This week's lecture focused on research, specifically research that supports ideation and game production. It is important to conduct research in order to make sure that the content and games we create will be a point of interest to our target audience, rather than something that will disappear into an oversaturated market -- something that can be seen on the Steam storefront, where the number of games on the platform nearly doubled each year between 2014 and 2017, and by September 2018 "over 6,000 games released on Steam; the majority of them [selling] fewer than 500 copies." (Wright, 2018). As of 2021, Steam housed over 50,000 games, and had over 10,000 game releases in 2020 alone (Dean, 2021).
 |
| Fig. 1: Singletary Jr, 2019. Steam Storefront |
This has negatively affected both the AAA and indie industries, who now have to work much harder to make their games stand out amongst so many. This can lead to initial ideas being changed to avoid releasing a game into a deeply over-saturated market. Housemarque, a Finnish studio, known for the side-scrolling shoot 'em up Resogun (2013), released Nex Machina on Steam in 2017, an arcade-style twin-stick shooter. By summer 2018, the game had sold under 100,000 copies, pushing the studio to consider alternatives. Mikael Haveri, the studio's head of publishing, stated that at the time "“We never really considered the commercial viability of a twin-stick shooter in 2017.”" also saying "there [were] simply too many small developers churning out quality games in that style and genre" (Wright, 2018). As a result of this, the studio chose a "market-driven" approach, and had began work on Stormdivers, a multiplayer third-person shooter, as the genre was and remains popular even now. However, Haveri admitted that it was risky to attempt to break into this already ultra-saturated market, and as of 2020, Stormdivers appears to have been cancelled in favour of a new project.
This highlights the importance of researching the current market, as well as your audience. It is not enough to rely on your studio name being recognised and your game being successful by association. Similarly, making a sequel of a previously successful game and hoping the recognisable title will benefit is not always enough. Lead writer on The Banner Saga 3, Alex Thomas, says "“I know a lot of indie developers that are friends of ours who put out a game that did great, but the second game comes out, and they expect it to feed off the community from the first game, but the players have moved on.”" (Wright, 2018).The small team behind The Banner Saga Trilogy claim it's their strong narrative which keeps players invested. Other games such as World of Warcraft (2004) keep players coming back with constant content in the form of expansions.
 |
| Fig.2: Jurkic, 2018. Games with Unique Art Styles |
For someone such as myself who wants to work in concept art, character design, and game art, researching an art style to both fit the tone of a game and its target audience is very important; "it's recommended to align the main features of the game and its expected user experience with the visual style... In Neopets, the stylized drawings for the characters/universe appeal to children, creating a solid bond between the game and the audience." (Rocket Brush, 2022). However, it's not always the best approach to assume "X style appeals to Y audience" and stick to it as a rule. An example of this would be the Animal Crossing games, which appeal to a broad spectrum of age groups, and uses a cartoony art style; "Animal Crossing: New Horizons focuses on relaxing experience with a strong emphasis on the non-violent social interaction... Animal Crossing implements that through cartoony and toy-ish forms that convey the "playfulness" and overall friendliness of the game." (Rocket Brush, 2022).
It's also important to consider the story and theme of the game; "the art style should be able to enhance most of the game’s message, invoke feelings and emotions and help to further immerse [players] into the narrative." (Rocket Brush, 2022). The realistic style of The Last of Us (2013) would completely change the tone of a game such as Minecraft, which has a 10+ rating from the ESRB, but has a significant fanbase of children aged between 3 and 12. Similarly, using the visual style of Animal Crossing in a Call of Duty game, would completely change the atmosphere of the game, and in turn, appeal to an entirely different group of players. When considering an art style for our game jam, we took visual inspiration from Overcooked! 2 (2018), a game which appeals to and can be played by all ages. This made the designs easy to build for our 3D artist, but also had the potential to appeal to a broad audience.
 |
| Fig. 3: Nintendo, 2018. Overcooked! 2 |
Ethics are essential to good research, especially if the research involves a level of risk. Risk usually arises if the research is dealing with sensitive subjects (racism, homophobia, etc.) or involves vulnerable participants (children, hospital patients, etc.). LOW RISK would mean the research presents no greater risk than those encountered in every day life, and doesn't involve participants or sensitive themes. MEDIUM RISK involves the potential for harm, but the likelihood is low, and can be further reduced by following correct procedure. HIGH RISK would have a much larger potential for distress or harm, and may involve vulnerable participants, unlawful material, or deal with subjects that can cause offence. High risk should be avoided, and low risk be the aim for research.
