Unit 22 - A1

When looking at Computer Games it is known that they are both positively and negatively (depending on whom you ask) affecting society and individuals; we can break down each of sectors to the “Societal Impacts” and the “Individual Impact”.

Societal Impacts

·     Social Isolation – There are some people that play computer games way, way too much; they end up secluding themselves from the rest of society in order to play those games. This affects the person by preventing them from interacting with the rest of society and in turn can prevent the person from developing adequate social skills. This is becoming an epidemic which is causing there to be an issue with the future generations because; more and more people are growing up playing games which is causing more people to suffer from this.

·     Time Spent Playing Games – There is a frightening increase to the amount of time people spend playing computer games per day. This is because people used to simply go and play computer games for approximately an hour a day or even every other day. The difference though that comes with modern day gaming is that the games are longer and they have much more replay ability. This is why there has been an increase to the amount of time that people spend playing computer games. 

·     Expense – The cost of gaming systems and games themselves have been skyrocketing in recent years. For PC gaming, graphics card (the component needed to play games) can cost up to £1000.  That is for a single component, games consoles can cost around £250. Alongside the initial cost for the game playing facilities, you need the games themselves to play. Games have gone up in price as well and can cost £40-50 and that’s just for the standard edition for a game. So, gaming is very expensive.

·     Separating Reality and the World of Gameplay – There are some people that are somehow unable to distinguish the difference between the two. This is because they spend that much time playing their games that it can cause the player to have hallucinations while out in the real world. This is because their brain becomes too use to seeing the different images that are created by the games that are played and then it means that the brain will subconsciously expect to see certain events occur and that can cause hallucinations to occur.

·     Educational benefits/drawbacks – There are some games that help to promote the learning that some children and even adults undertake. But, gaming is also notorious for reducing the amount of time people spend bettering themselves through education. When most people are faced with the option of playing a computer game or doing homework 99.99999% of people would rather play a computer game of their choice. 

·     The Future – As gaming has been evolving at such an exponential rate there is a massive societal impact that comes with this evolution. As new gaming technology takes the world by storm, these causes there to be new approaches in different types of technology to accommodate the gaming market. For example, now that there is more support for 4K gaming with the release for the Xbox One S and the PlayStation 4 Pro this means that there are going to have to be big moves in 4K TVs and how affordable they are. 

Impact on “mainstream” development

Gaming is easily the most influential industry because it is the largest industry in the world. The gaming industry has grown that much in recent years, it is bigger than the Music Industry and the Film Industry combined. This means that the gaming industry is able to control what the different technology companies release, because if it isn’t compatible with gaming consoles etc. Then most people won’t purchase the piece of technology. Also, most media that is currently being consumed is based around gaming. For example, the number one category on YouTube us Gaming, a majority the most popular YouTubers are gamers. This goes to show how influential gaming is.

Individual Impacts

·     Use of Sound – Sadly, most people only focus on the gameplay mechanics, graphic quality, user interface etc. When they play a computer game; one of the biggest factors within a game must be the soundtrack; just like in movies, the soundtrack of a game is what gives the game life. This is because the music within a game gives ambience to all the environments within the game. There are naturally, some games where this doesn’t apply as much but, there are plenty of games where the music is what makes the game so amazing. One of my person favourite game soundtracks is from a game called Darksiders 2. This is because the soundtrack suits all of the different environments within the game, when you are traveling through heaven you get very soft music that gives a sense of tranquillity, when moving through hell the music is eerie and demonic. Even the baron wasteland of the earth, the music is nearly non-existent to give the feeling of emptiness within the environment. The other major area where sound is crucial is during important plot points, there is a scene within the game where you must fight a giant being which is basically the main NPCs child and savour, you must kill this giant being and then the main NPC revives him and sacrifices himself. The music during this scene is very emotional and helps the player to understand the magnitude of the situation.

·     High Score League Tables – When a game has some form of leader board this can have both good and bad repercussions. In terms of the good individual impacts; when someone first plays a game and they perform a task such as a race in a racing game, they may see that in the world their time was the 10^th best. This will give the player a sense of accomplishment because they know that they are in the top 10 best players for that race. This however, can become a negative because the player may be angry that they are only the 10^th best player. This means that player may then constantly replay the same race to climb the leader board and try and get to first. Then they may be content with their performance and ranking. The other issue then arises if the player has been knocked off their perch as number 1. This may anger the player. When players know that they can do something a millisecond faster, or get a meter further, or get another 100 points; that causes a sense of addiction to the game because the player will truly believe that they can do better and that means that they will keep doing the minigame/task over and over and over again to get that bonus score.

Competitiveness – There is always such thing as healthy competition but, in the gaming community it

doesn’t exist. This is because there are some times where people play games and it angers them that it doesn’t go the way they want it to. The allure that comes with games is that you control the outcome, so when you do everything that you can and you still lose it gets frustrating. When you are playing against other players that level on control is taken away from the player and they either need to be really good at the game they are playing or they need to be really lucky. Because of this factor that can cause a lot of players to get incredibly frustrated and believe that the game is not competitive and is entirely based on luck.

Peer Pressure – I have experienced this and even caused it in the sense of gaming. When your friends all play a game and you want to play it with them they tell you to go out and buy it, you may then have some form of objection to this suggestion such as; you can’t afford it, you don’t have time to play it etc. and then your friends will say “borrow money off your mum”, “buy it on payday” and other suggestions to that effect. They will then continue to push the game and tell you to buy it.

Fun – Games are easily the most entertaining thing that we can do. They are interactive films (depending on the game) and they allow you to do things that you can’t do in real life. As much as I would love to be Batman I’m not a multi-billionaire so I can’t do it but, I can afford £30-40 to play a game where I can be Batman and that is enough for me. I also can’t afford to drive around in a Lamborghini and do over 200mph down the motorway. In Forza Horizon 3 I can do that and I do, regularly.  

Educational Value – Games are much better at being educational when compared to music, text and video. One of the up and coming educational tools is a small game called Minecraft. This is because you can build interactive quizzes that are great for teaching. For example, you could make a maths quiz where the children are given two options, if they get it right they fall in water and if they get it wrong they fall in lava and has to respawn at the beginning of the quiz again. That is a simple example of how a game can be used for educational situations.

Expectations – When I buy a game I have a lot of expectations because I want to be getting my money’s worth. If the game doesn’t meet my expectations then I am unhappy with my purchase and most likely not make a repeat purchase for games made by the same company. For example, when the newest version of FIFA comes out, I expect the players to perform as well as they do in reality (or at least their average performance). This means that when I use Cristiano Ronaldo or Lionel Messi, I expect them to be the best players in the game because they are the best players in the world.