Violence in Video Games

My topic I will be writing my essay on will be Violence in video games. There are a lot of controversies surrounding this topic in recent times and I find it very interesting to do some more research about this topic and what other people think. This has been everywhere in the news, magazines and even in the newspapers so this is no news to anyone. I will be using various researches sources such as magazines, article and internet sources to do my research. The reason why I chose to do my essay on this topic was, as a gamer I like violence in video games and I find it a little boring to play games with little violence it them. So choosing this topic will help me express myself freely in a way I would like and argue for and against violence in Video games. This research at the end will give me a broad idea about the effects violence can have in a video games and children.

The Impact of Video games as virtual worlds for positive learning and development.

Here is a brief abstract of the topic I will be researching this semester.

Video games have for many years been researched as activities that promote the learning of an individual as they can allow for personal, meaningful experiences and developmental growth. Virtual worlds are increasingly having a more significant impact upon society as an effective method of aiding in human development and learning through the participation in an activity that many class as fun and entertaining. The real world value of video game play cannot be underestimated as further study into the theory and practice of creating a game allows for increasingly more accurate representations of important aspects intrinsic to positive human development. This does not even take into consideration the abundance of games intentionally designed to promote learning that are now being crafted for specific purposes, allowing individuals to have a truly interactive and experiential method from which to learn skills. While there are certainly stories of people allowing video games to impact their lives to their own detriment, in general and with regards to the vast majority, video game play promotes the development of the individual. It is through participation in video gaming as a voluntary activity, that a person becomes challenged to overcome obstacles and in many cases is not only developing personal skills but is also learning what can be classed as the virtual embodiment of cultural and social practices.

Alex Wallace - Product Placement and Marketing within Video Games

The topic that I am going to be studying is on product placement and marketing within video games. In recent years product placement has grown exponentially due to rising costs in the making of a video game. These can either be seen as just subtle advertisements in the game world or as something more integral to a game such as a gadget representative of a real product.

I am going to looking at how this aspect of games has come about and grown into something that is now considered commonplace amongst big budget video games. I am also going to be looking at how this affects the game and how the player is expected to react when exposed to such marketing techniques.

To do this I am going to be using the internet to research specific games that express product placement frequently throughout games. I will be looking at other articles that are on the topic and I will also be drawing a comparison between product placement in movies and in video games to see how they are becoming similar and the reasons why.

Student Research Tagging

In the right hand bar of the blog there is a section called "Student Research" as content is posted to the blog that is relevant to different students research topics you will be able to click on your name (and if people make sure that they tag posting correctly) we will be able to collate research.

As you post, type the name into the tag section, if the name already exists in the tag library it will appear and you can click on it to add it.

I think that it might also be useful if you subscribe to the comments sections of your abstracts or related posts

to do this click on the comments link of the post and then click on subscribe

What is the role of video games within education?

Video games have become a standardised part of the entertainment industry and there are many people out there that would call them selves ‘gamers’. These ‘gamers’ use video games as a form of entertainment and escapism as an everyday thing but there are such things as video games that aren’t designed solely for their entertainment value. Education has been known to use video games as an education tool but it doesn’t appear to be a widely used or popular thing. The potential for video games to be used along side the regular text book or to even replace them is uncertain. It is not widely known how they are being used now and of what audience they appeal to best. Are computer and video games successful in educating everyone to a standard that is needed or are they used more as support tools? Their will be research into peoples attitudes from an industry and public view as well as seeing how they have changed over time. There are other areas of education other than the schools and university course criteria such as making people aware and educating them on such issues as bullying within schools and how to cope and what to do. The genre of serious video games is another area of video games used as education.

Presentation Abstract - Resi Evil and Bio Terrorism

Hey People

I have posted my Presentation Abstract on the blog for people to view and see what they think of my presentation if that is OK. I was going to put it into fileshare website, but my account is not working at the moment so I have put it into the end of this post (Sorry about that)

Title of Presentation/Essay:

Resident Evil: Code Veronica X and the Portrayal of Bio Terrorism in Video Games.

Presentation Synopsis

Terrorism is a subject that been put into widespread discussion over the last 30 years and has become the main focus point for many forms of media ranging from films such as World Trade Centre; telling the story of two police officers trapped in the rubble of the World Trade Centre wreckage after the 9/11 attacks to TV Series such as 24.

But no form of media has more coverage of the terrorism subject than Video Games which over the last few years, has basically covered all areas of terrorism ranging from the Hunt for Osama Bin Laden in America’s Top 10 Most Wanted to Bio Terrorism in games like Resident Evil

For this assignment, I have chosen to focus on the title, Resident Evil: Code Veronica X and its portrayal of Bio Terrorism within the game; this is because I feel that it’s storyline and the use of the series characters creates a realistic scenario of what could happen if Bio-Hazards such as the T-Veronica virus were created in real life and what could happen if an organisation such as The Agency or the games main antagonists; The Ashford Family wanted to use them for their own personal gains.