Gotta Win'em All: How Expert Play in the Online Community of Smogon Changes Pokemon

• Author / Creator

  Zielke, Grady

• The way that people play games has changed. This is especially true for both highly competitive games and online games. Expert play, a category of play undertaken by players who have a strong understanding of the game they are playing and are trying their best to excel at, is particularly affected by this phenomenon. Research has shown that many players now use online communities to support their play, and that these online communities influence the way expert play is conducted within a game. This thesis looks at one online community which is particularly influential to the game of Pokémon: Smogon. It will attempt to uncover the methods by which Smogon influences the play of Pokémon. Additionally, it will look at how gameplay changes when players are familiar with the online community and use that familiarity to enact a very specific type of expert play. To that end, it will also be examining Smogon’s sister website, the Pokémon battle simulator Pokémon Showdown.
  This thesis undertook a thorough examination of both Pokémon Showdown and Smogon, showing the differences between their structure and that of the traditional way of playing Pokémon. A close reading of three players playing Pokémon Showdown, each with a different skill level and familiarity with Smogon, shows the different ways that expert play is affected by familiarity with Smogon. More experienced Pokémon Showdown players appear to have a greater understanding of the ways that others play the game, an understanding which can be gained through familiarity with Smogon and the content that it produces. It appears that expert play is heavily influenced by the relationship that players have with online game communities that support their game, changing the way that players think about their game and the techniques they use in play. Further research could act to identify the extent of the influence that online game communities have over the games that they are created around.

• Subjects / Keywords

  • Smogon
  • Pokemon
  • Game Studies
  • Expert Play
  • Online Community

• Graduation date

  Fall 2020

• Type of Item

  Thesis

• Degree

  Master of Arts

• DOI

  https://doi.org/10.7939/r3-bcmc-pa46

• License

  Permission is hereby granted to the University of Alberta Libraries to reproduce single copies of this thesis and to lend or sell such copies for private, scholarly or scientific research purposes only. Where the thesis is converted to, or otherwise made available in digital form, the University of Alberta will advise potential users of the thesis of these terms. The author reserves all other publication and other rights in association with the copyright in the thesis and, except as herein before provided, neither the thesis nor any substantial portion thereof may be printed or otherwise reproduced in any material form whatsoever without the author's prior written permission.