FOR AND AGAINST VIDEO GAMES

FOR AND AGAINST VIDEO GAMES

Age

Underage people can still acquire games of a higher age rating, they have higher age ratings for a reason. There has been cases in which some parents think that the age rating is the level of difficulty. Manhunt was a very violent game, it showed audiences how to kill and torture people… This was picked up by the younger consumers, and with them being so young, they believed that it would not be a problem to do the same in real life as they saw in the game. You can't stop people from acquiring games underage, if someone buys an 18 and then gives/sells to a child under the age of said game, then there isn't any stopping them and who's to even know that they have it now.

Adverts

Recent Lara Croft game had scenes of rape in the beginning of the latest trailer, which obviously made the female population kick off. Live action trailers are becoming more popular in the current day, it shows hardly any gameplay if any resulting in the experience of the game being completely different than expected. Advertisements don't show every part of the game, they show some of the highlights but there will always be bits that you may encounter only once when you've bought the game. if an advertisement for a video game is shown after a certain time, young children could still be watching the TV even though it is unsuitable for their age range.

Sensorship

 

Some games contain material that wouldn't be appropriate for certain audiences, in this case they will sensor certain parts so that the audience may actually percieve what is happening without actaully seeing it, thus not landing the corporation that made the game in any legal or ethical trouble.

For example; Grand Theft Auto (GTA) is a game that is heavily in ties with drugs, gambling, sex and violence. Although this is happening, the more touchy subjects such as the sex is sensored smartly so that the consumer doesn't see anything revealing. Allthough this is all fine and dandy, there are people amongst the community that modify the game so that this sensorship is removed. For an example; a look at the "hot coffee" mod for GTA San Andreas. It is a sexual minigame that a user has created themselves. They are pretty much hidden away on the internet and you would have to be pretty specific to find it, but it is still there.

In the long run, I don't see video games going anywhere in the future. So we will just have to put up with the problems that arise and enjoy the good features. For every negative comment about a certain factor there is always a positive and I don't see too much wrong with the way they are at the moment in my personal opinion.

 

Negotiated, Preferred and Oppositional Responses.

Dominant/ Preferred is when an audience decodes the message as the producer wants them to do and baldly agrees with it.
For example, if the director of a documentary on illegal drugs intended to put a message out to the viewers saying that drugs are bad and should not be messed around with, and they took that information in and got the exact same message as was intended then this would fall under this.


Negotiated is where the audience accepts, rejects or refines the elements of text in light of previous events or experiences or previous held views.
If a director from a film about the youth of today attempts to portray the younger characters in a film as being lazy but nice, some people may be willing to accept that that's what teenagers are. But some may stand in and think "actually, no, last week I was mugged by a teenager, I believe that they are violent" then these would be examples of Negotiated where the audience either accept the information or due to past experiences they are forced to believe otherwise. Similar to Oppositional Responses...

Oppositional is where the dominant meaning is recognised but rejected for cultural, ethical or idealogical reasons. This could be something to do with a documentary on Jesus Christ or something and it is rejected by a religion that does not worship him.

Participatory is the theory behind an audience, such as ourselves, are free to open websites, blogs, social media accounts etc. to share information on products we have recently viewed/consumed etc.

Cultural Competence is how your input affects how the audience view something. For example, if a new children's toy is on the market and you see a review on the internet about a woman's child being hurt by this product then the likelihood of you buying it will decrease significantly.

Fan Culture is where fans of a certain media product/type will create fan accounts on social networking sites etc. of their favourite idol etc. For example, twitter is flooded with 'Beliebers' which are accounts dedicated to Justin Bieber the famous pop artist.







*All information found on the slideshow here:
http://www.slideshare.net/robertclackmedia/audience-theory-powerpoint

Hypodermic needle theory, users and gratifications, reception study and passive or active consumptions.

Hypodermic needle theory, users and gratifications, reception study and passive or active consumptions.



The hypodermic needle theory is where companies will put subliminal objects or messages in a film/product in order to pass messages into the head of the audience without them knowing. For example; an advert that is for a food restaurant or product will include a lot of the colour red, purely because meat is considered red and it tricks your brain into making you want to eat. It is a method used in near enough every advertisement on the planet, it is very popular.
The McDonald's logo is a brilliant example of this;

Users and Gratifications is where someone listening/viewing your product is looking to gain something from it, usually;

• Pleasure
• Emotional Release
• Escaping from Reality

I can use this to my advantage as I will be able to make my documentary have a more positive feel and a happier vibe to it by playing more upbeat music so that my audience doesn't feel depressed or negative whilst watching it.

Reception Theory is where a listener/viewer will take the information in different due to what environment they are in or something from the past that is brought forward during the material they are viewing/ listening to.

Reception Theory/Study Vantage Point

Reception Study




Reception Study/Theory is where you provide a meaning of understanding of texts and how they are read by audiences.

