In 2010, Bethesda released a “sidequel” to the highly successful Fallout 3, titled Fallout: New Vegas. This time it was developed by Obsidian Entertainment, many of whom had previously worked for Black Isle Studios on Fallout and Fallout 2. As a result, New Vegas became an amalgam of Fallout 3′s potential along with Fallout and Fallout 2′s spirit. Players start off as a Courier who returns from near-death and explore the Mojave Wasteland as they seek revenge.

Trailer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l-x-1fm2cq8

The Lens of Judgment

The player’s actions are judged by the game through both the ‘karma’ and ‘faction reputation’ system. Their choices will change how NPCs react to the player’s presence.

‘Karma’ is a reflection of all good and evil choices the player makes during the game. Having a consistently negative karma can adversely affect the player. For instance, an NPC in the game named Cass can be the player’s companion throughout his or her adventures. If the player continues to have bad karma, Cass will eventually leave the player’s company.

Regarding ‘faction reputation’, certain choices the player makes can result in a ‘tug-of-war’ situation, such as completing the quest ‘Ghost Town Gunfight’ will raise the player’s reputation with Goodsprings, but decreases reputation with the Powder Gangers. Completing the quest ‘Run Goodsprings Run’ will have the opposite effect. As a result, a high rep with a faction or town may give certain benefits, such as gifts from the people of the town, while a low rep may lead to hits being taken out against the player. It can even give the player access to new areas in the game.

The Lens of Meaningful Choices

At certain points in the game, the player will be forced to make tough decisions. Based on the player’s own mentality, morality, and intentions, they have a few options to choose from in order to progress further into the game.

For instance, when meeting the NPC Boone for the first time, the player will undergo a quest called ‘One for My Baby’ where Boone will request the Courier to find the person who kidnapped his wife. The player is given the option to either painstakingly find the real culprit through interviewing the townsfolk and even breaking into a safe (resulting in loss of karma), or frame any one of the other townsfolk. Other alternative playthroughs can be done, but ultimately, the positive result is to have Boone, a skilled sniper, as a companion throughout the game.

In another quest called Birds of a Feather, the player is given the task of sending their companion Cass to her execution at the hands of the quest-giver. The player is now forced to make a choice to either lose a companion for monetary and XP gain or to enter a fairly difficult gunfight with the quest-giver and his gang, resulting in failing the quest but keeping Cass’ companionship.

The Lens of the Story Machine

From the two lenses above, the player’s actions and choices will change the political and environmental landscape of the Mojave Wasteland. As a result, the player will be given access to more avenues to advance further into the story. However, this is not restricted to the main storyline, as the player’s interactions with NPCs, including their companions, will allow them to involve themselves in the NPCs’ lives, hopefully making the player more invested in the inhabitants of the Mojave Wasteland.

Another way the player can affect the story is before the final battle at the Hoover Dam, where the player will have to choose to either support a specific faction or independently claim the territory of New Vegas. This is done through completing quests given by the specific faction in order to gain a positive reputation with them.

Whichever option the player chooses at every junction in the story will result in completely different endings. All the endings can be seen here: http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/Fallout:_New_Vegas_endings

The Lens of Challenge

Hardcore mode is an optional setting in New Vegas which makes gameplay more realistic, which in turn makes things a bit tougher for the player. Effects include:

–          ‘Stimpaks’ heal over time instead of instantly

–          Ammunition has weight

–          Companions can die

–          The Courier must eat, drink, and have proper sleep cycles or they will suffer increasingly negative effects, up to immediate death

The Lens of the World

 The world that New Vegas encompasses is essentially a world that is stuck in the 1940s, but flung forward in time where technology has progressed to the level of science fiction. Most of the planet is still a desolate wasteland and hasn’t recovered from the nuclear fallout. The Mojave Wasteland is home to giant bugs, ghouls, mutants, and the terrible Deathclaws. Finding clean water is a luxury as most of it is irradiated, and radiation medicine is as important as food.

However, the focus of the Mojave is on the people who live and work there, who struggle everyday to see tomorrow. The player will experience their plight as The Courier is one of these survivors. They will hunt and scavenge for resources in order to fight another day. Considering the game is set in a post-apocalyptic Las Vegas, the inhabitants who visit there often indulge in hedonistic acts in order to forget their suffering. It is not unlike the Las Vegas in the real world, except there’s a casino/restaurant where a secret group of cannibals dressed in fancy garb reside.

The world in Fallout is a dark and morbid place, but setting it in Las Vegas makes things much more lively as it steals the attention away from the horrors of the world, much like what videogames do.

The Game

Plants vs. Zombies 2 is a free-to-play tower defense video game which is the sequel to Plants vs. Zombies. In this game, the player is a homeowner and has to decide on the type of plants to use to fight off waves of zombies so as to keep his garden alive. Each type of plant has its own unique role on the field, and zombies also differ in terms of health level. New and more powerful plants/zombies are unlocked or appear as the game progresses. This game requires the player to think and plan the strategy on the spot as the waves of zombies appear.

