pictures can be downloaded by the full text.
We have seen above that ZPD moves for development and changes dynamically through stages. I would like to propose that this can be seen in a game, here Legend of Darkness (http://lod.nexon.com). Before I show the development in the game first I’d like to introduce the game to the people who are not familiar with the Legend of Darkness (LOD).
The reason I choose this game to see if group ZPD exists or not, is because of the particular gaming system:
First, this is a 2D game not 3D which enables the monster or the users to move only horizontally or vertically, but not diagonally. This has made the users to build some type of formulated hunting positions which help them to catch (destroy) the monsters in the most safe, fastest way. Second, it is an online game where, everyone wants to play; this will push the students to give some type of motivation not like classrooms, where you are pushed to sit in the class. Third, this game has a strong party system.; a strong team-based system. No one can play alone!! It’s the beauty of the game! This is the most important part. The group needs to work as a team, no actually work as one. If they do not, everyone will die. LOD is a MMORPG (multiplayer online role-playing game) which is based 2D graphics and has 5 different professions to play the game. The professions are Warrior, Rogue, Priest, Wizard and Monk. All 5 professions start out in level 1 and it is our first goal to develop to level 99. The stat system is divided into 5 different parts:
- Strength is an important attribute determining the weight of items that can be carried and the amount of damage dealt to a monster.
- Intelligence determines the power of spells.
- Wisdom will help your character regenerate mana points faster, and determines the amount of mana obtained per insight.
- Constitution will help your character regenerate health points faster, and determines the amount of health obtained per insight. It also increases the power of some skills.
- Dexterity is useful in dodging enemy attacks, improves the hit of your character, and increases the power of some skills.
Sited: http://darkages.com
The initial stats are all shown as 3 when you start the game. For example, when you make a character it would be shown as 3 3 3 3 3, as you can see below.
▽
▽
▽
▽
▽
As you level up you get to punch in 2 points to the stat system. After you level up to 99, you cannot change your stats anymore. For every stat, depending on your profession, you can learn new skills and spells.
You can choose 5 different professions when you start the game: Warrior, Rogue, Priest, Wizard and Monk. Each has different characters and different skills which were supposedly to balance the game. All 5 professions have different roles when battling in the field. Intentionally the game company, Nexon, wanted the Warrior to be the strongest and fastest killer of the field, and Rogue to help out the team by interpreting the attack or defense source of the Monster for more effective battling. Priest was to give cure and undo curses for users, and Wizard for cursing and casting strong spells to destroy the monsters. Monk was the art of the game where it uses only its bare hands and feet to fight the monsters that would be able to cure it while fighting.
However this is only what the company has set up as a curriculum of the game. The users have developed these characters into most efficient style of battling in the game. The users developed the game in their own way. For example, Warriors are specified at hitting and demolishing and holding the monsters. Rogue needs to tell the group the defense source of the monster. Wizards curse and sleep the monsters, priests will heal the team and monks will usually gather up the monsters. My point here is that: it can be seen that group level ZPD changing among the game users. This is not about language acquisition it is only about the ZPD movement of the group level.
First I would like to talk about the development emerged in the game. As I noted above, the users are started out with all 3’s in the stats. There are no rules of how to develop any character. However the game which started in the 1998 has developed and came to an end that every character has different reasons for development in 2007. For example:
Warrior: Strength 132 Constitution 64 (referred as STR warrior)
Strength 118 Constitution 80 (referred as Con warrior)
Wizard: Wisdom 94 Intelligence 108 (referred as Wiz wizard)
Wisdom 134 Intelligence 68 (referred as Int wizard)
As we can see users has developed the characters into some type of prototype of developing professions. The reason of this development is something interesting to find out. For example I will use wizard’s stats as example, because it holds the least variations of stats and are pretty clear why the stats are developed in this way. Other professions hold too many different stats to analyze. We should know what Wis and Int causes for the character. Wiz has effects on how much mana (each spell will cause certain amount of mana when you cast) you will get through development, also the higher it is, it causes the ‘tic’ (the amount of mana you will get grow back as time goes by) to go faster. However I was lucky enough to talk with one of the old users (who have been playing since 98) how 108 would be the best result for wis and why 94 was for int:
Teld (user name for the old user, referred as T)
Hanbi (My user name, referred as H)
H: So why is it 94 for int and 108 for 108?
