Pet Shop Pay Day - XB1000

In a world fuelled with greed and peoples lust for making money four pet shop managers battle it out against each other to make money and win an upcoming promotion to become the company CEO for all the pet shops. As time goes on each shop will spread away from each other as the specialise in different paths that encourage different clientèle, but what looks innocent enough on the surface is held up by walls of lies, blackmail and industrial espionage.Each manager is evaluated at the end of each week to calculate how much money they have made that week, this adds up over time and each month the company boss awards a bonus the the manager that has performed the best. A bonus can consist of anything from money to a free upgrade or even something that the managers can use to blackmail each other. At the round each manager has access to the shop, in the shop they are able to buy different department upgrades or trade in complete sets for next tier parts. Managers can use the shop to bribe the bosses assistants, this will give that manager one of the bonuses but as the bonuses are all random the manager may find themselves at a loss.Upgrades are used to advance one part of the store, meaning that the pet shop will be able to sell a wider variety of animals. The more upgrades bought, the more animals can be sold which will multiple the over all money gain per week. Once a player has collected all of the upgrades from a certain tier (three different upgrades) they can trade all of them in to progress to the next tier. Once the player has progressed though all the tiers and collected all the cards of the final tier they receive a special bonus that is unique to that tier set.

Should Video Game Violence Be Limited? - DD1000

This is a debate that has raged over the past 40+ years, many fight one way or another believing ether that the level of violence in video games directly relate to violent behaviour. Whilst others disagree and think that if a person is sick enough to believe killing people is good then it is only a matter of time before they act on that, with or without the help of video game violence.

Craig Anderson, PhD a psychology professor at the Iowa State University made a large post on the American Psychological Association website (http://www.apa.org/science/about/psa/2003/10/anderson.aspx) in which he went through some of the big myths that the media use in arguments about video game violence. Although seemingly un-bias on the surface the more of the post I read through the more and more he seemed to lean to the side of people for the limiting of video game violence. Below are a few quotes from his blog:

"Myth 1. Violent video game reseach has yielded very mixed results"
"Facts: Some studies have yielded nonsignificant video game effects, just as some smoking studies failed to find a significant link to lung cancer."
"Violent video games are significantly associated with: increased aggressive behavior, thoughts, and affect; increased physiological arousal; and decreased prosocial (helping) behavior."

"Myth 4. Field experiments are irrelevant (aggression measures based either on direct imitation of video game behaviors (e.g., karate kicks) or are normal play behaviors."
"Facts: Some field experiments have used behaviors such as biting, pinching, hitting, pushing, and pulling hair, behaviors that were not modeled in the game. The fact that these aggressive behaviors occur in natural environments does not make them "normal" play behavior, but it does increase the face validity (and some would argue the external validity) of the measures."

"Myth 6. There are no studies linking violent video game play to serious aggression."
"Facts: High levels of violent video game exposure have been linked to delinquency, fighting at school and during free play periods, and violent criminal behavior (e.g., self-reported assault, robbery)."

"Myth 9. The effects of violent video games are trivially small."
"Facts: Meta-analyses reveal that violent video game effect sizes are larger than the effect of second hand tobacco smoke on lung cancer, the effect of lead exposure to I.Q. scores in children, and calcium intake on bone mass."


The full blog can be seen on the website (shown above). Although these are small sections of the full blog they highlight some of the main arguments for the limitation of video game violence.

On the other end of the scale is a blog by Aaron Sampson a video editor for game review website Gamespot (http://uk.gamespot.com/features/in-defense-of-video-game-violence-6403171/). In the blog he explains his experiences of growing up with video games and what he thinks about the arguments to ban violent games.

He explains his life growning up around games and guns, saying:
"I have played "violent" video games my entire life. I also own a gun, but I don't consider myself one of those "gun owners" the media likes to talk about. Growing up I always had a natural affinity for both. At home I would play on my dad's old-school Amiga computer, and when I wasn't indoors, I was outdoors playing with plastic guns." He goes on to talk about the link the media makes with guns and video games, how "one does not translate to the other". He says that firing a real gun requires skills "you have to be very calm and control your breathing in order to hit your mark. When the weapon goes off, you feel the metal leave the barrel and know something just went downrange that doesn't have an undo button."

