I've changed the look of my game

Changed it to vector graphics. Looks better and feels a little smoother now. Although the endings still have slight audio issues, the game itself works fine and has no glitches (that I've seen anyway), and you can't 'cheat' anymore by aiming offscreen. Now I just need to print out a few things into my sketchbook.

lighthouse

Pretty cool! I liked the 3d thing, should have had a jump scene though, it got a little dull, but it was awesomely made. The move-me booth seemed cool, should have had a moshing option though! Limited, but still cool technology... seems like ritual humiliation putting up on the internet though! But seriously talking, good technology. I didn't put in headphones for the films so I can't really judge.

my anti-shooter..

is done! Might adjust stuff like font but that's about it = )

my anti shoot em up game

I already have an anti shoot em up prototype working.. I decided to make a simple flash shooting game, except the aim is to avoid the targets. I'm basing it on Johnny Cash's 'I hung my head' lyrics directly, with the idea of him shooting his brother; only doing it in a somewhat comical way. Your rifle is damaged and out of control, constantly firing, and your job is to avoid shooting your brother and your father. The aim is to score a perfect 0 points; if you hit your father you lose points, leaning towards one set of bad rankings, while if you hit your brother your score rises, leading to another set of bad rankings. The higher the score whether it be + or -, the worse Johnny Cash yells at you at the end. While this scoring potentially means you could even out your score by hitting a different target, that would be far too tricky to balance to actually be done to any degree of efficiency, expelling risks of cheating for that perfect 0. Hitting Johnny cash's CD cover also raises your score by a significant amount.
At the moment you can cheat by simply aiming the mouse offscreen, and I don't know if there's a way to fix this. At the moment targets appear very fast and hectically, making them tricky to avoid, but there are still safe spots on screen to point the gun; something I must fix. I also should find the Johnny Cash 'I hung my head' song to add to it, at the moment I have Tom Green's 'I'm gonna throw the piggy off the hill' playing in the background. I'm certainly keeping the constant 'don't shoot Jebb!' and 'gosh you can't shoot poppa!' warnings I recorded, however.
As it is, I'm using poorly done images of actual people as the targets, although I may trace over them with vector graphics eventually to try and reduce lag; however, I like the cheap look fo it as it stands, its more humourous this way. I'm also fond of having Benny Hill music play at the end along with an angry image of johnny cash; although I need to find out how to edit the code to get a different ending to play when you succeed at the game.
The way I see it there are only really three ways to make an anti shoot-em-up. The first is: any genre that isn't a shoot-em-up, which doesn't rly count. Second, make a shoot-em-up where you fire non-violent ammunition. And third, make a shoot-em-up where avoiding the targets is necessary; I thought the third was the best course of action. I aim to finish the game using just flash and sound recorder, although if another program turns out to be more useful, I'll switch to it.

articles defending or attacking video games

attacking:
http://mentalhealth.about.com/cs/familyresources/a/vidgameviolence.htm
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2005/02/24/tech/gamecore/main676446.shtml
http://www.selfhelpmagazine.com/articles/teens/violentvideos.html

defending:
http://www.gamerevolution.com/features/violence_and_videogames
http://www.economist.com/displayStory.cfm?Story_id=4247084
http://www.helium.com/tm/158052/until-recently-active-synonymous

Personally..

I think people overreact to isolated cases of killings which appear to be linked to violent video games. These murderers clearly had something wrong with them to begin with; and would have found inspiration elsewhere for murders if not in videogames. The fact that the victim was playing the game in the manhunt case, as opposed to the murderer, is proof of how reactionary the media can be; without investigating properly, the issue of violent video games is certain to attract the attention of outraged parents.
In the case of these parents: it seems any excuse is sufficient for them to point the finger of blame elsewhere, rather than look at how they themselves bring up their children. It's quite hypocritical to complain about violent games being played by their children when they're the ones who buy the games for them, despite the big '18' certificate on such games. And regardless, any child will say they find the killing fun, just as how any child will at the same time point out it ins't the same as killing in real life. It's pretend killing, no different to playing cowboys and indians. And even if a game provides inspiration for one or two real life killings by some deranged psychopaths, is that justification for denying millions of sane people that game? And is it justification to attack the whole media of video games? I don't know about you, but I don't think so.
That said, I do agree that there is a limit to explicit content in a game. There is a difference between violence in a game to go alongside the game's theme, and having violence itself as the whole theme of the game. Nevertheless, even if the level of violence is grossly distasteful, I do not believe that necessarily influences people to kill. I'd say it's more inclination to switch the game off; relentless violence with no break would become tedious.
Then again I can't claim my opinions as absolute; everyone reacts differently to things.. and I'm not exactly a fan of most shooting games. They're fun for a little while, but shooting things quickly loses its appeal for me, so perhaps gamers who get more immersed in them are more likely to be influenced by them? Hmm, I'm not so sure, seeing as when I was younger (supposedly making me more impressionable) I enjoyed these games alot more, yet did not ever get the inclination to shoot someone in real life. But everyone's different, so thinking reasonably perhaps there should be a limit; nevertheless, the fact that everyone is different is all the more proof that parents should think carefully about how they bring up their own children, rather than simply finding a scapegoat in the form of video games.

