{"id":4819,"date":"2014-06-11T11:00:12","date_gmt":"2014-06-11T15:00:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.playthepast.org\/?p=4819"},"modified":"2014-06-09T12:50:09","modified_gmt":"2014-06-09T16:50:09","slug":"social-construction-of-technology-in-games","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.playthepast.org\/?p=4819","title":{"rendered":"Social Construction of Technology in Games"},"content":{"rendered":"

Technological development influences the way we live and interact with the world on a deep level.\u00a0 Technological artifacts like computers and cars dictate how our society functions and how we relate to one another.\u00a0 These influences are so pervasive throughout our everyday lives that it’s sometimes difficult to imagine things being any other way.\u00a0 Technology is seen as an inevitable, ever-advancing part of our world.\u00a0 We see it as almost a force of nature.<\/p>\n

\"Toxic<\/a>
Toxic Waste? Overpopulation? There’s surely a technological solution for that…<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

This deterministic outlook can be see in the way we represent technology in videogames.\u00a0 As I’ve discussed in some previous posts, the tech tree represents a very deterministic way of understanding technological development<\/a>.\u00a0 Technologies are always out there, waiting to be discovered.\u00a0 It’s not a matter of if<\/em> your civilization will develop steel, it’s merely a question of when<\/em>.\u00a0 Some games, like Master of Orion<\/em>, subvert many deterministic assumptions<\/a> by providing a more complex understanding of technological development.\u00a0 While more nuanced in its models than many other games, Master of Orion<\/em> does not entirely escape deterministic thinking.\u00a0 Scientific progress, which is powered by industrialism, continues to be the primary driving force in the game, strengthening the player militarily and enabling her to reach ever more distant planets.\u00a0 While the game does deal with issues of ecology and pollution, such problems are portrayed as purely technical problems, rather than social issues.\u00a0 Every problem in the game has a technological solution.<\/p>\n

In technology studies, there was eventually a reaction against deterministic theories of technological development.\u00a0 A number of scholars who had come from the field of science studies began applying the approaches that they had used to study scientists working in the lab to the engineers and inventors who created new technological artifacts.\u00a0 The result was an approach that looked at the social forces that shaped the way technology was developed.\u00a0 This new theory, called the Social Construction of Technology (or simply SCOT), would profoundly influence the way that we understand our relationship with technology.<\/p>\n

\"Although<\/a>
Although there were clear design problems with the Penny Farthing in terms of safety, stability and ease of use, different groups disagreed on exactly what the problem was.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

One of the classic examples of how social forces shape technology is Trevor Pinch and Wiebe Bijker’s (1987) analysis of the development of the modern bicycle.\u00a0 As many people know, the bicycle changed substantially during the 19th century.\u00a0 The unwieldy penny-farthing bicycles eventually gave way to the more familiar chain-driven rubber-tired devices that we still use today.\u00a0 Most often, we frame this transformation as a simple narrative of progress – an inferior design was eventually replaced with a safer, more efficient design that was simply better.\u00a0 In actuality, this is far from the case.<\/p>\n

As Pinch and Bijker note, the development of the bicycle was not a linear genealogy of incremental improvements.\u00a0 Rather, it was an explosion of differing and often contradictory ideas.\u00a0 While most people agreed that there were problems with the ordinary penny farthing bicycle, there was no consensus on how to fix these problems, or even what the problems were.\u00a0 Many groups, for example, resisted the use of pneumatic tires.\u00a0 Although having air-filled tires made bike riding more comfortable, especially over terrain like cobblestone, they also required considerable maintenance and were prone to slipping in mud.\u00a0 Some groups disliked them simply because they were ugly.\u00a0 As different social groups identified different problems and solutions, a huge variety of bicycles emerged, many quite different from what we see today.<\/p>\n

\"Chainless<\/a>
Chainless bicycles were one of the many designs that eventually disappeared in the twentieth century.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

In the end, the modern bicycle didn’t necessarily win out because it was objectively better, but simply because many relevant social groups came to accept it.\u00a0 Problems like slipping in the mud and requiring extra maintenance were never solved per se<\/em>, rather, people eventually decided that these problems weren’t really problems.\u00a0 Pneumatic tires still require inflating and patching, but we’ve come to see this as simply part of riding a bike, rather than a flaw in the overall design of the bicycle.\u00a0 Thus, the bicycle is not the product of some deterministic march of progress, but one solution out of many that triumphed not because of its inherent superiority over other designs, but because it ultimately matched up with the needs of society.<\/p>\n

As influential as the Social Construction of Technology has been in the field of Technology Studies, this influence hasn’t extended to videogame design.\u00a0 This isn’t terribly surprising, considering how pervasive technological determinism is in society in general and in the tech world in particular.\u00a0 Deterministic models of technology are also easier to design.\u00a0 It’s easy to create a tree of inevitable advances for the player to unlock.\u00a0 It’s much harder to design a system where technological choices are shaped by the whims of society.<\/p>\n

