You certainly can see a trend in video games becoming more emotional. We saw it happen to movies first and now is filtering to video games. The reason why? Technological advances in tools and software are allowing art and design to advance to never before seen levels.
The emotional response that video games are generating can and should be capitalized on by game designers and game artists. Increased graphics capabilities has provided the means by where increased emotional responses are generated.
Video Games have long been trying to capture the emotions of it's players to generate more income. This is a good thing for designers and artists to be aware of and to accentuate in their careers. Having this awareness helps the designer/artist to think more creatively and get in the heads of their audience.
Experience based designing centers around capturing the vision or emotional impact that you want your gamer to go through. Developing your ideas has never been so easy or so difficult as a game designer. A good game makes sure that the player experiences the vision that you are creating. It is emotional. Look at what's going on in the world. There's conflict, fear, intolerance, anger, happiness, and joy. Your game ideas need to reflect these and capture the emotions of the players.
Being a game designer with the technology where it is today has made the gaming world open up to expressing emotions more thoroughly. A good game designer incorporates this with their vision by letting the gamer have emotions in harmony with the vision of the game. This experience based game designing relates heavily back to the story and how well the designers keep the vision of the story intact.
Creating a good game is based a lot on how true to the vision of the experience the game designer stays. Staying the course and remaining true to this experience allows the player to experience a wide variety of emotions not dictated by the game but by the player through the experience.
Game designers and artists can capitalize on video games made this way in a variety of ways. First, there are more job opportunities with the technology of today. Job opportunities that allow for designers and artists to remain true to the experience they are trying to create. They can also capitalize on video games being more emotional by creating an environment where a wide array of emotions can be experienced.
Staying true to the story and experience is key in captivating players with an emotional response that they will want to come back to time and again.
Copyright 2006 Todd Harris
