Expressive Processing: Digital Fictions, Computer Games, and Software Studies [Hardcover]

Noah Wardrip-Fruin (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: July 31, 2009 | ISBN-10: 0262013436 | ISBN-13: 978-0262013437

From the complex city-planning game SimCity to the virtual therapist Eliza: how computational processes open possibilities for understanding and creating digital media.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Expressive Processing has the perfect combination of technical expertise, historical rigor, and dogged determination to get inside of the black box to make it a kind of primer on what Henry Lowood once called 'the hard work of software history.' It is, therefore, a model of a new critical approach. This is a must read for anyone working in fields such as new media, game studies, software studies, and AI. Because Wardrip-Fruin writes so confidently and clearly about complex systems, this will be a powerfully enabling book for graduate students, and advanced undergraduates as well." --Matthew G. Kirschenbaum, Associate Professor of English, University of Maryland, author of Mechanisms: New Media and the Forensic Imagination

Noah Wardrip-Fruin is Associate Professor in the Department of Computer Science at the University of California, Santa Cruz. He is the coeditor of four collections published by the MIT Press: with Nick Montfort, The New Media Reader (2003); with Pat Harrigan, First Person: New Media as Story, Performance, and Game (2004), Second Person: Role-Playing and Story in Games and Playable Media (2007), and Third Person: Authoring and Exploring Vast Narratives (2009).

"At last, an analysis by somebody who truly 'gets it!' We have seen plenty of first-generation books on interactive entertainment, in which an author with expertise in another field presents a bystander's perceptions on the subject. But this is a second-generation book, written by an author whose background is entirely within the field. Wardrip-Fruin was brought up on computer games and educated in the thoughts of the first generation thinkers. Now he has integrated them into a new perspective that builds on those ideas at higher levels of abstraction. Looking back at my own ideas from Noah's new vantage point was an educational experience for me."--Chris Crawford, former head of Atari's Games Research Group, and co-founder of Storytron

(Chris Crawford )

"The perfect volume to begin the new publication series in software studies.... Inspiring." Raine Koskima Game Studies

"The perfect volume to begin the new publication series in software studies.... Inspiring."--Raine Koskima, Game Studies

"At last, an analysis by somebody who truly 'gets it'! We have seen plenty of first-generation books on interactive entertainment, in which an author with expertise in another field presents a bystander's perceptions on the subject. But this is a second-generation book, written by an author whose background is entirely within the field. Wardrip-Fruin was brought up on computer games and educated in the thoughts of the first generation thinkers. Now he has integrated them into a new perspective that builds on those ideas at higher levels of abstraction. Looking back at my own ideas from Noah's new vantage point was an educational experience for me." Chris Crawford , former head of Atari's Games Research Group, and cofounder of Storytron

"I highly recommend this book to digital media -- games, movies, and fiction -- creators, AI students, and engineers." Irtaza Barlas Computing Reviews

"In Wardrip-Fruin"s Expressive Processing, the field of "interactive entertainment" comes of age; its theories and methods are native to its medium, rather than borrowed from literature, film, or history....Required reading." Annette Vee JAC

"Through insightful examinations of media ranging from simulations to computer games, the author presents an intriguing and cogent argument.... Recommended." Albert Chen Choice

About the Author

What matters in understanding digital media? Is looking at the external appearance and audience experience of software enough--or should we look further? In Expressive Processing, Noah Wardrip-Fruin argues that understanding what goes on beneath the surface, the computational processes that make digital media function, is essential.

Wardrip-Fruin looks at "expressive processing" by examining specific works of digital media ranging from the simulated therapist Eliza to the complex city-planning game SimCity. Digital media, he contends, offer particularly intelligible examples of things we need to understand about software in general; if we understand, for instance, the capabilities and histories of artificial intelligence techniques in the context of a computer game, we can use that understanding to judge the use of similar techniques in such higher-stakes social contexts as surveillance.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 504 pages
• Publisher: The MIT Press (July 31, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0262013436
• ISBN-13: 978-0262013437
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 7.3 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.9 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #339,456 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars How to use processes to create experiences, July 10, 2011

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M. Nelson - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Expressive Processing: Digital Fictions, Computer Games, and Software Studies (Hardcover)

This book is a great read, highly recommended for anyone interested in how to use computers for expressive purposes, whether in artificial intelligence systems, videogames, or electronic literature.

Wardrip-Fruin's basic point is that processes are the mechanism by which computers function as "media machines", and we should analyze expressive/aesthetic computational works by looking at what processes they use, how they use them, and what the effects are. This avoids either treating them as black-boxes to be understood only by looking at effects on audiences, or as technical artifacts to be understood by looking at literal lines of C++ or Lisp.

But, refreshingly, the vast majority of a book is not a theoretical argument for that point. Instead, it gets its hands dirty analyzing a number of specific pieces, to understand how each one works: what processes does the system use, for what purposes, and how does that contribute to its goals and experience? How visible or hidden are the processes from the user/player? If we trace what can actually happen in a system, how does this match up with what processes it nominally claims to be using?

Much of the tension the book identifies is between the internal processes of a system, and what users/players think is going on. The well-known "Eliza effect" takes place when a system appears to have more processing going on than it actually does. The canonical example is the classic chatbot Eliza, which users often think is doing complex internal AI to respond to their queries, while in reality it uses extremely simple logic. To this effect, Wardrip-Fruin adds the opposite: in the "Tale-Spin effect", a system is doing a bunch of complex internal processing, but in an invisible way, so that users think that a system is actually fairly simple. The book's analyses of Universe, Minstrel, Terminal Time, F.E.A.R., and BRUTUS along this axis should be of particular interest to anyone wanting to make entertainment or artistic use of AI systems.

There are many more specific insights as well; among too many to list, the section on dialogue trees (starting on p. 51) is probably the most thorough analysis of different kinds of dialogue trees, and how and when to use them, that I've seen in print. Since the book has something of a case-study format, these can profitably be read in isolation for someone who doesn't want to read the entire book. Some of the works profiled at length include: the videogames Sim City, F.E.A.R., Knights of the Old Republic, and Façade; the story-generation systems Minstrel, BRUTUS, Tale-Spin, and Universe; the chatbot Eliza; and the satirical AI systems The Goldwater Machine and Terminal Time.