The Final Frontier

“The design and organisation of space is a concern CENTRAL not only to game designers but also to those studying player behaviour. What kinds of activities and interactions does the game space encourage or discourage?” (Zimmerman, 2006)

Huzinga’s ‘magic circle’ has often come up during class discussions.  The idea that when playing a game, the real world becomes secondary, only the game, it’s participants and the space in which the game takes place are of any concern.  Video games provide the opportunity to leave behind the limitations of reality.  They can either create entirely new worlds or simulate a slightly altered one.  Grand Theft Auto is known for having games based on real world locations.  They then fill the locations with ‘dumb’ NPCs who won’t hold grudges for acts you’ve carried out.  This lends itself to the feeling of there being no lasting consequences, you are free to explore the environment and act how you want.

“the lack of talking NPCs as a design accomplishment that avoids breaking the immersion of the experience” (Frasca)

The games space can lend itself to the narrative.  By simulating certain time periods or geographic locations games can call on a wide range of cultural history.  If you stick an avatar in fur clothing, holding an axe, in a tundra landscape, almost every player would assume you were a viking of some sort, maybe lost after a raiding party gone wrong.  Convincing game spaces help create a narrative and get the player more invested in their avatar.

Other than the obvious landscapes and cultural themes, a game space is also made up by it’s sound.  Disney are well known for using music to influence the emotions of cinema goers.  Due to a wealth of creative works created throughout history, society now associates certain sound bytes with certain emotions or expectations.   Loud, fast paced music can be used to generate excitement at action packed moments in games or slow peaceful music played when a piece of narrative is being expanded upon and requires the players attention.

The game space is a crucial aspect of games design as it can create preconceptions that a player will take into a game.  The immersive effect of a game can be ruined if these expectations are not met, as the player is reminded it is only a simulated world that doesn’t match up to their expected ‘reality’.  The game space should still lend itself to the mechanics of a game.  If a game space is trying to set you up as a blood-thirsty warlord, the effect is ruined if a player is unable to jump over a foot high wall.

“The limitations of one generation’s game spaces may become the defining feature of another.” (Zimmerman, 2006)

Unit Operations

Ian Bogost put forward a new approach to video games analysis in his book “Unit Operations” which was to form the basis of our discussions.  Bogost put forward the idea that any piece of work, regardless of medium, can be viewed as a collection of  discrete units of meaning.  Bogost refers to these instances of procedural expression as unit operations.  A number of units make up a system, which in turn may be a unit in another system.

“The humanists who define intellectual approaches to such texts must get serious about technology. Likewise, technologists ought to understand the precedents in critical theory, philosophy, and literature that trace, accompany, and inform the development of software technology” (Bogost, Unit Operations, p.ix).  While different works are frequently compared to each other, they normally come from the same medium.  Wolfram Schulte points out that the object and relational effects that object technology creates in software are actually built into natural systems like human society.  Though units of work may come from different mediums they still conform to human created systems.

I would be skeptical of how effectively Bogost’s theory could be put into practice.  It relies on everyone having the exact same understanding of what exactly constitutes a unit operation.  It also contains the same flaw of any system that involves defining anything.  Words have no definite meaning, they are only sounds and letters to which we have attributed meaning and it is rather inevitable that two people will disagree on the exact meaning of a word.

 

The Rules

“Playing a game is the voluntary attempt to overcome unnecessary obstacles” (Suits, 2005, The Grasshopper: Games, Life and Utopia, p.55)

The role of rules in games was the topic for discussion during this weeks class.  Rules are used to create and manage the obstacles in a game which lead to it being challenging and engaging.  Chess would not be very interesting if the Pawn was able to take sixteen turns at once and move like the Queen.  By having rules that both players must follow, a challenging game is created.

Along with their explicitly stated rules, games carry unstated rules often based around the culture the game developed in.  With records of people playing games as far back as 3100 B.C, rules have had plenty of time to become so embedded in a culture that to break them has become almost unthinkable.  In soccer it is expected that the ball be kicked out of play if someone is injured and fans and fellow players can get angry if this practice is not followed, even though it is not one of the explicit rules of the game.

“The rules for playing the game are constantly being changed as they are passed from tribe to tribe and generation to generation” (McConville, The History of Board Games, p. 8)

One of the main points of games is that they should provide ‘fair’ competition.  There’s no point in having rules if they can be broken without any repercussions.  Any punishment should also be ‘fair’ which leads to even more rules regarding how such  rulings can be made.  Games that have large followings end up with governing bodies where people are employed solely to decide on the rules for the game.

