Blog 6

Video Games

Lecture

Started the lecture by talking and sharing ideas about what games we play and what game consols we play them on .....

• Arcade
• GamesConsoles
• Computer Games
• MUDs
• MMOGs

others might be handheld consoles such as the playstation portable, nintendo game boy and game gear.

games can be classed as fighting games, first person shooters, third person shooters, simmulation games etc...

Key things to remember are:

• Media Effects and Games;
• The Persistence of Effect;
• Games and Utopia;
• Thinking about video games as a new form of cultural practise... in the same way we now think about old media like newspapers, radio, television, films...
• what are some ways to approach thinking about games that might be unique to this genre?
• Are there questions that are specific to video games that don't apply to any other form?

Narratology

Narratology is the study of games being story orientated and having emphasis placed on good stories rather than general game play. Games these days often have story modes, games like tekken,soul calibur and need for speed stories as well as the traditional arcade style.

Ludology

Ludology focuses more on the study of the general gameplay being good. After all that is why people play video games... most modern games have a mixture of good story with good game play. games such as gran theft auto reign supreme regarding story line and free for all play.

Games such as Halo, Quake and Tom Clancys rainbow six all have interesting storylines and have good multiplayer, online, gameplay. ie death matches in the story lines venues.

Reading

The reading by Steven Poole- Trigger Happy

The third chapter on the worlds created. He specifically makes note of how games are extremely inaccurate regarding physics and health etc... but does argue that, the point of playing a video game is not to simulate the world and be killed in on shot etc...but to be entertained and enjoy the impossible. Mention was made of how games have incorporated feel into the game : the dual shock analogue controllers.... and having vibrations when zoomed in on a scope. The chapter was easy to grasp and very helpful and is very relevent to the course.

Tutorial task

The tutorial task involved retyping a letter and being able to change fonts .... the Mail merger turned out to be a little trickier than anticipated , exel basic were good to learn however rather difficult to proform some of the tasks .....the advanced task did my head in a little bit...

My Thoughts

I do beleive that video games are not a waste of time , however i fit in the class of male with not many friends category therefore its kind of subjective. The x box console is an amazing tool neve the less ... music from an ipod can be listened to while playing a game or looking at photos... being able connect to the internet and down load certain things and have an IM is a valuable tool and make the X box 360 a great form of communication technology....