He later goes on to talk about school and how he hated it with a passion with teachers "bludgeoning kids into submission with information" and how the only way he could find ways to outlet the stress of school was through friends, family and video games. "When playing violent games, I feel aggression as some of these studies have concluded, but aggression is a byproduct of all competitive sports and endeavors. Aggression is commonly harnessed for soccer, football, and tennis. What researchers and those who would condemn games are likely looking for is anger. Anger is what causes violence and a violent videogame has never made me feel anger. Often they have relieved those types of feelings rather than encouraged them."

TBC



P.S Christian apparently i cant email you through blogger so i just want to check that you are still ok with getting the poster ready. If you have any issues just leave a comment on this post, i will be checking it a couple of times a day. Also it needs to be printed monday as it takes a full day to print, so unless you are planning on coming in early monday i may need a copy of it so i can print it. 

Ashley Wood - DD1101

The final piece for my superhero project is to do i drawing in the style of artist Ashley Wood. His styles are more sketchy than the other pieces i have done for this project, and i actually had a hard time trying not to make all the lines crystal clear.

 

Gun UV, Textures and Render 'fun' - XB1134

Now the gun is fully modelled the next stages is to get the gun baked and textured ready for it to be rendered real time. After a lot of trail and error the UV began to form and once done the normal map and complete maps could be baked.

 NORMAL MAP

 

COMPLETE MAP

 

Once this is made the diffuse map can be made, this is basically the texture that will be skinned onto the gun. My gun has a matt black finish with urban digital camo, this does mean that alot of the texture is the same colour (a little boring). Once i knew what the texture looked like i could make a specular map, this tells the game engine where the light bounces of the gun so the lighter i make an area, the more it refects light.

 

 DIFFUSE

SPECULAR

 

 

Once these are done its time for the guns photo op. to do this i used two different programs to render the gun in realtime, firstly i used a program called Xoliul Shader which is an addon to 3DS Max making it very easy to use as you dont have to learn a new interface. The second program i used was Marmoset Toolbag, unlike Xoliul it is an indipendant program but this does have its advatages as there is more modification options so the final images can be the best possible. Below is examples of the same image taken in the different programs.

 

 MARMOSET

XOLIUL

 

 

 



Violence in video games - DD1000

Right, i have gone through the violent nature behind board games, Christian has gone through the violence of the past games and sports ( http://christian-whelan-dd1000.blogspot.co.uk/ ). So now its time to go into the big one, violence in video games.....

I will be splitting this topic down into 3 different posts. Firstly I will be looking at a few examples of games that have caused controversy over the years. The second post will look at the arguments for and against limiting violence in video games, and finally i will look at a few case studies of times where people have taken game companies to court of the level of violence in a game. 

Controversial Video Games

There are hundreds of video games out there and sifting through them all would take years so this list comprises of the five games that I personally think have caused the biggest and most controversial issues of the years.

1976 - Death Race by Exidy for the Atari 2600 console

In death race one or two players drove cars with a steering wheel and acceleration pedal with the aim of running down 'gremlins'. As the player hit the creatures they would let out a scream and a tombstone would appear in there place, as more gremlins were killed the screen got more and more cluttered with tomb stones which the players had to avoid. 

With the working title of the game being 'Pedestrians' the violent controversy surrounding this game was there from the get go. Despite denial from many of Exidy including Paul Kaufman the companies president about the games intent to promote violence it didn't stop the game from hitting the number one spot on many controversial game lists with the National Safety Council labeling it sick and morbid. 

1993 - Doom by id Software for the PC

The most famous first person shooter game of its time Doom has raised a lot of controversy over the years. In the game the player plays 'Doomguy' a bad ass space marine that blasts his way through hoards of devil like creatures to complete the three nine-leveled episodes (with a four being released in 1995). Doom is known for popularizing first person shooters as well is a pioneer of multiplier gaming, 3D graphics and support for mods and expansions.

Of coarse a game can't get to that level without picking up a few demons along the way (no pun intended). Slated for its intense gore and satanic influences it has gained the attention of a wide range of groups all of which weren't overly pleased with the way the game way going. But these were minor issues compared to the storm that hit them April 1999. Columbine high school students Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold walked into school one day and open fired killing a total of 13 people and injuring a total of 21 more causing the deadliest shooting to ever occur at an American school. Later during an inquiry it was found that both students were avid Doom players and there was even rumors that they designed a doom level that was styled on the school in which the shooting took place (later found to be untrue). 

More on the columbine shooting in a later post.

1997-present - GTA by Rockstar Games for PC, PS1, PS2, PS3, Xbox and Xbox360
Although the characters differ the theme of Grand Theft Auto remains the same between game. You play as some sort of low life criminal starting of driving people around of doing back ally drug deals, but as time goes on you start to get noticed by bigger fish who take you under there wing (until you kill them, which happens quite a lot) until you own the entire city's criminal mafia.