Even when a game has well known explicit rules, people may choose to ignore them or add in extra ‘house rules’.  Only when a rule has the agreement of all the participants does it really exist in a game.  Even when rules have be agreed upon, the various participants can interpret them differently, which can lead to disagreements.  You then require meta-rules on how such disagreements should be dealt with.  These meta-rules would then be open to interpretation as well.

“a game played by humans cannot be a closed system and therefore cannot be fully described” (Sniderman, Unwritten Rules)

Given how rules can be interpreted in different ways and the meta-rules needed to resolve conflicts, how outside events can influence a game, how punishments for breaking the rules require  their own set of rules and how all these rules apply to any possible action within a game,  it is impossible to ever fully know all the rules of a game.

War

War is as much a part of human culture as games and play are, and it formed the basis of our discussion for the week.  The urge to recreate war seems to be a strong one with it’s presence virtually ubiquitous in our everyday life, in video games, table-top games, board games, kids playground games, film, T.V, music, books, and even when not at war, military organisations around the world play war games.

“a game is an artifice for providing the psychological experiences of conflict and danger while excluding their physical realizations, a game is a safe way to experience reality”(Crawford, 2005).  The simulated world that video games provide allows people to experience the thrill and excitement of war without any real world repercussions.   They can have all the fun they want with none of the danger.  Given the highly appealing nature of such games, it is not surprising that more and more war games are being used to further political agendas and cultural ideologies.

In the early 2000’s the United States Army released a game known as America’s Army.  This tactical first person shooter was a new recruitment and propaganda platform for the American Army.  The game contains actual training that any recruit would have to undertake in the actual American Army.  While the game has been fairly successful, it’s release has been met with much criticism.

“creates a false sense of power and invincibility among American consumer-citizens, which in turn ‘contributes to US imperial arrogance” (Hall, 2006)

“desensitizing generations of American society” (Elkus, 2006)

By using the real life practices of the American Army and transferring them to the safe simulated world of videos games it blurs the lines of reality, stripping away the negative effects of war and making it more appealing.

It appears America’s Army is more of an exception than a rule in terms of games as an educational tool.  There are many examples of games being successfully utilised  to bringing attention to very important world topics.  PeaceMaker by ImpactGames attempts to educate people on and  and highlight some of the difficulties in solving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.  The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) published the game Food Force in 2005.  Players would have to get food to survivors in a fictitious drought ridden country.  The game would educate players on world hunger and the WFP’s work to prevent it.

Given humans nature to play and the engaging quality provided by the medium of video games, there is no doubt that they provide an excellent learning tool.  However steps should be taken to make sure these qualities are not abused for the use of indoctrination and propaganda, particularly amongst young children who would be particularly susceptible.

Clean Slate Apps

We started out by having a brain storming session about what services or products our company would be able to provide, given our skill sets.   I had the idea of creating custom Android based OS’s for parents who wish to keep track of young kids.  We’d be able to offer more security and better functionality than can be provided with just an app.  I thought this would be a good idea as we could easily branch out into the smartphone anti-virus market.  After a group discussion my idea was not ultimately chosen.

Our business, Clean Slate Apps, would create apps targeted at teaching young children about hygiene.  We would use Gamification to make mundane tasks, such as brushing teeth, getting dressed, etc. more engaging and rewarding.  As time passes the child would have to repeat the task more than once before being rewarded.  This way good practices would soon become good habits that they will keep up.  Once we had built up a following we would be able to expand into the educational games market.

I was in charge of making the revenue projections.  The existence of incubation centres for start-ups would provide us with access to office space for a relatively small fee.  Thanks to living together we were able to further decrease our own salaries.  I factored in three months with no sales as we developed our first apps.  Having searched for the average salary of an app developer, it was shown as falling within a certain range, from €1,200 – €3,600 euro a month.  Over the next two years I slowly increased what I expected each of the three business partners to draw in.  While the first few quarters had us making a loss, with very conservative estimates we should still be able make a profit by the end of our first year.

You can view our presentation on the business plan here. The executive summary is here.

Irish Ancestry Research Centre

My module Multimedia Industry Perspectives paired people with companies from the University of Limerick’s Nexus Innovation Centre.  The Nexus Innovation Centre provides office space and facilities for multiple start-up businesses.  I worked with the Irish Ancestry Research Centre.  As I was learning Android App development as part of my Final Year Project it was decided I would create a simple App for the company.  The App was to contain stripped down content from the company’s existing website.  Due to time constraints in place I would not have time to complete the App to a professional level but made an initial App and planned other functionality that could be added by subsequent students.  The project was a valuable learning experience as I learned about various guidelines, such as the icon style-guide.   I now also know what steps are necessary to publish and App to Google Play which will be necessary for my FYP and any future App development I undertake.

