New vs Old Games Journalism

 

New vs Old Games Journalism

 

 

This was a great discussion in lecture today as it opened my eyes to the difference between new and old games journalism. In the following blog I will starts by explaining my own opinions on the differences between the two, I will then lead on to post two different article locations (one of each) to show the difference. Finally I will summarise by giving a conclusion on which I believe is the best form of games journalism.

 

 

Old Games Journalism:

 

This form of journalism is the type I expected to find regarding games, this method focuses and analyses the separate parts that form the video game such as graphics, gameplay, interface and control. This would be seen as a more factual style article. You would normally see this type of article written as a 'pro's and con's list' or in paragraphs of text in an overview.

 

 

New Games Journalism:

 

I was mostly unaware that this type of article existed until today's lecture (I previously always used IGN for reviews and previews etc.). This would be best described as an article written by the writer/player responding to the experiences presented to them in the game world including interacting with other players online. This is a more personal form of article as it is based off that particular writer/player's opinion while playing the game. You would normally associate this type article written as though reading from a story book.

 

 

Example Journals:

 

NGJ http://blogs.guardian.co.uk/games/archives/game_culture/2005/03/ten_unmissable_examples_of_new_games_journalism.html

From this page I read Possessing Barbie which is about age notifications for players in an avatar based MUD.


OGJ
http://uk.ign.com/games/world-of-warcraft/pc-16985

This article is a summary of the game World of Warcraft.


Conclusion:

After reading the two above articles, you will see the difference straight away. However, which type of journal article is superior?

My answer is that neither is superior, they both have good points and bad points as follows:

A NGJ is much easier to read, you can be absorbed into reading the article with great interest much like reading a story book, it can set a clear picture in your head of the scenario that the player is in. The downside is that these articles can miss out on key game information. If you are looking to buy a game but want information on it before buying then this type of article could prove less informative as it is based on a single persons playing experience. What could make one person interested could cause another person to be bored.

An OGJ will provide you with key game information if you are looking for facts about a game before purchasing. However, to make it to the end of the article may prove difficult as they can be long and tedious . Again this type of article is based on the writer/players opinion, but this time it is opinions of game rather than the personal experience while playing.

I believe to create a great computer game journal, you would need to merge ideas from both NGJ and OGJ. You could have a pro's and con's list at the start of an article with bullet pointed information  (could include fact and opinion), it could then lead on to give you an idea of the game from the writers personal point of view while playing the game. This could include the writer/players feelings felt and experiences gained while playing.

Gender & Games

 

Gender and Games

 

Triple-A Games:

 

(http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/171567/the_designers_notebook_triplea_.php?page=1)

 

In an article on Gamasutra, there was a discussion about triple-A games for women. Ernest Adams says that while women may play small or free games, not many women will not pay out for triple-A console games for themselves.

 

He then goes on to question Brandii Grace about her founding a company to make triple-A games for women. From this interview, I have pulled the following key pieces of information:

• Current triple-A games on the market are custom maid to suit men more than women. The themes and executions of these games don't support the needs or attitudes of female audiences, (Difference between Twilight and Underworld in films).
 
• A successful big title game that did attract a lot of female players was 'The Sims' due to interpersonal conflicts between AI characters in the game. These types of mechanics would include deception and alliance manipulation.
 
• Men obtain fun from overcoming challenges within games, however in many cases women can be deterred by challenges as they are so averse to the risk of failure. Only 10% of women play for the challenge.
 
• Comparisons are made between games released on the Nintendo Wii & Xbox Kinect and core games released on the same consoles. This indicates that women head more towards the family friendly and socially interactive games and consoles, however the example given in the interview for the Xbox Kinect game 'Kinect Adventures' lead to a biased result statistic as the game is included for free when the Kinect is bought.
 
• Allowance for local multiplayer games where players can join and drop out as and when they please. Not currently many games on the market that permit this.
 
• Advertising and distribution to be related to the product / game theme. The examples given are to advertise women's games in women's magazines or cooking games in cooking magazines, and to distribute games including PoS (point of sale) in related areas such as cooking games being sold next to recipe books etc.

 

 

 
 
 

Story in Games

Story in Games

 

For today's lecture we covered 'The Nature of Stories' written by Chris Crawford (2005) On Interactive Storytelling.

 

Story Structure:

 

All stories required strict structural requirements to be classified as a story. The example given by Chris Crawford is the children's nursery rhyme 'Itsy Bitsy Spider', this four line rhyme contains a clear simple story. It has a protagonist (spider), conflict (rain), struggle (being washed out), resolution (crawled back up) and even a moral (the value of perseverance).

