Crtical Reflections

Austin Rider

 

Critical Reflection #1

                For this assignment, I primarily used EBSCOhost for my research. I am still taking the route of the psychological and narrative perspectives behind video games. In my searches I used terms like psychology, narrative, character, video game, setting, horror, and behavior. My note taking was primarily the same style that I always use, using bullet points with main ideas, then some of my thoughts or other thoughts on the subject. I tried to use some quotes to back up some of the main ideas that really stuck out in my mind and that might become helpful in future work. To improve my notes, I think I could have taken more and clearer notes. Some of them appear to be a little vague, but overall they appear to be decent.

This method of research was a little more in-depth than the usual Google sort of search to find a good website source. It was often hard to find articles that related to my topic that I could use for my annotated bibliographies, but I think the ones that I chose will help in some way because their topics are pretty broad. There is everything from the story and deeper thoughts, to character traits and building, to the game itself and its mechanics, and lastly the player’s behavior and morals of decision making. As of now, my focus is basically the same as when we started, just trying to find relationships between gamer’s perspective and interpretations of video games that hold a deeper meaning that just shooting and killing for say. As of now, this choice appears to be working because there seems to be a lot of information behind this subject that can be backed up in a nice fashion.

I would hope that the work I’ve put in so far could help someone out there out in some way. It may not be the greatest put together work, but it might spark some ideas in someone’s mind or lead them in the direction that they need to go. If I were to go back and do this assignment over, I would probably put a little more details in the arguments that the authors hold in their articles. As well as more contextual information that would back up examples of my own thoughts and what relates to my research topic.

Critical Reflection #2

For this assignment, I decided to choose the good old internet to find a website to help me out. I searched for an explanation behind the horrors of video games and what draws people in. Since I'm all about horror and scary things, I found this part of the assignment quite enjoyable. I found good and helpful answers and explanations of why video games are structured the way they are, when dealing with horror. The secondary research articles also have given me useful information and a sturdy background to help back up facts and other topics that I discovered doing this portion of the assignment that may become useful in the future. The information I found on the website revolved around the ways video games are developed and what elements tend to scare us. Everything from the atmosphere, character building, darkness, the usage of children, cults and religion, and our own personal expectations are key factors in developing a video game that can get inside our head. I semi-analyzed two different video games, Silent Hill and F.E.A.R. Both of these games consists of a pleasing series that don't leave fans disappointed. For future research, I wish to know more about video games that use horror techniques, or possibly more of a narrative/decision making basis and how those game are created.

 

Critical Reflection #3

From the sources I've gathered, a lot talk about how the video game is put together. There are many different aspects that suck in players to play these games. With a diverse field of genres for really anyone to enjoy, video games also take a psychological turn in order to keep things 'interesting.' Personally, the typical point and shoot genre of video games isn't my preference. I want the video game to have an actual meaning, not saying that these types of games don't, but with genres revolving around horror and psychology, prove to be more fascinating and easier to relate to my personal flavor. These games get inside your head, they know your fears, they know what makes you weak and what scares you. Decision making in games is also one of my likings. For this aspect, our own personality can come into play. When distinguishing if we're generally good people, or if we might have a slight malevolent side, can prove interesting. The choices we make in these types of game can alter the storyline to an extent, thus getting into the players mind even more. If we reveal through a decision that we do not like death or killing things, what the game would most likely do is put you in a situation of killing someone. Thankfully, this is an alternate reality where these decisions don't necessarily mean anything at all. However, since this is a form of entertainment, similar to reading a book, or watching a movie, it could indeed have some sort of impact on the player. With these types of things available for us, we can find stories that we can relate to and that can potentially help us in our own personal endeavors. For future research, I would really like to know more about how these video games get inside our heads and mess with us to truly scare us.

Thesis: There are psychological turns on video games because it draws the audience by getting under their skin and in the mind of the player.

After Group Work: We all had our topic and opinion pretty much down, its just answering the question itself that we had a little trouble with. I need to explain how these psychological turns draw audiences in. There are psychological turns on video games because it draws the audience in by knowing their fears. Perhaps something like that?

Critical Reflection #4

Main points that I used in this portion of the assignment would be the usage of Rhetorical Knowledge: Writing (Audience, Purpose, and Form), Critical Thinking, Reading, Writing, and Research: Reading, and Writing. For the Rhetorical Knowledge, scanning through various articles and understanding the meanings of certain key aspects proved interesting. I found a lot of information that was helpful when I needed to talk about the mechanics of video games and when it comes down to the actual analysis of a video game - Silent Hill. This was also proven in the Critical... Reading. Understanding what was meant by the authors and what their stance was on different topics and view points helped develop and back up my own opinions/statements. Thus being put into the Critical.. Writing.

Critical Reflection #5

The process started with a fairly simple subject that we would hope to develop into a research paper. It started with something personal that we could relate to and was enhanced into much further detail and processes that aren't normally taken to answer a simple question. Our research had to be much more complex than just a basic answer to a question. Findings of many articles, websites, and books proved very beneficial. I enjoyed taking this course because it strived from the norm of a typical class I feel. Instead of doing exactly what we are supposed to be doing, we could kind of branch of and choose something of our own interest and it made the class more enjoyable. I feel it helped with understanding how to develop a research question in order to write an extensive paper, and it will most likely help in future classes. I understand the processes and development when it comes to creating a final product that is presentable.