Week 2
09/10/07
This week I continued with more journal reading which are explained below.
Upon receiving the first task which is due on the 31st October, the team started to discuss ways in which this could be completed. We have started this by narrowing down our research to areas that we feel are important and we now feel we are getting closer with a pitch idea.
This week I have concentrated on reading documents about mise en scene and the subjects that this raises such as lighting techniques in games.
On 09/10/07, the team had a meeting with John Charlton. This was the person who we were advised to speak to in our first team meeting with the supervisors, for full details on this discussion see our team blog.
Journals
1.
Anthony, Reverend (2007) Bioshock’s storytelling flaws
http://www.destructoid.com/exploring-i-bioshock-i-s-storytelling-flaws-46498.phtml
Accessed 4/10/07
This is a document that goes into great detail about the recent game Bioshock. It raises a point about cutscenes and weather they should be interactive or non interactive. It goes onto explain that the cutscenes can remove players from the experience if done incorrectly.
It then goes into the mise en scene in Bioshock. It talks about the visual clues into the story that the player can see if they explore the world in Bioshock thoroughly.
2.
Anthony, Reverend (2007) Fun isn’t enough: Why video games have to move beyond simple escapism
http://www.destructoid.com/fun-isn-t-enough-why-video-games-have-to-move-beyond-simple-escapism-30905.phtml
Accessed 4/10/07
This Blog raises some interesting points. The first of these is that it suggests that gamers always remember sad moments in games more then they will remember happy moments. This is an interesting point as it suggests that sadness is a much stronger emotion then happiness. It also gives a few examples of how emotion can be evoked using simple ideas such as having to protect a vulnerable NPC throughout the game, if this NPC was to die suddenly, the article asks how would that make you feel.
It also has this quote which describes how games can be used to stimulate emotions.
“But consider the attributes of video gaming, as a medium. Video games can use text in large quantities without receiving copious amounts of criticism. Video games can use lighting, cinematography, mise en scene. Video games can use music, and video, and illustration. And, most importantly, video games are interactive. Video gaming, as a medium, is the single most inclusive art form ever created. Not only can it use the tools of filmmaking, illustration, literature, and music, but it actually forces the participant into the situation instead of allowing him to act as a passive bystander”
3.
Seif El-Nasr, Magy, Niedenthal, Simon, Knez, Igor, Almeida, Priya, Zupko, Joseph (2006) Dynamic Lighting for Tension in Games
http://gamestudies.org/0701/articles/elnasr_niedenthal_knez_almeida_zupko
Accessed 6/10/07
This article spoke about how lighting can be used to evoke emotions from a game player. It has some very good quotes which I have included below:
Games simulate many elements of traditional media, such as plot, characters, sound and music, lighting and mise-én-scene.
…“game aesthetics” as a sensory phenomena that the player encounters in the game: the visual, aural and haptic (and embodied) experience of gameplay (cf. www.gameinnovation.org), while the other defines it as an expression of the game experienced as pleasure or emotion, with focus on the “aesthetic experience”
According to psychology theory, the prototypical aesthetic experience is one in which attention is firmly fixed upon the components of a visual pattern, excludes the awareness of other objects or events, is dominated by intense feelings or emotions and is integrated and coherent
…just like light in real space, simulated illumination in virtual space has a direct effect upon participants’ emotional experiences. Knez and Niedenthal (forthcoming) have demonstrated that warm and cool simulated illumination conditions have differing emotional and performance effects upon players
Currently, game developers and designers adopt cinematic and animation lighting techniques to enrich the aesthetic sense of the virtual space and the gaming experience. For example, game lighting designers manually manipulate material properties and scene lighting to set a mood and style for each level in the game.
This document goes very well with The Expressions of Colours journal, as this article explains about different coloured lighting and the effects it can have on the gameplayer. This article also the type of experiment that they carried out and the results that they got from them
09/10/07
This week I continued with more journal reading which are explained below.
Upon receiving the first task which is due on the 31st October, the team started to discuss ways in which this could be completed. We have started this by narrowing down our research to areas that we feel are important and we now feel we are getting closer with a pitch idea.
This week I have concentrated on reading documents about mise en scene and the subjects that this raises such as lighting techniques in games.
On 09/10/07, the team had a meeting with John Charlton. This was the person who we were advised to speak to in our first team meeting with the supervisors, for full details on this discussion see our team blog.
Journals
1.
Anthony, Reverend (2007) Bioshock’s storytelling flaws
http://www.destructoid.com/exploring-i-bioshock-i-s-storytelling-flaws-46498.phtml
Accessed 4/10/07
This is a document that goes into great detail about the recent game Bioshock. It raises a point about cutscenes and weather they should be interactive or non interactive. It goes onto explain that the cutscenes can remove players from the experience if done incorrectly.
