This review is for the Metal Gear Solid HD collection which includes 2 games from the PS2; Metal Gear Solid 2, 3 and the PSP release Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker.
The Metal Gear franchise focuses on three different soldiers. Solid Snake is known as a legend in the US Special Forces and has stopped plans to create a new Metal Gear time and time again. Raiden, the protagonist of MGS2 is a child soldier and Big Boss, is also known for his impressive feats within the Cold War. As you progress through the storyline of each game, you start to see how indepth the story goes. Metal Gear Solid has the motto of "procuring on-site" on a "solo-sneaking mission" meaning that stealth is normally the way to play the game but you can play the game how you see fit, unloading a shotgun into an enemy soldier if the time calls for it.
Straight away we can see the remastered graphics really do show with the HD collection in comparison to other re-released HD titles that I've played recently. Another thing is the amount of content you get with the game. You get both the Substance release of Metal Gear Solid 2 and the Substinence version of Metal Gear Solid 3 which both had additional content to the originals like "Snake Tales" and "Operation: Ape Escape".
From a graphic standpoint, the games look excellent which every texture and model looking real good considering two titles came from the PS2 and the other came from a PSP. The graphics are reminscent of the Silent Hill HD collection but if we do compare the games to other titles on the Xbox 360, you can definitely see and feel that the games have aged quite a bit over time. The PSP title, Peace Walker, is most affected by the upscaling as the models can seem a little off sometimes but it's still incredibly impressive when you compare the two games side by side.
The models and textures of the PSP release Peace Walker look crisper but you can still see how it doesn't compare to the other two titles.
Going onto control of the game, the Metal Gear Solid games seem to constantly evolve in terms of gameplay and control. Looking back on MGS1, 2 and 3, the camera angle was locked to an overhead view and the game seemed clunky at times. With the HD remakes, they have made it possible to move the camera to whereever you see fit allowing for free movement in an active environment. This is a major improvement to the PS2 titles as you can see where your enemies are positioned and move accordingly towards it.
The difference between the HD (left) and original (right) with the fog.
One of the problems that comes with making HD versions of older games is the age of the games. For instance, the Silent Hill collection, the game had a range of faults because the code the company in charge of making the remakes were given. This gave the game many problems that included severe frame rate drops in both games, lag upon receiving Trophies/Achievements, graphical glitches, and one of the most important aspects of Silent Hill, reduced transparencies of fog, glass, etc.
The fog within a survival horror is clichéd in a sense, but it is part of what made Silent Hill such a impactful title in the years of the PS2 and also one of the most renowned survival-horror games out there. Silent Hill 2 particularly being featured on many people's top ten games of all time. The fog does a good job of hiding the monsters in the original title and adds to the suspense. With the fog the way it is, Silent Hill loses some of it's charm but it's still a very good remake nonetheless.
This gruesome image happens to be a glitch and not part of Silent Hill's aesthetic, believe it or not.
In comparison, the Metal Gear Solid HD collection has no glitches from what I've seen within the game and I've also checked out various sources from GameFaqs and GameSpot to see if anyone else has encountered problems with the game as it's been remade.
Casey
White Paris Roberts Kyle Mallard Dane Coleman
The reviewer
of IGN that reviewed the game, Tomb Raider goes into a lot of detail about the
games maturity levels and the release date of the games on all platforms and the
release date for different countries.
The reviewer also granted the
viewer a lot of insight onto the gameplay of the game and went into a lot of
detail about the character development aspects, the reviewer also mentions that
the game revolves around Lara Croft and her adaption to a dangerous environment.
She later says that other characters that Lara encounters throughout the game
have 2D personalities in comparison but says that this doesn't affect the game
as Lara is thoroughly interesting.
One of the criticisms that the
reviewer made about the game is that they make Lara seem weak and new to the
gruesome world around her and her first kill of the game has this emotional
depth to it but she mentions that this is jarring when five minutes later, Lara
is picking up weapons and killing lots of NPC's. "From scared survivor forced
to take a life, to head shot happy killer." This can show that gameplay and
story can interrupt each other if not done correctly. A good example of when
story and gameplay are synergised is the title Heavy Rain as it acts more as an
interactive story than a game. Many other games that try to have a emotional
attachment to the player have to make sure that it works around the gameplay.
