Elements of game design: Characters

Characters in games are, of course, extremely important. The character you play as is the conduit for which you experience the game itself. You play as that character, you tend to believe that you are them; you therefore take on their roles and motives throughout the game.

For games to be immersive, for them to have the ability to draw the player in and give them a unique experience, they must have forms of emotional attachment to the character they play or other characters that they encounter. If you have sympathetic feelings towards the character, if you can relate to their emotions and motives, you start to believe in the character. They become more real.

Game designers try to make the character you play believable and also relative to you by many different tactics. As you play, they make you feel what the characters feel. They try to get you to feel as confused as they are. Their emotions, by seeing a terrible tragedy happen, or experience some form of betrayal, are meant to be understood by you, the player. You can sympathise with their fear, anger, happiness, and as you get more attached to them, you start to become them. You want the character to succeed, and generally you want to help them to achieve a happy ending.

If the developers can get it so that you always want to see what happens next, like you want to see the characters’ story unfold, then it will be an immersive experience.

The acting and script are important too. There has to be an interesting story, to set the game up, so that you can clearly see the characters goals and motives. What the character says, and how they react to certain situations defines their nature.

To give characters more depth, and make them seem more real, they need to be given interesting histories. Back stories of their past gives us more information about them.

I don’t think the characters have to be necessarily good. Sometimes if the characters have bad ass attitudes, we love them more for it. A lot of games nowadays go for the badass anti hero type of character, possibly because they are more interesting characters than just perfectly good natured characters. Also, their appearance can be important as well. I wouldn’t agree that the character has to be visually appealing, like handsome or pretty, or necessarily cute. Sometimes the characters can be ugly, inhuman, demonised, odd etc and yet that does not reduce the emotional attachment, as long as the story has been carefully set up so that we still are sympathetic towards them.

One common thing in recent games is the near death scenario near the start of the game. For example in Red Dead Redemption, Bulletstorm, Darksiders, Infamous, Prototype, Assassins Creed, Just Cause and many others. This is a common way of starting the story off, and introducing the character to us. Allowing us to play as them for a bit, then suddenly getting killed, or almost killed, it is a way of getting us to want revenge, and understand why the character wants it, because we experienced it along with them. It’s a common starting point for the story line in a lot of games.

I also believe that the voice acting for the characters is very important as well. If they are voiced by good actors, it helps us to understand their attitude and emotions. We can hear tones when they talk with others, or talk to them selves. This makes them seem more real as well.

Art Direction

An art director is the person who is in charge of the overall look of the game. They have the vision of the whole games atmosphere. They work closely with the game designer in bringing the vision of the game to life. The look of the world is very important; therefore the Art director’s role is a very big responsibility. They must work with a diverse team of other artists, overseeing their work and communicating closely with them so that the game may be developed in the atmosphere the game is to be set.

Art direction for games is an extremely crucial part of their development. Everything from the environment to the characters must be thought and planned out; they must be designed to fit in with the game in specific ways, to enhance the world and atmosphere in general. Certain levels have to have certain moods, and these can be created by carefully deciding on things like colours, lighting, sounds, textures etc. Will it be a scary moment in the game? What can we do to make the player feel scared? Make it dark; make odd shapes and colours stand out in specific ways to lead their attention. Everything must be thought of and carefully tweaked to get the desired effect.

Art direction in games and films are quite similar. For example, the environments can be designed for a specific purpose, for enhancing the story or setting the stage for a particular event. One difference though is the amount of control the art directors have on the audience/gamers point of view. In films, you can control everything, if you want them to look at a certain building, and make the building look important by changing the camera angle, you can do this in a film. You lead the audience where ever you want, and they have only to watch. Also, there is technically less thinking involved when watching a film. In games however, the art director has to think about how the world is viewed from almost every angle. Of course, some games can have fixed camera angles; let’s not forget Resident Evil and Alone in the Dark! They were very much like films, fixing the camera in clever ways that make rooms look bigger, and corridors more imposing.  But the main difference is that the player has a little more freedom to see what they want to see. Therefore, the art director has to make sure that the mood and settings within the world stay the same no matter where the viewer is looking. Obviously in different areas, it can change for effect.

To be an art director, I think the key skills are communication, leadership, organisational skills. Also, the ability to evaluate others’ work, and give constructive criticism. I think they would be important since as the art director, you will be leading the other artists, communicating and collaborating with them to achieve the overall goal. I think you would have to have these skills, and have a strong team like approach to the project, respecting each of those on the team, and working together in an organised manner. For me, I think my communication skills may need to be developed a little further. I do have good organisational skills, and I think I would be confident in setting up goals for each person and organising things that way.

