BA3: Contextual Studies

The Horror Genre in Video Games

As my part of my groups contextual studies assignment I am looking at the genre horror within video games and doing a study of their western and eastern influences. There are 2 people in my group, as I said previously, focusing on the main influences of Japan and America on culture (films and books). So myself and Sophie are going to take these principles and apply them to modern and older video games which come under the genre of horror. 

We are mainly looking for cross over's and direct influences from western/eastern cultures and how they have moulded the horror genre we see today in games.  We are yet to decide the  main areas of interest, that is something I plan to talk to my group about tomorrow. I plan to talk to Stacey and Olive, see what they have found out about Japanese/American culture within their studies of film, media, books and literature and then see how I can apply that to my study of horror genre video games. 

Having said this, I have decided on my main 2 areas of focus. The 2 games I have decided to study are Resident Evil1 and Dead Space 1.

Resident Evil 1

My next plan of action was to simply post up the games trailers but I found something really interesting with Resident Evil’s trailers. The key thing to remember with Resident Evil is that it is actually a Japanese game. In Japan Resident Evil is known as “Biohazard” but due to a few key elements such as other games named biohazard and a band current to the time of release in America, the game could not be named Biohazard. This is the excerpt from an article on Kotaku explaining the reason:  

“In late 1994, Capcom Entertainment in the US was starting to ramp up marketing plans for the game that would eventually become known as Resident Evil in the US. Capcom Japan had let us know that the name of the game was going to be ‘Biohazard' in Japan, but I pointed out to the person who ran marketing at the time that it would be next to impossible for Capcom to register the name in the US.

As an example, I pointed out that a crappy DOS-based game had just come out in the US called ‘Biohazard' (not to mention the New York hardcore band of the same name) and that we'd never be able to secure the mark. As a result, the head of marketing held a company-wide contest to come up with a new name for the game.”

Anyway, moving onto my point. I was looking for simple tv trailers of Resident Evil 1 to demonstrate the game I was going to be studying, however I then came across some interesting advertisements. I am going to start with the Japanese trailer for the game. 

Japanese TV Trailer

 

• Keeps fixed camera angles even to just advertise the game.

•The music remains eerie and dark to suit the game, not making it out to sound like something it isn't. 

• I’m not going to pretend I have a clue what the guy is saying in the trailer, however, his voice sounds deep/dark, its not shouting or yelling, perhaps to add to the suspense theme of the game?

• The music is slow and not erratic, again, adding to the horror/suspense of the game trailer. It’s giving an accurate representation of the game.

The next trailer is the extended/directors cut trailer. This one has the English voice acting which means it was meant for release in America. You can instantly tell the trailer just feels…different.

American/English Voice Acting TV Trailer, Released in America 

  

• Whilst the music is still creepy, its very in your face and has a fast tempo. It suggests action to the viewer as opposed to survival horror.

• The clips from the game are all focused on action and epic, fast paced areas of the game. Anyone who has played resident evil knows that these do happen, but they aren't all the time.

This is the last of the 3 trailers I have to show. This one was releases only on American TV's as advertisement for Resident Evil 1 (& 2). The difference in focus on the game is hilarious, the game is what any gamer would describe as true survival horror, and yet somehow in this trailer, they have managed to completely distort that image of the game into something completely action orientated!

Purely American TV Trailer 

  

• The game has been completely re branded with a funny Christmas joke like opening scene.

• The scenes have been made to feel even more action-esque with sound enhancements on the explosions.

• The guitar music doesn’t really suggest survival horror, it just screams action. This is very American in style and feel in comparison to the Japanese trailers. 

Dead Space 1

Dead space is one of the true horror games left on the current gen console market worth mentioning. The first game was incredibly scary in my opinion and was truly horrific. Unlike the Resident Evil franchise, Dead Space is purely American. The point I will hope to continue to make is that despite being an American made game, there sure are a lot of references to other cultures and medias, especially from Japan. 

BA3: Digital Modeling

Something I Should’ve Posted Sooner!

I can feel time literally slipping through my fingers! My plan was to take some really lovely shots of the sketches I had done in my sketchbook at the beginning of this projects for my door but alas, as time fails me in front of my very eyes I have just taken some quick photographs to get them on here and give you a rough idea of where my ideas stemmed from. 

I should have posted these before I posted my Google SketchUp versions so you could understand where my design started and where it ended up. Ironically it has changed again anyway so I guess that makes my point pretty void but alas, here they are! 