For instance, Tomb Raider could have had Lara avoid and using stealth to avoid
enemies rather than blasting them with a shotgun to keep the atmosphere of the
game.
The reviewer was very biased when it come down to the multiplayer,
she didn't look for any pros in it, she only focused on the few cons simply
because she thinks that Tomb Raider shouldn't be a multiplayer game. As a group
we discussed that the multiplayer isn't a main element of the game and she used
it as a major criticism throughout the review, she also lowered the game's
rating because it which shouldn't be done because it's simply been put in the
game for a small side project, not only for the player but for the developers of
the game to see if players genuinely enjoy it. She does explain the objective of
the multipayer however and mentions that the multiplayer may just die off in a
couple of months after release.
The reviwerer expresses her opinion of
the main gameplay well, she uses a lot of enthusiasim when talking about key
points such as, the fighting system, the difficulty and the controls of the
game. She states that all aspects of the gameplay are up to date, very smooth
and are easy to grasp to jump right in and play the game. She then moves on the
say how much she has enjoyed playing the game and why. The reasons why she
enjoyed playing the game is because of the graphics used really set the scene
for the game, the character Lara Croft's emotions in the game and the way she
matures intrests you as a player. She says that not only the story and the
charcaters are interesting and that the game its self is fun to play because of
its action packed features and she also thinks that the developers have finally
nailed the combat system in a Tomb Raider, but crutially there isn't too much of
it like in most games of today. She then goes on to explain that the exploration
it's self in this game is throughly entertaning because although the character
moves naturally and confidantly but it still feels excitingly dangerous. The
reviewer states the puzzles used in the game are hidden but when found, they're
not too easy nor too difficult, they still give you a feeling of
acomplishment.
The reviewer comments on how immersive the world is,
saying the detail of the island makes you feel like an explorer. Using these
sorts of comparisons allows the player to understand what they are getting into
when purchasing the game. She also explains that the world is intelligently
design and not as linear as other titles on the market "going far beyond the
average action-adventure title".
As a reviewer, I feel she touched on
each point very well and gave suitable examples of each point showing gameplay
and cutscenes throughout, however, I do feel she was too critical of the
multiplayer aspect of the game as it seemed she was being stubborn and
unjest.
In pairs discuss and analyse the six images below, using the keywords:
Signifier, signify, connotation, denotation.
You can use the internet if you need help. Think about font, style and mise en scene:
The Red Rose's denotation would be that it's a sweet, strong smelling flower that has a vibrant red colour and looks pretty. The connotations however can connote different associations depending on the individual. For example, giving a rose to a person can show affection to a partner, lover or even a friend. The rose is normally seen as a romantic object but the meanings of the flower can change depending on the person that sees it as well as changing in culture and location. Another meaning for the rose is the Labour party as they have adorned the rose as their political logo but this may not occur in the minds of people that don't live in the UK. The quantity can also have a special meaning. A single red rose shows love, a
dozen shows gratitude, twenty-five shows congratulations and fifty show
unconditional love. Two red roses tied together symbolises an engagement. Even the thorns of a rose can connote that something beautiful can have a edge or a side to them that is unpleasant, just like thorns.
The Rainbow Flag, also known as the LGBT flag is a symbol of gay pride. The denotation shows that it's a flag using the colours red to violet. The flag signifies diversity with the use of colours. The Rainbow flag has been used elsewhere however still containing the message of diversity and inclusiveness. It also connotes the feelings of hope and yearning. The flag is also known as the peace flag in Italy and the cooperative symbolising the international co-operative movement. A rainbow itself has it's own connotations of a better future as a rainbow comes after a rainy day.
The "peace" sign, otherwise known as the "V" sign is a hand gesture in which two fingers are outstretched in the shape of a V. The connotations of the V sign: In England, it is a way to insult someone when it is shown to someone with the palm facing away from the person. This stems from a historical insult of when the English and French were at war, Frenchmen used to cut off the index and middle finger of English longbow men to stop them firing their arrows. In response to this, the English longbow men who still had their fingers, used to display them to the French (known as The Longbowman Salute.) to show they still have their fingers to draw their bows, this has slowly worked its way into a generic insult for most English-related countries such as New Zealand, the UK and Australia but is also not certain as there was no evidence for that the French used to cut off the fingers of the English captives.
