what are computer game graphics

 

Unit 78- digital graphics for computer games

 

What are computer game graphics?

 

Computer game graphics are more than people think they are. Generally when someone speaks of computer game graphics we think of electronics, pixels, and how the game looks in game. However they include a lot more than people think, computer game graphics includes graphics such as printing media, such as game packaging, box covers, manuals and posters. Other than printed media computer game graphics can refer to concept art such as weapons, vehicles, and environment. HUD or head up display which tells the player important things such as health, is also part of computer game graphics The type of game such as 3D and 2D also can be included as computer game graphics, things such as 2D sprites or 3D isometric sprites.All these are included under the term of computer game graphics

Unit 1: procedure and documentation

Pre-production techniques for creative media industries

Unit 1: Procedure and Documentation.

-Jack Swift

Procedure-

Identifying the finance: available, is knowing your budget and how to manage your budget, during development the budget will need to be separated and managed throughout all areas of development form software to hardware, and things such as personnel and locations, costs of travelling to certain places. You will also need money for advertisement of your game, these can come in forms of posters which will cost but will not be too expensive, or a TV advert which will also cost money and will be more expensive.

Identifying personnel: needed is also important, certain people for certain jobs or specialists, will require payment for their work. The availability of these specialists may not always be around, and will be costly to hire. With standard personnel things have to be considered such as whether they will be able to arrive for work, if they cannot arrive at work some days then production will be jeopardised.

Resources: such as software and availability of things such as specialists, availability of places for research such, for example with a racing game the development team may want to research a certain race track however the track may not be available to research. As well as hiring locations out, things such as swords, guns , cars, or planes may be hired out depending on what your game includes, if you needed to hire out a certain car for your game you would have to see whether you would be able to afford the hiring fee as well as if it is available

Preparing a budget: is an important step that, knowing how much money you have to spend and preparing it by separating for different needs a budget will be needed for the software and hardware side of things. And a budget will be needed to pay personnel, having the budget prepared and knowing how the money will be distributed will prevent panics when there is not enough money for something. It is important to examine and maintain your budget as going over your budget will not only cost you or your company money but if the game is not successful then money would have been wasted as no profit was made.

Contact personnel: is need for when personnel do cannot or do not turn up for production, or if they quit production a back up is needed, however in a case of personnel quitting production you would be informed of their leave, and would have time to find a new person to fill in for them, however if a member of the production does not turn up due to illness or other matters, someone will be needed to fill in his role, this is a problem if someone important such as a production manager cannot come in As you may not be able to find someone to fill in his role.

Prepare schedule: almost all productions and projects have schedules for finishing/releases . the prepare schedule is important to know what parts of your production are doing well and if any have not, prepare schedules can work on how much development has been achieved in a certain time period, by knowing how well your project is doing in terms of development, will give you an idea of when the project will be finished, and have a good idea of when your project will be released.

Identifying the health and safety concerns: The safety of your employees is the most important thing during the entire production and is the first thing to be considered at the start of production. If the health or safety of your employees is at risk then the project will be halted, or in serious cases can shut down the project for a certain period of time to review the conditions of the workplace.

Indentifying legal aspects:  The project does have to abide by the law; this includes things such as copyright infringement, and other legal aspects. It is important for your employees to know all of the legal aspects of production as not to break them, as this could cause the entire project to be halted or even ended.

Other risks: It is important to have minimal risks as possible, this not only keep the project safe from being 

halted or stopped, but also keeps the employees safe and comfortable which will not affect their work, however employees may feel uncomfortable or unsafe their work may become poor due to them not wanting to work in a dangerous environment. Other risks in the work place that need to be known are things such as, wires, long screen hours is bad for the eye sight and regular breaks should be taken, having food and drinks near electrical equipment etc.

My procedure:  For my maze game I will have a weekly procedure of tasks and sub-assignments set by myself which I will aim to complete, The maze game I will be making has a deadline in December, This gives me just under two months complete the game, I will stage my game into certain sections, one for level design and character design, another section for sounds and music etc. The resources i will need will mostly be illustrator software and gamemaker which the entire game will be made on. There will be no cost to the resources I will use as all the software is provided free by the college, however if I were in a company I would have to set aside money for software for other computers for my team. I will not be researching places which cost nor will I be booking resources or places. I will not have any employed personnel during the making of my game, but may at times ask for assistance in software I am not used to. I will need to identify the health and safety risks so I know how to avoid them, I will need to identify the legal aspects as well such as copyright, I will have to check my characters and plot to make sure I am not copying other projects, I need to get owner’s permission of certain things such as music, however if I or someone else makes the music and soundtracks I do not need permission, or the owner of the music may choose to donate the music for free to the game. Financially I will not require any finance or budget as the equipment and software I will be using is either already owned or is provided for free by the college, in case something does need to be purchased it most likely will not be expensive and will not require a budget. I will not need contact personnel as i have no extra personnel other than myself on the project.