Game Design!

Starting from scratch, where on earth do games come from? To most people, they just seem to pop out of no where and land on shop shelves. They don’t realise that originally this game was a thought, a small inspirational idea, or some scribbled notes on some paper.

Games start somewhere, but not all from the same place. Also, their design process, from the initial ideas, all through the production to the completed sale ready game, can be different as well between games. Sometimes it can be just one persons idea or dream. They may write out all the fundamentals of the game, how it works, the story (if there is one), how they want it to look etc. And then depending on the person and their game, they may make it themselves. But of course, they may also be in a group, or in collaboration with others to make this game. There’s small teams from only 2 to 5 people, and then larger ones from anything above 30 and anything in between. It all depends on the company and their success so far.

When I think of “game design”, I immediately think of the look of the game and the story. Of course, not all games have stories, which goes to show that the designing of a game has to be pretty different depending on the type and genre. And yet, it has to have some similarities. The process is heading for the same goal, to produce a playable game. But now, there are the other goals too, such as achieving a specific look to the game, to match the vision the main developer and or including the art director has for the game.

A design document it a good idea, once the initial idea for the game has been pitched. This is a summary of the process of making the game. Setting out the goals, what must be done, what must be achieved, and how.

Last week when we discussed how games are designed, we talked about how the initial ideas come about. Someone mentioned about the game project they are doing in collaboration with programmers, and one of the first points for the game was for it to be “not Spyro”! This is an interesting approach to deciding what the game should be, rather than saying “lets create a game that’s like this” “it can look similar to how this game works…” Instead, saying “we don’t want it to look like this and that game”, rules things out. I immediately crosses off the themes and elements that are not desirable in the game to be produced. By comparing it to other games, and crossing off what you don’t approve of, it helps to focus down to where the game is heading.

Then after that its making specifications and also refining so that its simple. That way, there isn’t countless ideas that each person has, and then a pile of wasted work that wont go into the game. Setting goals, deadlines, etc will keep everything focused.

Gameplay: This refers to the player’s experience of everything in the game. From the basic way you control the game, to the way you progress or achieve goals, and also the visuals and story, and how they affect the player’s overall experience. It refers to the look of the game, its genre and play style. When I play a game, I think the setting of the story and world is quite important. Also the goals and reasons for achieving things is a key element. If the story, characters, and environments drag you in to the game, its generally a great experience overall.

Is games like FEAR any different to PacMan?  With the general idea of running around, collecting items, being chased by baddies and killing them? Well yes, it is different. While some of those basic key aspects may be in most games, there are differences that make games nowadays more unique. Like the environment for instance. Environments are much more diverse, and intriguing. You can explore more, and also relate to more things. The capabilities of graphics are pretty stunning, and therefore its easier to set a mood for the gaming experience. Also, storylines are important, especially if they make you sympathetic to the character you play. If you can relate to them, you are more emotionally in tuned with the game. Another thing in games recently is the vast amount of freedom of choice that the player has. You can now play how you want to play, you can do anything moral or unmoral, and experience different outcomes and consequences of your decisions. And also, the very length of games are also important. A lot of games range in their total play time from about 6 hours even to 20.

So therefore, the design process for games does vary a little between different games. But it also has to have constraints so that the game is created how it should be, efficiently and in good time.

Games Wriiiiiiiiiting

The different forms of games writing is pretty vast as I have discovered. It has changed and developed over the years, and yet still remains the same. I remember reading Playstation magazine and a couple other ones when I was younger, in my PS1 days. But now, while game magazines, and the reviews and previews that they do, has not died out at all, I do think that the internet is or has taken over their role. Or maybe not taken over, maybe continued would be a better word.

Searching the net for game reviews is quick and easy. But depending on the kind of review you are looking for, you may have to search a bit to find the right place. It can depend on if you are looking for a review that is serious, because you need to decide whether to buy a game or not, or you could be looking for a review that’s light hearted and funny, either for entertainment, or maybe because you feel that sort of review is a lot better.

Personally, I think that some humour in the review of a game is better, while also having the good points mentioned about the game.

Some reviews have the writer ranting on about the flaws in the game, where they go into great detail describing what they do not like about the game. But this is still an opinion, and there will be others that think differently. You may be turned off of a game just because it received some bad words, and you may not realise that the game is probably really enjoyable to you.