Controversial video games

The first and probably most recent example of a very controversial game is Manhunt 2; the first game in years to actually be banned. The BBFC rejected it for classification due to the game's relentless killing, as it encourages players to perform kills in the most brutal and savage ways possible. Rockstar are hardly strangers to the world of controversy; bringing me to my other controversial game examples. the original Manhunt came under much scrutiny because of the killing of 14 year old Stefan Pakeerah, which was allegedly inspired by the game. An opdd case considering, it later emerged, that the victim was the one who'd played the game, not the killer. Nonetheless the fact that its vast amount of brutal killings was insufficient for a ban, yet it was for the sequel, brings questions as to either how extreme the level of explicit content is in the sequel, or as to the BBFC's classification; did they ban the game possibly due to controversy surrounding the previous game? There were calls for the original manhunt to be banned; indeed, it was banned in new zealand among other places. The BBFC claims the ban in manhunt 2 is due to the game's 'unremitting bleakness and callousness of tone'. However in recent interviews some of their reasoning seems a little questionable. In fact BBFC's press office manager Sue Clark's own admission of its findings is curious to say the least: "The interactivity element of it, one of the things we found, which we weren't really expecting, was that people felt that the interactivity slightly distanced them from the game. What with having to press buttons, you are more likely to be aware that you're playing a game." Of course, that somewhat contradicts the Board's self-admitted tendency to "bump the rating up to a higher category" in certain instances where videogames are concerned, while massively exploitative films such as Wolf Creek and Hostel navigate the classification process unscathed. This suggests some serious inconsistencies in the way games and films are rated alongside each other. The problem games face, which don't necessarily apply to film, is that it's much more difficult to make tweaks and changes to a videogame than it is to remove two or three seconds or several frames from a film. "It's a much more complex issue and in the case of Manhunt 2, as in the case of 'Terrorists, Killers and other Whackos', the amount that you'd have had to have changed or removed would have not made it a viable work which is why it was rejected." Yet if the interactivity suuposedly distances you from the game, is this logical to begin with?
The last controversial game I will look at is Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas; due largely to the 'hot coffee' mod, which allowed players to access a sex scene that should have been altogether removed form the game. The rest of the game, as with the otehr GTA games, was hardly immune to controvery as well; with the car stealing, vandalising, drive-by shootings (now possible on a bycicle!) and whatnot. It seems Rockstar has a taste for controversy with their games; most likely because it undeniably attracts attention. But are they going too far? Or are people overreacting to violence in video games?

violent shooters

so let's move onto the violent games where you shoot things, first off:

2006/ The rambo bros
http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/306263
A mario game where you shoot koopas, mainly with a sniper rifle. I admit, it kept me playing till I died, unlike most non-violent games that I closed from pure boredom. It also gains extra violence points for taking a peaceful game franchise (mario) and adding in guns and blood. Not that I'm ever going to play it again, mind you.

Duck Hunt 1945
http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/290917
a violent shooter + a violent shooter = a violent shooter. Pretty simple! Except it's also ridiculously difficult. Well made though, reloading animation's cool. Just, not very fun overall. Proves shooting does not equal fun.

Zombie Swarm
http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/275479
manic zombie shooting. Actually very fun, despite its simpleness. I particularly like how to recharge the gun you have to frantically click on the battery as zombies continue to advance.
I actually had to tear myself away from this one.

