UNIT01-A02&A03

What Is A Game ?

What_is_a_game

Unit 01 – AO4: Explore and describe how meaning is created in media products through the interaction of different elements

Colour

The colours shown in this peice of gamplay are very bleak and washed out. The colours give a good representation of the enviroment that the clip is in as it looks dull and isolated. The colour in the enviroment look very discrete not taking the impact away from the foreground content but gives a strong sense of realism. The colours of the chacters also help the player identify who the good and bad characters are as the good characters have lighter shades of clothing on which include a brightly coloured Mexian poncho worn by John Marston the main protagonist. I think the dull colours from the envrioment and sky to the characters, animals and vehicles.

Imagery

The imagery shows an action packed battle featuring the protagonists and antagonists as they gun fight on horse back protecting a train from blowing up. The content you can see on screen immediatly give the player an understanding of the scenario of the mission. The clip is filled with rich vibrant landscapes and very detailed featured such as snakes, armadillo’s and birds. The Characters and animals have their own unique looks which gives them all a different personality which makes it more interesting to play as them.

Music

There is a strong interaction between diegetic and non diegetic sound during the gameplay. During scens of high intesity action or dramatic gameplay, The soundtrack is usually very high tempo and flows very well with the action portrayed. There are lots of sound effects during the gameplay which make the experience of playing more realistic. There are various sounds you can hear which you might not see such as bird noises, dogs barking and the sounds from nature such as the trees and bushes. There are also sound effects which help give more understaing and meaning when you play such as gun shots, other characters talking, shouting or screaming, the sound of horses galloping.

HUD

There is not a lot of information on the screen to help the player as the gameplay takes up most of the screen. There is a Small heads up display shown in the bottom left of the screen which shows a map, you can use this to see your position and navigate around the enviroment. There is a helath bar positioned to the right of the map, this shows the player  how much life they have. To the left of the map there a blue bar which indicates how much stamina your horse has. on top of the map you can see how much ammunition you have got left. The map, health bar and stamina bar have been intergrated into one small HUD which allows the player to easily view whilst playing.

Effects

In gameplay, the player is awarded with XP (Experience Points) when killing the opposition, after every kill made, a little XP symbol bar shows at the bottom of the screen which shows the player how much more XP needed to level up. When taking damage, the screen turns a shade of red and blood splatter appears in the corners of the screen. When the character is killed, the gameplay turns to slowmotion and there is heavy blood splatter around the egdes of the screen, it also blurs out the corners of the screen.