Official Website: http://www.popcap.com/plants-vs-zombies-2
YouTube Tutorial/Demo: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VvYGXpPhv7Q

Analysis using Lenses

#1 – The Lens of Essential Experience

The main experience that players get is the trill of killing the zombies using different types of plants, which also requires some skills and tactics when planting the plants. The ultimate goal is to prevent the zombies from reaching the end point, hence players need to act fast. They need to think and plan carefully, or even change the type of plant halfway through the game when the zombies are too difficult to tackle.

However, in Plants vs. Zombies 2, a new way of killing the zombies is introduced, though at a cost (using the gold earned in the game). This new experience involves players using finger actions like pinching, swiping and flicking zombies away, and electrocuting the zombies by long pressing the screen. This makes the game more fun to players and brings more interactivity as players can directly “touch” and kill the zombies instead of just placing plants around the area and waiting for the plants to shoot the zombies down.

#2 – The Lens of Surprise

Several surprises are incorporated into the game, which adds an additional element of excitement for the players:

• Completing each level unlocks a new item: New plants, power ups, costume, gold, key to a new world, etc. The surprise involved here is that players cannot guess what they will be unlocking for the next level, which makes the game more interesting as the player is more motivated to want to complete the goal for the level and get rewarded with a surprise, which is something they can anticipate for but at the same time not knowing what they will get. The big boss will also randomly appear in some levels, adding on to the surprise as well, as players have to frantically fight it off.
• Graphics-wise, there is also an element of surprise when players use the new power ups or plants and watch how they are used to kill the zombies. The overall effects in the game (e.g. plants exploding zombies, burning zombies that suddenly appear, etc) are also pleasurable surprises to the player’s eyes, hence making the game more engaging to players.

#3 – The Lens of Goals

The ultimate goal of the game is to prevent the zombies from eating your brains, when they managed to walk to the end point. This goal is clear to the players, and is told to players at the very start of the game during the tutorial. The goal is generally achievable for the players, and if in any case the goal cannot be reached, the player is allowed to replay the level at no cost, hence there is no demotivation involved if a player loses the game.

Some small goals are introduced randomly throughout the game as well, which makes the game a little more challenging and different, such as using only a specific number of plants to complete the level, or to protect three plants from being destroyed by the zombies.

#4 – The Lens of Time

Each level in the game takes roughly 4 minutes to complete. It’s an adrenaline rush during the entire level as the waves of zombies appear, and the player has to fully concentrate during the game to defeat them. Although 4 minutes doesn’t seem very long, this is definitely one of the bad point for Plants vs. Zombies 2. In this version, it is specifically catered to the mobile platform hence the game play seems a bit too long especially for people who play this game when they travel. Looking away from the screen just for a while can be damaging, hence this is a game that requires absolute attention and should be played when you have ample alone time when nobody is there to disturb you. In this case, each level can be shorter or the waves of zombies can appear within a longer time interval, to give players more time to react.

#5 – The Lens of Beauty

The graphics definitely suits the image of the game that is being portrayed, not too cute and not too mature; it is a game for everyone. The maps, characters, zombies, plants, power-ups and upgrades are all nicely designed and serve their purpose well. Animations and in game effects are appropriate and not too cluttered, which makes the game a pleasure to play. The graphics certainly supplements the game play, which is the main pull factor (especially for me) to play the game, and make it more interesting and engaging for the players.

Basic Description

Genre: Arcade and Action | Platform: Mobile, Android (4.4 Star Rating)

Story: Princess Peach has been caught by a stupid programmer and player taking on the role of Warrior (assumed IQ>250) will try to save her.

Features: Warrior are suppose to pass through all obstacles laid path(rightwards direction) in all levels and stages. There seems to be only 1 unique solution for each level and stage. Warrior can walk left/ right/ jump.

Link to Website/ Youtube/ Gameplay Demo: http://youtu.be/XC5Y-b_lzak

Lens #71: The Lens of Freedom

Basic Description of Lens: This lens investigates player’s feeling of freedom must be maximized.

Features that match the Lens (2x Images):

• + There is no world time limit to how much time the player can take to solve the obstacle (unless the obstacle is timed). This allow the player to take extra care in solving the obstacle.

• + Players are free to die as many time as they want to test the obstacle. Doing so, will allow the player to have less frustration as they can continue the game without any loss.

• – Players feel constrained because there is only 1 unique solution for each stage. Therefore, they would have to accept the feeling of losing (death) for many many times before able to pass the stage.

Critics on Feature and recommendation:

• The game offers more constrained than freedom gameplay which is the main point of the game.

• 1 Recommendation would perhaps to introduce special bonus stages that will allow them to pass the obstacles or offer alternative solutions (more freedom) in the game.

