Gaming, Culture and Cyberspace

About the “Mimimi” Around Mass Effect 3 and the “Critical” Understanding of the Digital Games

Abstract

This paper has as its object the virtual communities of players – here understood as spaces of cultural consumption, production and circulation –, reflecting on the limits and opportunities in the socialization provided by them with respect to criticalness development in relationship between video games and its consumers. Methodologically, operates from the perspective of the ethnography of archaeological practice, establishing itself as a case study about the UOL Jogos online community. Through the controversy surrounding the game Mass Effect 3, observes that many of contents present in these areas holds the potential to expand player’s understandings  about the games, providing meaningful concepts and information that enable them to transcend and reframe your gaming experiences. However, because they are vulnerable to the interests and worldviews of those who produce it, such content also indicate a lack of new critical skills, capable to prepare players to handle the complexity present in the cultural contents dispersed within and around the videogames.