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Dezaemon, RPG Maker, NScripter: Exploring and classifying game ‘produsage’ in 1990s Japan

2019; Intellect; Volume: 11; Issue: 3 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1386/jgvw.11.3.215_1

1757-1928

Mikhail Fiadotau,

Cultural Insights and Digital Impacts

The article examines three tools used for hobbyist game development in 1990s Japan: the Dezaemon series of user-customizable shoot ‘em up games, the RPG Tsukūru (RPG Maker) series of tools for creating Japanese-style role-playing games and the NScripter scripting engine for visual novels. In doing so, it aims to highlight the diversity, but also to bring out the commonalities, of game ‘produsage’: producing video games by using dedicated software. The focus on a non-western historical context is an attempt to challenge assumptions about the locales and platforms of game produsage prevalent in English-language scholarship. The article concludes with a two-axis typology of game produsage, based on the degree of expressive freedom their functionality enables and the limitations they impose on users’ distributing their games.