Video Games: The Movie
Cedric Pulmano
1. Video games can be successful for a variety of strengths they may have. Games become very successful if they are playable for everyone, easy to start playing, but nearly impossible to perfect. This makes the gamer intrigued, and still want to play more, to get better at it. Games that also tell good stories and an understandable objective, usually triumph, for the players feels like they are really in the story, and really control the outcome. A good example of a successful video game with a nice story is Super Mario Brothers, with a really obvious objective, to save the princess. It is also successful with a recognisable character, for instead of previous games in that time, controlling a generic blob of pixels, they are really controlling a convincing looking person, so a player may want to really help Mario win! Success may also be found in games where the person effects the story. A very victorious game in the industry is Minecraft, and is doing well on the market, for all of the story, including the problems and solutions, is up to the player only, and their solutions. Video games can fulfil the desires of a gamer fantasy and imagination, and can fill in the gaps of the life of someone, so imaginative video games can do well too. As long as the audience can feel some sort of feeling, whether competitiveness, suspense, or curiosity, it usually will do great.
2. The video industry crashed mostly because of a few reasons. One reason is that since video games were selling so well, developers soon became lazy. An example is the game Atari's "E.T.", which was so poorly created because of how rushed it was. The developers took only about five weeks to make the game, when usually Atari half a year, to two thirds of a year. The video game was rushed to be in time with the release of the movie, but learned to be a punishment. The developers thought they could trick the costumers, producing whatever quality game, and they would still buy it. The actions of the consumers proved the theory false, for Atari lost money in the end. As a result, people began to pay more attention to the quality of games, and everyone became more careful.
3. I believe video games to be a form of art, for the definition of art, quoted from Oxford's Online Dictionary, (https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/art), it states that art is "The expression or application of human creative skill and imagination,..." and that is essentially what video games are. Video games reflect the creativity and imagination that the video game developers can express. The end result of the thoughts of a video game producer is their video game itself. One example of art is literary arts, or writing. What do authors usually write for? Authors usually write stories, for an audience. That is exactly what video games can also do. An example of a video game that tells a story is Pokémon, which tells a story of catching creatures, and the player is the protagonist. The only real difference between a story and a game is that the player can control some elements of the plot. An obvious art is visual art, and video games mostly need visuals. So, video games are not that contrasting to other arts, and fit in as a category of art itself.
4. Video games can, and will always evolve. There are many things video games can all improve on. An example is the graphics, for it has indeed evolved over the many years, but it is something that never will be perfected. Visuals can always be tweaked to make things better, but some aspects a developer may never know how to solve. So, aesthetics to a game is an example that could always be taken further, somehow. I think the next step of video gaming is virtual reality gaming, for games nowadays are mostly done satisfactorily, controlling with buttons or other controllers. But, if video games aspire to be more realistic, to all the more intensify how real a game can feel, then virtual reality is what video games desire to have. One element of a video game, and what makes it superior, is that they make the gamer perceive themselves to actually be in the world, living their fantasies and imagination, and not feel like they are playing some artificial and obviously fake environment. So, with virtual reality, if something can track the movements of the person playing a game, and input it into the game system, to make it mimic the movements on screen, that would be extremely realistic. The problem is simply that technology is not improved enough to do so. It is truly getting there, with some technology that, in a way, does move the character in the game based on the player's movements, like all video games on the Oculus Rift, where the person in real life turns their head, the game mirrors it, and there are indeed other controller sensors which are capable of producing some kind of life to game movement, but no full body sensors. Also, the gamer cannot physically feel what a character in a game is feeling, like if the character is immersed in water, or getting hit by a sword. The technology needed for this may be extremely complex. But, I am definitely excited and anticipate the future of video games as never imagined, to be great, and incredibly realistic.
3. I believe video games to be a form of art, for the definition of art, quoted from Oxford's Online Dictionary, (https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/art), it states that art is "The expression or application of human creative skill and imagination,..." and that is essentially what video games are. Video games reflect the creativity and imagination that the video game developers can express. The end result of the thoughts of a video game producer is their video game itself. One example of art is literary arts, or writing. What do authors usually write for? Authors usually write stories, for an audience. That is exactly what video games can also do. An example of a video game that tells a story is Pokémon, which tells a story of catching creatures, and the player is the protagonist. The only real difference between a story and a game is that the player can control some elements of the plot. An obvious art is visual art, and video games mostly need visuals. So, video games are not that contrasting to other arts, and fit in as a category of art itself.
4. Video games can, and will always evolve. There are many things video games can all improve on. An example is the graphics, for it has indeed evolved over the many years, but it is something that never will be perfected. Visuals can always be tweaked to make things better, but some aspects a developer may never know how to solve. So, aesthetics to a game is an example that could always be taken further, somehow. I think the next step of video gaming is virtual reality gaming, for games nowadays are mostly done satisfactorily, controlling with buttons or other controllers. But, if video games aspire to be more realistic, to all the more intensify how real a game can feel, then virtual reality is what video games desire to have. One element of a video game, and what makes it superior, is that they make the gamer perceive themselves to actually be in the world, living their fantasies and imagination, and not feel like they are playing some artificial and obviously fake environment. So, with virtual reality, if something can track the movements of the person playing a game, and input it into the game system, to make it mimic the movements on screen, that would be extremely realistic. The problem is simply that technology is not improved enough to do so. It is truly getting there, with some technology that, in a way, does move the character in the game based on the player's movements, like all video games on the Oculus Rift, where the person in real life turns their head, the game mirrors it, and there are indeed other controller sensors which are capable of producing some kind of life to game movement, but no full body sensors. Also, the gamer cannot physically feel what a character in a game is feeling, like if the character is immersed in water, or getting hit by a sword. The technology needed for this may be extremely complex. But, I am definitely excited and anticipate the future of video games as never imagined, to be great, and incredibly realistic.