Lens #57: The Lens of Feedback

Basic Description of Lens: This lens suggest the importance of player’s feedback from judgement, reward, etc.

Features that match the Lens (2x Images):

• + The main feedbacks of importance are the simple storyline and the “losing” message when player died.

• + The simple storyline with the on-screen controls (< >, Jump) basically creates the instruction to play the game without any further tutorials. Players are in fact encouraged to explore the obstacles and space in the game to reveal the solution.

• + The “losing” message is more of a “troll” that describes the player’s IQ, which is suppose to incur rage and make the player try the stage again.

Critics on Feature and recommendation:

• The game could have offer more feedback messages e.g. hints or similar if the player stuck in the same stage for too long. These would provide a more interactive approach to help players achieve their goals.

Lens #4: The Lens of Puzzle

Basic Description of Lens: This lens ensure the puzzles are doing enough to to shape the player’s experience in solving it:

Features that match the Lens (2x Images):

• Using the 10 Puzzle Principle to evaluate, Strange Adventure generally meets the most principles in practise, some worthy principles to note are:

• +, – Puzzle Principle #4: Give a Sense of Solvability + Puzzle Principle #6: Parallelism lets the Player Rest

  • The game has a bottleneck which is a double edged sword. It is good as it implies that there is at least 1 solution to solve it.

  • But is bad in that player are unable to continue further if they do not solve 1 of the obstacle in the stage as there is high chances player might abandon the game totally by assuming that they can’t figure things out.

• + Puzzle Principle #7: Pyramid Structure Extends Interest

  • In some stages, the current obstacle requires the clues from previous stages to be solved which extends the interest for the players

Critics on Feature and recommendation:

• The game could work more on “Puzzle Principle #9: Give the Answer!” since the essential experience that players want to achieve is to get the “Aha!” or “realization” moment.

Lens #27: The Lens of Skill

Basic Description of Lens: This lens ask to look at the skill of the players who play the game

Features that match the Lens (2x Images):

• + The most essential skill that is required to play the game is patient. Players need to be very patient to try out the possibilities and therefore have to lose many times.

• + The possibilities are not easy from stage 1, it requires the player to think out of the box.

• + The way to think out of the box is hindered by the creator’s advanced design of the puzzle. The + creator predicts the player’s general movement and puts an extra traps to hinder natural movement.

• + Thinking out of the box/  Ability to react instantly and differently is difficult for most people who does logical routine everyday which therefore creates a superior experience for players seeking the “Aha!” moment.

Critics on Feature and recommendation:

• The game can be improved by allowing different level of level difficulty/ easier obstacle at the beginning of the game so player can adapt themselves to the game better.

Screenshots:

Additional Information:

Music and Sound: From http://www.playonloop.com/ and http://sc.chinaz.com/yinxiao/
Artwork: ASCII art from http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:ASCII_art.
Similar genre games: Super Mario
Link to Android Play Store: http://goo.gl/zsbXKZ
Link to creater site: http://rage.thankcreate.com/
Player User Type: Philanthropists and Achievers (http://goo.gl/Tkdr1E )

Counter-strike : Global Offensive (CS:GO) is an online first-person shooter that is the latest installation from the Counterstrike franchise. It is a team-based, objective-based multiplayer game. Each player joins either the Terrorist or Counter-Terrorist team and attempts to complete objectives or eliminate the enemy team. There are many different game modes that revolve around this theme, but the main one we will take reference from will be Classic Competitive. Each team will have 5 players, and it will least a maximum of 30 rounds. At the start of each round, players purchase weapons and gear with money earned from various actions, from getting kills to completing objectives. Objectives differ depending on the map, one requires the Counter-Terrorist to extract hostages, and the other requiring the Terrorist to detonate a bomb. For both types, a round ends when the objective is complete, the time has expired before the objective was met, or a whole team is eliminated.

Game website : http://blog.counter-strike.net/

Gameplay example : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KslmylFCWLc

The first lens I will be using to analyse CS:GO is (7) The Elemental Tetrad, which comprises of Aesthetics, Technology, Mechanics and Story. The Aesthetics of the game has definitely improved leaps and bounds since the last one, and it definitely looks, sounds and feels more immersive, especially with much more attention paid to details. An example would be like the inclusion of a helicopter for the Counter-Terrorist team’s insertion into the mission location, which previous would just spawn the players at a location. These tiny additions make the game feel much fuller. Technology would be quite straightforward, because the basic keyboard and mouse can be used, with even the possibility of playing with a game controller. As for Mechanics, it follows basic FPS conventions, and yet it has the “buying” component that opens that dimension of strategizing how to work in a team to spend money most optimally to ensure a win. As for Story, there is no overarching story, but rather each match is a small narrative of a battle between Terrorists and Counter-Terrorists. It would have been more interesting if there was an embedded storyline, somewhat like a previous installation Condition Zero. Looking at CS:GO in an overview, we can see that it has all elements in it, and these elements work together to build and reinforce the game’s theme. The story is better brought out thanks to the improved aesthetics, and these makes the game more immersive into the mechanics put in place for players.