"Reception theory argues that contextual factors, more than textual ones, influence the way the spectator views the film or television program."

http://www.filmreference.com/encyclopedia/Independent-Film-Road-Movies/Reception-Theory.html

Vantage Point

When I watched the film Vantage Point I watched it in a classroom alongside other students, which made it harder to actually immerse yourself in with the film. The room was brightly lit also so that did not help either. When watching a film like Vantage Point you want to be alone because you can focus on the narrative more and actually feel like part of the movie, this wasn't the case as mentioned before, so I did not have as much fun watching it. This just shows how much companies have to take into account when carrying out Reception Studies.

They will also have to take into account on how audiences can view the product when it is released on DVD etc. because parts of the film can be skipped to so some information can possibly taken in a different way than the original creator intended.

FMP 2 Research

Short Horror Film Audience Research

I will hand out questionnaires to people of all ages to ensure I know what they want, by being given this information I can see what I would need to include and exclude from my material that I produce.

I will;

• Hand out surveys
• Hand out Questionnaires
• Look at the BARB website
• Look at Focus Groups
• Use both methods of Primary and Secondary research

Primary Research

Primary Research is where you go out and find information yourself, such as that of a public questionnaire or survey.  You would then put this on a website such as BARB and it would become secondary research to other people. You can use primary research as it is very reliable, compared to secondary research, that could be incorrect. You are basically taking information that other people have come across, what if the research that was taken place wasn't correct? You could be better off finding the information yourself, a good example of this would be Wikipedia. British Comedian Lenny Henry made this point on Live at the Apollo on British Television some time ago; Wikipedia stated that he grew up in a small town, when really he hadn't been there before in his life.

Below is the results for viewers that watch FOX's Family Guy

	Votes	Average
Males	90234	8.4
Females	18604	8.0
Aged under 18	2956	8.6
Males under 18	2262	8.6
Females under 18	694	8.2
Aged 18-29	75375	8.5
Males Aged 18-29	61991	8.5
Females Aged 18-29	13384	8.1
Aged 30-44	26519	8.2
Males Aged 30-44	22852	8.2
Females Aged 30-44	3667	7.8
Aged 45+	3440	7.5
Males Aged 45+	2806	7.6
Females Aged 45+	634	6.7
IMDb staff	5	8.7
Top 1000 voters	386	7.1
US users	36643	8.1
Non-US users	72195	8.4
IMDb users	147270	8.4

(source: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0182576/ratings)

Secondary Research

Secondary Research is where you acquire information from a source that has done all the finding out of the information already. Websites such as BARB are known as Secondary because you are retrieving information that they have carried out for you. (http://www.barb.co.uk) An advantage of this would be that the people that carried out the Primary Research could have a bigger budget and therefore been able to contact more people and gather more information than what you could do on your own.

Audience Feedback

Types of Audience Feedback

There are many different types of audience feedback; 

• Reviews
• Audience Panels 
• Trialling and Testing
• Complaints
• Focus Groups

With my chosen media product that is a documentary I will need to choose my method of Audience Feedback carefully in order to review what has been a success and what hasn't been so good.

Focus groups are basically where you have a select few members of the public or a business that view what you have created and give their opinions on it before it is officially released to the public. It is good because you can change what went wrong before you launch the product. It is similar to a basic review but you can change the problems.

Complaints are a negative, but can be a positive if looked at in the right way. Once you have released your product and you receive complaints you may use them to your advantage as people will hear about your product from word of mouth and then check it out themselves. It also gives you room for improvement on the next project you start, because you will know what you need to change in order to make the product better overall.

Trialling and Testing is pretty self explanatory, you just have to send the product to consumers and what they say about your product that is negative you can work on it.

You can acquire information by sending out polls to the public for them to fill in, it will help you by telling you exactly what they think.

For example, the video for "Call On Me" by Eric Prydz started controversy over the scenes that take part in it, watch it for yourself here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L_fCqg92qks

It has content which some people may find disturbing/wrong - but as I mentioned, the talk about the nudity/sexual atmosphere will make more people want to view it. However, say if the material they were complaining about was morally or illegally wrong, the producers could change it based on their audience research.

Representation

Representation



Representation is basically the way in which an individual, or anything for that matter, represents a social group or stereotype. For example; an elderly person sat in a chair with a grumpy look on their face would show to the audience that he is bored, grumpy and lazy. He represents the social group.

Not only people or products can be a form of stereotyping, locations can too.
You expect the caribbean to be sunny and bright all the time, but sometimes it rains and is really boring.
Locations can cause people to fall into stereotyping too; Harrods customers are seen as a more upper-class individual whereas Primark customers are more working-class. Which links into and endless tree of different assumptions, people with money are snobs - leading to arrogance etc. and people with less money are dirty.


Documentaries are often stereotyped to be a genre that is for the viewing or likes of a smarter, more intelligent or "boring" kind of audience. Purely because they convey information and do not usually contain huge explosions and action-related material that would grab the attention of the younger generation etc.
My production will be of what I do as a bedroom producer, meaning that people may stereotype me and other bedroom producers for being bad due to the fact that we do not have a huge mixing desk like studios in London etc.

I will try to avoid this by showing a production made by smaller artists and then one by bigger artists.