Documentation

Production such as a script, storyboard, mood board, production schedule: having a script, storyboard. A production schedule is needed to keep the game stable, by following a schedule you can never go off track and can keep up with production, A script or storyboard is the heart of the game, this is a necessity for your game, as the game is built around a storyboard. A mood board is useful as it can sums up all of your ideas simply and shows in clearly, during production you can then use this mood board when going off track of what originally was thought up.

Budget: The budget is funding for the project which financially does not come from the developers but is either loaned, or received in a contract. If the budget is not handled well or the project goes over budget then the money will come from the head of development personally. The budget is used to start the project going.

Clearances: clearances are the legal sides of the development/production, these are things such as using someone’s music for your project they can give the song to you for free, or it will come at a charge. If the owner of a piece of work does not want it in your game or you cannot pay the charge to put it in your game, then the work legally is not allowed  in you r game, if it is still implemented in your game this is copyright infringement and is illegal.

Plans: Most projects have future plans for areas such as finance, designs and scripting. Plans are there for you to follow during the development so you can keep on track on relative to what you want the game to be, you could also add to your plans when looking back on them.

H&S assessment/ risk assessment: this is important to your employees, they must know all the risks and how to avoid them or what to do encase of an accident, for example if there is a fire then the employees need to know where to go such as fire escapes, exits and where to go after a fire.

Contingency plan: Contingency plans are simply a backup plan if things go wrong, things that can jeopardise the production can be file data corrupted or missing, or legal aspects which have halted production. The contingency plan can help by having a backup files in a secure place.

Video Games In Society

 Video Games In Society

Video games are talked about all over the media , most of the time the media portrays video games as a bad habit that gives a negative affect on society , games such as Grand Theft Auto 5 were banned in many Asian countries as well as some European countries. However although it is true that video games can affect a persons actions and health, it is also true that video games can help to improve skills such as hand eye coordination, and problem solving ability's.


Separation from Reality

One of the most talked about negative affects which video games give are separation from reality, this is were someone becomes so absorbed into a game they don't take life seriously and basically think as they would if they were in a video game, shockingly this has lead to serious incidents such as theft, assaults, and even murder due to video games influences. one infamous case occurred in America in 2011 where a 17 year old teenage boy, shot and killed his mother due to her confiscating the FPS shooter Call Of Duty, this resulted in the teen killing his mother out of anger. Many incidents like this have been brought to the medias attention in frequent years and have gave influenced society in their negativity against video games.



Excess Playing times and the health affects

The media also have reported the concerns of excess playing times and the health effects it has on gamers, such effects include aggressive behavior caused by video primarily violent games such as the etc. grand theft auto series, and other gangster oriented games. other health problems include muscle pains caused by long periods of gaming, another way video games can affect a gamer is educationally many young gamers are leaving school under achieving due to students spending to much time playing video games rather than revising for school

"Results revealed that time spent playing games was related … to aggression and … to school competence."  In particular, violent games were directly related to attention problems and generally led to a greater decline in academic performance" -Quoted from HealthCentral.com


Most gamers also suffer from physical appearance damages caused by video games, most console gamers sit in hunched positions for long periods of time this can cause displacement and deformity in severe cases, lack of sleep also causes bags under the eyes due to eye strain at electronic displays. Other problems include lack of vitamin D which controls calcium levels which you need to keep bones and teeth healthy gamers fail to get vitamin D because most people get vitamin D from the sun, which most gamers do not see for the majority of the time.




Cost Of Playing Games

There is a price which comes with video games.Many gamers do not realize the effects constant gaming has on society and people you care about, Gamers who spend hours of their days playing games also affect other people such as family and friends, many children today spend most of their time playing video games instead of spending time with their family or going out with friends, this in turn affects them, it causes relationships to become more distant. there are several cases of marriages ending due to video games, 15% of divorces are because of video games. Video games can cause social problems in employment as well some heavy gamers fail to even arrive at work due to video games and their addiction. the cost of gaming comes with a price, literally gaming is financially damaging for some gamers, some gamers who play games such as Counter Strike where you can pay to buy skins and special items, can be damaging as gamers can spend up to hundred of pounds paying for these items. Also with the new consoles entry to the gaming market, company's have increased the price of games on next gen consoles than previous consoles game prices.


Educational
Over recent years there have been evidence which supports that video games do have an educational benefit. Some games in the market are not damaging the minds of players like the media will have you believe. Some games are actually educational, even the violent games can be educational. it has already been proven that people who play video games have better hand eye co-ordination and reflexes. such games as Assassins Creed II a action adventure game, set in Italy during the renaissance, I myself who have played the game have learned things that I had never known before. set in the renaissance era of Italy in the early 1500s, you play as a Assassin who will seek out vengeance to the people who killed his family, during the game you will see historical landmarks such as Giotto's Campanile located in Florence which you can interact with and free climb up. During the game you will also fights the infamous Borgia family of Italy however there is a mystical twist added to the game. This is a prime example of how a violent game can also be educational.