The next lens I will be using is (25) Goals. Looking at the goals within CS:GO, it can be said that they are appropriate and well-balanced. The simplest would be having a common goal for all players – the elimination of the other team. On top of that, there is also your team specific goal, which is either to plant/prevent the planting of a bomb, or to rescue/prevent the rescue of hostages. These are actually all there is to CS:GO’s Classic Competitive mode, which are simple to understand and grasp. Yet, one small issue is that this is not clearly spelt out to players at the beginning of the match; rather it is explained through the tutorial game, which players might miss out (because it is not mandatory). But other than that, players can still communicate with their teammates, so there are other possibilities for them to find out about their goals.

The next lens is (36) Competition, which appeals to our competitive nature. For this there is the ranking system, which ranks players according to their game stats, promoting or demoting them accordingly. This ranking system spurs players to want to win and climb up the ranks. And these ranks are also used to match-make players of similar ranks to play against one another, so as to provide an environment of fair competition where players of different skill levels can compete. This is a robust system as it also does not give new players any advantage over more expert players, rather it just puts all the new players into the same game, instead of making it harder for expert players to kill new players. However, accurate as it may be, latency, hardware differences and hacking can still cause “unfair” measurements of player skill, damaging the game’s mechanics to create fair competition.

(A list of the ranks available in Classic Competitive)

Another lens I will be using is (37) Cooperation, since it is an essential aspect of CS:GO. There is currently text and voice chat available, and also some fixed commands players can issue, but communications could further be improved if these fixed commands could be freely configurable by players to set custom controls for them. As for working together as a team, this can consists of friends and/or strangers, and there is a short warm-up time before each match, thus giving a team of strangers to warm-up and learn about one another’s playing style or exchange strategies. With regards to synergy or antergy, it really depends on how the team plays together. For example, having teammates to watch your back and cover you is synergy, but having teammates friendly fire you is antergy. As for roles within the game, there are no designated roles, but these can be set internally. For example, a team of 5 snipers would definitely be unwise, so players would have to communicate to assign roles for carrying different weapons, like sniper rifles, assault rifles, sub-machine gun, etc. Another way to designate roles would be in a Bomb Defusal game, where the Counter-Terrorist team splits up to guard different bomb sites.

Lastly, the final lens is (75) Avatar. Looking at the avatars used in its predecessors, CS:GO has done a really good job in creating multiple avatars, not only a set for Terrorists and a set for Counter-Terrorists, but even different avatars for of these characters in different settings. For example, one map is at a sugar plantation factory, and the Terrorists avatars are specifically fitting for the setting, as they are African men, who are shown to be locals. Even the hands holding the weapon by players in the first-person view shows a gold chain around the terrorist’s wrist. On top of that, there is even voice-acting in an African accent, saying things like “we will chase them off this island”. All these adds to the immersion of players into taking on the identity of the avatar and really play as a terrorist.

Game Website: http://lol.garena.com/home

YouTube Link of game play:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U5_WLD8ZkNg

Introduction

Developed and published by Riot Games,Leagues of Legends is now one of the most popular multiplayer online battle games in the world. This game is played by 2 teams of people with maximum number to five for each. There are totally about 120 different champions for players to choose. On the classic Summoners Rift Map, there are three roads, top, middle and bottom, connecting the two opposite teams’ base; each side owns three turrets to guide each roads. Players will gain experience points and gold by killing opposite players, neutral monsters, opposite turrets and minions that spawn and attack the other team regularly. With gold and experience points in battle, players can buy items and increase skill points to strengthen their champions. The game is ended by destroying the last structure on the map, then enemies’ “Nexus”.

Lens of Skill

In Leagues of Legends, the skill is really an important element that makes this game fancy. All the champions have 1 passive, 3 basic and 1 ultimate skills. Instead of just pressing the keyboard and attacking enemies automatically, players need to aim properly, decide when and which skill to use; sometimes even the order of champion’s skills can make a difference. Besides that, each player needs to kill as many minions as possible to get more gold for items while fighting against enemies. Some professional players know what items are the most suitable for their champions, and they may also choose certain items based on what their enemies have.

A skilled player is even able to carry the whole team and win the battle, which does earn respect and esteem from other players. For each champion, it takes time to be professional, and there are totally 120 champions(the company is always continuing to produce new champions). That is why people keep playing Leagues of Legends again and again.

Lens of competition

Competitive games can satisfy the basic human urge to determine who is the most skilled player. Leagues of Legends provides such a fair platform for two teams to compete with each other. When doing the matching of two teams, the system tries to make their average level as balance as possible. As the consequence, the result of a battle is not predictable. Sometimes the team appears stronger at the beginning may lose in the end.

