The rise of factions in games and the dynamics between them

Sammanfattning: As politics in the world becomes all the more polarized it is important to look at how and why groups and factions are formed in today's society. In addition; one of the fastest growing medias in history, that of Digital Games, only becomes more and more influential the larger the budget and the greater the market. Therefore seeing how factions work in games and what, if any, effect it has on real life becomes just as vital as studying the phenomena in reality. It is also useful to see how we portray different kinds of factions, how the developer uses faction-related mechanics to guide the player and what a player chooses to do when interacting with groups and factions in games. The methods we used was primarily focused on diffraction because we wished to see what the different components of factions were and how one can, perhaps, switch them up. There are many aspects of what makes factions in games tick and the best method for identifying them, separating them and then re-applying them to discover new approaches and perspectives is, we decided, diffraction. Ultimately the conclusion we reached is that when it comes to factions in games communication is key and it is vital for any developer to know how to make use of it. Not just how to facilitate it, but also how to limit it. For while communication is, in general, good it could be detrimental to anyone wanting to create separate distinct player-driven factions. This is because a faction that has grown in a vacuum is going to be more distinct and unique than one grown together with another. When two factions can not communicate you get two separate entities, but when they can you get one entity with two different flavours to it, as World of Warcraft has quite clearly demonstrated. But even in single player games communication is vital, but this time between the developer and the player. Factions in this regard helps the player with categorizing that which they encounter in the world as well as better understanding said world in general. For instance, if a character belongs to a faction it is reasonable to assume the character supports the ideals of said faction. This helps both in assisting the player to quickly grasp the nature of the character, but also gives the potential for a bigger surprise if one chooses to undermine it later on in the narrative.