CATS Log Book
Compare and Contrast
Character Biography
Log Book
Music Video
Comparing two different types of media
Games and films are both very popular media in the world, I want to compare the two and see what would be a more successful industry for a business. I will be comparing how much money each industry makes and costs as well as some vital arguments on which is better. Games and films are also made from one another so comparing the money each made would be a great way to compare the two as they will have the same audience.
Both are very different however they are both quite similar in that they try and draw the audience into the media and make them feel very much a part of it. A film you are watching the life of someone whereas in games you are controlling the life of someone and in many newer games you get to change the whole course of the games. Fahrenheit is a great example of a game that throughout you change the ending and the turnout. It allows you to change the relationships of the characters in it, from falling in love with someone and them dying or staying away from them and in some events prevent them from dying, but this also has a twist on the other parts of the game with future acquaintances.
There are a few games I would like to cover however one title I would like to cover would be Tomb Raider. This started out in 1996 as a game for the PlayStation 1 and was one of the biggest gaming hits. It had a female lead character which meant it opened up to a wider audience with women and teenage girls wanting to play due to it been diverse. Their was also a wide male audience for this game as the character was an attractive smart British woman, with a perfect figure. This soon lead onto a blockbuster hit, and while there are still a lot of women having lead roles in films, there is not many action films that star a female lead character, however since, there have been many films such as Underworld and Resident-Evil starring female leads, however both having a game counterpart.
The release date of “Lara Croft: Tomb Raider” was 2001 and it had quite a big impact on viewers, however many of the gamers where really unhappy with it and thought it could have been a lot better but it accumulated $47.7 million at the box office in the opening weekend and grossed nearly $300 million worldwide.
It stuck to the same general idea as the games and in many ways it was very similar however there was something about it that made it seem not quite right; this was probably the fact that you are not playing the character “Lara Croft”.
“Resident Evil” was another title that I should cover it was one of the first survival horror games along with Alone in the Dark and it sparked off the craze with the survival horror genre, with games such as Clocktower been another big hit. A few games were released prior to film development, however when the film was released unlike the Tomb Raider film it was seen as more of a success however the strange thing about this is that Resident Evil has more of a fixed audience. This did not profit as much as “Tomb Raider” but my opinion is that this film was a lot better than I at first expected. Another comparison is that the Resident Evil franchise has sold almost 40 million which if put into figures means they have probably made around £150,000,000.
A film that was made before the game was “The Lord of the Rings” this really wasn’t anywhere near as successful as the film, but the three films are some of the highest grossing films in history and would be near impossible for any game to match however starred some of the best cast and crew in Hollywood. The games were all RPG games which was a genre that best suited the style of the films and would have attracted the same audience however there wasn’t anywhere near enough advertisement or publicity given for the games.
DVD Sales are like game sales, games normally cost 4 times as much but the film industry has the cinema which gains a huge audience worldwide however with games its either a hit or miss with films viewing the film in the cinema means you can see if you do you can buy it on DVD. Cinema money can often pay for producing the DVD's and other formats it might be released on such as Blu-Ray whereas Games have no money to gain prior to release. There is game testers which give feedback but by just releasing the game there is nothing to say how many will sell in each country which is always a problem financially, make too many, lose a lot of money, don't make enough, you'll have to run back to the duplicators and distributors to arrange everything again which will cost more if you’re not buying in bulk.
There is always market research for this type of thing to give a rough estimate and can often help to provide the best plans of product type to market, but nothing is ever certain and can really affect the profit. To add to it most of the costs will need to be taken out prior to the game release which means as a starting business, they will not have much money of their own to be spreading on the things like this. Along with this, loans will be an option and if they can’t get any backing funds, they will end up paying back a lot more than what they borrowed.
Advertising is one of the biggest things to make the audience aware of your product, game advertisements aren't very common on standard television channels as it is harder to get an audience however it is easier for films to advertise as everyone watching T.V. will most probably own all the necessary equipment to play a DVD and if someone is watching an action series on T.V. they will probably watch an action film if it is advertised on T.V.
