Gaming in SNS context

Luca Rossi from the University of Urbino presented on social gaming in the context of social networks. He discussed how social games allow people to play together with their real-world friends and family using social network infrastructure, returning games to their roots of being played with people you know. Rossi hypothesized that specific game structures work better with specific underlying social structures, with competition encouraging closed groups and cooperation encouraging open groups. Preliminary data was presented from games like Biggest Brain and Pet Society that showed people tended to stay within their networks and share achievements rather than add new friends or invite existing friends when playing cooperative games.