Serial Game Killers

Today video games are an important part of the entertainment of children and teenagers. However, many video games are characterized by violence which often contains aggressive and brutal elements.

How many times we have stopped playing a game because is too much violent for us? And how many times we’ve stopped because is crap or boring? The answers are easy to find but what is actually important is which the criteria to choose from are. It seams that over the years games have become more violent and now is a big concept of the industry. For example, over the years violent games are among the games which sell most.

Most violent games by vote:

10 Resident Evil 4 (PS2 - 2 million)

9 Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas (PS2 - 14 million)

8 God of War (PS2 - 1 million in US only)

7 NARC

6 Killer 7

5 The Warriors

4 50 Cent: Bulletproof

3 Crime Life: Gang Wars

2 Condemned: Criminal Origins

1 True Crime: New York City

Also, at the Best 20 Selling Video Games some violent games are very high. At the 6^th place ‘Grand Theft Auto’ with 50 million sales, at the 14^th place ‘Resident Evil’ with 31 million, at the 19^th place ‘Street Fighter’ with 25 million and at the 20^th place ‘Mortal Kombat’ with 20 million sales.

So, what is the real reason to buy one of these games? Is the blood? Is the violent atmosphere? Is the opportunity to do a crime without going in jail? And worst to get credit for that? Is because the violent games give more adrenalin than other games? And how is this valid?

One reason is TV & cinema. Why? Because they have many violent-crime-killing movies, as well as the “News” of the channels are all about war, killings, serial killers, crimes, narcotics, guns and in other words we are all surrounded with violence. So, we are familiar with violence and at one point we have been used to it. To sum up, games with violence are nothing more than games with race-cars for us nowadays. In our conscience is all right because we are familiar with violence but subconsciously we have a problem.

Problems

There is an important number of video games with the same degree of attractiveness for the gamers, which have no violence and offer inventiveness, creativity, education and sociability to the gamers.

Nevertheless, violent games spreading very fast and becoming more and more popular. At the same time, there is a suspicion that people who plays violent video games suffer from changes in their brain such as negatively influence at the personality and at their behaviour.

It is important to be discovered in which degree, the violent games /and generally speaking the violence /, influence or promote the negative and aggressive social behaviour.

For first time, scientists from the University of Indianapolis search with objective criteria the functional effects of the violent games in the brain of teenagers. They distributed with random way 44 adolescents in 2 teams. The children of the first team should play a violent game for 30 minutes, and the children of the other team should play also for 30 minutes a non-violent but equally interesting game.

The results are particularly interesting:

For the gamers that played the violent game, was observed reduction of the activation of regions at brain which are responsible for the self-control, the concentration and the suspensions. Also was observed more activation of structures of brain which involve the emotion of excitation and agitation-confusion. On the other hand, for the gamers that played the non-violent game, was not observed any of the above. This short-term effects on the brain of the gamers may cause permanent changes in the character and the behaviour.

The EU strikes back

The possibility of establishment of limit of age in the sale of electronic games which contain scenes of violence is discussed by the ministers of Justice and the European Union, adopting the idea that the violent pictures which appear have lead to the increase of cases of children criminality.

(The initiative for the beginning of dialogue round the imposition of restrictions in the sale video games belongs in Germany (which maintains also the European presidency), country in which was marked and the last relative bloody incident: the passed November, 18year old get in his school and shooting indiscriminately and it wounded five students, before it puts an end to his life. The Germane police connected his aggressive behaviour with his love for the violent electronic games.)

Programming thoughts

I imagine you all know the “Minority Report” like novel or film. For those who have not seen the film or have not read the book, the history concerns a society in which the “authorities” are in position to know in advance who commits a crime (without even realize it). However, this system is always corruptible, not only from innocent mistakes but from bad manipulations too.

The question that “Minority Report” places remains unanswered, in these days we have terrorism and restriction of individual freedoms, so the question is tragically suitable. Who will look after us from these “authorities”? The answer is coming from some neurologists of Max-Planck Institute announced that they can read our thoughts (http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/story/0,,2009217,00.html ). They asked people to think if they would add or subtract two numbers that they would show them later. And achieved to predict with 70% accuracy their intentions, before the numbers flashed up. Scary?

Think that this can be the first step for policing our intentions. And if this method is going to be perfect in the future, who guarantees us that the “authorities” will wait to arrest a suspect after the crime, when they are in a position to know in advance the bad thought that someone can have? How far we are from the technology of “Minority Report”?

The scientists believe that as long as we learn more of how the brain works, the better we become to predict the human being. In December, in an article (http://www.economist.com/opinion/displaystory.cfm?story_id=E1_RQVPRVD ) in the magazine “economist”, they dispute the scientific prestige of what we name “free will”: the persons with concrete genetic characteristics in combination with certain conditions from the environment, that they have inclination for violence.

If we reach up to there, in a world like the one described in the “Minority Report”, I’m wondering if our thoughts, which is something that belongs only to us until today, is going to be exclusively ours.

Task 21

The Last Stand

The university is a way to have a certificate for you knowledge . So is not so difficult to realaze what you know and what knowledge you gained from one course on a Univesity, because the educational system at the last few years specializing the students. So the when we finish the course is clear for as what we know and what we can do. The tricky thing is to find a way to use our abilites, creativity and knowledge to prove that we can get in the industry jobs. The unuversity will, for someone is the best or some of the best students, give them a chance to get a job at industry but nothing elses and only for few. So the way to get a job is to learn how to “sell” our selfs, ours abilites, our knowledge and for that we need to know, what we can do with ours knowledge (which we know), what we want for ours lifes (ambitions). I can see myself working with some game companies and at the same time working with some colleagues on our on-line game.