It can be argued that the games industry has a dubious relationship with ethics. From loot boxes and other gambling mechanics being marketed to children, to stories of devs working 100-hour work weeks, and toxic work environments, putting the industry under scrutiny. For artists and animators working on Mortal Kombat 11 (2019), there was a push to make violent animations appear as real as possible; "“You’d walk around the office and one guy would be watching hangings on YouTube, another guy would be looking at pictures of murder victims, someone else would be watching a video of a cow being slaughtered”" (Rivera, 2019). The potential negative effects of watching this kind of content, and then working to match it in a game, were seemingly not taken into consideration; "There was also no formal process, standard procedure, or guidance available from the start for anyone who might need to step back from the violent content, or felt that their work was starting to negatively affect them" (Rivera, 2019). This is an example of high risk research, with no procedures in place to protect the people conducting it. As an artist, this is something I frequently consider when looking for references for my work. Many people will have their own boundaries around the kind of imagery they are comfortable looking at, especially when depicting violent images. But, there is no need to make a team look at potentially traumatising content in order to create a more realistic gaming experience.
Research can be either qualitative or quantitative. Qualitative research can involve usability testing, user interviews, and surveys with descriptive questions. Quantitative research utilises user support metrics, product metrics (analytics), and surveys with open-ended questions. Essentially, qualitative research is usually far more time consuming but also more detailed, and quantitative research is less detailed, but allows the researcher to gather large amounts of information. Each has its pros and cons, as large amounts of info will lack detail, but detailed info takes more time to collect. It’s good to consider which will be best when producing a game, taking into account timeframes and what level of detail of information will be needed.
Another good way to conduct research is to engage with communities of like-minded people within your industry. Attending conferences and events can help with finding new ways of doing things, and aid technical aspects of your work. Similarly, getting feedback on your work from peers, or posting to social media is also helpful. In my undergraduate course, we were encouraged to give feedback on our peer's work as it was posted to their blogs, to help them pick the best designs from their concepts, or suggest new ideas. Collaboration and feedback from others has helped me greatly in the past, and something I value in my work. I hope to become better at collaboration in the future.
Asset building
 |
| Fig.4: Spence, 2022. ZBrush Asset Progress |
 |
| Fig. 5: Spence, 2022. Detailed Asset in Maya |
As next week is Reading Week, I will have no lectures or classes to attend. Instead, I plan to work more on my 3D asset, refine my journals, and prepare for my viva presentation. I also hope I will manage to produce some personal work in this time, in order to practice using Photoshop more.
References:
WRIGHT, Steven T. 2018. 'There are too many video games. What now?' [online] Polygon. Available at: https://www.polygon.com/2018/9/28/17911372/there-are-too-many-video-games-what-now-indiepocalypse [Accessed on 25/10/2022]
DEAN, Brian. 2021. 'Steam Usage and Catalog Stats for 2022' [online] Backlinko. Available at: https://backlinko.com/steam-users [Accessed on 26/10/2022]
Rocket Brush Studio. 2022. 'HOW TO CHOOSE THE ART STYLE THAT FITS YOUR GAME' [online] Rocket Brush Studio. Available at: https://rocketbrush.com/blog/how-to-choose-art-style-for-your-game [Accessed on 26/10/2022]
RIVERA, Joshua. 2019. ''I'd Have These Extremely Graphic Dreams': What It's Like To Work On Ultra-Violent Games Like Mortal Kombat 11' [online] Kotaku. Available at: https://kotaku.com/id-have-these-extremely-graphic-dreams-what-its-like-t-1834611691 [Accessed on 26/10/2022]
Images:
Figure 1. SINGLETARY JR, Charles. 2019. Steam Storefront. [online] Shack News. Available at: https://www.shacknews.com/article/109349/steam-now-has-30000-games-on-its-storefront [Accessed on 26/10/2022]
Figure 2. JURKIC, Pavo. 2018. Games with Unique Art Styles. [online] Esports Talk. Available at: https://www.esportstalk.com/blog/best-video-games-with-unique-art-styles-15503/ [Accessed on: 26/10/2022]
Figure 3. Nintendo. 2018. Overcooked! 2. [online] Nintendo.com. Available at: https://www.nintendo.co.uk/Games/Nintendo-Switch-games/Overcooked-2-1388792.html [Accessed on: 26/10/2022]
Figure 4. SPENCE, Nel. 2022. ZBrush Asset Progress. Private Collection: Nel Spence
Figure 5. SPENCE, Nel. 2022. Detailed Asset in Maya. Private Collection: Nel Spence
No comments:
Post a Comment