It then goes into the mise en scene in Bioshock. It talks about the visual clues into the story that the player can see if they explore the world in Bioshock thoroughly.
2.
Anthony, Reverend (2007) Fun isn’t enough: Why video games have to move beyond simple escapism
http://www.destructoid.com/fun-isn-t-enough-why-video-games-have-to-move-beyond-simple-escapism-30905.phtml
Accessed 4/10/07
This Blog raises some interesting points. The first of these is that it suggests that gamers always remember sad moments in games more then they will remember happy moments. This is an interesting point as it suggests that sadness is a much stronger emotion then happiness. It also gives a few examples of how emotion can be evoked using simple ideas such as having to protect a vulnerable NPC throughout the game, if this NPC was to die suddenly, the article asks how would that make you feel.
It also has this quote which describes how games can be used to stimulate emotions.
“But consider the attributes of video gaming, as a medium. Video games can use text in large quantities without receiving copious amounts of criticism. Video games can use lighting, cinematography, mise en scene. Video games can use music, and video, and illustration. And, most importantly, video games are interactive. Video gaming, as a medium, is the single most inclusive art form ever created. Not only can it use the tools of filmmaking, illustration, literature, and music, but it actually forces the participant into the situation instead of allowing him to act as a passive bystander”
3.
Seif El-Nasr, Magy, Niedenthal, Simon, Knez, Igor, Almeida, Priya, Zupko, Joseph (2006) Dynamic Lighting for Tension in Games
http://gamestudies.org/0701/articles/elnasr_niedenthal_knez_almeida_zupko
Accessed 6/10/07
This article spoke about how lighting can be used to evoke emotions from a game player. It has some very good quotes which I have included below:
Games simulate many elements of traditional media, such as plot, characters, sound and music, lighting and mise-én-scene.
…“game aesthetics” as a sensory phenomena that the player encounters in the game: the visual, aural and haptic (and embodied) experience of gameplay (cf. www.gameinnovation.org), while the other defines it as an expression of the game experienced as pleasure or emotion, with focus on the “aesthetic experience”
According to psychology theory, the prototypical aesthetic experience is one in which attention is firmly fixed upon the components of a visual pattern, excludes the awareness of other objects or events, is dominated by intense feelings or emotions and is integrated and coherent
…just like light in real space, simulated illumination in virtual space has a direct effect upon participants’ emotional experiences. Knez and Niedenthal (forthcoming) have demonstrated that warm and cool simulated illumination conditions have differing emotional and performance effects upon players
Currently, game developers and designers adopt cinematic and animation lighting techniques to enrich the aesthetic sense of the virtual space and the gaming experience. For example, game lighting designers manually manipulate material properties and scene lighting to set a mood and style for each level in the game.
This document goes very well with The Expressions of Colours journal, as this article explains about different coloured lighting and the effects it can have on the gameplayer. This article also the type of experiment that they carried out and the results that they got from them
4.
Jones, Mike, Composing Space: Cinema and Computer Gaming - The Macro-Mise en Scene and Spatial Composition.
http://www.dab.uts.edu.au/research/conferences/imaginary-worlds/composing_space.pdf
Accessed 7/10/07
This document goes into great detail about the macro mise-en-scene which I have been reading and watching about in previous journals and videos. Below is a selection of quotes from the document which I found interesting.
The process of designing and producing a 3D game is both aesthetically and practically that of creating a macro-mise en scene containing the entire imaginary world. During game play individual frames will be ‘composed’ by the camera/player but the larger macro-mise en scene remains fully intact and the player/viewer’s awareness of it as a composition is never diminished.
…the Macro-mise en scene. The audience may be viewing the narrative/story/experience through the hard borders of a visual frame but there is no illusion or pretence of the frame presenting any sense of a totality of vision because of a larger composition constructed for the viewer through spatially specific sound. The viewer accepts that the frame is just a small part of the composed scene, not the scene in it’s entirety.
All this would imply that, if it can be argued FPS gaming and the worlds games construct holds at its core an ideal of immersive realism, then Half Life 2 is a game that confirms Bazinian ideas of long-take mise en scene as the best embodiment of cinematic realism.
Other things which the document talks about is how important sound is to the macro mise en scene because it helps make up the scene around the player.
During this last week my journal reading has become a lot more focused on the important areas of the project, such as macro mise en scene and more focused details on mise en scene such as lighting and the use of colour. Over the next week I am hoping to decide (as a team) a final area of investigation for this project and start to writing up the literature survey.
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