Cluster Theory of Art

The topic of discussion was whether or not video games can be considered art.  This then lead into trying to pin down what exactly art is.  Given the subjective nature of art it’s difficult enough to get two people to agree on a definition of art, let alone one that could be used to judge video games.  Several artists and philosophers, such as E. J. Bond (1975), Berys Gaut (2000), and Julius Moravcsik (1993), have advocated Cluster Theory as a way of defining what art is.

Cluster theories of art claim that many concepts function by specifying a potentially fuzzy set of criteria or “family resemblances” that an object might meet in any number of ways (Wittgenstein, 1968).

Berys Gaut, a Professor of Philosophy, put forward a list of conditions that he believes can help define art.

(1) possessing positive aesthetic properties, such as being beautiful, graceful, or elegant (properties which ground a capacity to give sensuous pleasure);
(2) being expressive of emotion;
(3) being intellectually challenging (i.e., questioning received views and modes of thought);
(4) being formally complex and coherent;
(5) having a capacity to convey complex meanings;
(6) exhibiting an individual point of view;
(7) being an exercise of creative imagination (being original);
(8) being an artifact or performance which is the product of a high degree of skill;
(9) belonging to an established artistic form (music, painting, film, etc.);
(10) being the product of an intention to make a work of art. (Gaut, 2000: 28)

I find this definition rather lacking.  There are many works that are socially accepted as art to which one or more of these points would not apply.  If something has been universally accepted as art and you create a definition for art that excludes said works, then said definition is flawed.  I disagree quite strongly with his first point, that art should be beautiful.  Many works of art, such a My Bed by Tracey Emin, rely on a works shock value or ugliness to convey the meaning of the artist.  Other works of art are too abstract to be considered elegant or graceful yet no one would say that the works of Pablo Picasso aren’t art.

So flawed is this definition, even when I agree with it I have to add in stipulations.  I wholeheartedly agree that for something to be considered art it must be expressive of an emotion.  However I do not believe everything that is expressive of emotion is art.  There is obvious sadness in any picture of a child crying yet not every picture of a child crying is thought of as art.  Yet I would consider the picture taken by Kevin Carter a work of art due to the cultural and historical lessons behind it.

Many works of art are based around trying to visually represent a human emotion so may be quite simple in design and the obviousness of their meaning preventing it from being intellectually challenging.  If a child is able to understand a work of art, does this mean it is no longer art. If it is so simple as to be understood by a child, then surely it is not intellectually challenging and cannot be considered art.  This is of course ludicrous, as there is no age requirement to appreciate art.

I disagree with the following two criteria for similar reasons, in that they contain expressions that are not well defined.  There are many pieces of modern art that are not very complex in appearance, such as pieces done by Erin Bauer for Vienna’s Mumok Museum of Modern Art.  Other pieces of art may deliberately break up cohesion in order to convey confusion.   His following point also dictates art should convey complex meanings.  Art often tries to evoke certain emotions in it’s viewer, emotions are really quite basic meanings.  The are abstract and hard to define but not inherently complex.  Given the wide scope of the already established art world, I cannot agree with any definition that tries to put restrictions on it’s form.

A large part of the attraction of art is how it can be interpreted in so many different ways.  If art was only capable of exhibiting one fixed point of view and could not be misinterpreted then there would be no point in viewing it as you could learn all you need to know about it from a book.  This point even conflicts with the next criterion that it should be an exercise of a creative mind.  One fixed point of view would not facilitate creative works of art.  Gaut also stipulates that art should be original which is ridiculous, many artists have carved Statues of David so does that mean only the first one carved is art?

For the most part I would agree that art should be the product of a high degree of skill but once again disagree with placing restrictions on what can be art.  Who gets to judge what is a suitable level of skill. How long did Leonardo da Vinci have to paint before he reached the requisite skill level to create art.  It is for similar reasons that I disagree with Gaut’s last two criteria as well.  If art had to belong to an established art form then the Lourve would be a giant cave with charcoal drawings on the wall.  It would be nearly impossible to use the intent of the creator as a judge for whether or not something can be judged as art.  I would think most painters would set out to create magnificent paintings, it is only other people that then judge it as art.   People might view it as art but the painters intention was to create a painting, not art.

I do not believe there is any suitable definition for what art is.  The criteria of Gaut’s cluster theory are at times too broad and at others too narrow.  When it comes to art I have to agree with Philip Dormer Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield, “I don’t know art, but I know what I like”.