Psychological factor of games
Psychological factors of the game are what effects the player mentally, this can be mean two things. Developers use things such as sound, high scoring, and competitiveness, to affect the player mentally.
Game developers use the sound to give immersive feel and sometimes to even scare the player. the use of sound to affect the player mentally is mostly seen in horror games. most horror games make good use of sound, just like most horror movies use sound to keep the viewer tense and scared. One way sound is used in horror games is with silence, most people who play a horror game know to expect something that will scare them, however when the scene in the game is completely silent and only a few silent sounds are used to keep the player on their feet, silence can also be used as jump scares in game just like in movies, where there is no sound then all of sudden there will be a loud event, such as a door slamming or a scream, sounds affect the player more when the user is wearing headphones. An example of when sound is used to affect the player is in the horror game amnesia, throughout the game it is mostly silent with the only sound being your footsteps and old record disc music, sometimes through the game the music may stop suddenly or quietly fade out, making the player think something is going to happen, in some moments door slams or other foot steps can be heard and then stop when you stand still to listen this gives the player minor paranoia. Another way in which the player can psychologically be affected is by high scoring and competitiveness, this is most often seen in FPS shooters, players often compete against each other for the best weapons and unlocks or for the rank as a status, an example of this is call of duty many players in call of duty strive to reach the highest level possible. this is psychologically affecting as players can play for hours to get to the top level and will feel as though they are more of a worse  player than people who are a high level.

Expectation
Expectation is what society want to see, and hope to see. society and players can expect many things from games such as release dates, the quality of the game, and fixing of bugs. One example of how expectations affected society was with Rockstars Grand Theft Auto 5, after the release of the game. developers promised bank heists by the start of 2014, However this additional add-on which alot of players where excited to play never came. Even now over a year after the release of the game heists are still not out, this has caused alot of GTA players to lose faith in Rockstar, This in turn meant players sought out other games which gave what they promised. Events such as this can be really damaging to a games company, as this new status of rockstars unreliability will stick with them until they redeem themselves.


