ABSTRACT
Syntax is the set of rules or conventions by which a language's users combine words into phrases and phrases into clauses and sentences. Syntax is about units and combinations of units. Semantics tells us what sentences and their constituent parts mean in a literal or basic sense. Semantics is about the basic meanings of these units and combinations of units. Discourse analysis is a part of linguistics. It is intimately tied to the way language works as a structural and communicational system. Discourse analysis asks how these units and their combinations and their sequence and flow across time, in actual contexts of communication, signal a particular social language and carry out actions or tasks associated with that social language. Thus, gamers bring special tools to the visual world of the game, not microscopes and telescopes, but things like avatars and controllers that allow them to manipulate the game world in various ways.
