Unit 12 - Task 1 - Understanding Organisational Structures, Company Types and job roles within the games industry (Andrew Kershaw)

The game I looked into was 'Epic' also known as 'Epic Games', this game falls under the company type of Developer but they used to publish games as well when they where known as 'Potomac Computer Systems' and 'Epic MegaGames'.

Under the name 'Potomac Computer Systems' they released one of their most famous products known as the ZZT which was a ANSI character-based computer game, created in 1991 by Tim Sweeney. Key developers at Epic Games include lead programmer Tim Sweeney, game designer Cliff Bleszinski, Erik de Neve, and Steve Polge.

In 2003, Jerry O'Flaherty was named Studio Art Director. On May 20, 2008 Epic Games acquired Chair Entertainment, and on November 7, 2008, Epic Games released Gears of War 2. In association with Chair Entertainment, Epic released Shadow Complex on the Xbox Live Arcade.


Three different departments in the Games Industry:

• Developers:
  A video game developer is as the title states a developer of video games.
  
  There are 3 types of developer:
  1. In house - A developer who works directly for a publisher for example EA is a publisher who has lots of in-house developers like Maxis.
  2. Third Party - A Third Party developer is a developer who is normally contracted by a publisher to develop titles.
  3. Independent - Independent developers are developers who are not tied to any publishers and normally self-publish their titles via the internet and rely on conventional methods of advertisement like the internet and word of mouth.
  
  
• Designers:
  Games designers are the team who design the concept of the game from the game play elements down to the scripts.
  
  
• Artists:
  Game artists are artists who are responsible for all aspects of games development that call for visual art.

Five different job types in the Games Industry and explanations of each are:

• Graphics Programmer:
  A graphics programmer used to be known as a programmer who developed clever optimisations for 2D graphics and specialized blitter algorithms but in today’s industry the programmer specializes in developing and modifying complex 3D graphics renderers. The only use for the old 2D style of developing for this type of programmer today is with the more basic of gaming devices e.g. Mobile phones, PDAs and some handheld games consoles.
  
  
• Quality Assurance:
  There are 2 forms of quality assurance, alpha testing and beta testing.
  
  
• Alpha testing is the form of quality assurance which is based solely in-house, the developers and other members of the company who are making the game play a early version of the game to try and reveal any early bugs and glitches that need fixing.
  
  
• Beta testing can be done in-house but is normally also released to the public as well in the form of a public (anyone is allowed access for testing) or closed (the developers only give access to certain people) beta and they use the feedback from the testers to fix any bugs or glitches that are in the game.
  
  
• Concept Artist:
  A concept artist is someone who is gifted at drawing and who's job it is is to draw a initial design for an object in a game e.g. Scenes, Characters, Vehicles. The artist is given the storyline and the bio of what they are designing and then need to draw it at different angles and in different ways with different variations, they work with the person who is wanting the design until they settle on one and then the design is given to the 3D artist team to model it.
  
  
• Artificial Intelligence Programmer:
  Giving a games engine its own thought process so that it can deal with actions within its environment and then react in way that is successful. Game A.I. programmers are told what they want from the designers of the game. Different characters in the game will have different sets of AI like for example, enemy soldiers will try and shoot you back if you shoot at them but pedestrians are likely to run in fear.
  
  
• Physics Programmer:
  A game physics programmers is in charge of figuring out which physics need to be employed in the game, as physics for water would not be needed in a game without water, they are in charge of making the physics in the game look good without maxing out the processing power of the machine it is working on, they are in charge of making sure there are no glitches in the physics system such as objects not going through walls and colliding in a realistic manner.

Out of these 5 I think my ideal role would be a physics programmer because I am very interesting in coding and would like to be able to build this into game engines.

I am going to be explaining three notable Industry Trends.

User Interaction - Intuitive HUD and Information Delivery:
As games get more and more complicated, one of the most obvious and yet under appreciated key part of a game that is also changing is the game's HUD (Head's Up Display). A HUD's job is to show key information on the status of your character and other related data in the game, a typical FPS (First Person Shooter) HUD that I am going to use as an example is the HUD from CS:S (Counter-Strike: Source) by Valve, the reason I'm using this HUD is because it is a typical FPS HUD and shows all the information clearly that I will be discussing.



I will talk about each Item in order:
Area Reference 1#
This is the 'Chat area', you wont ever see this item of the HUD in a single player game because you don't need to type to anyone but in Multiplayer games this item is key to every online game, it's pretty much a default item when it comes to online HUDS. The Chat area is there for you to talk to other players on the server whether it's taunting your enemies or talking tactics with your team mates, the chat box is also widely used for telling you if anyone connected to the server and some server messages as well which have nowhere else to go.