-Jack S

Game Genres

Genre name		Genres example	Genre description
Third person Strategy		Strategy games are games similar to the style of play in chess, the game is all about making the right decision and taking risks, most strategy games are played in a god like view were you look down on the map and what you’re doing these games usually have long play times, and can last from 30 minutes to a couple of hours. An example of a strategy game is Company Of Heroes, a strategy game about WW2 combat. Strategy games can be a combat strategy or adventure strategy, these games are similar in style of play but different in the objective, combat strategy are games which are mainly aimed around war are and fighting the enemy to get an objective for example company of heroes has multiple games types like conquest where you play to capture and hold certain positions.  Annihilation in company of heroes is a game mode where the objective is to kill the enemy completely including their home base, hence the name. Adventure strategy are similar in the look of the game meaning you still play in a bird’s eye view overlooking the map, however the game objective is different an example of this type of strategy is banished a survival adventure game where you control a small settlement in the wild and you must keep the settlement stable unlike in company of heroes where you a fighting against an enemy AI, in banished you are fighting against problems such as starvation and disease. in banished you must thrive and sustain the settlement you have made, you encounter problems such as fires and starvation where you must tackle these problems by taking risks, much like how you take risks in other strategy games. Most strategy games are PC only.	The audience of Strategy games is more aimed towards older gamers although some younger gamers also play strategy, rather than the younger teen audience which are more likely to play games such as fps or adventure types. The audience is mostly older gamers because most strategy games require more skill and time, a lot of young gamers don’t want to sit and play games for hours and prefer shorter games. However survival strategy games are more susceptible to younger audiences as survival games have recently become more popular on the market. this results in younger audiences playing survival strategy games rather than combat strategy games however a lot of first person strategy games are played by all age audiences, games such as world of tanks where strategy is needed in a first person style of play where you must destroy the opposing team in tanks, is more common amongst younger audiences than third person strategy.
Puzzle Games	Puzzle games are found on all main platforms such as mobile console and pc. One puzzle like game which was recently big on the mobile market was candy crush a game which is not as difficult in solving stuff as other puzzle games however it still requires you to be fairly good at quick problem solving and requires quick reflexes. The aim of candy crush is to swipe identical candies together in rows of three (candies cannot be swiped diagonally), this results in more candy falling down from the top of the screen, the action is similar to Tetris however you must swipe to get rid of the gems. You keep swiping the gems until you hit the points needed to progress to the next level, there is a time at the bottom which decreases constantly and refills a bit when candies are swiped, if you cannot find candy to swipe before the time runs out it game over. If you hit the point limit objective you progress to the next level. Other popular puzzle games include portal series portal is a futuristic puzzle game. The game is about you completing tests in a room, to get to the next room. The game has a sense of maze game mixed in with the puzzle aspect, in the game you use a portal gun which can fire two oval portals which you can then walk through, the game starts of very simple with little difficulty and gradually progress’s to extremely difficult levels. Portal unlike candy crush is has a story, the aim of the game is to complete all the levels and rooms until you reach the last room where you meet the robot whose voice has been guiding you through the game, in the end you must kill the robot called Galdos.		Puzzle games don’t have a set audience at all any age group, or gender can play puzzle games in fact most games people play somewhere involves a puzzle and will involve trying to solve the puzzle, games such as action adventures have many puzzles within the game. Candy crush is a game that went viral in 2012 and most players of the game are women mostly older women in 30s and 40s. The game surpassed Farmville 2 as the most popular game on Facebook with an average 46 million active users per month. Candy crush is not as big in the younger market of teens and young adults. As it is in the older audience, most young females do not play as much as the older audience and very few males play the game. However portal was a very popular amongst gamers mainly male audiences as there are not as many female console gamers as the game was only ported for console and PC. Portal was very popular through both the console and PC market making 4 million sales in the first year of release. Puzzle games are games which are require intensive analysis of the situation or quick reflexes.
Horror		Horror games have only in recent years become popular on the market and are most common on the PC market. One popular horror game is Amnesia. Amnesia a machine for pigs is popular on the PC market, amnesia Is based around several interlocking stories. You as the player switch between past and present gameplay. The game is set in London on new year’s eve in the year 1899, you play as the character Oswald Mandus. Who has awakened from a coma/fever, throughout the game you hear the voices of Mandus’s children he then receives a phone call informing him that his children are trapped underground him in the machine which mandus created, the objective of the game then is to find your children you encounter various monsters such as man pigs deformed swine like men that guard the depths of the machine. The game features jump scares and sick graphic imagery, mandus must reactivate the machine to save his children, eventually after reactivating the machine mandus is regains his memory and the engineer betrays him by releasing all the man pigs out into the streets of London to catch people and feed them to the machine. Mandus eventually realizes his sons died in the battle of the Somme in ww1 (this is where the past and present comes into place and makes the game really confusing for the gamer) mandus so mandus decided to kill his children in the machine to stop them dying in the Somme. He realizes his mistake and decides to sacrifice himself (the player) into the machine to destroy in which ends the horror described above as it never happens	The target audience for horror is mostly young adult males and teenage males, the reason for this is because most male gamers prefer to get a scare out of game and can stand horror unlike how women or young children may not. Horror games are mostly either a few 16+ games but most are 18+ age ratings Amnesia machine for pigs was not as successful as the first amnesia however it still sold a considerable amount of sales Horror games are games which are designed to scare the audience and give keep them tense and never board. Most horror games have the common jump scares and loud sounds which will scare the player