Another connotation of the "V" sign is peace (with the palm outward) but this can also mean victory which became popular when many historical figures like Winston Churchill and Richard Nixon started using the symbol though in some countries, the "peace sign" can be seen as satanic like a broken cross. The "V" sign has a lot of different connotations in the word.
Lego Indiana Jones:
The connotations of Lego Indiana Jones are the adventure and exploration. One of the things that signifies this is the map in the background of the game case. The sepia tone used in the background could also suggest archaeology and exploration of travel to old settlements for long lost relics of the past. His attire and clothing is very typical of old style clothing, as Indiana Jones was set during the second world war, his clothes represent the time but also look adventurous in appearance as well. The style of the character is also childish in appearance as well suggesting that this game could be aimed at a younger audience that other games of the genre.
Bioshock:
Bioshock's denotation is that it's two hands reaching for one another as the background is set in an ocean with a clock. If you look for more and the connations within the image, you could maybe represent the clock with a world lost in time. The arms reaching for one another pose more questions as well as one is much larger than the other. Could the larger hand be trying to drag the smaller hand into this ocean. The worn look of the gloves and the clock are another hint at the world lost in time theory or could also suggest a post-apocolyptic world surrounded by ocean just like the movie "Waterworld".
The Effects Theory is the idea that the media can effect the behaviour and opinion of their audience controlling the way the audience act. These media sources can effect the way we view the world.
The media controls what we think about because they get to choose what they write about them. This is called "agenda setting" or "gatekeeping". For example, the media can choose to make taxes and education prior topics in the newspaper, but leave out stories about the banks and climate change.
There are other manipulative techniques that the media use as well like Framing. This is where the media is purposely trying to make the audience take a side. For example, scientists could find a cure to a disease but they tested on animals first, meaning that the media can go two different approaches with this either focusing on the merits of the scientists or the fact they tested on animals therefore choosing a bad guy for the situation and manipulating the audiences opinion because we don't get the whole story or only partial parts of a story.
The point in which media became a popular way of receiving information into it's own was in the 1940's because of all the propaganda that either side of the war was spreading and they used the Effects Theory to their advantage to get the people on their side.
These are all different ways that the media can effect the behaviour of an audience
This is an example of the type of properganda used in the 1930's.
Hypodermic Needle Model
The Hypodermic Needle Model is the idea that the audience of media, for example, newspapers, television, radio, etc, will willing accept everything told to them as fact and label them as "passive". It also suggests that we are all the same in the way people think and that we respond to media messages exactly the same as everyone else.
It was created in the 1920/30's after the way that propaganda was spread in World War I, and though many people think it's an outdated approach to the way we think about things, the model is still used sometimes today. For example, many people still worry about the effects of violent games and the media can use this to their advantage blaming the acts of someone on video games like Grand Theft Auto and Saint's Row.
In 1938, Orson Wells played a radio drama of The War of the Worlds caused many people to panic as they thought the attacks were real and that the Earth was being taken over by martians causing a lot of people to be hysterical. This shows how powerful the media can actually be as a lot of people took what the radio was saying as the truth.
Another good example of the Hypodermic Needle Model coming into action is the Nazi film "Triumph of the Will", which is one of the best known examples of using propaganda in film history,
Despite all this however, the Hypodermic Needle Theory is inadequate as it focuses on the idea that everyone is the same and easily manipulated which isn't the case. Though some people can be influenced by the media, it doesn't mean that everyone can.
Cultivation Model and Desensitisation
Cultivation Model (or Cultivation Theory) is a social theory that examines the long-term effects of television on people.
The overall definition of the Theory is that watching too much television will cultivate the viewers perception on reality.
The creators of the theory state:
"Television is a medium of the socialisation of most people into standardised roles and behaviours. Its function is in a word, enculturation"
This suggests that television is shaping the way we behaviour and act and shaping us to be accepted and similar to each other. Another idea of the Cultivation theory is
that the more people watch cinema with lots of gore and warped imagery, the more used to it they become.This means that a person may search out for more extreme types of gore because of how used to the imagery they've become.