 

The key areas that are usually used to structure a story are as follows:

• People (characters) - All stories are based around a character. What a story needs to do is focus on the role of those people within the story and less upon items/objects/things. Stories such as Lord of the Rings and The Legend of King Arthur could be argued with this point as they contain key objects which seem to be central to the story, however they do not actually play the main piece of the story. In LotR the story is based on Frodo's struggle during the adventure, if the ring was replaced with a magic sock, the story would not have changed by much whereas if Frodo was swapped out for Han Solo then the story would change considerably.

• Conflict - Conflict always seems to play a part in stories in two different forms. Direct conflict which is the most common of the two as it is the easiest to implement in film and games, examples of this would include fights, wars, races etc. The other form would be indirect conflict, which is more commonly found in books as it is easier to portray with written words, examples of this would be more social or symbolic such as a characters personal dilemma or an argument/debate between people.

• Puzzles - Puzzles can play certain parts in stories and would even be a large part of story in a mystery story. However the puzzles used in stories are actually primarily about the people/characters. Puzzles are not a necessity to form a story.
 
• Choices - Choices are ultimately the decisions that people/characters make within the story. Important points in stories are usually revealed by key choices made by the protagonist.

• Spectacle - Spectacle is most commonly found in film and computer games as it is a visual form of 'pleasure from novelty' by providing exotic imagery as a form of entertainment. Films and games are continually striving to provide better graphics and spectacle for the audience. However, due to the increased amount of spectacle used within film and games, it tends to sacrifice story. A lot of younger audiences would associate spectacle with story, but spectacle is another element that is not a necessity for story.

 

 

Visual Thinking:

 

Observers have noted that in the modern day the use of imagery is rising and the use of written words is declining. This can be shown through amount of effort put into increasing the quality of images and CG (computer graphics) along with the amount of money consumed in doing so for research and development. Plus the size of images as data can be equated to megabytes whereas text would be kilobytes.

 

When you read a book, your understanding of the story is formed as an image in your head, however, it is written word that puts the image there. So without a book, if you think of the life of an item, the image provided in your head is from what you have read or seen previously - the more detailed the reading, the more vivid the image.

 

Spatial Thinking:

 

My understanding of spatial thinking is how the brain uses your imagination to fill in blanks within reasoning and stories. An example I would use is to describe a character/person in England in one chapter of a story and the next chapter they are in Spain. Different people would imagine different scenarios and images in their heads for how the character got from England to Spain, such as via multiple forms of transport or by flying there like superman. This spatial thinking is your brain making logic and order of things within a story and is only limited to your individual imagination.

 

Temporal Discontinuity:

 

Stories can be broken up into sections using stages or chapters etc. However, they can also play and make use of time - breaking up, jumping backwards and forwards, and skipping time altogether. Time in stories created drama as it treated completely different to normal physical time. Examples of this would be flashbacks, skipping years with "many years later..." and simultaneity shown via "meanwhile, back at.....". Storytelling using time, can be easily used by both visual and written forms of entertainment.

Remediation

Remediation: Games

 

In today's lecture we stared looking at remediation, looking at the definition and also the way it is used in today's society and finally looking at remediation in films and games.

Matteo Bittani, (2003), The Technoludic Cinema: Images of Video Games in Movies (1973-2001).
Jay Bolter & Richard Grusin (2000), Remediation: Understanding New Media, MIT Press.

 

To sum up the definition of remediation, it is to use one form of media for another purpose and that remediation is the defining characteristic created from that new purpose.

 

 

Forms of Remediation:

 

Immediacy - The aim to make a viewer be wholly drawn into the experience making them forget seeing or watching. Examples could be immersive virtual reality or photo realistic images.

 

Hypermediacy - Items/media that purposely calls attention to their own constructed nature all the time. Examples of this could be video game HUD's and the WWW.

 

 

Examples would include:

• Photo realistic paintings similar to photography.
• Forms of the WWW are commonly used on TV and TV advertising used on the Internet.
• 3D imaging on flat surfaces is now used on TV's and computer consoles but originated from a painting in 1430.
• Wide screens used in technology were originally used in landscape paintings.

Why Remediation is Used:

 

There are multiple reasons. It can take a long time for a new medium to develop new forms of content.

 

Another reason would be to improve upon an existing media, an example of which could again be computer games. They stared out as 2D pixels on a screen but have since become 3D and more photo realistic. Companies are still taking computer games further and further until the point in which a new form of media is created in which video games can be played.

