Montag, 9. Februar 2004
Trust Me, Computer Games are not bad for your social life.
georg, 14:48h
Developing Computer Games is one of the most insane things you will ever do and will ever have done in your life - obviously only if you are attempting or want to attempt such a thing.
But the good news is that saying "I'm working in Computer Games" isn't as much of a turn-downer than it used to be. Nowadays you mostly can happily walk up to somebody and tell them the truth about your job without being suddenly dropped and left alone. So basically we are more and more mass-market and that is a good thing. When graphics and sound started to become more and more advanced, when computers dropped to an affordable price and also when the internet kicked off the interest in computer games started rising quite drastically. More and more the ambition of creating games suitable for everybody became one of the priorities and now recently with all the game enabled mobile phones lots of people have been drawn into the world of gaming.
This obviously has huge effects on the actual development side of a game, especially its standards and how you deliver your ideas, your game, your vision - everything.
Example: Years ago a computer game fanatic would easily read through 25 screen pages full of story information before being able to do something in the game.
Nowadays this would be nearly impossible, only a small amount of people comparred to the big pie are willing to do so.
Or you could fool a player by making him believe that a white bar with a little tick on the top is an axe. Or you could write on the screen "Imagine a huge fly with slime all over its face..."
...but thanks to TV and Cinema the average person wouldn't even consider giving such thing a go.
And this is a good thing, it drives the quality standard high and makes computer games more accessible. As a result saying that you are working in computer games becomes more acceptable in the social environment.
Basically: Don't be surprised if you hear about computer programmers / artists / designers who have got a wife, kids, a house and enjoy sitting in the sun.
Nowadays this is perfectly possible.
But the good news is that saying "I'm working in Computer Games" isn't as much of a turn-downer than it used to be. Nowadays you mostly can happily walk up to somebody and tell them the truth about your job without being suddenly dropped and left alone. So basically we are more and more mass-market and that is a good thing. When graphics and sound started to become more and more advanced, when computers dropped to an affordable price and also when the internet kicked off the interest in computer games started rising quite drastically. More and more the ambition of creating games suitable for everybody became one of the priorities and now recently with all the game enabled mobile phones lots of people have been drawn into the world of gaming.
This obviously has huge effects on the actual development side of a game, especially its standards and how you deliver your ideas, your game, your vision - everything.
Example: Years ago a computer game fanatic would easily read through 25 screen pages full of story information before being able to do something in the game.
Nowadays this would be nearly impossible, only a small amount of people comparred to the big pie are willing to do so.
Or you could fool a player by making him believe that a white bar with a little tick on the top is an axe. Or you could write on the screen "Imagine a huge fly with slime all over its face..."
...but thanks to TV and Cinema the average person wouldn't even consider giving such thing a go.
And this is a good thing, it drives the quality standard high and makes computer games more accessible. As a result saying that you are working in computer games becomes more acceptable in the social environment.
Basically: Don't be surprised if you hear about computer programmers / artists / designers who have got a wife, kids, a house and enjoy sitting in the sun.
Nowadays this is perfectly possible.
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