Shooter		Battlefield 4 is a popular shooter currently, the games story is not as interactive and as deep as the opposing call of duty stories are. However battlefield 4 is a game which is designed heavily for multiplayer. The game is an enjoyable experience most of the time. Working together to defeat the other team and heavy co-operation between players is what’s unique with battlefield as a shooter in call of duty you rarely see FPS games which can involve that type of team work. It also helps as in battlefield 4 you have squad spawn which can be used to spawn on a player in your squad, there is a maximum 5 players to a squad. The gameplay is medium paste , unlike call of duty where one player can win the game battlefield requires the entire team to be fairly good at the game, if you have a good squad of 5 all equipped with the right equipment such as , support like an LMG to provide suppression and ammo. Anti-air and anti-tank which an engineer can give, a medic which can heal squad members. However with all multiplayer games you will have cheaters, hackers are fairly common in battlefield lag switches can be used to disrupt the gameplay for everyone resulting in an unplayable experience. There are also a few bugs in the game such as gun sights not rendering properly.	FPS or first person shooter, is a game which is your standard shooter in a first person view. First person shooters have become extremely popular since the release of call of duty franchise in 2003, ever since then shooters have become frequently released every year some popular names such as battlefield, destiny, and titan fall. Frist person shooters audiences are varied, although most shooters have an 18+ age rating it is still very common to encounter under 18s playing the game. Apart from that first person shooters are played by many ages and genders
Racing		Most popular racing games are based around track races a couple examples include Gran Turismo and Forza, Forza is a track racing game for the xbox 360 and Xbox One, the game is in my opinion significantly more realistic than Gran Turismo and is more  aesthetically pleasing, the game is also less buggy than Gran Turismo. Gran Turismo which was first released in 1997 was one of the best racing games on the market, however since then other games such as Forza Horizon and the upcoming The Crew are more popular mostly because people are bored of the standard driving simiulator, after years of racing games all just repeating themselves with the same concept on a differnent track, people have become bored with them now action/adventure racing games are becoming more popular, forza horizon is more rally/street racing and contains special abilities such as rewindable perks in races encase you crash. The Crew is similar in the fact that it is off road and yourself and other players must race across The United States, as well as evading police, the game also contains other types of game modes yet to be revealed	Racing games are not as big on the market as some other genres such as shooters, although they are fairly common amongst most gamers. Racing games can range from sorts such as rally cars, track cars, or formula one. Many games also implement races into their games such as Grand Theft Auto. Racing games have no set audiences as there is no age limiting factors in racing games as they do not include violence or other controversial topics. Racing games is accepted among all gender and ages. Racing games unlike most games usually do not have a story and is a unlock to gain play style where you complete races to gain more upgrades for your vehicle and unlock more races until you have completed all the races.
Rpg Role playing game		One Example of a RPG game is The Elder Scrolls: Skyrim. this is the fifth title in the series of The Elder Scrolls. Skyrim was released on PS3, XBOX360, PC  in 2011. The game start out in the fictional continent of tamreil, In the province of Skyrim, Your unnamed character is being escorted to Helgen a small village for you execution, with you are captured Rebel militia who are fighting the Imperials, A legion which have conquered almost the entire of Tamriel. Your character which the player can customise including changing races, is about to revieve a deadly blow from the headsman when a dragon attack causing chaos in the village. you escape to find out dragon have come back from the end world, and are causing havok over the province. The player is set with the task of sending the dragons back to the end world, after he finds out he is a dragonborn, a power which enables him to speak dragons tongue giving him the powers of a dragon. The player must set out on a huge quest to complete his task at hand, whilst dealing with other problems such as bandit-ism, helping other people and trying to end the waging civil war between the native militia stormcloaks and the imperial empire.	Role Playing Games or RPG is where the player, acts the role of a character in a fictional setting, players also follow a sequences of development either in character development or the story line.
Simulator		Sims 3, The Sims 3 standing for simulator 3, attempts to act out the life of your own custom made person, the game is started by creating your character and siblings (optional), from here on the game is pretty simple, The player acts out everyday life, However of course with alot of exaggeration, your sim can go to the life of crime or become a rich celebrity, the game continues like this until you Sim dies, which is when you then move on to another sibling.	A simulation game or simulator game attempts to act out real life task and problems in the format of a video game, simulators can range anywhere form piloting simulators all the way to sitting simulators. Simulators are one of the least common genres on the market and only have recently become popular due to YouTube game commentators playing them.
sandbox		Rust is a example of a sandbox game in alpha development which is fairly popular on the market,The game is a multi player only game. The player starts out by waking up in the wilderness; the setting of the game is not fully known as of now,but the game location is unnamed, the world is filled with nothing but animals some which have radiation poisoning, and destroyed shacks and concrete huts, many people believe the game is set after a nuclear fallout and that 'man' has started again. after the player has woken his main objective is to survive and thrive, this includes making a base, finding a sustainable amount of food, Providing protection for yourself and making community's or waging war	Sandbox games or more commonly called open world games, are games which have no real objective, as the player makes up their own objective, and is just a fiction world which the player has no limits in.
Arcade		Pacman is a classic arcade game first released in 1980 during the rise of video games, pacman has ultimatley the grandfathers of video games. The objective behind the game is to collect white coins inside a maze by moving into them to get the yellow circle character called Pacman to eat them, the player must avoid four ghosts who chase Pacman round the map while still collecting the coins there are four white blinking dots on the corners of the maze called enigizers which if collected means pacman can eat the ghosts who will now run from him once a ghost is eaten they are locked away in the middle until a set timer converts them back into there normal selves who will chase pacman again.if all coins are collected the player moves onto the next stage which is to repeat the exact procedure how ever the ghosts are quicker and faster each time you progress through the stages the difficulty increases.There is a max level limit with the game, level 256 is a bugged split screen level caused by an error in coding, this causes the game to be in completable on the original version  -Level 256 coding bug on Pacman	Arcade games are simply fast paced action games, usually requiring fast reflexes and good hand eye co-ordination.