There are several modes available for different kinds of players. Those novices can join some tutorials to gain a better idea of how the game is running. After that, they can join the “Co-op VS AI” mode, which matches players against bots team. Besides the novices, experienced players can also join this mode to practice their new champions.

Lens of Cooperation

In Leagues of Legends, players need to queue up for few seconds to start a new battle. Before queuing, people could invite their friends to be in the same team. If there are no friends online, players will be assigned to teams with strangers randomly. During battles, people could meet new people, and build friendship with them.

During the battle between the two teams, cooperation is always the priority. Typically, players have different role in the battle: one in the top road(can also be two), one in the middle, two in bottom(one will support the other by healing, watching for invasion) and one doing the “jungle”(this player will kill those neutral monsters to gain gold and experience in battle, and at the same time assist three roads if possible). Usually, after about 20-30 minutes, two teams will gather together for the team fight.

In the game, players is able to chat by typing and use some quick warning(for example, holding Alt and click Left click of mouse) to inform the danger at a particular position to other teammates. Nowadays, Leagues of Legends also supports a tool for players to talk to each other online.

Lens of Reward

Regardless of winning or losing a battle, each player will gain different amount of experience points and influence points based on their contributions to that battle. Players need experience points (out of battles) to increase level, which can be up to level 30. The benefit of gaining levels is to unlock Mastery Points and Rune Page slots which improve slightly the overall strength of the Summoner’s chosen champion in-battle. In Leagues of Legends, champions and runes can be purchased by either the influence points, which can be gained freely, or riot points that can be gained by paying real time money only.

Lens of Friendship

Players are able to meet and make a lot of friends in Leagues of Legends. During battles, people need to either type or talk to their teammates in order to cooperate, through which them begin to have connections to each other. Usually, after a specific battle, players will send friends requests to those who are skillful or kind to people. Then they can fight together in another coming battle. It is certainly very enjoyable to make new friends and fight with them.

1. lens used: Fun

The very essence of the game involves hack and slashing hundreds of enemies at once, making it juicy and fun to play for those who like hack and slash game. At times it might be monotonous as you just need to slash those hordes of enemies again and again, but the improvement of the story telling and graphic element compared to the previous installment add variation and fuel my curiosity to keep me wanting to play it more and more.

Secondly, the number of playable characters are enormous, featuring more than 70 different characters to play, each with different specialised weapons, abilities and attack patterns. It takes time to master all those characters with their ability. This results in the huge – but not too long – amount of time spend on the game to fully utilise its features, which to me, adds the fun elements. It’s a long game with vast amount of abilities to master, each with fresh different characters, coupled with good story and juicy hack and slash element, blend together to make this a thrilling and fun experience.

2. lens used: Surprise

What i think that this game will be very similar to the previous installment series of dynasty warrior has been proven wrong. From the absence of minor things such as unintentional “bug”, whereby things like the enemy can be attacked behind a gate and the item from the enemy dropped in an unreachable place, which present in previous series, to big features such as being able to ride tiger and elephant, immediately surprised me. There are other things that i do not expect to present in such a “simple” hack and slash game, like the presence of weapon affinity whereby if used against enemy with different affinity who are weak to you, you will be able to launch a furious attack and vice versa, thus adding more strategy element to the game. From all these features and improvement, i can say, at least in my opinion, that they put in a lot of effort to improve the gameplay experience, something that i must show respect to.

3. lens used: Challenge

In terms of the game difficulty, the game adapts quite well at the beginning. There are 5 difficulty level making the game suitable for those who are new and also for those who are already experienced and enjoy challenge. The later stage is tougher than the beginning of the stage, even though it is on the same difficulty, as the player is expected to gain some skills and experience with the game, making the adaptive difficulty a good element in the game.

At later stage, or high end game, however, when the players have access to all the weapon upgrades and element enhancements and skills, the game might be too easy for those who seek challenges, even on the highest difficulty, although in my opinion it would feel just right for those “casual” players. In my opinion i feel that pushing the limit or boundary a little bit more for those who like challenges would be a good addition to the game.

4. lens used: Story

The game itself tells the story of the very famous historical event Romance of the Three Kingdom in chinese history. While i think most of the players that like this series more likely to put emphasis on the gameplay rather than the story, the story itself is presented in a way that undeniably adds interesting element and a good plot to the game. How the story is foretold in the game also affects the different gameplay mechanics such as the strategies and plans that are to be used in the certain battle, with the key figures, such as zhuge liang or cao cao, devising them.

The story inarguably affects the gameplay, as the game itself would cripple in the absence of the story, simply degrading them to a complete mindless hack and slash game. With the story, careful strategy and planning elements are added to game, which makes the game less monotonous and mindless. Some balancing of the game needs to be done though, with respect to the story. For example, one scenario requires the player to lure the enemies to the ambush point to be defeated, however, it is completely possible for the players to just go, create havoc, and kill all of the enemies by themselves without the need to lure them. A more realistic situation would be a welcome improvement in this area.