As far a controversy Grand Theft Auto has manged to successfully tick every box again and again over the years. Sex, Drugs, Violence, Nudity (in the case of GTA: San Andreas), Foul Language, Drink Driving, Cop and Civilian killing, Prostitution... and that barely scrapes the surface of this series long history of fueling of every person opposed to video games with enough ammo to keep them going until the rapture. The games most controversial scene (i know its hard to chose just one) is a feature found throughout most of the newer games in which the character can hire a prostitute then kill them which there 'job' is done before taking the money back off them. 

2003 - Manhunt by Rockstar Games (that's there second appearance in the list) for PS2 

In this stealth based horror game you play as death row inmate thought to have been killed, he had actually been freed from jail by underground snuff film director Lionel Starkweather. The player is the forced to take part in a snuff film where he has to kill more and more gang members in the most horrific and torturous ways possible.

This game has had a lot of negative press over the graphic nature of the game, the game is so bad that it has been banned in some countries including Germany, Australia and New Zealand.
The game was so bad that even member sof the development team at Rockstar North were grossed out, some thinking that this game crossed the line of acceptable behavior in a game. 
The murder of British school boy Stefan Pakeerah (14) by a friend Warren Leblanc (17) did nothing to help the games standing after police discovered that both boys were strong fans of the game and the murder was set with the same weapons found in the game. The family filed a law suet against Rockstar and Sony for the death of Stefan but later dropped the charges after the police found the motive of the killing to be robbery, A spokes man for the police stated: 'the video game was not found in Warren LeBlanc's room, it was found in Stefan Pakeerah's room. Leicestershire Constabulary stands by its response that police investigations did not uncover any connections to the video game, the motive for the incident was robbery.' 

2009 - CoD: Modern Warfare 2 by Infinity Ward for Xbox360, PC, PS3

Call of Duty has become the iconic first person shooter of its age. Playing as a number of different secret 'black ops' military groups around the world, defending against terrorists.  The mission that has caused the most controversy was in the game Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 during a mission called 'No Russian' in which an under cover CAI agent is working in a Russian terrorist cell attacking an airport. The main issue comes from a scene where the player guns down multiple unarmed civilians. 

Violent Board Games - DD1000

All these games use the act of violence as a major point in the winning or loosing of the game. But although they may sound extreamly violent compaired to other games, they are not. Admittadly they are a little more obvious with the violence then other board games, but most games of all types contain subtle hints of a violent intent. The classic game of Cluedo is a good example of hidden violents, in the game you all play as detectives trying to locate a killer and the murder weapon that they used. In the game of Risk player fight each over as they all attempt to take over the world using any menas at there dispossal.

Capital Punishment - A game original made for political reasons to make a point and try to warn people away from committing crime. This game consists of each player trying to get their criminals along the path of justice to death row and the electric chair, while this is happening the players have to also spring the opponents criminals from jail so they go back on the street and cause more crimes. The escaped convicts then assault the players civilians sending them to 'heven'. This game has violent undertones as it forces players to release criminals onto the street even though they know that those criminals will kill Innocent people.

Kablano - A game that highlights the fun that can be had playing Russian roulette. Each player gets a board that shows the rotating barrel of a gun pictured on it, the player loads the gun with six counter that represent chambers. Each bullet can do different thing some kill you and others can be used to change the placement of the bullets in an opponents gun, each turn the player rotates the gun revealing the next bullet in the chamber.

Pain doctors - In this game the player plays as a doctor that is performing surgery for money, the aim of the game is to perform as much surgery as possible without the patient dieing. This is made harder by other players sabotaging the surgery to try and lower the patients health. This ends up like a game of chicken with yourself as you try to do more and more surgery for points but risk the patient dieing and losing it all.

Marek Oken - DD1101

This is a continuation of the superhero character i made for the Sean Galloway project. This image is designed to be a photo-realistic styled image. This is the first time i have made a piece in this style so i used a tutorial from the book 'Digital Painting Techniques masters collection: volume 1' pages 136 to 142 by Daarken.

This is the image after 3 hours work. I have managed to get the skin shade and facial structure about complete at this point, the left eye is very close to being done although it still need a little work to get the correct shape and some colour as it it very dark currently. 

4 hours work later and this is the result, as you can probably tell the hair is not quite finished, i may still mess around with some aspects of the face later on but the basics are all now in place.