Visual Styles

Visual Styles

Visual styles in video games are a type of feel the player gets when playing the game and can clearly be distinguished. Styles are used by game developers in most games to give the game a more immersive feel.an example of this is with most sports games most sports games have fast upbeat music in the background with high saturation and high contrast makes the player feel tense and pumped. Some styles used by game developers include

Pixel Style is closely associated with retro games, pixel games are game which you can see the pixels clearly and gives an old school feel. Old games such as space invaders or Tetris are good example of the pixel style.

Atmospherically gloomy which can be seen in most horror games and zombie games,

The Washed out style is also common among horror games, the washed out style is where there is very little saturation and the game has barley any colour, making the player depressed which is ideal for a horror game.

The cartoonish style is a versatile style as it suites most games. It can be used in a fun shoot them up game such as borderlands, and BioShock infinite.

Militaristic styles are those that are solely based around realistic warfare an example of this would be the Arma franchise which aims to give the player the most realistic military experience.

Photorealistic is a style where the game is styled to look as real as possible, most driving games have this realism especially games such as Grid which looks as if you are in the car due to the highly textured buildings and lens flares from the sun.

Cel-shading is a style which aims to give a simplistic look, with minimal texture detail. The style looks very similar to a cartoonish style.

Dayz the zombie apocalypse survival game still in alpha is a clear example of the gloomy dull atmospheric style. The game always has a low saturation and the player rarely feels relaxed when playing the grey sky and very frequent rain storms keeps the player depressed and feeling miserable much as you would in a zombie apocalypse. The gloomy atmosphere does sometimes pass and bright daylight can be seen at times this is to keep the player not to bored of the atmosphere and to brighten the gameplay.

An example of Photorealism style is seen in the racing game Dirt 3. Dirt is a rally level based game where once one race is complete you can unlock and play the next race. The game is very photorealistic set in various rally tracks around the world the scenery looks almost real due to the EGO engine used in the game which. The most notable thing about the engine is the particle effects, this makes the game really immersive especially in first person view, and the engine also gives good depth of field when in first person due to the real time shadows.

BioShock Infinite is a First person shooter, which Is fantasy world, the game features two different realities conjoined game is set on the floating city of Columbia where the player booker dewitt must save his daughter from himself in a different reality whose name is now Zachary Comstock the founder and creator of Columbia, however he is a twisted tyrant who stole his own daughter from himself in a different reality to make her heir to the throne in Columbia. The game itself has a brighter feeling about it compared to the previous BioShock 2 which was dull and gloomy. Bioshock infinite at the start and throughout the game is bright and highly saturated, its cartoon look makes the player feel welcomed and relaxed on Columbia, when in reality Columbia is a corrupt nation. The the game keep the cartoon graphics and bright atmosphere throught the story, to show that they are trying to deceive the inhabitants of the truth. Although the game does not match the doom and gloom of the previous games it makes for a more enjoyable experience, and doesn’t leave the player feeling depressed when they stop playing the game.

Some of the most popular games with the pixilated styles are old games from the 70s and 80s games such as Tetris is a clear example of the pixel style although in the early development of video games pixilation wasn’t really a style but more of a limitation and if possible game maker in the 70s and 80s would have preferred less pixelated game, however back then the technology limited them to that resolution. However today most games which are pixelated are done so on purpose to give the game a retro feel as technology today is capable of rendering clear non-pixelated images. One example of a more recent pixel style game is the 3D survival game Minecraft, The game is not as pixelated as some other games which strive for the original bright pixels with low resolution. Instead Minecraft is a mix of modern day video game capability and retro pixilation. In Minecraft you spawn in a randomly generated 3D world made of 32x32 pixel 3D blocks, at closer inspection pixels can clearly be distinguished within the blocks. Although the community have made texture packs which re-textures the entire game. Some of the texture packs have had a resolution increase with ranges from 64x64 , 128x128 to 256x256, This eliminates the pixilation and removes some of the retro feel however the square cubed blocks still give a hint of the classic pixilation.

Cel-Shading visual style is where the modelling of the character is realistic meaning you do not have oversized features like you would in an anime/cartoon style. A popular example of Cel-Shading style is in the game series The Walking Dead. The walking dead this zombie apocalypse game based on the TV show contains cell shading. The colours used in the cell shading are very washed out and dark, this enhances the zombie apocalypse gloomy atmosphere.

 
 

One in depth example of two games which share the same style are EAs Battlefield 4 and Activisions Call Of Duty Ghosts. Both
these games share many of the same styles some of these styles being militaristic, both games clearly have a militaristic style about them, however they also share other styles such as photorealistic and fast paced. Both of the two games are photorealistic this means that the games are similar to what warfare would look like in real life, although Battlefield is using a new and better engine Frostbite 3. Whereas Call Of Duty uses the older IW engine which has been used throughout all of the call of duty’s in the franchise, first used in call of duty 2 in 2005 the same engine is used in call of duty ghosts. Although the developers of call of duty say they have tweaked and altered the nine year old engine. Both games vibrant adrenaline colours and exposure effects give the game an immersive and hyped feel.

