Research project on ARMA 3, Informants needed!

[almanzo 144]

Hi!

My name is Fredrik Weisethaunet, and I am a master student on the subject of sociology at the Norwegian university of science and technology, NTNU in Trondheim. After christmas, I will be starting on my master thesis with the working title of "Arma 3 and DayZ, a tale of how user generated content created a best seller". The topic of my thesis will be how important user generated content is for both players and developers, and how mods have an effect on the community at large.

In regards to this, I will need informants to interview about different topics in relation to the topic at hand. I would like to get in touch with developers from Bohemia Interactive, preferably developers from the DayZ team (I have not been able to figure out what e-mail to use in order to get in touch with the correct person to organize this). Secondly, I would like to get in touch with mod developers both veterans and new modders. I would also like to get in touch with players who where introduced to ARMA through DayZ and of course I would like to get in touch with veterans of ARMA, the more experience with the game, the better.

As an informant, you will be asked to participate in an interview that might last anywhere between 30 minutes to an hour, and this interview will be conducted through Skype. For sake of accuracy, it is beneficial if the informant allows the interview to be recorded. The recordings will be handled only by me, and will not be available to anybody else. After transcribing (writing them down) the interviews, the recordings will be deleted. As an informant, you are free to withdraw your participation at any time, even after the interviews have been conducted. If you choose to do so, all of the material that your contribution have resulted in, will be deleted. All interviews will be anonymized, and it will be impossible for anyone to identify any contribution.

One important notice though: No interview will be refered to in it's complete form. The only thing that will be used in the final product is relevant quotes that are anonymized, where each informant will be given a nickname in order to sort individual informants from each other. Sadly, I must inform that the final product will be in norwegian. There will be a short summary in english though.

In order to keep my informants anonymous, I will ask anyone interested in participating to contact me via this e-mail adress: spillredet (At) gmail (dot) com.

Do not reply requesting to become an informant in this thread, I repeat, do not reply with a request to be an informant here.

I would like to thank everyone who are interested in participating in this project in advance. This is not possible to do without you! If I am able to recieve some funding, there might be a lottery with a small price among my informants, but so far I haven't been able to find someone to fund the project.

Any questions regarding the project can be asked here. This forum post will be linked too in the paper itself.

With the best regards

Fredrik Weisethaunet

---------- Post added at 17:15 ---------- Previous post was at 15:43 ----------

If there are anyone who has any suggestions or tips on different things they are also welcome. If anyone from scandinavia have any experience as a sociologist, I would love it if you'd be able to read as I go along and provide feedback as well.

Also, if anyone knows of any company or organization that might help fund the project or back it up with reasources of any kind, please feel free to reply to this thread.

[JdB 151]

Don't you mean "Arma 2 and DayZ, a tale of how user generated content created a best seller"? Since DayZ is a mod for ArmA2, not ArmA3 ...

[almanzo 144]

Don't you mean "Arma 2 and DayZ, a tale of how user generated content created a best seller"? Since DayZ is a mod for ArmA2, not ArmA3 ...

Originally I intended to focus on ARMA 2, but since ARMA 3 has been released and the community have moved on, the modding scene in ARMA 3 will be the main focus. In the early part of the process, I am working with the assumption that the mod DayZ has recruited alot of people into ARMA as a franchise, and that this has had an impact on the community at large. The impact, even though DayZ as a mod was released before ARMA III, is assumed to have an impact on the current community. That's the reason I wan't to get in touch with both veterans, and new commers to the franchise. ArmA 2 makes less sense to focus on due to the fact that a large portion of the community have moved to ArmA 3.

I completely understand the question though. The title is still a working title, that builds on the assumption that the sucess of DayZ contributed towards the fact that ARMA III is now one of the best selling pc games in history according to wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_best-selling_PC_games) . DayZ outperforms ArmA 3, but my speculation in the title is based on the assumption that some of ARMA III's sucess is due to the sucess of DayZ. I wan't to find out what old players feel about the DayZ influence, and I wan't to hear new players share their perspective on the same.

Thank you for asking. You do have a point, and I might change the title to something that doesn't build upon assumptions. Any assumptions I have now, will have to be confirmed in order to make it into the paper of course.

[andersson 285]

Just change it to "ARMA". That way you include all iterations of the same game and the same community.

OFP - today known as ARMA: Cold war assault

ARMA: Armed assault / combat operations

ARMA2 + OA

ARMA3

[theevancat 277]

I think I can get Dean Hall to see this thread. I'm on his Space Engineers server a lot and have talked to him. I'll see what I can do.

I'll also shoot you an email about contributing.

[almanzo 144]

I think I can get Dean Hall to see this thread. I'm on his Space Engineers server a lot and have talked to him. I'll see what I can do.

I'll also shoot you an email about contributing.

That would be amazing, thank you!

I'm looking forward to that e-mail.

And Andersson: Good point.

[I give up 152]

I will gladly be a "informant" but first I want to know why Arma 3 and Dayz references are in the same sentence.

[PolyG 69]

I started back when DayZ first appeared in ArmA2, now I am a veteran milsim player and novice modder - I can gladly be reached if you'd like some information from my view point :)

[almanzo 144]

Again, to everyone who is interested in becomming an informant, for your own anonyminity, please try to avoid replying with volentairing in this thread, rather contact me on the e-mail adress provided. I am very, very grateful to see that so many are interested in participating of course, it's just out of concern for your own rights as anonymous sources I stress this point.

You are of course allowed to tell others that you are participating, but I would still strongly discourage public announciation of your participation like this.

This thread is mainly intended to inform about the project and to recruit new informants through e-mail. And of course, it is more than ok for anyone to provide thoughts or criticism here as well.

