Creative Uses of Software Errors: Glitches and Cheats

@article{Bainbridge2007CreativeUO,
  title={Creative Uses of Software Errors: Glitches and Cheats},
  author={Wilma A. Bainbridge and William Sims Bainbridge},
  journal={Social Science Computer Review},
  year={2007},
  volume={25},
  pages={61 - 77}
}
Video games constitute a major sector of computing with distinctive social implications. Analysis of video game programming errors, design limitations, and rule ambiguities suggests a range of positive functions that glitches and cheats may perform. Glitches are software errors, either programming bugs or design flaws. Cheats are tricks for mastering games by circumventing the official rules for play. This article is based on the study of 751 glitches in 155 popular video games plus examination… 
View on SAGE
wilmabainbridge.com
19 Citations
Highly Influential Citations
1
Background Citations
10

Figures and Tables from this paper

19 Citations

Problem Solving Through “Cheating” in Video Games
Academic dishonesty and video game play: Is new media use changing conceptions of cheating?
Cultural differences in game appreciation: A study of player game reviews
TLDR
It is found that, while preferences in the both cultures are generally similar, they are sensitive to different aspects: for example, American players emphasize the replay value of a game, whereas Japanese players are less tolerant of bugs and emphasize overall polish.
What went wrong: a taxonomy of video game bugs
TLDR
A taxonomy of possible failures is presented, divided into temporal and non-temporal failures, which can guide the thinking of designers and testers alike, helping them expose bugs in the game.
Cheating in Multiplayer Video Games
Cheating in video games has been prevalent ever since the days of Pong. Games have evolved much since then and the ways in which people play together have changed as well. Older systems required…
Online Multiplayer Games
This lecture introduces fundamental principles of online multiplayer games, primarily massively multiplayer online role-playing games (MMORPGs), suitable for students and faculty interested both in…
Negotiating Students' Conceptions of 'Cheating' in Video Games and in School
TLDR
Researchers explore the narratives of three teenage males as they described their experiences in gaming and in school, and their views of ethics, honesty, and acceptable forms of information gathering in the two contexts, revealing three themes relating to students' conceptions of cheating.
Wrong Warping, Sequence Breaking, and Running through Code
  • J. Newman
  • Art
    Journal of the Japanese Association for Digital Humanities
  • 2019
This article focuses on Nintendo’s influential and much-celebrated 1998 videogame The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time (hereafter OoT). In particular, it explores the often unexpectedly creative and…
The Quality Analysis of the Video Game Failure
TLDR
This paper investigated, collected, and analyzed the video game failures on the development company websites, and discussed the key issue of improving the quality of the game.
Characterizing disruptions in online gaming behavior following software patches
TLDR
It is found that the severity of patches is correlated with the magnitude of behavioral changes following a patch, and the opportunities of leveraging software patches to online games as a valuable but overlooked empirical instrument for measuring behavioral dynamics are discussed.
...
...

References

SHOWING 1-10 OF 57 REFERENCES
Game design : theory and practice
TLDR
This book delves into the entire breadth of interactive games, covering computer, console, and arcade titles, and spanning a variety of gaming genres including strategy, adventure, simulation, action, role-playing, sports, and wargames.
Game Design Workshop: Designing, Prototyping, and Playtesting Games
As experienced teachers of novice game designers, the authors have discovered patterns in the way that students grasp game design the mistakes they make as well as the methods to help them to create…
Core Techniques and Algorithms in Game Programming
TLDR
Code design, data structures, design patterns, AI, scripting engines, 3D pipelines, texture mapping, and more are covered here-in clear, coherent fashion and with a focus on the essentials that will have you referring back to this volume for years to come.
Creative Player Actions in FPS Online Video Games - Playing Counter-Strike
TLDR
This project aims to provide a history of digital gaming culture, gender, race and popular culture, and social inequality in the 21st Century through the lens of computer game research.
Defining grief play in MMORPGs: player and developer perceptions
TLDR
The paper suggests that greed play be treated as griefing, but a more subtle form, and investigates the different types of griefing and establishes a taxonomy of terms in grief play.
Theory of Games and Economic Behavior
THIS book is based on the theory that the economic man attempts to maximize his share of the world's goods and services in the same way that a participant in a game involving many players attempts to…
Free and open source development practices in the game community
TLDR
These FOSS processes offer new directions for developing complex software systems that rely on lean electronic communication media, virtual project management, and version management mechanisms to coordinate globally dispersed development efforts.
On the Promise of Game Theory in Sociology
Students of game theory (GT) investigate strategic interaction between two or more actorsindividual, corporate, or other. 1 In Elster's (e.g., 1985, p. 10) words, GT is a theory for studying…
Foreword
Two case studies of open source software development: Apache and Mozilla
TLDR
This work examines data from two major open source projects, the Apache web server and the Mozilla browser, and quantifies aspects of developer participation, core team size, code ownership, productivity, defect density, and problem resolution intervals for these OSS projects.
...
...