 

If a form of media is successful it is more likely to be remediated, computer games had the intention to become 3D from the start. Also variety TV programmes took the successful idea from radio which in turn had originally started out from music halls.

 

 

Technoludic Films:

 

Technoludic films are a combination of Technology and Ludus (Latin for Play).

 

Technoludic Film as Commentary - Video games are subordinated to the film. Example movies would be 'The Lawnmower Man' (1991), 'Existenz' (1999), 'The Matrix Triology' (1999ff).

 

Technoludic Film as Quotation - Games appear in the film for illustrative purposes. They are not central to the theme of the film but form part of the fictional world the film is trying to create. Example movies would be 'Blade Runner' (1982), 'Clockers' (1997), 'Inception' (2010).

 

Technoludic Films as Remediation (1) Adaption - Films using a direct adaption of games as a source of text for the film. Example movies would be 'Super Mario Brothers' (1993), 'Lara Croft: Tomb Raider' (2001), 'Dead or Alive' (2006).

 

Technoludic Films as Remediation (2) Incorporation - Films that incorporate the narratives and/or style traditionally found within computer games. Example movies would be 'Groundhog Day' (1993), 'Toy Story' (1995), 'Run Lola Run' (1998).



Game Britannia Episodes 2 & 3

 

Games Britannia

 

Episode 2 - Monopolies and Mergers

 

 

From the start of this episode, Benjamin Woolley leads on to explain about how board games have affected and influenced the British society over the past 200 years by teaching a wide audience of people valuable morrals.

 

 

The first game looked at was Monopoly. This game was created with various playing boards globally, depicting different landmarks and areas based on the version of the board while keeping the same game rules and mechanics. There were many releases, the one we all know was based on London landmarks, with American board versions using landmarks from New York etc.

 

What I didn't realise about Monopoly was that it influenced by another game called 'The Landord's Game' also named 'Brer Fox & Brer Rabbit'. This game was very similar, however it taught players the value of fair play while pointing out the differences in classes of people with how land taxes were extremely unfair compared to taxes based on income. So it pulled in and laid bare the social inequalities of that time while keeping the game fun and teaching players the benefits of equality and fairness.

 

Woolley then goes on to explain that during the great depression, board game companies decided to help families through this time by creating games such as Cluedo and Scrabble, these games are popular games that most households have even today due to how families can come together to play.

 

Towards the end of the episode, Woolley shows how the popularity and production of board games has declined due to the rapid advancements in technology. However, board games today are still using the original idea of teaching players about the happenings around the world but with changes or improvements that water the information down, making it into a more family friendly fun game.

 

 

 

Episode 3 - Joystick Generation

 

 

With this final episode of Games Britannia, Woolley shows how classic board games moved on to the first fantasy RPG, and also how board games turned a new leaf into modern day computer games.

 

The first fantasy RPG game that was created which derived from classic board games was 'Dungeons & Dragons' (this RPG is also massivly popular even today). This game was created as a distraction from real life during the great depression to a fantasy game where people would role play a made up character from a fictional world. Players could make whatever choices they wanted in the game (even to extreme measures that would oppose the normal characteristics of the player) and creating narrative which further emerses the players into the fictional fantasy of the game.

 

It was from the idea of Dungeons & Dragons that the first computer games were born. Due to the success from the unique play style, simulation games were created for computers which gave players similar choices to those in D&D, such as Rolercoaster Tycoon, Theme Hospital and The Sims - again creating and taking players from their imperfect worlds to their fantasy perfect worlds.

 

From these examples we can see the link between board games to computer games and for this reason we see why the those particular board games should not be forgotten.

 

Finally, Wooley goes on to show that players create deep emotional connections to the characters within modern day computer games. We see examples from Grand Theft Auto, to see how players can relate to a character such as the main character in the game, and be lead to do things like steal cars and kill innocent people. We only have to look back at the history of games to see why players can make these choices - a complete opposite to choices made in real life. Players can see the consequences of their actions in an unreal environment without the penalties that they would recieve in real life.



Caillois Terminology

 

Caillois's Terminology

 

 

In this lecture we looked at the different terminology that Caillois uses for describing types of games or gameplay, (all information was obtained from the notes provided by the tutor in the lecture).

 

The following are the words and their descriptions:

• Paidea - Refers to 'Play' as pleasure.
• Ludus - More restrictions due to rules with clear outcomes (example 'winning').

(Examples of a Paidea type game would be SimCity or The Sims. There are also games that allow players to switch between these two modes).