Overall the violent shooters were more fun than the peaceful games.. but not necessarily. In fact thep eaceful game jazzy jones was my overall favourite of the bunch I tried.

peaceful games!

I don't completely get how a shooter can be peaceful, except that the lead characer's motives are usually peaceful. Assuming I'm supposed to research peaceful games as per se as opposed to specifically peaceful shooters, here are a few examples I found:

1. Jazzy Jones!
http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/343778
absolutely brilliant game where you guide jazzy jones the cat through levels in an attempt to stop fred the evil. You actually resolve the entire game without directly attacking anything or anyone; you merely avoid obstacles. I've played the entirety of this masterpiece several times.

2. Cherry Cola
http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/319527
place tools in certain places to guide a cherry cola to his goal. There was some kind of storyline but, it wasn't important. Anyways challenging, and no violence.. unless accidentally hurling the cherry cola to its death can be counted as violent. And the aim of the game is to avoid that happening, so... I'd count this as a good pacifist effort, you don't attack anything.

3. Fruit fall
http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/332159
roatate the stage to line up fruit of the same colour and burst it. I beat two levels and got bored. But it was nicely made, and had no hint of violence, so well, that's that. If I wasn't so easily bored, I would have certainly played it more.

So there we have it. Games don't need to be violent to be fun. Well... they can be kind of fun without violence anyway.

New unit

An anti-shooter? Sounds awkward. At the moment I'm working on the idea of a gun constantly firing, and you have to avoid hitting anything. It's the opposite of the usual aim of a shoot em up, so therefore I'd say that classifies as an anti shooter. However I'm having trouble coding the gun to constantly fire at the moment. I'll probably come up with a different idea in the end though, but for the moment it's nice to have a basic idea to work with.

For now I'm looking at shoot em up games.. some more violent than others, most involving shooting, and with plenty of violence

finished!

Minor flash bugs fixed (credits glitch being the main one) and sketchbook work will be done once I write in a little conclusion. So yeah, done. I'm pretty pleased. Got alot of things added into my sketchbook today... may just need to add one or two more sources into the credits, nothing major

the flash

is finished! But I'm not gonna spoil the surprise on this blog. Anyway I need to write more in my sketchbook, so will do that in a moment.

working on the flash video at home

Going pretty well, now I've finished the most ambitious part animation-wise. Still got about 2 minutes left to animate, but it shouldn't take too long. Will post some stills soon.

Finally decided

'As the rpg genre has evolved, how have some rpg series evolved, and are these changes making these series and the genre better overall?'
I'll mention several rpgs but concentrate on pokemon and final fantasy as the main series. It could be fun ranting about some of the console pokemon games.

Today's awesome presentation on research!

So we looked at pervasive gaming! I might go to the lighthouse event. But it said I have to register, and I think they're trying to steal my details and do bad things, so I'm not sure if I want to risk it. But pervasive games take gaming off the screen and into the real world, so to speak. And the event has a bar. So I must say it's tempting.

Had a quick look at modernism. Well, more looking at how the image said more than words. Which reminds me, I should put an image on this blog entry. We then looked at a poor example of a powerpoint layout. Juxtaposing... pretty useful, in terms of making comparisons.
Anyways, then a few examples of males represented as violent and dominating, with fire and flames, as Tom Cruise demonstrates on the left. And a few other ways of advertising. Finally, looked at Harvard referencing.

Dungeons and dragons. Admit it, you love it.

D&D, everyone's heard of it. Gary Gygax's fantasy tabletop role playing game is widely considered one of the nerdiest possible past-times. So that's an achievement in itself! But in all seriousness, many consider it the beginning of modern role playing games and therefore the start of the RPG industry. So it really is quite something.

So what made this dice rolling boardgame so appealing? Let's analyse the way the game plays. Players create characters that embark on imaginary adventures in a fantasy setting. One person assumes the role of Dungeon Master, and acts as the game's referee and storyteller, maintaining the setting in which the adventures occur. Players listen to the DMs explanation of their surroundings and possible choices, then describe their actions. These actions generally involve interacting with fantasy world characters, solving problems, battling monsters and finding treasure. Does this sound familiar? It should to anyone who's played a 'traditional' style role playing video game. The idea's exactly the same in computer RPGs like dragon quest for example; just the storytelling is done by the game rather than being assigned to a player as a role.

