Researching every topic in project 2
Race, Religion & Culture
Race in games
Through interactive game play, players learn about race through the types of characters that are portrayed in the virtual reality. The way racial groups are portrayed in video games affects the way video game players perceive defining characteristics of a racial group.The presence or absence of racial groups affects how players belonging to those racial groups see themselves in terms of the development of their own identity and self-esteem.
Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Race_and_video_games
Religion in games
Video game developers use religious and spiritual themes to involve the player more deeply in the game. Video game developer Shigeru Miyamoto, who used to play outside as a child, used his experiences and memories of exploring the forest and discovering a Buddhist temple in the design of his video games. Canadian developer BioWare (Mass Effect, Dragon Age) has in its offices several encyclopedias on religion, as well as the Book of the Dead.
The negative portrayal of religions has been criticized.
Religious elements are used in two ways: explicit and implicit. They are seen side-by-side in video games and do not exclude each other. Religion in Mass Effect, for instance, can be understood as an "unseen character".
An explicit reference to a religious or spiritual concept is one that is clear to what it is referring. These can be based upon real-world religions, but also on fictional ones. Stories, motifs and names of characters from religious texts are used as reference points.
Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religion_and_video_games
Mental Health Awareness
Mental Health awareness in games
Website with ideas of puzzles and Games for people with mental health issues:
Source: https://www.mind.org.uk/need-urgent-help/how-can-i-distract-myself/games-and-puzzles/
There is games like geoguessr,Puzzles like jigsaws and Agar.io.
Mental Health awareness in games
His YouTube series Low Batteries examines how video games help players cope with their mental health struggles. It's based on his own experiences.
"For pretty much my whole life I've used video games as a support tool to help me deal with difficult times," he tells Newsbeat.
If anxiety or depression overwhelms him, he often dives into a virtual world to "stop my internal monologue from having such a prominent place in my brain".
He believes playing games too much is often a symptom of wider mental health issues, rather than a cause of them.
Source: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/newsbeat-44662669
Depression Quest
A simple text adventure, Depression Quest tasks players with making it through their days as someone with depression. Through a series of choices, players must do their best to maintain their social circle, hold down their job, and otherwise make it through the day, with status descriptions representing the impact of whether or not they’re speaking to a therapist, on medication, or currently being hit by their depression. Due to their illness, however, the player’s choices become more limited as the game goes on, eventually leaving players with as few as one option to proceed regardless of the consequences. Depression Quest can be a frustrating experience, but also an accurate depiction of some of the daily struggles those with depression face.
Found on padlet
https://gatesheadcollegelive.padlet.org/heather_penten1/Celebratedifference
Pry
This simple iOS game seeks to convey the challenges veterans face living with post-traumatic stress disorder, offering a new take on text-based story games. Focused on a soldier who has returned home from war, Pry allows players to zoom toward and away from text and braille hanging in the air to open new pieces of information about what he experienced during his service. The longer players spend focusing on a memory or topic, the harder it becomes for the soldier to bear the memory, which forces the player to leave once it becomes too difficult. By the end of the game, the memories block out images of the real world, offering a view of what can result from a constant struggle against PTSD.
Physical & Hidden Disabilities
Hidden Disabilities
Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4NGe4dzlukc
Making Games Better for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing | Designing for Disability
I think that this is great for people that are Deaf or Hard of Hearing because it gives them an opportunity to play there favorite games even with disabilities which may make their life better because they can enjoy games with subtitles that may suggest what is going on in each scene by adding the sounds of the effects in the subtitles.
Physical Disabilities
Age Related Issues
Gamers are getting older and older. One of the unfortunate aspects of aging is the gradual loss of flexibility in joints and difficulties moving as fast or as well as one used to. Gamers can get degenerative diseases like arthritis. Games that require much physical partitipation, such as “Dance, Dance Revolution”, may not be physically possible. Controllers can cause problems for an increasingly older population, because there is often a gradual loss of muscle tone, making fine movements more difficult. Other factors like Parkinson’s disease can also affect the ability to control a game. Therefore games often require highly trained motoric skills and fast reaction speeds may not be playable and/or appealing for aging gamers.