The thing with films is that they are much easier to copy than Games are and nowadays, 'chipping' consoles is less frequent than it was when they was first released. Films are much smaller in file size than games as they can be compressed to a very small file which means downloading is much easier. Games however struggle to be compressed as it will lose quality on the textures and models however not only this most games are encoded, as a simple term, like a ZIP folder where everything is placed in one file, much of the game content is stored in a file like this which would mean opening up each and every single game file to edit the size of it, and a program to compress it would be extremely difficult and would vary from game to game. However there are still quite a lot of people that copy games however it’s not as easy as it was when the PlayStation was released.
Whilst films suffer from piracy games have a major downfall in that people can now get them cheaper due to trade-ins. Obviously for the developers, this is not a great industry as it means that they are not getting money from the shops that sell them as new. A study also showed that “At the revenue level, roughly one in every three pounds spent on a game is spent on a pre-owned title” whereas selling second hand titles can happen with films, the money and trade-in prices for films are near pointless for a trade-in and whilst it still happens, it turns out you would be more beneficial just keeping the film than making £2-3 back from it. With games, they retail at around £40 and the trade-in price for most games within the first month or two of release is £30-£35, because of this you can easily add £5 and get another game to complete so with about £60 you can keep yourself entertained with around 5 games which is purchased new would end up costing around £200.
Both have quite a lot of things to consider such as getting it rated for violence, both films and games go through a classification process, normally done by the BBFC (British Board of Film Classification) or on games PEGI (Pan European Game Information.) In a film it is much harder to remove a lot of the violence if they are not targeting the right audience however if a game wants to remove content to make it more suitable for a younger audience or even make something more violent for older people then it is much easier too do, a study by the BBFC stated that “Video game players indicated that they were less likely to become emotionally engrossed in a game than they would be if watching a film or a television programme. Many stated that the fact that they have to actively participate in the action, by making decisions, pressing buttons and moving characters, means that they are constantly made aware that they are playing a game and that gameplay is not real life.” So it would be much easier for a violent video game to get a lower classification however most games where you can freely kill an innocent out of choice are 18. This also costs a lot of money around £1200 to get a classification so editing the game and running it back through will only cost more money.
In conclusion, a film is possibly the most beneficial industry to move into but looking at all the research most games feature an iconic character, which is much easier to invent than trying to find the perfect actor who will charge millions for the lead role in a film. Along with this the software to develop a game is much cheaper than a lot of the equipment and production materials for a film.
I think for sequels, films normally accumulate more as a trilogy, but when they extend it over a trilogy they normally flop, games however keep running for example; there are a handful of Resident Evil games, there is the obvious 1-5 that are out now, but then there was others such as Code Veronica X and they are still selling in the millions. A lot must be considered before either business is entered, game development isn’t cheap and it is harder to find funding for but in the long run it is much cheaper than films, whereas funding for films is much easier. Both industries normally start out with recognition such as an iconic game such as worms or a low budget film like Dead Mans Shoes to get the developer or director some recognition for their work, after this it will be much easier to show what they can do and get funding. Overall I would say that games are the better industry to work in however films are where the money lies.
References:
http://www.sanfranciscochinatown.com/events/tombraiderinterview.html
http://www.sbbfc.co.uk/home.asp
http://www.sbbfc.co.uk/Site%20Articles/gameon.asp
http://www.pegi.eu
http://www.gamesbrief.com/2009/04/nearly-1-in-every-3-game-sales-at-game-group-is-pre-owned/
Character Biography
Name: Acacia
Age: 23
Hometown: Africa
Acacia was born in Africa, named after the genus of plantation, derived from the Greek word “ακις (akis)” meaning “sharp point” as the first born to two Australian parents. He grew up in a rich household in the middle of a small town normally reserved for tourists. He went out a lot into the wild as a child and gained an understanding for animals; he could communicate with them and had a natural gift for being able to make the sounds of them. He, at the age of 12 left his family for the wild and has since never returned to his parents.