Designing a Software System

As part of a Second Year module, CS4125 Systems Analysis and Design, we were tasked with designing a system for a theoretical business of our choice.  This was a very challenging project as it involved planning out a software system in it’s entirety that was larger than anything we had previously worked on.  It involved using industry level UML workbench software, looking at different development methodologies, functional and non-functional requirements as well as planning out the systems architecture.  I undertook the project with one of my fellow students Ian O’Brien.

For the project we designed a time and resource management system for a warehouse wholesaler.  It would automatically handle the processing of stock requests from outside retailers, calculate the most efficient shipping route, inform warehouse workers of what needed to be loaded, track where items where stored in the warehouse and draw up invoices for managerial authorisation.  I wrote up the narrative description of the business, created use case descriptions and non-functional requirements and I worked on the system architecture.  There was a critique section at the end of our project that I was in charge of writing.  I found it a very worthwhile exercise as it made me think critically about all the decisions that had been made and think on ways the project could have been improved.

One of the mock-up screens we were required to draw up

Games Design and Development

The Games Fleadh is a yearly gaming and programming festival hosted by LIT-Tipperary on their Thurles based campus.  There are several competitions ran over the course of the two day event, including XNA Game Studio which entails designing and programming a game with a retro game as a theme.  XNA is a set of tools with a managed runtime environment provided by Microsoft to aid in video game development, games are written in C#.

It is normal for people to enter as part of a 2 – 5 person team.  I’ve taken part in the competition twice, both times with the same team. Gerry-Lee Cullen was the team’s artist while myself and Raymond Kearney were programmers.

2011 Frogger

I came up with the idea and back-story for the game.  After watching Frogs die for the past 30 years, the great Frog gods were tired of watching their people die as they crossed the road and imbued them with the power of the elements.  This let us expand on the original Frogger game by adding in obstacles in the environment that could only be defeated by using these new powers.  I also took care of menu navigation.  Working to a set deadline was a valuable learning experience, deciding what features we had time to implement and what we would have time to finish.

-Awarded best Windows 7 game

2012 Chopper Command

For this entry I had the idea of incorporating elements from the Tower Defense genre into the original Chopper Command Game.  The player had several abilities that effected how their avatar behaved as well as having a selection of placeable objects that would help the player.  This entry was quite a challenge as at the time all of the team were geographically separated due to work placements.  The team never physically met up until the day of the competition, we used Skype for group discussions and Tortoise SVN and ProjectLocker for source control. I was the Lead Programmer for this game.  I planned out and implemented how all the different parts of the game would come together, how maps would be switched between, how enemy sprites and friendly sprites would behave and menu navigation.  I really enjoyed developing this entry as it gave me a chance to put into practice a number of things I’d learnt about over the past year and improve my knowledge of XNA/C#.

-Awarded Best in Original Digital Art

Open Emotion’s ShamJam 2011

In September 2011, the Limerick based games company Open Emotion Studios hosted a Games Jam.  A Games Jam is when Programmers, Musicians and Artists get together to create one or more games.  They are normally set over a set period of time, such as a weekend.  Limerick slang ‘Sham’ was incorporate into the title of the event to give homage to the companies Limerick roots.

There where people there from various Indie Games companies from around Ireland and it was great  getting to meet them all and work with a few of them.  I worked in a team of four, one artist and three programmers.  Two of my team-mates, James Sadlier (@SpoonTheGreater)  and Sharkey (@DeadMansPixels) work for Indie games companies.  James is CTO and co-founder of Nevermind Games and Sharkey was an Artist for Open Emotion Studios.

Don’t Shoot Elvis Credits

The games we were creating where targeted at a Winnitron cabinet.  The theme of the Jam was ‘Escape’ and after a short brainstorming session we came up with the idea for ‘Don’t Shoot Elvis’.  James was the lead programmer for the game, while I was tasked with menu navigation, changing the behavior of the enemy sprites and any small bugs that cropped up.  As part of the developement we used Tortoise SVN for our source control.  This was an incredibly useful tool that I had never touched on as part of my course, which just goes to emphasise how useful Games Jams are for learning new techniques and technologies.

Elvis never died, he was just wrongly convicted. Set to be released for good behavior, an untimely prison riot is all that stands between The King and freedom. With budget cuts and quarterly reviews you mustn’t be caught napping. Take out any would be escapees from leaving through your gate while funneling as many of them as you can past the opposite tower, drag down your co-workers to make yourself irreplaceable. Careful though, killing The King is a fast track to the unemployment office.