So so far, the game sounds like a big daydreaming session. However the game's more complex actons are decided on the roll of a dice, rather than players just describing every action. Therefore, there is an element of risk involved in the game, and this random element is similar to the damage element in modern computer RPGs. Characters also gained levels, gaining skills, gold, etc. Consideirng its similarities to popular modern RPGs it is no surprise how popular it is... the main difference being that D&D requires a much larger degree of imagination.

Well I don't know what my angle is exactly yet but...

But I'm beginning by researching into the roots of video game role playing games. So what is the definition of an RPG? It is a game where players assume the roles of fictional characters and follow stories. Rather than being competitive, players generally have to collaborate by forming a party to make it through the challenges within the game's rules. These journeys, often done in weekly sessions, could potentially take place over a period of months or even years, though some players preferred single sessions. They are essentially forms of interactive story-telling, therefore computer games adopting their take on the genre is a natural development, especially with the increasing significance of narrative in games. But before we get too far ahead of ourselves, let's look at an example of the old fashioend board game rpgs... Case study: Dungeons and Dragons? It sounds like the most logical choice..

advertising for women

More feminine colour scheme means it's aimed more at women

Emphasis on fashion, sophisticated look: stronger woman's representation

Emphasis on thighs but not in a really sexually appealing way to men, more aiming at sporty women.. Nike = sportswear so, makes sense

Old fashioned advertising for women was a little.. questionable?

Sexualised scene, man on top, but woman appears more in control then on similar men's ads. Also, half naked men used to appeal to women!

Unfortunately the results aren't quite as entertainingly sexist as the ones for men. Oh well

Advertising aimed at males eh?

Notice the emphasis on specific parts of the woman's body...

Darker colour scheme etc. makes for overall more manly look

Alcohol ad from a teen magazine. I somehow don't think alcohol is the central focus of the image though...

Guinness: bold, dark, manly. I think that sums it up.

And here we have another example of women's representation in men's adverts!

Gorilla Drumming

The gorilla video rules. It makes me want to buy Cadbury's. That's alot more than I can say for most ads, even though there's no immediately obvious link between a gorilla drumming and a bar of chocolate. I guess random does work!
http://www.aglassandahalffullproductions.com/?CMP=KNC-gkw

Chris Cunningham

Chris Cunningham's work is... shall we say.. unique? Above's a shot from his Aphex Twin video 'Come to Daddy'... perhaps twisted is a more appropriate word for much of his work. Still, it definitely works, that's for sure... take his video for Bjork for example, which won multiple awards and was even nominated for a grammy for Best Short Form Music Video. So, weird and strange is the way forward!

His work on adverts definitely strays away from the conventional.. and whether you think it advertises the product well or not, it certainly gets people talking; which is what the big companies want, it seems. Personally I thought the 'mental wealth' playstation advertisement was more off-putting than anything... then again it beats the 'fun, anyone?' playstation ads I suppose. I thought the Levi's ad was very good and clever though, so I suppose with randomness on ads, it comes down to personal taste much of the time. Oh, on the subject of randomness in ads, I thought the gorilla drumming cadbury's ad was pure genius. Researching weird ads is a possibility I guess.

Decision

I'm going to work around the RPG genre for my research. I'm thinking the development of the genre as my central focus, unless of course I get some major brainstorming ideas. I've already done alot of primary and secondary research on this subject in my spare time.. no harm in revisiting though! I'll begin my research by researching the genre itself, before starting on any specific games.

trying out some practical research

Since I had no idea what to do the research on, I decided to pick quite an abstract topic: money. Or specifically, the use of money. Once I had this in mind I picked up a 5p coin, and two leaflets, demonstrating how you could save, invest, or waste money.

While this topic wasn't exactly linked to my main idea for the unit it did serve as an opportunity to practice quick research. Generally I prefer to take my time deciding on a topic or finding sources, though...

I have a blog now! First blog post

Ok, I guess it's time I started working out what to do for the project. Right now I'm thinking of researching a genre of video games... I was thinking of beat-em-ups until Lukas said that's what he was probably doing earlier. So, maybe Role Playing Games (RPGs) instead. Or I'll stick with beat-em-ups at the risk of stealing his idea, cos they'll have more interesting controversy to consider.. since they are just about beating people up. Above is a perfect example of a video game character needlessly beating up a streetful of people!