I have played one video game in four years; I'm not a gamer per se. But the ongoing revolution in social and casual games has been hard to miss, from watching my little cousins playing Club Penguin to the irrepressible Facebook invites I'm always getting for Mafia Wars. To date, social games have been used as part of a feature film's marketing campaign (most recent example: The Crazies), but they will become increasingly integrated into the core story. I'm already working on a social game as an integral component of my next project.

For the future of (social) gaming in one entertaining 30-minute presentation, here's Jessie Schell's invaluable primer from DICE 2010.

Watch it all the way to the end, as his final point is worth the half-hour on its own. And if you think it's just a thrown-in feel-good ending, the success of Nike Plus (sidebar) and more recent entrant Fitbit is living proof of socialization's effectiveness when it comes to modifying real-world behavior.

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Games & Transmedia