[NoWay_AsWay 10]

As a fan of psychology, Sociology, Research and ArmA I am very interested in your project. Also I am a Norwegian-American, My family (Forsethlokken) had a farm near Trondheim and moved to the US around 1900. So an extra point of interest for me anyway. I will be thinking about your Research project and will offer some thoughtful input when its digested.

One suggestion, the word "Informant" in common english is a pejorative. e.g. Informants are commonly found in the world of organized crime.

Edited December 2, 2014 by NoWay_AsWay
Removed off topic

[DarkDruid 96]

Hi,

I am not sure how many participants do you need, but you should probably try to ask on the DayZ forums as well: forums.dayzgame.com

I will send the link to this post to our PR/Community Managers and the DayZ developers. I guess some of them are going to be interested to participate. :)

Edited December 1, 2014 by DarkDruid

[almanzo 144]

I've made a post there as well, but thank you for your input DarkDruid. It's indeed important to speak to DayZ players as well. I think I am going to need about 10 informants, but I might go higher than that since I need so many people from different groups. I'll officially start working on my thesis in January, gathering informants is something I do early due to experience. Especially considering how many I need.

I am glad to see that developers have taken notice, I did choose this subject simply because I find BIS attitude towards modding to be facinating, and at least for me as a player, very beneficial. It makes me curious to find out how this influences the community at large, and what developers think of it.

[TiborasaurusRex 11]

Hi aLmAnZo :)

let's say i'm your thesis advisor or thesis judge, i'm gonna ask you some questions, and you try to defense your research lol XD

1) what's the basic phenomenon of your research?

2) what's the urgency of your research? why do you have to do this research? what's the issue?

3) what's the benefit of your research? what will people (especially Arma community) get from this research?

4) what's the basic theory you use to conduct this research?

5) why are you using qualitative method (interview) instead of quantitative method (questionnaire)?

good luck with the Thesis ;)

Edited December 6, 2014 by TiborasaurusRex

[almanzo 144]

1) what's the basic phenomenon of your research?

It's on a very early stage yet, but what triggered my interest is the facinating growth that DayZ saw in it's early days, especially considering the complete lack of marketing. But I'm also curious about how important the community find modding and modders to be. How important are mods for people when it comes to playing ARMA?

2) what's the urgency of your research? why do you have to do this research? what's the issue?

DayZ is a rather unique phenomenon, I've written about Minecraft as well, as there are many simularities. I find games to be an important part of culture to study, as games are increasingly both popular and relevant to our cultural development. The issue I'm trying to adress is how parts of the video game industry have turned it's back on user generated content in favor of creative control and the ability to sell DLC and downloadable content. Maybe modding benefits both the consumer and the publisher/developer? DayZ seems to suggest that, and I think other mods do to.

3) what's the benefit of your research? what will people (especially Arma community) get from this research?

I hope to spark a conversation about how allowing your consumer base the creative freedom to alter and change your product can improve both the financial sucess of a game and the value consumers feel the game provides, but also about wether or not modding is an important way of recruiting new talent. I hope to provide some light into these issues.

4) what's the basic theory you use to conduct this research?

Not decided yet, as it's quite early in the project. The theoretical foundation will be in place before any interviews are conducted of course. The one theorist I am keen on using is George Simmel and his term "sociability".

5) why are you using qualitative method (interview) instead of quantitative method (questionnaire)?

Several reasons. First of all, I am much more competent at qualitive forms of research, secondly as this is a study on something others haven't studied that much before and that it's very spesific (aimed at a small community when comparing to the gaming industry at large) it's easy to loose important perspectives when you don't have prior research to build upon. I do hope though, that my study might provide insight that can be used as a basis for larger, quantitative studies later on in order to see if my findings are representative.

Lastly, it's important to note that this is my master thesis. It's main purpose is for me to be able to demonstrate that I am capable of performing such a study. As such, I enjoy the freedom to study something of my own choice. I will be thrilled if I was to be published, but I do not expect to be.

I enjoyed the fact that you asked though.

And "NoWay_AshWay", I study in Trondheim and live just outside as you might have seen. Who knows, maybe we are related

:P

[TiborasaurusRex 11]

Alright then, you seem to have a solid grip on this research especially for the chapter 1 (introduction). I like the idea of your research, you want to find out how mods have a great effect on this game & its community, you want to explore how mods can turn this game into something better for its community. I admit it's pretty unique and never been done before :) well i'm a psychology b.s. and i myself used to conduct some researches on gaming behavior as well from psychology perspective :cool: you're gonna do this research based on sociology, ain't you? Sociology is related to psychology coz we're talking about humans behavior, right?

What makes me really amazed is Arma community shows us a great deal of Pro-Social Behavior (voluntary behavior intended to benefit other people). Modders are willing to spend lotta times busting their ass to work on their awesome mods but in the end they always share their mods with us for free. I always wonder what underlies this Pro-Social Behavior in this community. Is it the love & passion for this game which drives them to voluntarily put lotta efforts into their mods? what motivates them to concern about the welfare of this community? Is it emphaty or altruism? damn, we can explore so many things here dude :)

i wish you good luck dude ;) please keep us informed about your thesis especially your findings and conclusions...

P.S.: if you need any help on psychology literature, just contact me ;)

[almanzo 144]

I am still in need of informants, preferably people who mostly play DayZ. I am conducting interviews during february, and I have allready finished a few.

[almanzo 144]

As of last friday, the 12th of june 2015 I have submitted my thesis and am awaiting an oral defense.

I would like to thank every one who have been so kind as to participate in interviews. If anyone is interested in a summary or something, I might write something up in english. For any scandinavian forum dwellers, send me a PM and I'll send you a digital copy if interested. Please do not redistribute without asking though.