Tag: Passion Blogs

Many popular games get remastered or reconstructed years after their original release. The companies producing these games make a significant profit just from the re-release of the once extremely profitable games. People that were big fans of popular games tend to replay the missions and do the different story lines of the games that they like the most. While replaying games is much more inexpensive than buying a new game it results in a lack of proper updates and maintenance for the game. As technology advances, it results in the graphics being a lot less developed then the more modern games. A great example would be the heavily popularized game “Spider-Man 2” made in 2004 by Activision that is still only playable on archaic (but still fun) gaming stations such as the original Xbox and the original PlayStation. The graphics on that game are extremely lackluster compared to today’s 4K graphics that most of the games being produced today have. Another big reason why companies like Activision and Ubisoft choose to revamp or remaster popular games is to update the gaming station capabilities so that newer customers with the more recent gaming stations can play. They also make a lot more money buy reintroducing the updated and new version of the games.

Spider Man 2

Remastered games have the exact same plot and story line as the previously released game of the same name. While, revamped games have the same name and same overall theme but the plot, missions, and story line are different. The most recent example that I can think of would be the game “Call of Duty: Modern Warfare”. This game has its original that was produced in 2007 by Activision and was rated “Best Overall Game of 2007” by a video game magazine called GameSpy. The remastered versions which is basically the same game but with enhanced features and much better graphics garnered a significant amount of profit when it was released in 2017 by the same company. The revamped versions of “Modern Warfare” had a completely different plot and story line and overall had a much more modern day transition from each mission throughout the game. Having played and completed the campaign mode on all three of these games, In my own opinion each has their own individual benefits and I would definitely play all of them again. I think that I really enjoyed the newest version of Modern Warfare because I personally believe it was one of Activision’s best campaigns to come out of their company in the last couple years.

Revamped Modern Warfare

 

Religion plays an extremely large role in the lives of most people in the world. They are very devout in there beliefs or they may not even follow it that closely but to most it is a large part of their individuality. Although, there are a big amount of individuals that do not follow religion to closely called Atheists. They still are surrounded by religion on a day to day basis meaning that they are still heavily influenced by it. The many different types of religions are present in most of today’s increasingly modern world whether it be on electronic billboard ads on the side of the road or just a religious affiliated group posting on a forum. This has also taken a big step into the video game community with religion playing a large role in some games. In games like Far Cry 5, religion is the entire focus of the game. There is a cult leader named Joseph Seed and he puts a lot of his faith in his religion so in turn so do his followers. Although, the game is technically a first person shooter. The heavy dependency on faith is a big part as to why it so popular around the world.

The only other issue that can occur with such a extreme use of faith and religion in a video game is how they producers and developers chose to portray the religion and whether it fits the actual ideology of the faith. For example, there is a game about a cartoon “sack person” character and he goes on different missions doing random tasks to win the game. The game is obviously a cartoon-like puzzle game that has no obvious religious affiliations but the game chose to include audio from the Islamic holy book called the Quran. It was forced to crop out that audio because most countries didn’t want anyone to be offended but it is extremely controversial for a game made for seven and up children to be promoting a religion. Games also chose to make up their own religions as a way of streamlining the plot. In Fallout 4, there is an extremely radical group called the Children of the Atom who’s sole purpose is to gather around a not detonated nuclear bomb and pray to it as if it is their god. They also cause a bit of chaos for the main protagonist. Religion is in so many different games and has so many different effects to the plot of it.

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Far Cry 5

Fallout 3

Bias due to cultural differences is very prevalent in the video game community. Countries ban games for having a rude message added on a wall in a side mission. It is not hard for a country to end partnerships with companies over disagreeing political views. Many games currently have a message before the initial start up of the game that states that there is no political, cultural, and social bias in regards to the game and usually that is enough for countries to not mess with the release of the game but lately it is becoming a hazard for companies. Different countries are taking a stance on whether the message actually counts as a good standard for promoting a safe gaming community. A good example of this would be the gaming franchise, Assassins Creed, on their very first game they released they put up the disclaimer that set a known standard for the game even thought it had the set rating of M for mature for the United States’s ESRB rating standard. ESRB stands for Entertainment Software Rating Board and as the primary rating system for video games in the United States there is a bit of a harsher time getting approved games in other countries with that rating.

A good solution for this would be to have a universal rating system that could be beneficial for the video game manufacturers and the different countries because than most games would be able to be approved at a faster rate and we could have a better control on more obscene video game content and have a globally recognized way of promoting games and hopefully stop the excessive banning of games that are deemed by countries to be offensive or inappropriate to be released in their respective countries. Also having a set standard for rating video games would allow minor glitches to be caught at an much more efficient way due to the fact that there will be a greater audience playing the game at one time so it will allow for more people to have a chance to catch things that may be less obvious to a certain server. It will also boost overall revenue for the countries the games are being played in as well as the manufacturers and game producers. A universal standard gaming rating system would be beneficial for everybody involved in the gaming community. It will also address censorship issues in more controversial countries and hopefully bring out a greater dialogue about the community.