T: as you know for wizard the final spell needs to be at least 104 to learn it. And also you know that through items you can push up 10 points on your int. However, we found out that we needed at least 108 for wis which will give you at least 5 tics for full mana (which will mean that for 5 tics you’ll get full mana). Since the wizard only do cursing and sleeping the monsters, there was no need for high int actually. So to increase the mana tic for wizards it was crucial to put as many as points possible to the wis.
H: but wasn’t’ there other types of wis?
T: sure from my memory there was gold wizard, int wizard.
H: and they were what kind?
T: int wizard was used to be to give big power for cast spells. However it was found that spells wasn’t too effective in actual battle, so a very few bread did this and found to be less fate full. And also you know how hard it is to buy mana out of experience; it takes to long for appropriate amount of mana to be bought. (mana is bought with your experience you gather from the experience. However the more mana you have the more experience it takes to buy it) In the end, people didn’t really put a lot of effort into the int wizard and stick with the wis wizard. For wizard, it was a type of wizard to have better equipment. Different from other professions, wizards don’t really need to put any points to the str. So, after becoming level 99, wizards didn’t have any strength to carry heavy equipments as the warriors do. The gold wizards wanted to have better equipments so they would put 10 points out of the wis and into the str so that it was possible for them to have gold equipments (gold would be the highest equipment you could do within the game, the sequence would be leather->iron->silver->gold).
It was interesting to see that players developed there own need into the optimal solution for each characters. This didn’t come out of the blue; it was each player’s contribution to the game and actual practice after practice which finally came up with the optimal solution. If the role of the wizard was to attack the monsters straightly then the 94/108 stat wouldn’t have been the optimal solution. Since the int causes the power of the casting spells, the int style wizard could’ve emerged. However the role of the wizard turned out to be only casting curses and sleeping them which didn’t require the int of the wizard. Therefore the wizard development only stayed with the wiz concentration style. The only part where the stat has changed through the LOD history was when the game makers came up with new skills and spells to learn. Depending on the stat the optimal stat changed.
I would like to match the ZPD concept in this situation. To become level 99 is the goal or the task within the game, and the players are learners. The ideas and optimal suggestions for character development can be also considered as scaffolding for learners. Through scaffolding the learners will develop their characters and each time they are stuck within the task the adult(higher level users) can provide them with tips and others to give them more space to develop. The goal of the game before becoming level 99 is leveling up and how to give in points for each character. It is clear that the users developed their own way of optimal character development. The company of the game had no intention of the character development as the users did; it was the users who were developing themselves. In this case, there was rarely any other type of scaffolding among the users. Peer interaction helped the users to come up with the optimal solution. However I would also like
Comment on this post!
이번에 필리핀을 다녀왔는데...거긴 현지어 외에 영어가 공식 언어거든요..
그래서 팀이 같이 갔을때 영어를 써야되는데 다들 쩔쩔매더군요 ㅋㅋ
뭐 전 역시 아무 문제 없었지만.. 오히려 오랜만에 나불나불 수다 떨수 있어서 좋았지만 (퍽퍽퍽ㅋㅋㅋ)
단기선교여서 캠퍼스전도하러 가면 당연히 영어로 말해야되는데
한국사람들이 영어를 잘 못한다는 걸 알기에 첫 3일동안 수련회를 하면서 필리핀쪽 현지 목사님이 그러시더군요...
필리핀이 영어가 공용어이긴 하지만 한국과 다를 것 없이 똑같이 청소년때 배워야만 하는 외국어라고..
그런데 한국과 다른 점은 필리핀사람들은 단어를 몰라도 "말하려고 하는데" 한국사람들은 훨씬 전부터 배우고 문법이나 단어나 많이 안다고 해도 절대 말을 안 한단다는 거죠...
좀 뒤죽박죽 길어졌습니다만;;
결론은 이거인것 같더군요.
알던 모르던 먼저 말을 꺼내는 자가 승자다! ㅋㅋ
저도 그렇게 생각해요 말을 하려고 하는것과 머리속에서 많은 생각을 이미 가지고 있는...-_-
하지만 우리나라와 다른나라가 같은 조건에 영어를 배운다고 해도...
문화를 고려 안할수가 없어요.
영어가 단순히 영어로만 자리잡은게 아니고 이제는 영어가
완전히 하나의 권위를 나타내는것이니 더욱더 겁내는게 당연하다고 생각해요...
아..어렵죠.ㅡ,.ㅡ?