Worlds at Play

Using virtual worlds for online role-play

The paper explores the use of virtual worlds to support online role-play as a collaborative activity. This paper describes some of the challenges involved in building online role-play environments in a virtual world and presents some of the ideas being explored by the project in the role-play applications being developed. Finally we explore how this can be used within the context of immersive e...

The State of Play: Law and Virtual Worlds Virtual Worlds: a Primer

A snow-capped mountain range stretches over the town's northern border and tapers down to a southward-facing, concave bay embracing a small archipelago of glittering islands. Homes are clustered in predictable locations: on the islands, against the seaside, and close to the mountains. This is the community of Blazing Falls, a town with over 25,000 inhabitants-roughly the size of Timbuktu or Pou...

Video Game Spaces: Image, Play, and Structure in 3D Worlds

Simulated Public Argument as a Pedagogical Play on Worlds

The teacher sits at the head of the classroom, feeling pleased with herself and her class. The students are engaged in a heated debate. The very noise level reassures the teacher that the students are participating, taking responsibility for their own learning. Education is going on. The class is a success. But look again... On closer inspection, you notice that only a few students are particip...

Multi-Modal Investigations of Relationship Play in Virtual Worlds

Millions of youth have joined virtual worlds to hang out with each other. However, capturing their interactions is no easy feat given the complexity of virtual worlds, their 24/7 availability, and distributed access from different places. In this paper, we illustrate what different methods can reveal about the dating and flirting practices of tweens in Whyville.net, a virtual world with over 1....