This is called "Desensitisation". Desensitiation is an important survival mechanism, if you take a job as a roofer, then it is to your advantage to become less frightened by heights over time. Same thing with a doctor, a doctor who can’t stand gore or body parts won’t be that effective. However many people think that desensitisation can change a way a person thinks. For example, the 1999
Columbine shootings. There was a massive debate around what caused the two
shooters to kill 12 students, 1 teacher and wound several others, a source said
they played games such as Wolfenstein and Doom (Which had a lot of blame placed
on it)
Choose a game thaat you think you might like (maybe for Xmas)
Look at advertisements for that game and explain why they might make you want to buy the game how are they influencing you?
Then discuss the game with your friends - how might this influence you what do your friends say? Is it positive or negative?
Read a selection of expert reviews of the game, what do these tell you, how do these influence you?
Finally, which of the 3 factors has influenced you the most and why?
Reception Theory
While uses and gratifications research is concerned with why people use media, the approach often referred to as 'reception theory' focuses on what people see in the media, on the meanings they produce when they interpret media texts.
- Reception Theory
In a sense this is an extension of uses and gratifications theory. Reception analysis is based on the idea that no text has one single meaning. It suggest that the individual members of the audiences help to create the meaning of the text. We decode the texts in our own individual way - which may be a result of our upbringing, the mood we're in, where we are or any combination of these factors. So you might watch and enjoy a TV prgramme while your friend will hate it, you may actually find different meaning for it.
Reception analysis tries to understand these differences. Factorssuch as gender, social status and social context can have a major impact on the way we construct the meaning of a text. #
Dominant (or hegemonic) reading - the reader shares the programmes code (it's meaning system of values, attitutes, beliefs and assumptions) and accepts the perferred reading. An example of this is the news.
Negotiated reading - the reader partly shares the programmes code but modifies it in a way which reflects their position and interests.
Oppositional (counter hegemonic) reading - The reader does not share the programmes code and rejects the preferred reading , bringing to bear an alternative frame of interpretation (e.g. A feminist reading of a 'lads' magazine).
Activity 2:
One example for myself that's been in the line of Dominant reading was the opinion of Egoraptor who creates flash animations and videos for YouTube and Newgrounds. He goes on to state how games in the past taught the player progressively and kept a steady learning curve while still adding some challenge which games of today, like Call of Duty for instance, aren't doing and prompt the player with unnecessary pop-ups of how to play the game and I completely agree with his opinion. A link to the episode can be seen here:
An example of negotiated reading for me happened recently. I was looking at the top 100 most disappointing movies of the decade and the movie Tropic Thunder came into the list. The critic said that the film was extremely disappointing because of the amount of potential the movie had like being one of the most funded comedies of all time and having an a-list cast but resorting to "retard jokes" and "Robert Downey Jr in black face."
I did agree with the points that the critic put across because I do feel that there could have been a lot more to the movie and it seemed a little underwhelming at times. However, I don't think that I personally would name it one of the most disappointing movies of the decade because there were also many funny and enjoyable moments within the movie but there obviously could have been more to it.
The final example I have is oppositional reading which is the recent headline of the nurse, Jacintha Saldanha and the prank that lead her to commit suicide. I feel that areas of the media have been demonising the two DJ's that prank called the hospital which isn't right to me because they didn't have the intention of taking someone's life when they started the prank call, however, I do admit that the act was inappropriate because it is a hospital and calling such a place can be unnecessarily time-wasting.
Two different newspapers wrote two different articles on the subject:
The Independent goes for a less biased approach to the funeral.
Genre
What kind of games are the GTA games?
A free-roaming, RPG, action-adventure, open-world third person shooter with driving elements.
Games are developing and becoming a mixture of different genres and as a result, it's becoming more and more difficult to put games into a category.
We classify things by comparing them to cultural norms. We can classify people, objects or media texts for example, we classify people using a range of different ways from gender and sexuality to the types of movies and music that a person may like.
We use genres to look for a particular type of game. I may look for RPG's for instance, because that is a genre which I enjoy. One of my favourite games is Final Fantasy and by using the genre I may want to look for games similar to it.
The way we catergrise things is how similar something is to something else but also what they are dissimilar to something else. We make sense of the world by comparing one thing to another thing because this makes stuff easier to understand. If I need to describe a game for instance like Resident Evil, I can tell people that it's similar to Silent Hill to make people understand.