IGN do some pretty good reviews in my opinion. They do written reviews, based on a scoring system, on the points of Presentation, Graphics, Sound, Gameplay and Lasting Appeal. Scores are out of 10 for each point, and an overall score out of 10 is used from these. They also do game review videos, which they upload through their youtube channel. I prefer to watch these mostly than to their written ones. It is fundamentally the same scoring system, but the difference is that the video is classed as gameplay/commentary. You will see different levels and parts of the game being played as the reviewer talks about the games points. They discuss the presentations, the gameplay, and then they have the verdict at the end. They usually pick 4 plus or minus points of the game, and then give it a score out of ten overall. For example, a review on a game for the DS called Ghost Trick, the gameplay was discussed, and the verdict showed that its plus points were “clever gameplay, variety and animations” One negative point was “very wordy”. The overall score was 8.5 “Great”.

One odd example of a form of review would be Zero-Punctuation. This is a video series on The Escapist magazine site with Ben "Yahtzee" Croshaw commentating. http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/zero-punctuation These videos do not show any gameplay, and only a few pictures. It is mainly a comic style video, with funny characters acting out what Ben is saying. He talks very quickly, hence the name of the series. He will go into detail of the politics of the game, while also mocking the company or the designers for what ever reason he finds. They are really amusing reviews to watch, and you will be surprised many times over of the truth in what he says! He cuts right to the point, and will bring in all kinds of examples to go with the points he makes. His review on Black Ops was particularly funny to me!

New games journalism is an interesting form a games writing, coined by Kieron Gillen. This form of writing focuses on the players experience and feelings while playing a game, using references to other media, and also recounting events that happened to them in the game. I think a good quality of this is that the reader gets a sort of personal view from the reviewer. I think this means that they have a more truthful view on the game.

Objectivity or subjectivity, that is the question. For me personally, I would prefer a blend of both, if possible. I think I do appreciate objective reviews because they give the points without personal views or emotions, but I also do like subjective ones, because they DO have personal views and emotions in them. Confusing I know, yes. But I think that just one of the other isn’t very beneficial. I guess it depends again on what I am looking for. If I was to review a game, and if I happened to really enjoy it, I would probably show those emotions in my writing. But also, I would not just say that “this game is awesome because I really loved it and you should buy it”, I would instead say that yes I enjoyed it, and give reasons, but then also give other points of the game, more technical and objective, since I think that is also as informative as the writer’s views.

When Gaming began for me

My own gaming history all started when my step-dad bought a Playstation in November 1999. I was 8 years old. The first game I played was Ridge Racer Type 4. I think I remember that we had bought racing games at first, thinking that we would all enjoy them and they would be easy enough to play. At the time, Ridge Racer’s graphics were pretty good, and the controls were also quite realistic. I got the hang of playing the game pretty quick and it wasn’t long before I had completed it.

Spyro the Dragon was the first game that I owned myself. But from that point on, I played a range of games including the Resident Evil series as well as the Tomb Raider games.

The most influential game I think though was Soul Reaver. Having been one of the first games I had seen and played, and since I was quite young at the time, it made a very big impression on me. I grew up believing that it was the best game on PS1 ever and never got tired of playing it! To me, this game has an awesome story line, beautiful graphics, and fascinating gameplay. The gameplay had a great blend of clever puzzles and gory fighting. As far as I know, it was a pretty unique kind of game. I would describe it as an adventure, fantasy and horror game. I remember getting freaked out about certain underwater areas in the game. Even now, they still give me the creeps! The game didn’t have levels per sae, it was all one world, but as you achieved a certain ability, you could advance to a different area. I thought it was cool how you could run past all these areas of water, and then when you get the swimming ability, you can trace your steps and find secrets in parts you had gone past at the start. Another unique feature was being able to shift into the spirit world at any point, and as you do, the world morphs and bends around you and time stops. You sometimes had to use this ability to get further or complete a puzzle.

One thing I’ve noticed is how your thoughts on how good something looked changes over the years, and when you look at it again, you see it differently. I’ve experienced this for games, but also for drawings and films. For example, when I first played Ridge Racer Type 4, I thought that the graphics were amazing and I couldn’t see how they could possibly be better. But over the years, after seeing and playing newer games, when I look back at the game, I can see that the graphics are not as good as I first imagined. Obviously, the way you see things and what you believe is normal, changes over time as you experience gradual and continuous improvements. I remember when I was younger and was pretty bad at drawing dragons; I used to look at some sites where people had uploaded their dragon artworks. I used to think they were amazing, flawless and completely impossible to do. But not too long ago I found the same sites with the same drawings, and looking at them, now that I’m more experienced, I see that they have mistakes and are possible to do.

