I am a behavioral ecologist interested in gathering data on resource distribution and avatar characteristics in multi-player online games like World of Warcraft or eve-online. I am not interested with any data on the players themselves, just with in-game parameters.
I am looking to collect data on movement patterns of avatars across space, their characteristics and their behavior during game play. Is it feasible in an automated fashion?
Are you aware of anybody or any lab that has collected data from World of Warcraft or eve-online virtual worlds?
Many thanks in advance!
I do think it's feasible, but the problem here is who would be the owner of your data. I mean, for example, all the data produced in WOW is owned by Blizzard, you cannot collect and use data without Blizzard'c consenting to your research. Blizzard is accommodating though, and I guess your best shot would be contacting them directly, that what we did for a research project a few years ago.
Then it's the matter of users' consent, but I really don't know how to help you there: I tend to think that if you are conducting your research with the help of the VE owner, then there must be something in the terms of service that would cover your research. Kind of troubling from an ethical point of view but still legal.
Hi Eleonora,
Thanks for your answer! I did not aim at contacting Blizzard directly, but all my attempts to ask for the permission to collect data in other games have never been answered yet.
Are you aware of studies using only in-game data, without using surveys or forms that people use?
Best wishes,
POlivier
That I know of, there are studies using automatic data mining and studies using observational and interactional data in VEs.
It's kind of difficult to find journal articles , but there are a few conference papers that may interest you. I know that there are other papers on traffic patterns on WOW but it's not my field so I have nothing on that subject.
Hi Eleonora,
Many thanks for the publications. I was not aware of them. I'll read carefully and will use this to refine my ideas! Building such datasets is the first step toward the study I am aiming to conduct.
Using the data in research in many cases is covered by fair use or use in research exemption. The data collection is feasible and doable. Regarding the legal aspect, you should contact your university lawyer. There is a bit of data mining in http://blog.gameanalytics.com/blog/fun-facts-about-world-of-warcraft-character-names.html
Hi Petri,
Thanks for your answer, pointing out this interesting blog. I guess it won't hurt to know a bit more what will interest the gaming industry.
Hi Sebastian,
Thank you for your answer! Indeed, I may try to expand my scope to inlcude smaller companies.
Currently though, my main limitation is effectively linking my research to the inductry's needs. Other researchers in academia seem to feel this 'gap'. For that I would need to know more about what companies actually do to monitor/analyse game dynamics and stats. I would probably be more successful if I could 'translate' what I am doing (ecology, conservations) into a language understood by the industry. My first strategy has been to conduct informational interviews, but I failed to get answers on this as well.
I will keep working on these points!
Currently, probably the most commonly used method for this purpose is data collection, reading the full content of selected pages, comments, entries, posts, including from social media portals to Big Data Analytics analytical platforms and analyzing sentiment of assessments, opinions of Internet users on specific topics, issues, e.g. opinions of computer game users, on the basis of which one can assess the dynamics and directions of changes in the development of a particular game on the Internet. this type of research is used to create prognostic analyzes in a specific field in order to forecast the continuation and / or change of trends, development directions of specific issues. I conduct research in this area. The conclusions of the research I published in scientific publications that are available on the Research Gate portal. I invite you to cooperation.
Greetings,
Dariusz Prokopowicz
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