Unit 12 Task 1

The company I researched was Activision Blizzard, they formed in 2008 when Activision and Vivendi Games merged on December 2nd 2007 the deal was worth $18.8 billion. It is a publishing company and many of its most popular games have been published by the Activision part of the company which include Call of Duty series, Crash Bandicoot series post 2008 and Tony Hawk series. It has many in house studios some of these are Radical Entertainment (who developed Prototype), Raven Software (who developed X-Men Origins: Wolverine) and Neversoft (who developed Guitar hero and Tony hawks games.)

Design
They come up with ideas for games and the concepts for games and have to present their ideas to be put forward to be put into production

Programmers
They are in charge of covering the many types of codes used within games from physic codes to friendly AI.

Texture artists
These are given the 3D models created and have to apply textures to them using UV mapping also have to test to see if textures work in game.

3D modeller
They will create a 3D model whether that is a character or an object they will base it of some hand drawn concept art. They won’t always stick the artist original design or the design document specifications this may be due to program limitations or just that the design wouldn’t work in game or would be difficult to texture or rig.

Game designer
They come up with concepts for games and create a design document, this will contain information on the games genre, a basic plot synopsis and everything that contributes to the fun of playing the game. This document has to be presented to higher ups within the company so it may be brought into production.

Artists
These in charge of making the concept art for the game this will could included several designs for each character or object within the game. They could also included different appearances on level designs which could be changing it from day to night, changing style of level for example changing look of a forest from a dense one to open.

AI programmer
They program the computer intelligence and the way none playable characters interact with objects in the game and players. They could be in charge of programming AI that lets the game use tactics or AI that allows game to learn the environment and get the advantage. Other AI within game is friendly AI which allows friendly people within the game to help you.

Physics programs
These programmers create the physics that will be used in game, they will have to use calculations to work out how certain objects would move in real life and for example a bullet being fired would have several forces acting on it like air resistance, gravity and the push from being fired. There are many different types of physics needed for each game you wouldn’t need to program wind physics for a level set indoors.

User Interface

Motion Control
Motion control has become increasing popular in this generation of games. It’s not just the Nintendo Wii that uses it as gimmick, the Playstation 3 Sixaxis controller also uses it and it can really draw you in and immerse you within it. In Killzone 2 when uses the sniper rifle you have to keep your hands steady and not move the controller around or you will mess your shot up just like using a real sniper rifle you can’t shake about. In Uncharted drakes fortune the Sixaxis is used to depict the angle of a grenade. These simple little movements don’t break the flow of game play but they seem to add an extra button the controller.
But Nintendo are leading the way with motion control there controls work well and play like no other games, they keep improving and updating the controls with things like Wii motion plus which allows more control in the game a prime example of the motion control is “Wii sports resort”
Each game is controlled with motion control and immerses the player in a way that using buttons and analog stick.



Game Design

Emphasis on Storytelling
It’s not only graphics that improve with games but story lines grow and grow to the point of the phrase “Cinematic gaming” being used to describe some games. Games from this generation focus a lot more on combining story with game play when in older games the story was told with simple text boxes and maybe a few short cut scenes. Cut scenes from games now have started getting longer and longer to tell more of the story. Stories in games also drive the player to want to carry on playing and it is another hook for buying sequels.
Films producers and writers are even used to write and work on stories for games which shows how important a good story is in a game now with a bad story a game is at an immediate disadvantage and a good story can make up for other mistakes in games. Now a good story is on a par with good game play and good graphics within games.


The Gaming Sphere

User Generated content
User made content is a huge part of gaming and ranges widely from games like “Garry’s mod” which allows players to use objects from other games with maps from the games to have nearly unlimited control over it and even within that modifications have been made to it by users so the game grows and grows. Even in children’s games like “Little Big Planet” that has a massive focus on levels made by other players and offers an in depth tutorial on how to do this. Letting the user make their own levels in a game offers them endless amount of playability.

Contracts within games
Milestone Contract: These contracts depict when certain parts of the project should be finished by. They often contain 8-15 milestones and start when the first one is completed. When each part is completed it will be presented to the publisher by development for their opinion on it and to get any comments they wish to make and get payment.
A milestone contract must contain, the first thing is the original design document outlining the story, type of play, objectives, level design, capabilities and often concept artwork. The contract may also ask for a prototype version of the game which will consist of one level in the game in a very basic form. The contract will often state that the prototype be presented early as a way to show how the game will feel and the publisher will give the green light for rest of the project based of this. Later on in the project development the game will be presented in 3 other forms an alpha, beta and gold version. Alpha version is a nearly completed version with some details and levels not there or uncompleted the game will contain bugs. Next is the beta version of the game which is the completed game ready for the testing to begin, a good test needs to eliminate as many bugs in the game as possible. If the game has high amount of bugs still in it then it will not go into gold version which is the finished project ready for distribution.

When a developer is writing up a milestone contract it should set realistic goals because if they miss a milestone the publisher can consider that a breach of contract. Also if the publisher rejects any work presented the work has to be represented at a later date and this is what causes delays and setbacks when development

Copyright, Trademark, Advertising and Packaging
This contract will outline who owns which parts of the game, a badly done copyright contract can make things get really messy with disagreements when it comes to design ideas. So it needs to clearly show which parts of project the developer and the publisher. When it comes to advertising and packaging it is always the publisher that gets control over this, the contract will also constrict the developer from holding press conference about the product without the permission from publishers. This contract may seem to just constrict but it keeps the project running smoothly as everyone knows what they can and can’t do and stops things from getting out of control and confusing.

Ethical
Ethical choices play a big part in games recently, many games get banned for reasons such as, violence, sexual scenes and racially insensitive parts. So when creating a game the developer needs to be aware of the ethical side of playing. Some countries have stricter laws when it comes to games for example Australia has very strict laws and due to this some games have had to been edited to take out gore or sexual scenes. But Canada and France have not had a single game banned, although in Canada some games are still considered controversial.
Ethical choices are often given to the player when playing the game to enhance their experience. The choices they are given will affect the game play and the story line which makes them want to play the game more than once. The ethical choices are split into good and bad choices which give the player to story lines to play. The game will highlight the point where a choice needs to be made and tell the player how to make each choice and these game play mechanics are becoming popular with games such as “Bioshock” and “Infamous.” Both these games having multiple endings.