VIDEO GAME INDUSTRY

MODELED BY COMPLEX

NETWORKS

Presented By Tony Morelli

Outline

Intro/Problem Description Summary Visual Network Representations Numerical Network Representations Questions/Comments

INTRO

Has the organization of the video game industry changed in the last 20 years?ConsolesGame TitlesProducersDevelopers

INTRO

Related Work ShowedGraphical Analysis is good

○ Both Colors and Size are important

Soft Drink Industry

Soft Drink Industry

Seed Industry Consolidation

INTRO

Related Work ShowedNumerical Analysis is Good

○ Clustering Coefficient○ Degree Distribution○ Expansion

Network Topologies, Power Laws, and Hierarchy

Analyzed internet topology generators Metrics

Expansion○ “The average fraction of nodes in the graph

that fall within a ball of radius r, centered at a node in the topology

Comparison of Translations How accurate are software based

translators? Portuguese->Spanish->English Clustering Coefficient, Out Degree

Consoles to Analyze

Group A – Classic ConsolesAtari 2600 (1977)Nintendo Entertainment System (1983)Sega Master System (1985)

Consoles to Analyze

Group B – Current ConsolesXBOX 360 (2005)Playstation 3 (2006)Nintendo Wii (2006)

Problem

Not evaluating enough consolesSuggestion – Evaluate all consoles from

Atari 2600 and forward

Enhanced problem

Still want to organize by generations Need to group all consoles by

generation

Generation 1

Atari 2600 Nintendo Entertainment System Sega Master System

Generation 2

Super Nintendo (1990)

Generation 2

Super Nintendo (1990) Turbo Grafx 16 (1989)

Generation 2

Super Nintendo (1990) Turbo Grafx 16 (1989) Sega Genesis (1989)

Generation 3

N64 (1996)

Generation 3

N64 (1996) Playstation (1994)

Generation 3

N64 (1996) Playstation (1994) Sega Saturn (1995)

Generation 4

GameCube (2001)

Generation 4

GameCube (2001) Xbox (2001)

Generation 4

GameCube (2001) Xbox (2001) Playstation 2 (2000)

Generation 5

Playstation 3 Xbox 360 Nintendo Wii

Suggestions not used

Total Sales for each titleData is not available

Cross development Developers/publishers that work on multiple

platformsMy goal is to average statistics for each

generation separately. Data is not consistent in naming

conventions○ Would need to do a lot of editing by hand

How to analyze video game networks? Collect Data Use Software Tools Create Tools where existing tools are

not good enough Present the data

Data Collection

Need to obtain TitleConsolePublisherDeveloper

Data is not centrally available Spread out across the internet

Data Collection

Need to write a custom scraper to get data

Video Game Grabber (VG2)Written in C#

Data Collection

VG2 CodeNeed to get data into a csv

○ Easy for importing into other tools○ Title,Developer,Publisher○ Console is in the file name

Data Collection

VG2 CodeC# provides a nice interfaceHttpWebRequest request =

(HttpWebRequest)HttpWebRequest.Create (www.yahoo.com);

HttpRebResponse resp = (HttpWebResponse)request.GetResponse();

StreamReader sr = new StreamReader(resp.GetResponseStream());

string source = sr.ReadToEnd();

Data Collection

VG2 CodeUsing the previous calls

○ Data retrieved○ Or links followed to find the data

Custom functions were written based on which website the data was pulled from

Data Collection

VG2 Code

Data Collection

VG2 CodeError detection

○ Any links that could not be followed○ Any data that could not be retrieved○ Recorded as ERROR into the csv file

These were looked at by hand and either removed or adjusted.- Common errors where when the publisher was

different for different regions- NA publisher was used in these cases

Data Collection

VG2 CodeConvert csv .netPajek FormatSample:

*Vertices 11231 "PS3"2 "100 Bullets"3 ”Silicon Studio"4 "D3 Publisher"5 "2010 FIFA World Cup South Africa"6 "EA Canada"7 "EA Sports"8 "3D Dot Game Heroes"

Data Collection

VG2 CodeConvert csv .gdfGUESS FormatSample:

nodedef> namePS3100_Bullets

Silcon_Studio

D3_Publisher2010_FIFA_World_Cup_South_AfricaEA_CanadaEA_Sports3D_Dot_Game_Heroes

Data Collection

Current StatusAll consoles have data in csv,.net, and .gdfExcept Sega Saturn

○ Data seems incompleteMight assemble data from multiple sitesMight replace with DreamcastMight just throw it out

Data Analysis

Now that the data is in the correct formatsNumerical AnalysisGraphical Analysis

Numerical Analysis

Clustering CoefficientHow to do this with PajekNet->Vector->Clustering Coefficient->CC1

Numerical Analysis

Degree DistributionHow to do this with PajekNet->Partitions->Degree->Output

Numerical Analysis

ExpansionHow to do this with custom softwareWant to know what percentage of nodes are

at each level in the hierarchyPercentage of total nodes that are

○ Titles○ Developers○ Publishers

What to do with the numbers Create a plot and produce a trend line

Average each of the 3 metrics for each generation○ Clustering Coefficient○ Degree Distribution○ Expansion (3 separate averages)

Plot the average of each of the 5 generations

Graphical Analysis

ColorsHow to do this with PajekNet->Partitions->Degree->OutputDraw->Partition

Graphical Analysis

ColorsHow to do this with PajekLayout->Energy->Kamada-Kawai-

>Separate Components

Graphical Analysis

SizeHow to do this with GUESS

Graphical Analysis

SizeHow to do this with GUESSg.nodes.outdegreeresizeLinear(outdegree,1,75)Layout->Physics

Data Analysis

Create animations from all the data3 Consoles from 5 Generations

Data Analysis

Average all numerical results for each generation

Show a graph with a trend line for each metric

Data Analysis

Make guess as to what will happen in the next generationBased on numerical graphsBased on visual trends

Questions/Comments?