Task 20 Creativity

Creativity is a mental process involving the generation of new ideas or concepts. From a scientific point of view, the products of creative thought are usually considered to have both originality and appropriateness. An alternative, more everyday conception of creativity is that it is simply the act of making something new.

Some researchers believe that creativity is the outcome of the same cognitive processes as intelligence, and is only judged as creativity in terms of its consequences, i.e. when the outcome of cognitive processes happens to produce something novel, a view which Perkins has termed the "nothing special" hypothesis. However, a very popular model is what has come to be known as "the threshold hypothesis", stating that intelligence and creativity are more likely to be correlated in general samples, but that this correlation is not found in people with IQs over 120.

Creativity is typically used to refer to the act of producing new ideas, approaches or actions, while innovation is the process of both generating and applying such creative ideas in some specific context. “creativity by individuals and teams is a starting point for innovation; the first is a necessary but not sufficient condition for the second".

Measuring creativity

Several attempts have been made to develop a creativity quotient of an individual similar to the Intelligence quotient (IQ), however these have been unsuccessful. Most measures of creativity are dependent on the personal judgement of the tester, so a standardized measure is difficult to develop.

Task 19

Luck and Knowledge

I think, luck and (a good-large field of) knowledge are the most important things for someone to have, in order to find a good job in game industry and generally in every field. So, the best thing to do to prove that you have the knowledge (because, for “luck” you must be lucky :P) is to have a good degree. The degree gives a label to your knowledge and also the employer can see what you know, for what you have been specialised and the extent of it. But for someone who hasn’t got a degree (in any field!) is very difficult to prove his abilities; he must present works, and if that works are good then he might have a chance to take the job.

So, in our field, game industry, there are the highly trained graduate artists, the programmers and the creative individuals with a good Liberal Art background. In other words, there are those who have a degree (in gaming) and those who haven’t got one. I believe that both can work together, can be together, and of course both can contest for a place in industry if they worth it. If someone have the skills to be creative (and he is able to prove it) then the other things (such as, no degree) are not that important.

The education and the (game) industry are the winners. Because people who have been trained have success and some of these are evolving and extent the knowledge of that field. On the other hand, the individuals with good Liberal Arts background can prove that all types of knowledge are useful and they can be very creative. So, the knowledge and the luck are the main important things someone needs.

Who feel lucky?
(And that is the right question…)

Task 18

Breaking the Sound Barrier

The use of sound in games is like the shoes in a sprinter of 100m. Without the shoes the sprinter can’t reach the maximum of his performance.

A game must have sounds which suits to the game; the sounds must create the right atmosphere for the gamer, in order to make him feel part of the game!

So with the right sound (music) we can have pretty much everything, such as suspense, fear, mystery, rush, peacefulness, fun, and action atmosphere. The sounds (not the music) are another key to prove to gamers that the game is “real”, in other words that the graphics complete the sounds and vies versa. For example, the sound effects of the cars from Gran Tourismo 2 were marvelous, from the sounds of the exhaust of each car which were defferent, to the sounds of the tires of the cars while they were drifting at the corners.

Some of key composers
(http://www.last.fm/music/%E4%BC%8A%E8%97%A4%E8%B3%A2%E6%B2%BB/+similar )

Nobuo Uematsu (//Time Magazine's list of the Top 100 Innovators// "Eyes on Me" from Final Fantasy VIII and others games)

Yasunori Mitsuda (Square-Enix- Chrono Trigger, Chrono Cross, Xenogears, Xenosaga EPISODE I: Der Wille zur Macht)

Tsuyoshi Sekito (Brave Fencer Musashi, Metal Gear Solid 2, FFVII: Advent Children, FFChronicles, FFIII)

Yoshitaka Hirota (Shadow Hearts, Shadow Hearts II and Shadow Hearts: From The New World)

Noriyuki Iwadare (Grandia and Lunar series)

Hamauzu Masashi (Tobal No. 1, Front Mission: Gun Hazard, Final Fantasy X)

Hiroki Kikuta (Secret of Mana, Seiken Densetsu 3)

Well my key sonic moments in my gaming history are at the Final Fantasy VII (especially at the village Red XIII), V-rally 2, Colin McRae Raly 2.0 and Grun Turismo 2.

Task 17

The engine

Game engine is the core software component of a computer-video game or other interactive applications with real-time graphics. It provides the underlying technologies, simplifies development, and often enables the game to run on multiple platforms such as game consoles and desktop operating systems such as Linux, Mac, OS X, and Microsoft Windows. These games are sometimes called “game middleware”.

The main advantages are the game reducing costs, complexities, and time-to-market. In other words the engines contain features to make a game easily (not to create everything for scratch). Disadvantages are pretty much the same like the advantages, except that the time and the cost reduced; the complexities you have to use are limited such as the engine. The next generation engines must give a better level of processing (page per second) and detail.

Let’s play with the colours..

The subtractive colour theory of mixing colours to create colours which absorb some wavelengths of light and reflect others. Also the additive colour system involve light emitted directly from a source or illuminant of some sort. The additive reproduction process usually use red, green and blue light to produce the other colours.