Although, the improving graphics of games can make them great to play, sometimes they lack the good qualities of older games. Like the story line, or interesting gameplay. When all the focus is on getting the most realistic looking game, characters, storyline and content quality begins to fall. Therefore, the kind of games I would love to play in the future would be ones that concentrate on storylines, gameplay, but also good graphics, just as long as there is a nice balance between them all. Amazing photorealistic 3D graphics does not necessarily make a game awesome to play. It can make you go “Wow” the first time, but after awhile, that impression fades, and you will end up looking for something more, and probably turn to memories of the good old classics you grew up with.

2000 and beyond!

History of Computer game, 2000s to today.

Of the sixth generation consoles, the PS2 was the most successful. It was released March 4^th 2000 in Japan and October 26^th in other countries. Over 150 million were sold, and that’s still increasing. I still see PS2s being sold in game shops. It also had the widest selection of games. Hit titles seen on the Playstation 1 had their series continued on for the PS2. Game companies took full advantage of what the PS2 was capable of. For example, the Tomb Raider series and the Resident Evil series had a range of games developed for it. Towards the end of the 6^th generation, some amazing games had been created, pushing the boundaries of the PS2 software, examples like God of War 2 and Shadow of the Colossus.

The other consoles that were part of this generation were the Microsoft Xbox, Nintendo GameCube and Sega Dreamcast. The Xbox was released 15^th November 2001. This console, however, was far behind the success of the PS2 for numerous reasons. It did not sell very well in Japan since they did not take well to non-Japanese controllers. The Xbox controllers were bulky and heavy. So Microsoft was forced to come up with a slimmer version that comes with the Japanese console, and as an add-on purchase for the US and European markets. This was down to poor research, as they did not check for global usability and were mainly concentrating on the US. The same problem went for the Xbox start up screen, which had to be redesigned in the European Xbox because they failed to realise that the German word einstellungen for “settings” would not fit in the same space! Epic Microsoft fail there! Xbox live was released November 2002, which was successful, though the PS2 still had online gaming capabilities as well which was free.

The seventh generation of consoles, the current one we are in, for home consoles, started in 2005 with the release of the Xbox 360 on November 22^nd. Sony released the Playstation 3 November 11^th 2006 and the Nintendo Wii came out November 19^th of the same year. For handheld, it started in 2004 with the release of the Nintendo DS on 21^st November. It featured a touch screen, built in microphone, Wi-fi and can connect with other DSs and the Wii. Sony released the PSP on 12^th December of the same year. It was the first hand held console to use an optical disc format, using UMDs (Universal Media Disc). It could also connect with other PSPs, internet and the PS3.

The Wii was a whole new kind of console idea. With the motion sensing controls, the focus was on interactive fun for the whole family. I definitely see it as a family targeted console, not really for serious gamers. Also, the range of games for the Wii shows clearly that it is targeted at families with young children and more casual gamers. It has a uniquely shaped controller, complete with wrist straps, since someone realised you may accidentally throw it at your TV when playing bowling for instance! Games like Wii Sports and Wii Fit are very popular, along with the Mario games and many others too.

The PS3 offers full 1080p high definition graphics and Blu-ray disc technology. The system makes use of the cell microprocessor, features a new graphics card from Nvidia and has seven wireless controllers. There are consoles with 40, 60, 80 and 160 GB HDD, with Linux pre-loaded and also free online gaming through the Playstation Network. The 40 GB and 60 GB ones are able to play PS1 and 2 games.

“The processor has 234 million transistors which is more than Intel's Duo Core Extreme which just breaks the 200 million mark. This means the PS3 is faster than the most powerful desktop computer processor since 2005…The PS3 contains an RSX graphics card which was designed by Sony and Nvidia. The RSX graphics card is based on Nvidia's GeoForce technology. The RSX graphics card contains 550-MHz, 300-million-transistor which is more transistors than the Xbox, GameCube, and PlayStation 2 combined.” Quoted from:      http://gaming.wikia.com/wiki/Sony_PlayStation_3

The Wii sold double the amount of consoles that PS3 sold, mainly because of the price difference. Playstation Move came out 15^th September this year. Kinect for the Xbox 360 came out 10^th November.