 

Unit 1 - Pre-Production

Unit 1 - Pre-Production

To produce a game or for any form of the media industry, various industries such as film production, advertisement, television production, website creations pre-production is required to lay the foundations of your game or other entertainment, the requirements pre-production needs are

-Finance

-Type Of Production

-Time Constraints

-Personnel

-Facilities

-Materials

-Contributors

-Location And Codes Of Practice

Finance

Finance is needed for almost all pre-productions, a budget would need to be established, before pre-production to give an aspect of how much money the development of the production would cost. The advantage of having a budget is knowing when to stop investing in a production, which would not produce a substantial amount of profit. equipment needed for the development of the game is required, such as cameras to take pictures for pre-production and scenery this would have a cost. employees is another important aspect of finance, people are needed for animation, programming, or voice actors especially celebrities, which would require a lot of money to get celebrities an example of a celebrity who has voiced in a video game, is Sean bean voiced a character in the elder scrolls V oblivion. Materials needed in creating a game will also cost a lot of money materials such as good quality computers for editing and rendering a game engine is also required for the basics of the game these can cost up to thousands. facility hire is needed if your game is based on a real life place, such as a racing game, you may hire a racing track to take photos and observe the surroundings so you can get it looking as real as possible in game.

clearances is where you are paid by the company you are making the game for in portions, the company does this to make sure they will invest all their money into a game that may fail.Sources of finance can be from private loans, sponsors , or from contracts from other companies an example of this is Call Of Duty. Activision offered a contract with infinity ward to produce some of the games in the franchise.this meant that Activision would give infinity ward a set budget to produce the game under a contract.However lone developers who create a type of media by themselves, most of the time will not have a contract 

Type Of Production

 Type of production is how you will produce copies of the media entertainment, whether it be television or the film industries the type of production applies to all types of media production.
There are four main types of production. batch production is where small amounts of copies are produced and sent to retail, usually from 30-120 copies per batch this is only used when needed. one-off productions are when the is one copy produced most of the time this is not used in game design and is used more by fashion industries, continuous production is when  production of the game is continuous, the games are produced 24 hours everyday this makes use of the money needed to create the copies as stopping and starting the production costs more money. Mass production is where hundreds of copies are produced is where assemblies are used to speed up the process of the production.

Time Constraints

Time is an extremely important in the arts industry, time is important when developing and releasing. Most games development companies such as EA or Activision, release games almost every 1-2 years. it is important for these big companies to release games every year to keep their name in the market. timing the release of a game is also important this also is the same for timing the release of additional content. Most big companies such as EA mainly release their main titles during the end of the year between October and December, this will increase sales as many people will buy the game as presents for Christmas. Timing the release is also important in case of competition, two companies who are competing for sales, are Dice and their Battlefield franchise and Activations Call Of Duty franchise, both try to release their game before the other and try to keep sales consistent. however sometimes a companies game could fail in sales, this would be the ideal time to release your game as consumers would be looking for a better game to play.Deadlines are an important aspect of managing time as with anything deadlines must be met this apply s to everything during production as well as release, if deadlines are not me then this could result in the games release being rescheduled this could in turn affect sales. An example of deadlines not being met is Rockstars Grand Theft Auto 5 heists (where players would be able to participate in online bank heists with friends) which were scheduled to be released in early 2014, Rockstar promised that heists would be out in a few months once the game had been released back in September 2013, one year later and the heists which rockstar promised have still not been delivered. this is a clear example of how Rockstar lost out on sales and on players, as many players have gone to other games, rather than wait for heists to be released. this has lost rockstar potential money for other DLCs (downloadable content) from the players. Based on this, it is easy to see how important deadlines are.

Personnel
The size of the team is important as a big team will increase rate of production however costs more money to employ, it also means more equipment is needed which again will cost money. The availability of personnel is important if employees do not turn up or have problems getting to work this could slow down production, personnel could also quit the job due to stress overworking or other reasons, if someone significant to the development quits the production such as an artist or model designer, this could effect the entire game if an artist leaves his style of work would not been seen through other work that would have to be done and the style of some models wont look the same if development continues after someone has left .skills and experiences are important you should be employing people who are skilled at what they say they are, CV s are one thing however seeing work they have done is a good way to see if they are good at what they say they are.Having your development team split into certain groups would keep the development easier to handle and to organize, Such groups would be, script writing, story boarding, programming, illustrators, and more.

although personnel is needed most of the time for a production there have been some accounts where entertainment has been created by a single person the advantage of this is obvious the creator; if his game is successful  would gross all the money to himself however the disadvantages of producing media entertainment alone is, firstly that it is more time consuming alone, secondly 

Facilities

your company will have to have good facilities for production, it is important to have enough equipment for personnel and to have it working properly if there is something wrong with the equipment then production will be slowed down. Also the employees must know how to use the equipment or programs if not then the work they produce may not be as good as they may have been if the employee new how to use the program. Production equipment includes editing software, modelling software and game engines examples of these are editing software such as Adobe Photoshop. some rendering and modelling software are programs such as blender, and cinema 4D, some game engines that are used include unity 5, and the unreal engine, game engines usually can cost up to a £1000 or more especially the more recent game engines.

Materials

 Materials for production are the types of things your company will need, this links in with the facilities your company will need as well, materials are mainly software in the production in media. software needed for the production of games development include engines such as Cinema 4D,also game engines will be needed such as unreal engine or unity engine. Editing software may also be used in some media productions such as adobe Photoshop.These materials will all cost a lot of money affecting the budget. also some personnel may have to get used to the software this again will have a knock on affect on the managing time as it will take a while to get used to.