Here you can see a selection of rough and very initial designs for the pillars around my door. I found something quite frustrating in God of War and that is that there are few doors…this really helps when you’re trying to build a GoW inspired door yourself! (Facepalm!). Anyway, what I did find were a lot of pillar so I focused my designs into them.

  There is often a lot of symmetrical shapes and pretty design work with patterns on the stone pillars or an intricate stone emblem in the centre of the top of the door.

I then had the insane idea that I could do a character themed door. Hades, the lord/god of the dead and underworld, is a crucial character in the GoW series and I think he looks awesome. I thought perhaps I should try and do a large model of his helmet above the door. As if this was a door leading to him. Alas, I soon realised this would just be too difficult to do in my time frame, alas, here are the designs (above and below).

Thinking of the possibilities of what could go on top of the door, I decided to try some header designs. Intricate stone details that would be raised above the door over the pillars. Here are my rough designs. 

 

I then decided I needed to actually try and find an example of a door in GoW3 that I liked enough to place into my design. I filtered back through my research and found the door to the City of Olympus. This door was basic enough to not contrast against the pillar design (shown next). Here is my design taking the door to the City of Olympus into consideration for inspiration. 

Here is the first door design that I did fully finished and ready to make 3D. It was what my first Google SketchUp 3D mock up was based on and I also did my orthographic drawings on it too. Because I did this so long ago, my design has since dramatically changed. This was due to my SketchUp designs just not looking good enough or GoW inspired enough. I let my fear for Maya change my designs, I made it way too over simple and it needed changing. Here are the drawings anyway to show where I started. Orthographic ¾ view. 

 

Orthographic Sketch: Side View

Orthographic Sketch: View from the top

Skip forward a bit, I designed my simple door in Google SketchUp and it just wasn’t cutting it. The pillars look terrible and far too simple. The roof top looked rubbish too. I needed a serious re think of my design. I tried to design more pillars based on the games vital architectural shapes and ideas. That is when I did this.

 

 

Conclusion…

So, the point I was at this stage was 2 semi final built 3D models in SketchUp, 1 far too basic and rubbish, the other looking slightly more realised. I decided there was no better time to dive into Maya. Now that I had a decent pillar design down, I figured the rest would come through trial and error. 

For example, I soon realised the flat, square roof & detail over the door was terrible too so I scrapped that in favour of a more commonly seen in GoW3 arched roof with stone detail. This way I could ensure my door would fit in perfectly with the game. 

I have, at this very point, got the door built in Maya and I am ready with screen shots to write up jut how I did it. I also ended up including stairs in my design which I trialled in SketchUp and asked friends which they preferred (options shown below). They all said the rounded stairs looked best. So I went for these. 

The nest post will be of the door in Maya and a (sort of ) step by step guide on how I got from A to B.

 

BA3: Contextual Studies

The Beginning of Something Terrifying!

Lots has happened since I last posted about the contextual studies project. We now have a clearer understanding of what is expected from us. The aim of this project is to produce a presentation focusing on the relation between western and eastern cultures. The brief was left pretty open for us to interpret how we felt best suited it.

I am in a group of 4 with good friends Olive, Sophie and Stacey. So far it’s been great because we are all interested in similar things so it made coming up with the title of our project really simple (details to follow). 

Today we had a mini group presentation where we were given the task of presenting our idea for the project to a handful of the students in our year. Our idea went down really well, I would say the only problem we actually face is being given the choice to do pretty much anything we want within our title space. 

Okay, so here are the details of the project. So far we have a working title which is pretty accurate of what we are doing. It is: "An Exploration into the Horror & Terror genres in Eastern & Western Culture/Media“. Our project pretty much does what it says on the tin. And by tin I clearly mean title. We are looking into Japanese and American culture and rummaging through anything horror/terror related. Today we came to the conclusion that Olive would focus her studies around horror films, Stacey will focus on books and literature and Sophie and myself will be doing studies into horror games.

Stacey pointed out to us that horror and terror are actually 2 different elements. After a quick look up on the ol’ internet  I discovered that horror is psychological, the subject gets into your head and does nasty things. Terror on the other hand, is physical. Such as an earthquake or realism. The 2 closely cross over but are classed under the main genre of “Gothic”. Our project will take a look at how these 2 different elements of “scary” (horror & terror) are portrayed in Japan and America and how they have influenced SO much of our culture.  