Objective - to develop your understanding to identification of generic types and to apply this to examples
What to do -
Pick between 3-5 games
For each game think through the narrative structure, how you control your avatar and how the game 'handles'.
The work out how it fits into different genre box by thinking about the key reference points of time, location, iconography and how you actually play the game. Use your notes on classification and genre to help you do this.
Final Fantasy X is a JRPG which is set in a fantasy setting. The game sets itself into this genre by taking a turn from traditional westenised RPGs like Skyrim of which the lore consists of Orcs, Trolls and things of that nature. Japanese RPGs base some of their content on Japanese mythology but mostly, a JRPG can take place anywhere from a fantasy setting, near future, oriental setting, or in a science fiction setting.
The game includes a lot a religious referencing as the game revolves around one of the main characters, Yuna, going on a pilgrimage as a Summoner. The game deals with both discrimination as the Yevonites (The religion of the game is named Yevon.) and a race of people named the Al Bhed are at constant war because of the religion's banning of technology.
The video above carries a lot of emotional depth as Yuna "sends" the souls of the lost at the log town of Kilika. JRPG's have a job of keeping the gamer emotionally invested and is best compared with Spirited Away, the Studio Ghibli film, as they both explore spirituality and the afterlife. Japanese movies and games also use a lot of strong visuals as well.
If we compared this to a game like Call of Duty, you can see the difference in feel. The Call of Duty title focus on action and mindless fun. Though there is a narrative to some of the games, and some of the story is upsetting, it is closer described as the Rambo or the Terminator of the game world as that action is the main focus of the movies. Spirited Away, however, aims to get you emotionally invested in the start with a whole new world just as Final Fantasy does.
Criteria 1 – Understand how media producers define audiences
for their products.
It’s important to make a game for a specific target
audience.Looking at secondary research
to find out what audience would buy your games. Defining an audience allows you
to target a specific target audience and identify that audience.
Ways of dividing an audience up:
Age
Gender
Sexual Orientation
Religion
Country
Race/Ethnicity
Niche
CoC
Alternative
Conker’s Bad Fur Day
Mainstream
FIFA
Audience Profiling
Psychographics
Psychographics classifies an audience by their lifestyles,
attitudes and values or ‘tribe’ rather than income or social class.
Succeeders : People who are successful and self-confident.
They tend not to buy aspiratio10nal products and follow their own ideas of what
is a good product.
Reformers: Creative, caring, altruistic, not brand
conscious.
Aspirers: People who want to “get on”.
Manistreamers: The largest segment, conformists who buy
“safe”, big brand products
Strivers: Status-oriented people who seek money, approval
and social status. Obvious buyers of “aspirational” goods.
Explorers: seek novelty and want to try new things. They are
likely to be early adopters of completely new products.
Constrained: they are the resigned and struggling poor.
Alternative: Usually an alternative to the mainstream.
Niche or Specialist: Special interest groups.
Hipster: Liking games because nobody else does or claim they
play something before it was popular.
Fanboy
Criteria 2 – Understand how media producers create products
for specific audiences
Criteria 3 – Understand how media audience respond to media
products.
Criteria 4 – Be able to develop
responses to media products.
Geodemographics
Geodemographics literally means where you are in the world
or where you live. Knowing where an audience lives can really be helpful
because if they live in a poor area, you will obviously try to target that
audience so they can afford it.
Places that appear in games when you play online are
normally from the USA, Spain, France, UK, Holland, China and Japan. These are
westernised areas of the world and are the richer countries as well.
This allows thinking about the marketing that you will need
to do and where it would be most profitable to put on and this also allows you
to know what languages you might need to translate your game into.
You also need to think about making the characters appeal to
the audience and make sure that you don’t insult a certain culture or nation.
Researching what could be offensive to a certain country would be a good idea.
Types of games that would appeal to a certain psychological
profile:
Succeeders:I feel that people with a
succeeder profile would try to strive for games with challenge and likeability
but the game can also be a game that is personal to them. Games that may be in
this category are games like Nier, Dark Souls, Fire Emblem and Shadow of the
Colossus.These games give a degree of
difficulty and mix it well with storylines, music and gameplay. These are the
sort of games I feel that a succeeder would play as they would personally like
a game themselves and not because another person does and they are good games
with lots of challenge involved.