Contributors

Contributors are can be specialists in development of media, or could be the public contributing to the production this has been done in the past, where lead developers have gone into the public and hired random people for voice acting or for mmodelling Developers may see someone in public who they think would look good in their game and is the type of character they are looking for. In some cases celebrity's are used in games, this can give the game more popularity, one example of celebrity's being featured in games.

Ricky Gervais a English comedian and actor, was featured in GTA IV as himself at a comedy club in the game.Other contributors are specialists. Contributors to a game or a production could be through funding. funding's can come from sponsors or from contracts, contracts are when a company will hire you to make their game or , will fund your game idea. One example of funding from another company is with the production of the game Before a game which had only started development at the start of 2014 was on slow production,  However Facepunch studios the company which is developing the game Rust have funded the project in an agreement of a certain percentage of the revenue from the game. Soundtracks and sound effects in games can be given or bought by contributors, either by a band or found free online. 

Location And Codes Of Practice 

location and codes of practice these are needed in any production. Location is where your game is going to be based if the game hopes to have realistic landscape then a team would need to go to the location to take pictures and observe the landscape so the modelers can accurately create the landscape. this is often done in racing games where real tracks are used, developers will go to these tracks and make records of how it looks sometimes taking photos, or even getting an aerial view of the track. Codes Of Practice is the legal side of production, things such as copyright, Ofcom, and PCC. Copyright is extremely important when producing a game, companies must be careful not to breach the copyright of another game. One example of how copyright may be breached in a game is in the mobile market. The popular game CandyCrush  Tried to copyright the word 'Candy' fortunately the request was not met. however if they had copyrighted the word 'Candy' this would have been a big problem for the gaming market.
Ofcom are a government approved-regulator of broadcasting, telecommunications and other media. Ofcom decide things such as what can be shown in trailers at certain times due to children watching TV, they can also change the age rating on your game if they think you have set it to low. They can even in some cases deny sale in a country or at all, this is usually because the game is to violent or gory. PEGI or pan European game information this association controls the ageing rating used on games and decides whether or not the age rating is reasonable, if they think that the age rating your company has given the game is incorrect, you must change it to their age rating or selling the game in the EU will be banned. Examples of PEGI age ratings can be seen an games such as call of duty a popular war game which has a 18+ age rating although it is common that gamers under the age of 18 do play these games and parents do buy 18+ games for their children while ignoring the age rating, unfortunately not much can be done to stop this as an adult can buy the game and give it away. 



parts of pre-production will and would be used in my 2D Maze Game, some parts i will not be affected by but would be if I where to create the game by myself for the market.
Finance is needed for the entire production of the game, it is needed for facilities and equipment such as software, hardware, employees, and locations. I do not require finance in the making of the my game as software and hardware is already provided. However if I were to make this game without the facilities provided by the college I would need finance to accommodate Software such as Gamemaker which the full program costs £500, I would also need high end computer however i already do have a computer which is capable of running the software, although if i did not have good enough hardware it would cost around £1500 average. If I required assistance with the game production that would also cost to hire personnel, which will also cost. Time constraints is another area which in reality is not affecting the production of my 2D game, However if I were to create this game alone, I most likely would have a job which is providing income for the development of the game, however with having the job production would not be as fast as it would be if all my time was focused on the development of the game.Facilities are not needed with the production of my game as they are already provided, however in reality i would need to have update equipment such as cameras if i were to photograph or RECE a location, much of the facilities needed also links in with finance as all of the facilities will come with a cost, some examples of facilities are software such as game engines, game engines which for 2D games can cost up to a couple hundred pounds, or for a decent 3D game engine can cost up to a £1000 and more. Contributors for a production can be financially such as sponsors or contract, or celebrities or the public can contribute.In the making of the 2D game I will most likely not have contributors as, i do not need financial support to create the game, the game also will have no dialogue so there is no need for public contribution to the game. However if I were to create the game by myself I would most likely need financial support this could come from private investors, or other companies in a sponsorship. I may also hire people from the public for voice acting if I did choose to add dialogue. Location and codes of practice, I will find places to base my games setting on, locations such as parks will almost certainly influence the setting of the game. The locations I will be visiting will be free to enter and will not effect finance, unlike some places which would require payment to visit. Codes of practice does not really apply to the game i am making in reality as it is not going on the game market, however If this game where to be released on the market, the maze game would not have an age rating due to it having a passive nature to it. Copyright Infringement will apply to the creation of the game in reality and if I were creating this game as a company, I must be careful not to replicate or copy other work with a copyright place holder. This would also apply to if I were to create the game as a company, Infringement of copyright may and could lead to a lawsuit, which could damage the games production.

-Jack S