Area Reference 2#
One of the most important parts of a HUD in both Singleplayer and Multiplayer is the Health and/maybe Armour display, not every game has armour as a mechanic in it but if it does then it would be in the same region as the health. If you don't know what this information is it's the remaining health and armour of your character, generally when your health runs out, you die and they need to get through your armour before they get to your health.


Area Reference 3#
This section here is the remaining ammo and/maybe clips (not all games have clips but just full remaining ammo). As you shoot you use up ammo, the remaining ammo for the gun you are using at the current time is displayed here and when this reaches zero it means you cannot shoot with that gun anymore until you pick up a new gun or more ammo.


Area Reference 4#
This section is very simple, it just shows you who killed who, whether it was a head shot or not and with what gun, there isn't much else to say about this every online game has it in some form on your screen, this is just how CS:S displays it.


Area Reference 5#
Another one of the most important elements on a HUD is the minimap, this shows a basic top-down view of the map you are playing on where you are always at the centre. If an enemy shoots then they show up as a dot on the map (depending on the game is dependant on what colour they show up as), normally your team constantly shows on the map so you can coordinate where you are going by their actions and their current condition.


Area Reference 6#
This is the most simple element of the HUD, if the game has a time limit then this shows the remaining time.



Lastly I wanted to give a great example of Information Delivery from a game called 'Dead Space' where all the HUD was a component of you're characters suit because the game was going for a very cinematic gameplay style.

The Information Delivery system of this game is unique because you will get sent messages to you from your allies around the space station by them streaming a video steam to you through a projector in the suit so you can see it as if your character was looking at it, making it both cinematically unique and delivering the next mission or the next part of the storyline to you in an easy to process manner.



Game Design - Emphasis on Storytelling:
As the technology of games improved, the ability to tell a story like a film tells a story became more and more similar.

Games used to be just text in between levels and that is how you progressed in the storyline but now games have started building more and more on the story line of games, bringing in film script writers and producers to help cinematically make the game good at telling the story of the game. As the engines games where made on improved, the features available to developers for them to use to make games have become easier to use.

Another reason for the storytelling factor of gameplay getting more and more emphasis is they want people to want to carry on with games, as games have got better, players have become more critical to other aspects of games e.g. storytelling, so as a result of this game developers have been improving their storytelling techniques and now this is a key part of making any game.



The Gaming Sphere - User-generated Content:
User-generated Content for games is normally a Mod for a game that uses the game's engine and models (modders can import their own models/textures also) to make a 'modification' of the game. It's a big part of online gaming, there are lots of teams of people that dedicated their days to making mods for games and it's also a great way for budding games developers to get into the industry. Modding is one of the fastest growing uses of games and their SDKs (Software Development Kit).

Contractual
- Non Disclosure Agreements
A Non Disclosure Agreement is a document signed by both employer and employee that forbids the disclosure of certain information specified in the NDA. This information can be anything the Employer wants to specify, for example all information which relates to; policies and practices; files or data; concepts; software or hardware development; specifications; documentation; lists of names; forecasts; trade secrets; techniques; product plans: marketing plans; customer information; or financial or non financial information or related information which were directly or indirectly disclosed or revealed to the employee. This is so the business can keep anything they don't want customers to know about secret and disclose the information as they please.

- Employee/Consultant Agreements
The Employee/Consultant Agreement is an agreement between the employer and the employee to assure that everything that is created/developed that is related to the game by the employee whilst working on your game is property of the business. This is to ensure that your IP (Intellectual Property) is protected because if it's not then you cannot sell it.

Legal
Before you submit your work to a publisher, as a Regulatory Requirement you must ensure that all Copyrights, Licences, Trademarks and any contracts/agreements you issued to your co-workers/employees are signed, completed and up-to-date to ensure the publisher (and someone in your team) can not in some way take your IP. Only with these Regulatory Requrements fulfilled should you approach a publisher and pitch your game to be published.

Ethical
Games are becoming more and more ethically questionable as new generations of game are produced, games where the main enemy is zombie Nigerian black men is one such questionably ethical game due to it's concentration on the black community being the antagonist there was question as to whether this entered the realm of racism, in response a Caucasian character was re-introduced into the game as the core Antagonist who is responsible for all the other black antagonists.

Another contemporary example in the media today is Left 4 Dead 2 and the fact that the game is rated 18 and the Australian authority on games ratings don't have an 18 games rating means the game is ethically incorrect in that country. In response Valve (The creators of the game) released a more toned down version of the game to compensate for the lower age rating of 15, this is a great example of how Developers need to adapt to the ethical and moral needs of it's consumers.

ESRB, PEGI and the BBFC introduced a system of rating games to try and warn people what a game would contain. They have sorted this list by age group, providing Independent standardized ratings in the groups of 3+,7+,12+,16+ and 18+, enforcing the age of the group being the minimum age of the person who can obtain that group of game, reducing the need to correct ethical problems in the game that might be inappropriate for younger people.