 

The following four terms, Caillois adapted from Huizinga:

• Agon - meaning Competition.
• Alea - meaning Chance or Randomness.
• Ilinx - meaning Movement.
• Mimicry - meaning Situational, Make-Believe or Role-Play.

 

My Examples:

 

Now from these words and definitions, I will try to come up with some games as examples for each of the four categories under the two modes.

 

Examples of Paidea Games:

 

Agon - Theme Hospital (and many other simulation type games).

Alea - Tetris (untimed version just playing for high scores).

Ilinx - Skipping (and other sports that could be made into games - hopscotch etc.).

Mimicry - Dungeons and Dragons (live acting version where people act out the story).

 

Examples of Ludus Games:

 

Agon - Monopoly

Alea - Poker

Ilinx - American Football

Mimicry - Final Fantasy (console games)

 

 

Conclusion:

 

From the above, I can say that my examples of Ludus games were much easier to find. However based on the definitions provided for the above terms I believe that there are many games that overlap on both the term types and modes, so it is therefore hard to extract pure examples for any one game type. For example, The Sims and SimCity have restrictions and boundaries within the game's mechanics so therefore you could argue that it is not necessarily a Paidea game but rather a Ludus game. Also games tend to have all four terms (Agon, Alea, Ilinx and Mimicry) rolled into one such as Monopoly.

 

So my conclusion and opinion on the above words used by Caillois is that although it may be useful to summarise descriptions into a single word, they are not however clear cut distinctions. 

Games Britania - Dicing with Destiny

Games Britania - "Dicing with Destiny"

 



 

In this lecture we watched episode 1 of Games Britania presented by Benjamin Woolley. This was for us to understand when and how games stared centuries ago.

 

In this game, Woolley explores some of the oldest games known (in their original forms) and explains how these games may have been played at the time.

 

 

The Stanway Game:

 

The first game to be looked into was the Stanway Game which was excavated in Stanway in 1996 from graves of British people (when Britain was under Roman rule), however once uncovered from the graves these pieces were believed to be from around 43AD. The graves were referred to as 'the Doctor's Grave' and 'the Warrior's Grave'.

 

From this excavation, a board with metal corner pieces and glass playing pieces found on opposing sides of the board were found from the Doctor's grave (already set up as if a game was being played) however the rules are unknown. This is where Woolley decides to consult Irving Finkel (who states it is probably a strategy game predating the Roman invasion) and Mike Pitts (to get an idea of the original owner of the game).

 

 

Alea Evangelii:

 

Alea Evangelii (Game of Angels) was a game mentioned in a manuscript, (including diagrams), alongside Athelstan who was the C10th King of Britain. This was believed to be the game of his court.

 

Woolley plays this game with David Howlett. This game is part of the Tafl group of games where there are twice as many attacking pieces as there are defending. The defending pieces are based in the center of the board surrounding a king with the object of the game in getting the king to escape via one of the corners (or sides) of the board. A piece can capture another of the opposing side by surrounding him (a piece on either side) and if the king is captured then the attacking king wins.

 

The game board is an 18 by 18 grid with 72 playing pieces in total.

 

 

Nine Men's Morris:

 

This game was found scratched into stone within a medievil cathedral. This is a form of naughts and crosses, however if a player manages to get 3 in a row they then get to remove an opponent piece (rather than an instant win).

 

 

Hazard:

 

A gambling game using dice throws (therefore chance), believed to bought back to Europe by crusaders in the C14th. However this game was looked down upon by the church and was banned for a period of time due to this.

 

 

Faro:  

 

A card game which bought about a peak in gambling in the C18th. Due to this game, a murder trial took place in 1823 involving James Thurtell who was the son of the Mayor of Norwich. He was convicted and hung of murdering another man over a gambling debt, this later led to The Gaming Act in 1845.

 

 

The Royal Game of Goose:

 

This game was bought about showing that not all games are evil, this game was about virtue and used a spinner rather than dice. This was a simple board game of 63 squares played in the Victorian times.

 

 

Gyan Chapoor:

 

Woolley decided to play this game. This was the original form of 'Snakes and Ladders' and was of Hindi origin, believed to be the game of knowlege in which players must reach a state of enlightement in both the game and in life. The board to this game is much larger than normal snakes and ladders and has areas that can be reached rather than just one direction.

 

 

Chess:

 

The original pieces in this game were named after Howard Staunton. He later standarised the pieces and rules for all to play (which ended up being world wide) for the first international chess tournament in 1851.