VIDEO GAME CULTURE

 How many of you play video games?  If so, what kind of games? There are different types!! nres nres  How often do you play?

 Demographics (Characteristics of a Population)  Socialization Vs. Anti-socialization  Offline and Online Gaming  Slang and Terminology  Competitive Gaming  Video Games as an Art Form  Representations of Gaming Selves Vs. Real Selves  Anonymity: Good or Bad?  Issues and Benefits of Games In Popular Culture

 How Big Do You Think Video Games Are?

 The Highest Grossing Movies Worldwide are: 1. Avatar: $2,782,275, Titanic: $2,185,372, The Avengers: $1,511,757, Harry Potter And the Deathly Hallows-Pt.2: $1,328,111, Transformers: Dark of the Moon: $1,123,746,996

 5. Wii Play: $1.25 billion  4. Grand Theft Auto 4: $1.35 billion  3. Mario Cart Wii: $1.4 Billion  2. Call of Duty Black Ops: $1.5 billion  And the Number One Top Selling Game of All Time Is….

 $10+ BILLION  It continues to sell enough copies and expansions to have its gross total continue to be counted, thus the +  Released on November 23, 2004  Has sold over 15 million copies since its release  Brings in over $1.5 billion PER YEAR

 Let’s look at the most played video game in the world per month at the moment:  kf04 kf04

 People from more that 145 countries play daily  Over 32 million people play monthly, which is more than the 12+ million peak subscribers to World of Warcraft  There are 12 million active players daily, with and average of 3 million people being online at any given moment  Worldwide, 1+ billion hours are spent playing the game EVERY MONTH  The Season 2 Championship from the video used around 5% of all of North America’s internet bandwidth during its occurrence.

 We will now start out unit on video game culture and Ernest Cline’s novel, “Ready Player One”.  But before we open the book…

 We will use your avatars throughout the unit, so be sure to put some effort and thought into them. Don’t lose them!  You can either draw your own or use HeroMachine HeroMachine  Your avatar can be anything you want! Male, female, wizard, warrior, space marine, Jedi, or anything else: it doesn’t matter. Just make your avatar into something you would want to be or how you would want to represent yourself in a game.