Abstract
© 2015, © The Author(s) 2015. We address the subjective experience of social network gamers playing Restaurant City, a game hosted on Facebook. We adopted a netnographic approach to studying the culture of transient Internet communities shaping the player off-line communities. Fieldwork was conducted over the entire life span of the game (3 years). Data were analyzed using a qualitative thematic approach and the software EdEt. The results describe the evolution of the gaming experience through online interaction and its importance in everyday off-line life. Players were observed to play an important role in the production of social meanings associated with gaming and with the gaming community online and off-line. We discuss the implications of our findings regarding how the gaming process is a far more complex scenario than envisaged by a business vision based on acquisition, retention, and monetization.
Original language | English |
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Pages (from-to) | 650-670 |
Journal | Games and Culture |
Volume | 12 |
Issue number | 7-8 |
DOIs | |
Publication status | Published - 1 Nov 2017 |
Keywords
- gamer experience
- netnography
- social interaction
- social network game