Gaming News: Have You Heard of #Gamergate

As you know, most of the gaming population is male. And for some reason, they are not taking kindly to females in the industry. These women have had their phone numbers leaked and have received rape and death threats from anti-feminists gamers. Recently, a jouranlist who writes about female roles in video games, Anita Sarkessian, was going to give a speech at Utah State University, but couldn't out of fear a student would commit "the deadliest school shooting in American history." This needs to be resolved because these women deserve respect.

Apps Are Getting Even More Random

Game designer, Roger Dickey, is trying to prove a very valid point. Roger Dickey is attempting to show that games (specifically apps) can be based on ANYTHING and still maintain the consumers attention. I noticed that games often contained pointless themes a few years ago when I heard about "Make It Rain: The Love of Money." The objective of the aforementioned game is to tap on money, get more money, and waste your time gaining virtual funds. Game consultant Nir Eyal says,"...these games have underpinnings in consumer psychology." Dickey wanted to say if you could make an addictive game out of anything. Dickey tasked his game designing team to make an addictive app about toast.  That's right, toast. The psychology of the game occurs when leveling up, which increases dopamine;also, time pressure is factored in and it produces adrenaline, says Shokrizade. They plan on making money from the game by introducing an obstacle, (called "fun pain") that players can pay for to evade. I've seen these methods used in games like "Candy Crush" and "Subway Surfer." But, what does it say about society if we are persuaded so easily to waste time on apps with little though behind them? Nowadays, our attention is quickly gained by meaningless things and game designers are taking advantage of that. There are people in the game industry migrating to specific positions to form the new pointless app. So how do you feel knowing game designers are calculating what type of apps you'll like, waste time with, and even financially invest in? And what do you think the next pointless--but, popular-- game will be about?

Roger Dickey the game designer and entrepreneur.

Smith, Stacey V. "You Can Create A Hit Video Game About Anything. Even Making Toast." (n.d.): n. pag. National Public Radio. Web. 12 Oct. 2014. 

Games Are Beginning to Reflect Our Progressive Society

According to Jagger Gravning, a journalist for The Atlantic, our progressive society is beginning to diffuse into video games. If you pay attention to protagonists like Aveline de Grandpre (Assassin’s Creed: Liberation) and Lara Croft (Tomb Raider series) you may have noticed their sexual orientations are never clearly stated. This is due to the fact that the writers of these characters want them to be LGBT characters, but want to be subtle as not to offend homophobes. I am not an impartial party when it comes to the treatment of the LGBT community and it’s equal inclusion in all aspects of society. So, I am proud that our society has progressed far enough where there are all types of characters. However, we don’t know if the writers of these LGBT characters include them for the same reason. The hasty generalization is that these characters are just involved for sex appeal and that would explain why they are both women. Although games like Mass Effect 3 include scenes involving men and women. In the future there will likely be just as many LGBT characters in games as there are on TV.  But, let me know how you feel about these new characters.  And what type of characters do you think video games are lacking?

Lara Croft of Tomb Raider

Gravning, Jagger. "How Video Games Are Slowly, Quietly Introducing LGBT Heroes." The Atlantic:   Web. 5 Oct. 2014.