Because of where the game industry is now, with these high end technology consoles and accessories, I think that this generation will last for quite some time. Considering that Sony and Microsoft won’t be planning on making new consoles any time soon since they have only just bought out these motion sensing gadgets. I think we will see continuous improvements on games specifically designed for Kinect and Move. Game companies will be constantly trying to make new and better types of games for them, pushing the limits of what the technology can do. Eventually though, it will become too repetitive, and then it will get to a point where there can be no more improvement on the software. It’s at that point that either new accessories will be made or new consoles, but not for at least 5 years I would think. 

Also, it’s interesting that Microsoft hasn’t had a go at making there own hand held console yet…  I wonder how long it will be before we see Xbox Mini? I doubt they will be able to compete with the PSP or the DS, unless they made something truly unique.

As for the future of gaming, maybe the next generations of consoles will be mind controlled? Where you can virtually control what happens on screen. Or even simulators, taking 3D to a whole new level and you can virtually walk and fight by thinking what you would like to do, and the images could either be viewed by a special visor you can wear, or maybe projected around you if you are in some sort of room.

Since games and technology is always improving, it’s difficult to say exactly what the future will be like. And just think, the creators of the first consoles would never have imagined what was to come years later. Who knows what will be coming up?

Its getting better!

History of games 1980s to 1990s

This period of game history saw the emergence of many different types of genres of games. Fighting games, adventure games, platform and racing games are just some of the types that had begun to form a trend that would continue today.

In 1980, Mystery House was released for the Apple 2, the first graphic adventure game on home computers. The commands were by text, and this continued to be used for games until about 87, until a game called Maniac Mansion, by Lucas Arts, built the SCUMM system to allow a point and click interface. And now point and click is the standard for flash games today.

Donkey Kong was considered to be the first platform game, where the player must jump over obstacles and gaps. These games continued to use and develop scrolling graphics. Jungle King by Taito had scrolling jump and run sequences. Namco took it a step further with Pac-Land in 84, which was the first to feature multi layered parallax scrolling, setting the basics for the Super Mario games.

Games continued to have better 3D graphics and also cinematics were introduced. The survival horror games were a major break through at the time. Haunted House, 81, was first to intentionally have elements of horror fiction. Sweet Home, 89, by Capcom was an influence for there later release of Resident Evil, with gameplay involving terrifying monsters and difficult puzzles, also the opening door loading screens and mansion setting, was a great start for future horror titles. Alone in the Dark, 92, was also another inspiration for Resident Evil, it simulated 3D scenarios by mixing polygons with 2D backgrounds, also introducing a more investigative style to the game play. You were able to click on parts of the environment and read information about what ever it may be. It set the standard for future survival-horror games.

At this time, PCs were developing into better machines. Their graphics were being improved, along with their sound quality. But whenever something new came out, like a better computer with more bit capabilities, it was always quite expensive and most people had to wait a while to buy it.

I had never heard about the video game crashes before, so it was interesting to read about them. In 1983, the game industry completely crashed due to a number of companies going bankrupt and a lot of poor quality games being produced. It brought an end to the second generation of consoles. Supposedly there was a landfill in New Mexico full of E.T games by Atari that were never sold.

During the 90s, graphics transitioned from raster to 3D. Arcade games started to become less popular, as home consoles advanced. Sonic the Hedgehog came out in 91 on the

Sega Mega Drive

. Also online multiplayer games were still becoming popular, leading to the first MMORPGs, including Runescape. The Sims PC games were very successful as well during this time. Id Software’s game Quake was the leading first person shooter game with online multiplayer and new 3D graphics technology.

With 16 and 32 bit consoles, the popularity of arcades began to decline.

In 1995, the Sony Playstation was released, which out sold all its competitors. The Nintendo 64 was released a year later, and it set the standard for 3D game like Super Mario 64. Resident evil came out in 96 and sold over 2 million copies, and is still considered one of the best games on the PS. It was during this 5^th generation of consoles that games became mainly 3D, with games like Crash Bandicoot, Tomb Raider and games that were unlike others before such as Golden Eye 007 and Soul Calibur. CDs were more popular, and most games used realistic graphics and large environments for the game world.

So after reviewing this period, I can see how games and consoles had changed throughout. They became more realistic, emphasis was on better graphics, pushing the limits of what could be done with games at the time. They transitioned from cartridges to CDs and from basic raster, 2D graphics to realistic 3D graphics. Also, gaming was focusing more on home entertainment and less on arcade games.

I will next review the games from 2000 and onwards, and also about my own personal history of the games I’ve played.