So, where are we at right now I hear you ask? Well, here is a list of our main areas of study so far and who is researching them: 

Stacey: Is going to stick to American/Japanese/Horror/Terror related literature/books for her part. She will also conduct the introduction by looking into where the sub genres come from i.e. Gothic genre. She will be using books and literature to bring in the whole influence side of the presentation. She has found out that most of the writers/books etc she is reading about influenced films and games. Her main areas of focus right now are:

- Stephen King
- HP Lovecraft
- Japanese ghost stories (brilliant link to Sweet home)
- Japanamerica (the book)
- Japanese Culture books generally

Olive: Is going to focus on Japanese and American horror/terror films and study how and why (etc) they are horror/terror. She will see if there are any cross over's between the Japanese versions and American versions of films (such as the 2 versions of the Grudge). Her research will include the following:

- American & Japanese Grudge & The Ring films
- Resident Evil FILMS
- She will look into what the differences are between typically Japanese horrors are, likewise with American horror films by looking at SAW & The Texas Chainsaw Massacre
- Silent Hill FILM
- Sweet Home (the film version, also a fantastic link into the resident evil games)

I am currently waiting to hear from Sophie in our group to find out what her main elements of study will be for our project. I am fairly sure she is going to study the horror and terror in the video game Alan Wake. We thought it would be good to do 2 games, one older and one newer.

I am sticking to video games, I decided to pick 2 of the most memorable horror games I could think of that I have played through and experienced, that way I can also angle my research and study of the horror within them from a personal perspective too. The 2 games I have chosen are Resident Evil (I am undecided which one I will chose yet, I don’t really want to do the whole franchise because it has changed too much, id rather focus on 1 of the original 3, ill keep you posted), and Dead Space 1. My areas of focus will be studying gameplay of these games, picking out WHERE and WHY they are scary, HOW/WHY they are horror films and seeing where they link into Olive & Stacey's research. I will be strategically picking out parts that are American horror/terror influenced and likewise with Japanese horror influences. 

Key areas I am going to consider while studying the games are music, atmosphere, character design, story, cinematic and environments. My next move is to do some historical research into the games to give a brief overview and idea on what they are and are about, then I will work on finding root influences by working with the rest of my group to find interesting links of how my games are influenced by Japanese and American horror and terror. Let the scares begin!

 

BA3: Digital Modeling

Designing the Door!

Over the Easter holidays I was trying to come  up with a solid design for my door. I had been looking relentlessly through my God of War art book for inspiration (of which I posted previously) and also watching gameplay videos, pausing at every piece of interesting architecture or door.

The stage I am at now is probably around 95% Maya ready. I am happy with my design and I have drawn it enough on Google SketchUp (another thing I learnt to use over Easter!) to fully understand my door design in 3D which I am hoping will help me with Maya!

Okay so, first things first. I actually bought a sketchbook which was exciting because its been a while since I tried to keep one even alongside a project for personal use. This is where I began my sketches of doors, archways and general architectural designs. I will take proper photographs of my sketches and post them up later. I know the process seems backwards, show you the “finished” product and THEN the designs that got me there but I haven't had time to take the photographs yet.  When I do, I can take you through the ideas for my door and why I am doing them. 

Design 1:

My sketches lead me to my first proper design which I took straight to SketchUp so I could see it in proper 3D. Here are the results. 

 

I really like the door. Something I noticed through watching playthroughs of God of War is that a lot of the architecture consists of archways, there just aren't that many doors so I took inspiration from the door to the City of Olympus which was a simple design with squares that are imprinted onto the door. 

I really do not like the roof, I was really hard to get the triangle to work in SketchUp so I just gave up. A key thing to note is the scale. God of War is full of huge buildings and everything is very imposing. I want my door to be HUGE!

Design 2:

Okay so this is my final (for now) version of the archway which will surround my door (the door will remain the same as in design 1). I had a really quick experiment with the colours & textures that Google SketchUp provides to get a further understanding on how I want my door to look. 

 

Orthographic Drawings 

Top View

 Left/Right hand view

 3 / 4 view

 Front view

Here are my colour experiments, they aren't great or by any means a representation of the final door but I just wanted to have a look to see if it made my design any stronger. The yellow colour is supposed to be a stone which is what the pillars and archway will be made of and the roof is supposed to have a typically Greek orange tile.