Interactive Gaming 2009

Our good friend in GS9-1 is loaded in SmallWorlds. How? Ask him! But in the meantime, have a look at this piece of quality and unsurprising news:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/8425623.stm

Mmmm, this appeared to be quite a tough gig for some of you. There are only a handful (possibly 4) distinctions offered from 44 submissions. Oh dear! How did that happen? Well, let's have a look:

Criteria 1 - what you need to do here is look at a variety of games developers and explain how they work. How are they financed? How does one become a managing director? Who looks after the well being of a company? How is a company forged? Do you need good ideas, or money to succeed?

Can any of you, hand on heart, tell me that you ticked all of these boxes? Even though some people got distinctions, no one answered every question above. Most of you fail to answer a single question above and pretty much all of you completely forgot to even bother with this part of the assignment. How come?

Criteria 2 - It's great that everyone mentioned different jobs in the industry but who actually mentioned what these jobs do, and who does them? Also, how many of you compared the jobs and job roles across the indsutry (because each job and employer is different).

My main area of disappointment was despite standing in front of you for 2 hours a week for 12 weeks, some of you still managed to copy and paste big old sections from wikipedia, bungie.net and others. If you are one of those people, you might want to rethink your options because this course may not be for you.

I want individuals like Bobby L (Distinction), Bobby W (Distinction), Cam (Distinction) and others who are prepared to go away, think about the question and deliver a sterling piece of work.

Some people tried really hard (and some a little too hard). Relax! You have 2 years to work, and work hard, but shirking out and copying from websites is a bit low.

Some people have yet to submit assignment 1.1! Gasp! Oh, and just one person failed to submit the work in the required format; so their work was marked last!

I feel a little like Marlon Brando in the Island of Doctor Moreau as I write this blog to you today. You see, I am sat in a comfy chair in front of a microphone marking your work. But why Marlon Brando? Well, I'm lazy! So rather than type this blog, I am using a speech recognition tool to talk type this entry. Exciting stuff eh?

You might be interested to learn that I am marking assignments 1.1 and 1.2 in the same way! For me this makes my job very easy and it almost sanitises my feedback to you, however I do get to add the odd funny!

On the whole, I have seen a good standard of work from you and promise to provide you with the break down of stats throughout the holidays. I must tell you though, there is an element to GS9 that does not work as hard as the others. they know who they are and will be smoked out during the course of the next two years.

I am very encouraged by the standard of work I have seen because I know that those who have made a real effort will succeed in the industry. Take heed slackers!

Look in your in box over the next week for assignment 1.1 feedback at the very least.

Who said digital communications is dead?

Hey, as an intro to next year/next term: we went through this on Monday.... Also, click here for pics from last night's partay! http://nathangoredema.blogspot.com/2009/12/crazy-hey-but-thats-how-it-goes.html

This time, from a GS8 student -

http://nathangoredema.blogspot.com/2009/12/shaun-of-dead-assignment-gs8-style.html

I really don't want to do this but I feel I must. Some of you are really struggling and that ain't cool.

Here's some hints and tips for writing the Shaun of the Dead assignment...

I'd start by writing a few sentences, or one paragraph on what you actually want to say. So you could start by saying "I will be discussng the various implications on creating a Shaun of the Dead game".

Then, kick off the essay/report with an overview of the game, stating key copyright and licensing issues with say, a reference to Dead Rising and Romero if you really want to. Thius should take 2 or 3 paragraphs.

Generally follow the criteria as it comes up, so, the first criteria reflects ethics and law, so you can talk heavily about case studies affecting ethics and law in these paragraphs. The second criteria is a bout regulating bodies.

You must, must, must talk in detail about all of the regulating bodies and regulations affecting games. Look back in the past at around the time of the Slasher genre and you'll note that games were governed by the exact same body as the Slasher genre. Scratch the surface and you will find all manner of similarities in terms of shock value and controversy.

Like all reports, you should be in a position to conclude your work - so how about looking for some correlations between then and now. How have games developed? Are they gorier now than then? Why do people go crazy after playing games? All of these things separate the pass from the distinction.

I really want to see good use of functional skills English (spelling/grammar etc) and Maths (statistics/figures) to really set you apart from the rest of Confetti. You already have high standards that you have set yourselves, lets see whether you police them, eh?

Good luck people!