UC Irvine studies differences between Chinese and US players
by Mike Schramm 
Sep 12th 2008 at 1:30PM
Our good friends at the OC (don't call it that) Register have an article up about how the University of California at Irvine has received a grant to study the differences between US and Chinese players of World of Warcraft. And the differences are fairly interesting: apparently US players use many more UI mods and addons than Chinese players do. Additionally, more Chinese players play the "more challenging version of the game" (seems like they mean PvP servers to us, though that may change with yesterday's big news), and Chinese players, say the researcher, tend to talk more about color schemes and architecture than American players. Finally, the demographics are fairly different -- here in the states, women make up 20 percent of the playing audience, and in China that number is almost halved. And while people here may play with parents or even grandparents, in China, the older generation isn't interested in the game at all.These observations seem more to be based on anecdotal evidence of Chinese players in cafes more than anything else, but the study is just getting started, so maybe with some more research they can come up with some more solid numbers (or even more reasons) showing why this is the case. But it's interesting that inspecting how people play this game in two different countries can reveal something about the cultural differences between each.
Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Fan stuff, Odds and ends, Blizzard
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Todd Sep 12th 2008 1:35PM
lol UCI is also known as the University of Chinese Immigrants. If you went there you would understand.
fuserchris Sep 12th 2008 3:05PM
Uh, just about every UC could be categorized that way...if you're a racist that is.
Manatank Sep 12th 2008 1:40PM
20% of the US player population is female? I always suspected it was at least this high. Anecdotally, many of the players I encounter are female, but I'll often hear other males taking about how their aren't any women playing this game. It always confused me as to how they got that impression.
Jenny Sep 14th 2008 4:24PM
Because of most of us don't tell people in-game that we are female, for a variety of reasons. That's probably why a lot of men don't realize we're in the intartubes, sneaking around!
Gerbodis Sep 12th 2008 1:45PM
Not surprising they'd do research on blizzard. Blizzard HQ is RIGHT down the street, and they have a separate building ON the UCI campus, they also have the official "Blizzard PC cafe" on the UCI campus as well
JPN Sep 12th 2008 1:47PM
OC disorder?
Bugz Sep 12th 2008 2:08PM
Pretty cool. By the way, I love the Arrested Development reference.
Hap Sep 12th 2008 2:32PM
Todd, you're so right about the student population @ UCI. Dosen't help that Blizz is just down the street!
Angry Joe Sep 12th 2008 2:43PM
Now that research is gonna change the fate of mankind, maybe they can get an Ig Nobel prize for UC Irvine:
http://improbable.com/ig/
Zhaoan Sep 12th 2008 3:02PM
Chinese players are always complaining about those Californian gold spammers hanging out in their cities.
sharkeater75 Sep 12th 2008 3:31PM
I'd still love to understand why they play for free. and somehow make money spamming my paid for time with gold selling bullshit.
Eric Sep 12th 2008 3:49PM
Speaking as a recent alumn of UCI (wow, that is just really creepy to write...), let me shed some light on things:
1: Yeah, we got lots of Asian students. Over 50% describe their nationality that way, although you'll see a lot of Japanese, Koreans, Thai, Philipino, and others there. The only reason it's "University of Chinese Immigrants" is, well, UCI.
2: I never really noticed a big Blizzard presence on UCI. I mean, they were always at the career fairs, they're local and everyone plays the game, but it's not like they're camped out locally. If EQ2 had 10 million players, Dr. Nardi would be interviewing EQ2 players.
3: Nardi does this stuff. She's really interested in MMO's and no doubt finds the college population with a fairly large CompSci contingent to be a great place to talk to players. She actually interviewed me a couple of years ago about this, about cooperative thinking in regards to WoW. I'm sure it'll be pretty interesting.
DirtyPriest Sep 14th 2008 6:27PM
Every college, at least in Southern California, is packed with asians. UCI is not any different.
And it was suprising their HQ was on UCI. I've been there a couple times. Funny to think they've been there the whole time. Now they have their private office campus now? That WoW money sure goes a long way. They even got a big orc statue on the front. Looks like no more hiding for them. :P
zoombag Sep 12th 2008 4:51PM
A Grant ?? I certainly hope this was not a Federal Grant, using OUR tax dollars
Keyra Sep 13th 2008 1:34AM
Grants such as these are typically from corporations interested in such studies, or from private financiers. Federal grants are normally given out to large-scale studies (and then typically those that would be of benefit to something on the state or national level). There have been a few exceptions to the latter, but I seriously doubt that Joe and Jane American are footing the bill for this. Instead, we pay for $10,000.00 coffee makers on Air Force One. Gotta make certain that the prez has his coffee!
DSOmega Sep 12th 2008 4:41PM
I remember reading a spotlight on this research on the UCI website's front page about a year and a half ago. As Eric pointed out, Nardi is well known to have a high interest in MMOs.
Also, Blizzard is no longer on the UCI campus. They actually switched commercial buildings with Broadcom and are now about 10 miles out (closer to the Irvine Spectrum entertainment complex). Even then, Blizzard kept a low profile on the UCI campus. If wasn't until they moved that I even realized where there original location was.
Fenom Sep 12th 2008 5:05PM
chinese players are more hardcore, american players are more about socializing, simple as that
Lauren Sep 12th 2008 5:26PM
I'm currently a Computer Science student at UCI, and I've been trying to get into Nardi's research for ages (I've been doing other research in the meantime), but I was under the impression she was focusing on something else right now (based on research announcements) -- could you please list for the record which professor it is that's doing this study?