Source: http://game-accessibility.com/documentation/gaming-with-a-physical-disability/
This is what an article said about making games more accessible for people with disabilities.
There are two important aspects for making games accessible for people with a physical disability.
1 – The first aspect is the adaptation of the way of controlling a game. This enables gamers to control the game with a specific remapped or adapted interface. Some gamers are only able to use a limited number of controls and might need grouping the controls in order to fulfill al the actions that need combined actions.
2 – The second aspect is the adaptation of game play or extending the game itself with extra functionality to make the game (more) accessible. The ability to turn on slow-motion game play (often referred to as bullet-time) helps gamers in very difficult passages in a game. The option to reduce the number of controls is very important for gamers that are limited to only a few controls at a time. The ability to remap controls is essential in order to support different external controllers.
We put fun and inclusion back into the lives of people with physical disabilities by helping them to play video games.
By using technology ranging from modified joypads to eye-control, we're finding a way for people to play to the very best of their abilities.
But we're not just doing it for fun. By levelling the playing field, we're bringing families and friends together and having a profoundly positive impact on therapy, confidence and rehabilitation.
Source: https://www.specialeffect.org.uk/
Link with more Information: https://www.cnet.com/news/street-fighter-brolylegs-disabled-gamers-hardware-ablegamers-xbox-special-effects-software-players/
Gender in games
Sexualization
The portrayal of women in video games has been the subject of academic study and controversy since the early 1980s. Recurring themes in articles and discussions on the topic include the sexual objectification and sexualization of female characters, done to appeal to a presumed male audience, as well as the degree to which female characters are independent from their male counterparts within the same game. Research on exposure to sexualized media representations of women in television and magazines has asked whether it reduces male compassion toward women, and reduces women's perceptions of their desire and suitability for various vocations.
Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gender_representation_in_video_games
Sexuality in games
Description: Games have reached the point where realistic portrayals of sex and adult relationships are possible, but what does this mean to us as developers? How much responsibility do we have in addressing issues of sexism and sexuality, and are we inadvertently making statements about what is acceptable, even when we don't mean to say anything at all? Our industry is struggling with a conflict between the desire to be taken seriously as an art form, and the desire to avoid addressing social issues because what we make are "just games." These things have implications on our sales, and while they can be addressed, it can only happen if we are willing to acknowledge that greater discussion of the topic within the industry is merited.
Source: http://www.gamasutra.com/view/news/194571/Video_Sexism_and_sexuality_in_games.php
Eric Spiekermann
Saul bass
More Research on Physical & Hidden Disabilities my chosen topic
Tiago plays with his eyes
About Tiago
Tiago, who's an engaging and sparky five year-old, has cerebral palsy. He finds it difficult to control his limbs, but he was already confidently using an eye-controlled computer to communicate and do his school work before we met him.
He was desperate to extend the use of his eye-gaze computer to play games, so he visited our Games Room where our team matched his abilities and interests to appropriate activities. You can see the fun he had in the short video below.
This was just the start of a welcome journey into computer play for Tiago, and after the visit we worked with him at home, creating personalised software to allow him to enjoy games and activities like Club Penguin and Moshi Monsters online.
Ajay playing video games with adapted controllers
About Ajay
Here's Ajay, an IT support analyst with spinal muscular atrophy, explaining what it means to regain the ability to enjoy video games. He hadn't been able to play since he lost his hand dexterity when he was 17 years old, but we introduced him to a chin-controlled joystick and voice control setup that's got him back in the game.
"Initially I wanted to play every game because I was so excited," he said. "SpecialEffect have given me back something I lost many years ago."
In this video Ajay, who uses a head-controlled mouse to control his PC at work, talks about how essential games are for him to maintain a good work/life balance.