Reformers:Games like
Minecraft, Age of Empires, Command and Conquer and SimCity are games where you
create in a massive world and expand to create more. As reformers don’t care
about brand and they like to be creative, these games cater to their
demographic.
Aspirer: A game like The Sims could appeal to an aspirer because
The Sims in a game you can just “get on” with. You don’t need to know a whole
lot to play it as the learning curve is really low. Mario games are another
example of a game you can just get on with as the controls are really simple
and the game appeals to a lot of people meaning it’s well known.
Mainstream: Games like Call of Duty and FIFA are mainstream
games. These are the sort of games that the majority play so people who are
mainstreamers can feel safe with their purchase because so many people like
these games and these games also stick to a formula so the games barely change
when newer versions of the games come out.
Striver: A striver will go and buy an extremely hard game, just to complete it on the hardest difficulty so that they are able to brag about it. A good example of a game that a Striver would buy is, Dark Souls. The Striver would play it on the hardest difficulty and try to complete all achievements/Trophies then post it on gaming forums and tell as many of people as possible to make them sound better at gaming.
Explorer: An Explorer would go and buy a game that has been released by a new game producer to test if that they are good at creating games. They would also go and buy new games series released by previous game producers and would typically write reviews on forums and other type of gaming websites to let people know what they think about the game. A great example of a game that a an explorer would buy is Dead Island.
Constrained: A Constrained gamer would buy games with good replay value or MMORPGs because they are unable to buy multiple games. A great example of games with good replay value would be Elder Scrolls or Fallout because they have multiple ways to play through the game.(Good, evil etc.) They would buy MMORPGs because they can take years to become top members of the servers and are mostly free or a one-time payment.
Alternate: Alternate gamers will buy the games opposite to the main stream game. A great example of what a alternate gamer would do is, if people are playing Call of Duty they will go out and buy Medal of Honour just to be di9fferent and try and stand out from the crowd.
Niche: A niche gamer will only buy games that are good for their specific type of gaming interest. A great example of this is Pokémon. The reason they would buy it is because there isn’t many or any other game that are the same as it.
Hipster: A hipster will go out and buy a new game that people aren’t talking about just in case people decide to play it and it becomes mainstream so they can say they played it first. A game that a lot of people did this with is Mine Craft. They bought the Beta and never let people forget it.
Fan-boy: A Fan-boy will go out and buy a game if it is part of the series. A good example of this is Final Fantasy. There is well over 30 games released in this series and people buy them just because it is part of the series.
Kyle Mallard Age: 17 Home Area: Wythenshawe Type of Music: Hard Rock, Metal. Stereotype: Alternative/Geek TV: British Comedy Film: Comedy Guilty Pleasures: Final Fantasy X-2, the works of Ellie Goulding and Freddy Got Fingered. _________________________________________________________________________________
Phil Gordon Age: 19 Home Area: Altringham Type of Music: Hard Rock/ J-Rock/ Metal Stereotype: Weeaboo TV:
Group 1: Casey, Jordan, Ben, Ciaran and Jake Group 2:
What have you found to be the most unifying factor between the people you profiled?
When did your profiles start to narrow down and become more defined?
What did you find difficult about this activity?
Australia
The Top 3 Popular games in Australia:
Lego Batman 2: DC Super Heroes
London 2012: The Official Video Games
The Amazing Spiderman
The games that are most popular in Australia all contain mainly minimal violence. This is because of the strict laws that Australia abide by. An example of the amount of censorship that some games go through is Left 4 Dead 2. You can see the comparison in this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OH7QCtuaXgI
The average income for Australia is around $43,960 which is rather good meaning that many households can afford a decent internet connection and also have enough money to at least casually game.
Western Europe
The Top 3 Popular games in Western Europe:
FIFA 13
WOW: Mists of Pandaria
Borderlands 2
The most popular game sold in Western Europe is FIFA 13. This may be because of the immense love of football in the region and the ages of the people that play the game. The game is a 3+ game, meaning anyone can enjoy the game without worrying about violence or gore.
MMORPGs are immensely popular in a lot of different regions. This may be because of the fact that you can play with other people from different regions and also play with friends with chat capabilities and it makes you feel like you're accomplishing something.
The average income of the region is rather high meaning that many people will be able to buy at least a couple of games a month making sales high for this region and online capability available to most people as well.