He grew a bond with an African Elephant, using Ivory from his tusks to create sharp, pointed weapons; he protects the animals from hunters and hustlers. There once was a family of tourists who got lost in the African Rainforest, to survive they killed a small rabbit to cook, awakening the next morning to the sight of his dead parents was 14-year-old Uzoma, which in African means “follow the right road.”
He left the wild and was found by a group of hunters who took him in, he never spoke a word to them, his face was always emotionless, until he shot an animal, a smile would sweep his face. He grew up for several years hunting the animals moving from area to area until he reached a town he once visited, hearing the myth of a plant that would protect the animals from hunters, slaying them with the sharpest of thorns and anyone that had ever pointed a gun at an animal would be shown no mercy.
Word was passed from each whistle of a bird, warning of a nearby hunter, and no matter where the whistle would be, travelling on the back of a cheetah, was Acacia, a myth, following the right road, ready to hunt the hunters.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acacia
http://www.20000-names.com/female_african_names_02.htm
Log Book
Week 1 – This was our introduction the second semester describing what we would be doing and what we would have achieve along with a bit about time management.
Week 2 – In the second week we was told to develop a character to present to the rest of the group. It was just a conceptual design and did not have to entirely represent our finished design.
Week 3 – We developed the character and showed off the concept and the background of the character, we received some feedback from the group and gave constructive criticism on work for others.
Week 4 – This week we watched a few music videos from bands we liked and were told to think up some ideas for creating our own music video for our own choice of song.
Week 5 – Half Term Break
Week 6 – We spoke to people about our idea and presented it in front of the class receiving criticism and giving feedback on others.
Week 7 – In this week we had to determine the reading age of certain documents by reading how many syllables there was in a line along with the lengths of sentences and paragraphs.
Week 8 – We read through an essay this week continuing the reading age and deciding which one was easier for us.
Week 9 – We learnt about essay writing, that anything in quotation marks does not count towards the final word count, learning to avoid all types of plagiarism, if your copying from something make sure quotation marks are used other wise it will be classed as your own words, rephrasing something is classed as summarising which is putting things in your own words otherwise it could be classed as plagiarism, to add to this reference must be used appropriately.
Week 10 – Lesson was cancelled.
Music Video
Verse 1
And I'd give up forever to touch you
Cause I know that you feel me somehow
You're the closest to heaven that I'll ever be
And I don't want to go home right now
In the first verse there will be two people together (boy and a girl) playing around and laughing just as friends but the girl then goes and kisses another guy (her boyfriend) and the other guy looks upset to see this, he then grabs his coat to go home.
Verse 2
And all I can taste is this moment
And all I can breathe is your life
Cause sooner or later it's over
I just don't want to miss you tonight
In this verse he says bye to the boyfriend and shakes his hand he then goes to the girl and hugs her. A camera is aimed at his face as he takes a breath and holds her as he looks like that hug means everything he then lets go and smiles and turns around.
Chorus
And I don't want the world to see me
Cause I don't think that they'd understand
When everything's made to be broken
I just want you to know who I am
The camera then spins around him so the boyfriend is seen in one rotation of the camera, then is gone the next and the two are running after each other in a field laughing and smiling, chasing each other and playing.
Verse 3
And you can't fight the tears that ain't coming
Or the moment of truth in your lies
When everything seems like the movies
Yeah you bleed just to know your alive
In this verse the girl then argues with her boyfriend and throws a glass at the wall, she then holds her hand and looks down as a shard of glass cut her hand.
Chorus
And I don't want the world to see me
Cause I don't think that they'd understand
When everything's made to be broken
I just want you to know who I am
Chorus
I don't want the world to see me
Cause I don't think that they'd understand
When everything's made to be broken
I just want you to know who I am
In the last two choruses and the interlude the cut in her hand heals up and the two are seen playing with each other again in a field and smiling, holding hands until the girl hugs the guy and the fall to the floor smiling together as she leans in to kiss him.
Outro
I just want you to know who I am
I just want you to know who I am
I just want you to know who I am
I just want you to know who I am
The guy then turns around in the room with the boyfriend and she hugs him and kisses him as he walks out the house and walks down the path to the gate, the camera then aims at his face as we see over his shoulder the girl come out the door as he turns around to a fade out.