Also, the storyline is not so linear and straightforward. Those who are already very familiar with the story and chinese history can still immerse themselves in the world of curiosity with the addition of hypothetical history route. The players own choices and decisions could very well affect the course of the history itself, which in my opinion is a really nice elements to be added in the game.

5. lens used: Freedom

Last, but not least, what always excites and amuse me in the world of game is the freedom that the game offers to the players, and dynasty warrior 8 in my opinion has done a decent job to provide this element to the players. While there exists some restriction within the game, those restrictions are good-to-have restrictions that control the balance of the game and there are always some degree of freedom within that restriction. For instance, while some of the area in a battle cannot be explored before some plans is executed, the players can explore and move freely to other accessible area. The players can even choose to abandon the plans that are already devised, although it will result in a more difficult battle. Another example would be the elements that can be added to the weapon. they are limited to 6 elements, but the players are free to choose any combination of elements to customise their weapon according to their preference. I sometimes feel restricted in the past series of the game when the only thing that the players can do in the game is to choose a battle to play and play it, but this game delivers an improvement in that area, whereby the players can build their own city, upgrading the buildings to give enhancement, such as stronger weapons, mounts, and experience to level up.

All these elements combined together, i could say that dynasty warrior 8 is a pretty decent game to play for those who like hack and slash game and i totally respect the effort they put in producing this game despite some of its minor flaws.

Demon’s Souls is a third-person action role-playing game developed by From Software, a Japanese video game developer most famous for the Armored Core and Tenchu series. The player controls a customizable hero and has to explore and make his way through stages set in five major locations. The game has garnered accolades for its brutal difficulty as well as its deliberately-paced and challenging combat system.

Official website (USA): http://www.demons-souls.com/
Gameplay video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kWlBomIcUlU

Despite Demon’s Souls breaking almost every game design “rule” in modern big-budget games with its relentless combat and labyrinthine level design, it succeeded beyond the wildest expectations of the original Japanese publisher Sony Computer Entertainment Japan, which admitted it had made a mistake^[1] not publishing the game in the North American market. I will examine the game through a consolidated set of 4 related lenses: Judgment (20), Skill (27), Challenge (31), and Punishment (41) and a fifth unrelated lens of Infinite Inspiration (11) and point out what Demon’s Souls did that accounted for its success.

Looking at how there are situations where the player can go from full health to zero while being unable to do anything, anyone who has read the hundreds of articles and books on game design would cry out at this blatantly terrible decision to make the game inaccessible and the difficulty curve a difficulty cliff. Yet Demon’s Souls is unforgiving too in its judgment of the player. The game assumes the player does not need mollycoddling and every mistake is penalized. The game judges that the player’s pride would not let him give up at being instantly killed by a swarm of weak skeletons and insert another game into the console, because he knows he made a mistake. The game judges that the player understands that accomplishments require struggle and effort. And most importantly, the game judges that the player can figure out where he went wrong, by heavily emphasizing deliberate action and punishing button-mashing and rash decisions.

Fairness in the game’s judgment comes from highly telegraphed actions from the game’s wide variety of monsters, fixed level design and monster placement, consistency in its feedback to player actions, and freedom in allowing the player to customize his equipment to suit each stage and playing style right from the beginning of the game. As an example of Demon’s Souls consistency and deliberate pace, most weapons have a relatively long “swing time” where the attacker is unable to take any action. So, if a player were to rapidly press the Attack button, he would be left vulnerable if his attack missed. However, the same applies for all enemies – they do not have the ability to interrupt their attacks in mid-swing too, allowing players to safely attack during those considerably long attack animations. So, punishments are applied fairly to everything.

This is one of the skills that Demon’s Souls cultivates in the player as he makes his way through the game. The game tests the player’s observation skills and positioning skills: each enemy has a massive ‘tell’ before each attack that the player can take advantage of to avoid damage, and the many environmental traps like long falls or even a stray pillar can cause your death if you roll carelessly – or the enemy’s if you manage to lure him off or get him stuck in a pillar. Knowledge is another aspect of Demon’s Souls that a player will learn is necessary for survival in the bleak world, be it knowledge of enemy placements and level layouts, weaknesses and attack patterns of monsters, or even the most effective weapons to forge and craft. The most important skill tested is probably patience in many various ways: trial-and-error is the main form of progress, taking on enemies requires you to wait for the right gap in timing or chink in armor, and careless repeated deaths can take away an entire day of progress. While in-game progress can be lost, the player’s knowledge of the game can only increase as he plays, and the game’s mechanical depth work such that the more knowledge a player has, the better he will do. The avatar’s skills just give the player more leeway in making mistakes – it is always the player’s skill that allows him to win, and this is one aspect Demon’s Souls executed perfectly.