Although including societal forces in such a system is complicated, it’s not impossible.\u00a0 One of the more innovative games in this aspect is Crusader Kings II<\/em>.\u00a0 The game is set in Europe in the middle ages and was designed with great attention to historical accuracy.\u00a0 Unlike most strategy games, scientific achievements in Crusader Kings II<\/em> are not treated as sweeping cultural events that change the player’s entire empire.\u00a0 Instead, science is implemented geographically, with certain provinces developing new ideas and techniques which slowly spread to other nearby areas.\u00a0 For example, one province may develop a more powerful bow while another may improve farming methods.\u00a0 Even if these provinces change hands between different players, the situated technoscientific knowledge remains.<\/p>\n

\"Members<\/a>
Members of the king’s council can influence the spread of ideas by traveling to different provinces.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

While the player is occasionally allowed to directly influence what technologies develop in a given province, the more common way to improve your technology is through indirect means.\u00a0 The player can encourage the development and spread of ideas within her realm by dispatching members of her court to intervene in some capacity.\u00a0 This can range from the Treasurer being ordered to assist with the development of economics to the Spymaster being sent to neighboring kingdoms to increase the chances of technology spreading to the player’s lands.\u00a0 The success or failure of these missions depends primarily on the skills and traits of the noble appointed to the post.\u00a0 In stark contrast to most games, which portray technoscientific development as a purely material undertaking, operationalized as a function of resources spent over time, Crusader Kings II<\/em> portrays it as being a primarily social process.<\/p>\n

\"Rather<\/a>
Rather than acquiring technologies through spending resources, the development of new techs in Crusader Kings II<\/em> depends on wisely choosing your councilors.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

So how did Crusader Kings<\/em> develop such a uniquely social model of technology?\u00a0 First, it differs from other medieval strategy games by placing a greater emphasis on politics and interpersonal relations.\u00a0 In games like Age of Empires<\/em> or Total War<\/em>, military power is the key to victory.\u00a0 There are some non-military units and structures like trade carts and universities, but these exist primarily to support the player’s military.\u00a0 Combat units are still important in Crusader Kings<\/em>, but warfare tends to be less important than forming alliances, arranging marriages, and providing a strong line of succession for your dynasty.\u00a0 As such, the importance of the social is apparent not only in the development of technology, but in many aspects of history.<\/p>\n

The representation of technology in Crusader Kings<\/em> is also influenced by its specific timeframe in history.\u00a0 Since the game spans at most from the years 867 to 1453, there is never a railroad, nor telegraph for disseminating ideas.\u00a0 There isn’t even the efficiency of the Roman Empire’s infrastructure to spread ideas.\u00a0 I was able to speak with Henrik Fahraeus, the lead designer on Crusader Kings II<\/em>, who described their design choices as such:<\/p>\n

While it may seem strange, many advances took centuries to spread across the continent rather than the decades you would expect. Also, it was almost unheard of for rulers to fund scientific or technological research (especially in the West.) It was more that a clever blacksmith came up with an improved plow on his own and the idea slowly spread, etc.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Although the relevance of social forces to technological development is no less today in the age of the Internet than it was in the middle ages, this slow spread of ideas and information makes it easier to see the social forces at play.<\/p>\n

The technology mechanics in Crusader Kings II<\/em> are certainly not a perfect representation of the Social Construction of Technology, nor were they intended to be.\u00a0 As I mentioned earlier, the focus of the game is on the interaction between noble houses and the politics of creating a lasting dynasty.\u00a0 Although the technology system is very innovative, it is also quite abstract.\u00a0 There are eighteen different technologies, each of which follows a linear path of advancement.\u00a0 Although this development is shaped by social forces, there is no means for representing the kind of alternate technological solutions that we see in the development of the bicycle.\u00a0 That said, Crusader Kings<\/em> manages to escape the ubiquitous shadow of technological determinism in a way that few other games have managed to do.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Technological development influences the way we live and interact with the world on a deep level.\u00a0 Technological artifacts like computers and cars dictate how our society functions and how we relate to one another.\u00a0 These influences are so pervasive throughout our everyday lives that it’s sometimes difficult to imagine thingsContinue Reading<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":20,"featured_media":4822,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[15],"tags":[396,394,329,395,317,318],"coauthors":[311],"class_list":["entry","author-christiansen","post-4819","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-articles","tag-bicycles","tag-crusader-kings","tag-master-of-orion","tag-scot","tag-tech-tree","tag-technological-determinism"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"http:\/\/www.playthepast.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/06\/Crusader-Kings-Advisors-Large.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.playthepast.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4819","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.playthepast.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.playthepast.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.playthepast.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/20"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.playthepast.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4819"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"http:\/\/www.playthepast.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4819\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4833,"href":"http:\/\/www.playthepast.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4819\/revisions\/4833"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.playthepast.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/4822"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.playthepast.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4819"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.playthepast.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4819"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.playthepast.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4819"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.playthepast.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcoauthors&post=4819"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}