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Assassins Creed Disclaimer Message

As sexuality becomes less stigmatized in the more developed technological age, how does it affect such a major platform like video games. In the United States, gay marriage was legalized in June of 2015. I remember sitting in my mom’s room playing games on my iPod touch when I looked over to the television where my mom was watching the news and  the words “GAY MARRIAGE LEGALIZED” were sprawled out on an extremely large flashing rainbow. My first thought was how I was glad this finally happened. Being a terribly uneducated kid on the topic of the LGBT community, I did not realized how big of a deal this actually was, like it was such a big step in regards to equality. I grew up in a not so religious Islamic household so when people first interacted with me and we would discuss how my religious and ideological views are very different than those that live in primarily Islamic nations, they would be very surprised. When you hear about Muslims hating gays and them wanting to stone them its mostly the more radical views of the Quran. I never understood why people would first come to associate hatred with something they know next to nothing about.

Many of the more radical Islamic practices lived in countries like Saudi Arabia and the UAE. These countries have strict laws against homosexuality and anything basically gay. Video games are just a fictional method of interacting with a virtual story line so to ban an entire game due to a minor inconvenience is incredibly stupid in my point of views. The game, Mass Effect 2 and 3, it is an action role-playing game that consists of a space alien struggle throughout the game. The game was banned in the UAE because the player has the opportunity of having a homosexual story line added in a quest. One singular part of a series of games impacted the UAE government so hard that they were inclined to cancel the release of it in their country. A Japanese game called Valkyrie Drive: Bhikkhuni, is a very graphic and sexual game regarding two women who have been infected by a virus. These two women are engaged in a relationship and as a result the ban was set in Saudi Arabia to ban this game. Although, the content of the game is very graphic and sexual. The primary reason the game was banned was do to the strong homosexual theme throughout the entirety of the game.

In the middle of April in 2012, a phone app came out and took the world by storm. This app was called Candy Crush and it was the start of a worldwide epidemic. Looking at the phone usage by individuals gradually getting greater and greater in the past couple of years is insane to see. In 2012, Candy Crush was the biggest game being played around the world. At one point, it was the number one game on the Android and IOS app stores in majority of the countries globally. It led to several similar, copycat games which mimic it’s core idea into different items such as colors or vegetables. The key design of Candy Crush is matching three or more of one variety of cartoon like candies to unlock another level. It’s simplistic design is what led to millions of people playing the game on a daily basis. It is insane how many people play these games. What is even crazier is the amount of adults playing these games. These games that were designed for children with its animated expressions appealed to adults in a way that had never been seen before.

A big unintended outcome from the release of these games was addiction. People were getting addicted to the game really easily. This massive phenomena of colorful colors wrapped in a game was inciting people into spending hours of their day playing games. Even to this day, my own mother plays this game for hours after she gets off work. She tells me that it is one of the only things that helps her relax before she goes to bed. Which is understandable because it seems like a simple, menial task to get her thoughts off of work. That is until you look into the design of the game and how much extensive thinking goes into winning the higher levels. If I were to just pick up the game and start at level 5,000 without any prior knowledge of the game. It would be one of the most difficult things that I have done due to the fact that the previous levels train your brain to look for patterns that it would not normally look for. The reason why people are getting addicted is because of the natural response your body expresses when you solve something difficult as a reward it releases endorphins and serotonin which makes you want to do it again to have the same response. It had gotten so bad to the point where addiction centers had to start specializing in Candy Crush rehab centers.

(On the left is Level 100 of Candy Crush and on the right is level 5,000 of Candy Crush)

Picture Sources Below

Level 100

Level 5,000

 

Everyone has heard about the most recent mass shootings that have happened in Texas, Ohio, and my home state Virginia. The United States has sadly become the leader in the most amount of mass shootings in a single year. As we navigate the increasingly difficult time of grief and hardships surround mass deaths, Americans are looking for a place to put the blame on the reasoning for these incidents. In the past few months, there have been multiple assumptions in the media that violent FPS (first person shooters) games may be the cause for the sudden rise in acts of domestic terrorism.

Don’t get me wrong, I can personally say that some of these games are too violent. There was a mission on Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 that was designed for individuals to walk freely into an airport and shoot with no mercy at all of the civilian NPCs (non-player characters). All the civilian NPCs were running away from the bullets in a very similar fashion as those in a legitimate shooting have done in the past. I remember as a little 12 year old girl that had just gotten into playing FPS with my dad, I was very shocked and confused. It was one of the first games that I had gotten into playing by myself and when the warning came up for graphic content I thought nothing of it. I went and continued with the mission because I thought it was just concerning a tragic death of a main character or something irrelevant like that. I was extremely wrong in my thinking. As soon as I walked out of the elevator at the start of the mission, the game prompted me to open fire on everything moving. Although, the mission was supposed to indicate how global wars were put into effect and emphasize the plot more. It was a very controversial thing to put into a video game. The sad thing about it was that it was the first time I realized that there are some really messed up things you can find on video games.

In the past couple of months, media sites have put an emphasis on the effect that violent video games are having on the mental state of teens and young adults which may be prompting them to go commit acts of terrorism. I don’t necessarily see it as that being the cause. In my first week of college, my science professor has restated multiple times that correlation does not equal causation and I think that’s true for mass shootings and video games. There is no definite way of viewing a connection between mass shootings and violent games. I hope though that in the future, we can foster a healthier community in such a violent game space to essentially prevent the possibility of their being link between mass shootings and FPS.

Game: (Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2)