It can be argued that Demon’s Souls’ challenge does not cater to a wide variety of skill levels, although certainly there is a wide variety of challenges themselves ranging from those in the game (environment, monsters, bosses, level design, inventory management, player invasions etc.) to outside the game (the player’s own fear or nervousness as he enters an unknown area leading to poor decision making…) But that does not matter, because Demon’s Souls was never a mass-market game by virtue of its brutal nature that expects a lot of investment from the player’s side, and thus never needed to cater to different skill levels. For the player who is willing to learn about Demon’s Souls, the payoff is huge as every challenge overcome provides an overwhelming sense of satisfaction many games do not provide in the interests of “creating flow” or “not breaking immersion”. In exchange, Demon’s Souls sets a baseline of skill and does only a few things to mitigate that.

One such thing is drawn from the lens of infinite inspiration. One much-lauded feature is the ability to leave messages on the ground for other players to read. These include warnings like “Be wary of a fall ahead” and hints like “Use spells on the next enemy”, which provide all the help the game is willing to explicitly provide. In an interview with Eurogamer^[2], director Hidetaka Miyazaki says the inspiration for that feature was his car being stuck on a snowy hillside. The cars behind him slowly pushed him safely over the hill, but he could not stop the car to express his gratitude to the people behind. The essence of simply helping out other people through mutual adversity is relayed in this unique message feature. You do not know who wrote these messages, and if you wrote one you know you will not receive any gratitude (although in the game you can “recommend” a message and if a recommendation comes while you are playing you get your health fully restored), but you simply do it anyway because every little thing counts in Demon’s Souls and you want to help (or harm) your fellow players. I think this is a perfect example of capturing the essence of an experience and putting it in a game.

Option 1:

(note: There may be more than 2 pages because I have included the lenses’ description. Without the pictures and my own text, the description of the lenses already filled up 2 pages)

An analysis of Command and Conquer: Tiberium Alliances

Game website: https://www.tiberiumalliances.com/home

Gameplay video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K73eoCLY55Q

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1.)Lens #18: The lens of flow

1.1) Does my game have clear goals? If not, how can I fix that?

The goal of the game is to move you base towards the center of the world map and hold down the position. While not particularly mind-blowingly exciting, the circular shape of the world map meant that as a player gets closer to the center, they are bound to encounter competing players and engage in player versus player battle. This is the main focus of the game.

1.2) Are the goals of the player the same goals I intended?

Gaining levels and building the strongest base and army are natural goals of the players. Since players require increasingly larger resource income to maintain the pace of progress, they will seek out areas can keep up with their consumption demands. The re-spawning artificial intelligence (AI) enemies become progressively stronger towards the center of the map and this attracts the players. This falls in line with the developers’ goals.

1.3) Are there parts of the game that distract players to the point they forget their goal? If so, can these distractions be reduced, or tied into the game goal?

The goals are very natural and clear to the players. There are no distractions from this goal.

1.4) Does my game provide a steady steam of not-too-easy, not-too-hard challenges, taking into account the fact that players’ skills may be gradually improving?

Yes. As players progress towards the center of the map, they will encounter stronger AI enemies as well as other players who are capable of defeating the AI enemies in the region.

1.5) Are the players’ skills improving at the rate I had hoped? If not, how can I change that?

Unfortunately during the earlier servers, the players were progressing far too quickly than the developers had hoped. As a result, the game has seen patches that consistently slow down players’ ability to progress.

 
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2.) Lens #32: The lens of meaningful choices

2.1) What choices am I asking the player to make?

Players have to plan the use of their resources, the armies that each of their bases contain, the position of their different bases and their armies’ formation of attack and defence.

2.2) Are they meaningful? How?

Each player generates a particular resource required to attack other bases. Since there is no way to increase this income(not even through the in-game real-money purchases), players have to plan their course of action in order to maximize their efficiency. Additionally, players have to commit a set of military equipment and personnel to each base as the cost of reassignment is prohibitively high. Thus, players have to observe enemies in his or her region and move their set of bases to best defend their positions.

2.3) Am I giving the player the right number of choices? Would more make them feel more powerful? Would less make the game clearer?

The number of choices feels comfortable. Suitable for fans of strategy games.

2.4)Are there any dominant strategies in my game?

Unfortunately there are several dominant strategies that discourage alternative playstyles.

 
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3.) Lens #37: The lens of cooperation

3.1) Cooperation requires communication. Do my players have enough opportunity

to communicate? How could communication be enhanced?

The game places heavy focus on team work. There is an “alliance” feature where players can come together as a group and share their territories or work together to attack and defend against other players. There is an in-game forum as well as each “alliance” granted their own forums.

3.2) Are my players friends already, or are they strangers? If they are strangers,

can I help them break the ice?

Unfortunately little is done to help break the ice. Players have to depend on themselves to make friends. However, the nature of the game results in many “alliances” seeking to recruit players, which helps a little in breaking the ice.

3.3) Is there synergy () or antergy () when the players work

together? Why?

