden City; Netease’s "Fantasy Journey to the West" computer version, in cooperation with all-brand products of "Journey to the West" and Dunhuang Museum, through the game, players can feel Dunhuang culture and the beauty of nine-color deer and flying without leaving home. An excellent game product can carry more excellent culture, enhance people’s cognition and taste of the game, and then subtly influence the world outlook, outlook on life and values of players, especially teenagers.
In the game circle, the charm of China’s classic literature is also fully released: the games with the themes of Three Kingdoms, Journey to the West and Martial Arts have gained a certain market in the Chinese cultural circle. "Game+Culture" is promoting the organic integration of traditional culture and trend culture, and making traditional culture rejuvenate in the Internet age.
Those young people who love domestic animation will also have the opportunity to play their favorite animated characters in a game. In recent years, Migu Entertainment has actively supported and promoted the development of domestic IP. At present, it has been authorized by more than 500 high-quality national IP of Shanghai Meiying Factory, including classic IP such as Make a scene in Heaven, Gourd Baby, Black Cat Sheriff, Lotus Lantern, The Legend of Heroes in Sui and Tang Dynasties. In the words of Feng Lin, general manager of Migu Interactive Entertainment Co., Ltd., it is not only the cultural responsibility that an enterprise should undertake to make Guoman IP shine. In fact, once the cultural values of a large number of domestic classic IPS are fully excavated, everyone can become the beneficiaries of the development of the game industry. To do this well, we need a group of creative and dreamy developers to jointly explore the value of IP, so that games can work together with animation, film and television, literature and other businesses to jointly create a cultural IP that young people love.
With the development of game industry and technology, the influence of games is also rising. In the past, the game relied heavily on other entertainment industries, and the methods of drawing materials from film and television dramas and IP adaptation almost ran through the whole game history. However, with the maturity of the game itself and the expansion of its influence, the current game began to be exported to other entertainment industries, and the number of film and television dramas with the theme of games gradually increased. These film and television dramas usually make some divergent adaptations or imaginations of the games, and expect and describe the future games in their own way.
Liu Wei, president of Giant Network Technology Co., Ltd. believes that online games have transcended regions and become an international interactive "language" because of their Internet attributes. It can be said that online games have certain development potential in cross-cultural communication. An online game product bearing excellent culture can introduce the story of China and the image of China to the world, and also let the world know about China.
How to subtly transmit more and better Chinese culture in a form acceptable to overseas users? In fact, industry management departments have made explorations. For example, the "China National Online Game Publishing Project" has increased its support for game products with profound Chinese traditional culture connotation; In recent years, some research and development of "art games" reflecting China’s traditional aesthetics have also received considerable attention.
Install a "firewall" for teenagers
In China, few parents support their children to play games. Many families regard games as a scourge, and equate playing games with doing nothing and playing with things. However, it is undeniable that with the popularity of mobile phones and electronic devices, the age at which teenagers in China first come into contact with online games is getting younger and younger.
"Gamification is an irreversible trend of today’s social development, which is an unchangeable fact in the era of artificial intelligence." Huan Wang, principal of Beijing Shijia Primary School, suggested that parents should treat the role of video games in the growth of teenagers objectively and rationally. Try to avoid the induction of bad factors in the network and let children "live in harmony" with video games. She suggested that parents go through the process of playing games with their children and listen to their voices and favorite content. On the premise of empathy, parents will recommend games suitable for children from the perspective of adults.
The parents of a high school student told reporters that the game itself is innocent, and the key is to guide children to establish a rational "game view." At present, the state’s supervision of online games is increasing. No matter what kind of games, it is required to embed anti-addiction system, strengthen the protection of minors and teenagers, and provide them with a healthy atmosphere of education and fun. At the end of 2019, the State Press and Publication Administration issued the Notice on Preventing Minors from Indulging in Online Games, which gave game manufacturers clearer guidance. Before the end of May, tencent games will implement new regulations for its 80 games, including "the glory of the king" and other products, strictly implement the real-name system of online game accounts, control the duration and consumption amount of minors’ games, and further explore the application of "face recognition" technology.
Installing a green "firewall" for the online world of minors is not only the aspiration of parents, but also a systematic challenge faced by the whole society, and it is also an important proposition that the game industry needs to overcome. Experts believe that, on the one hand, from product design to thinking mode, game developers have the responsibility to carefully research and develop, scientifically build, pay attention to increasing culture and education, and spread mainstream values. On the other hand, it is necessary to correctly guide young people to establish a correct concept of games, rather than protecting them by banning games.
In recent years, e-sports has gradually become a formal major, appearing in the curriculum of some colleges and universities. In literary and artistic works, with the popularity of film and television works reflecting the e-sports industry such as Full-time Master, Dear Love and Love O2O, the e-sports industry has gradually penetrated into people’s lives and is no longer excluded.
With the rapid development of the e-sports industry, many new professions have emerged: e-sports anchors, professional players, data analysts, etc., including the recently popular e-sports sparring trainer, who plays games with people for a fee and has become a "new rice bowl" for many young people.
In the face of such a young and energetic generate, tradition and innovation blend, many young people regard it as the stage of their dreams. With the all-round development of the game animation industry, it is also an urgent need for the development of the animation industry to cultivate compound talents with perfect combination of animation creativity and technology. In this case, both families and society need to strengthen positive guidance, so as to promote the better development of the whole industry. (Economic Daily China Economic Net reporter Jiang Tianjiao)
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