Yes. This is because as players work together, they share their territories and allow other friendly players to move across the region much quicker and easier. Furthermore, friendly bases that are near a player’s base will automatically help defend the player if his or her base comes under attack.

3.4) Do all the players have the same role, or do they have special jobs?

The roles are entirely defined by the “alliance” they belong to. Typically some players will be assigned to push towards the center, some will be “spies” to infiltrate enemy alliances and some will travel across the map to capture bonuses for the entire alliance.

3.5) Cooperation is greatly enhanced when there is no way an individual can do

a task alone. Does my game have tasks like that?

Yes. Through cooperation, players will be able to manoeuvre easier, gain larger bonuses that apply across the “alliance”, protection from attacks and teamwork to defeat much more powerful enemies.

3.6) Tasks that force communication inspire cooperation. Do any of my tasks

force communication?

While certain situations due to player behaviour (of the player and others on the server) may encourage player communication, there are no situations whereby communication is forced.

 
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4.) Lens #82: The Lens of Inner Contradiction

4.1) What is the purpose of my game?

The purpose is to let players engage in player versus player combat.

4.2) What are the purposes of each subsystem in my game?

The attack and defence subsystems provide strategic gameplay.

4.3) Is there anything at all in my game that contradicts these purposes?

The game is very straight-forward and does not have any elements that contradict the purpose of the game.

4.4) If so, how can I change that?

N.A

 
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5.) Lens #87: The Lens of Griefing

5.1) What systems in my game are easy to grief?

Since the majority of resources is awarded when a base is destroyed, it is possible for players to wait until another player weakens a high-resource base before jumping in to do the last attack and get the reward.

5.2) How can I make my game boring to grief?

The developers have implemented a feature that locks down a base when attacked. This lock-down prevents other players that are not the original attacker from attacking the base.

5.3) Am I ignoring any loopholes?

The developers have acted to close certain loopholes while some are ignored.

Hay Day is a time-based, social mobile game which provides players with the experience of farming. By growing crops and rearing animals, players can trade these products for money and experience which is then used to level up and unlock more items.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ED-xH_jXkYE

Lens #1:  46 The Lens of Economy

In Hay Day, gold is the universal currency for buying and selling items. Players can either purchase gold using real world money or trade items for it. Hay Day provides two main channels for acquiring gold in the game. The first is through NPCs, the other is by trading with other players through the Roadside Shop.

The constant demand of goods from the NPCs ensures that all players have a minimum amount of coins which will still allow them to purchase machinery to further their progress in the game, albeit at a slower rate. The Roadside Shop gives the players some freedom to sell their items at their desired price (though the price range is still capped). Through the Roadside Shop, players can earn coins at a much faster rate as well as get missing items to fulfil their NPC orders, thus enabling them to level up faster.

I think the existence of both two channels is a good idea. Players do not get left behind if they choose not to participate in the Roadside Shop. If they do however, they get the thrill of trading items with other players which adds another level of fun to the game.

Lens #2: 75 The Lens of the Avatar

Hay Day does not provide an avatar. The only personalization available is the farm name. In many cases however, the farm name is used for advertising instead of bringing out the player’s identity.

Although having an avatar is a nice touch to bring players closer to the game, I do not think that an avatar is absolutely necessary in Hay Day. The view focus of the game is almost always on the farm itself, and the avatar will hardly be seen. Thus it is better not to spend resources on designing a redundant avatar.

Lens #3: 53 The Lens of Control

Hay Day’s controls are intuitive. For example, the zooming in and out of the screen follows the conventional pinch-to-zoom. The other controls are swiping and tapping. These controls are familiar to the players which enable them to pick it up fast. Even if they are not, there is a tutorial at the start of the game to familiarise them with the controls. Simple controls allow players to focus more on playing the game than mastering the controls which is essential for a better gaming experience.

Lens #4: 84 The Lens of Friendship

Friends in Hay Day help players progress in the game by reviving crops or completing deliveries. These friends usually come from the player’s social network like Facebook or Google+. Players can ask for help by announcing it which appears as a post in Facebook or Google+.

I would say there is not much interaction between players since there are no chat rooms and the only form of interaction is by helping each other or trading with each other. However, I think there is no need for chat rooms since players do not need to advertise their goods through word of mouth. Their Roadside Shop does that for them. That being said, Hay Day maintains these interactions by ensuring that it is a win-win situation for both parties, for example, the helper receives game experience and the player being helped gets to complete deliveries.

Lens #5: 66 The Lens of Obstacle

The obstacles in Hay Day are the deliveries requirements. As their level increases, the deliveries get more and more difficult to complete. Thus players often have to depend on their friends for help. It could be a problem if none of their friends are able to help. Another method is to purchase diamonds using real life money to complete delivery orders. However, this is a turn off from the game if players are not willing to buy diamonds yet are unable to progress in the game. Since the deliveries are the only obstacle, it gets boring after a while. Hay Day could introduce other challenges to keep players entertained.