Videogames: Horizon Forbidden West - Audience and Industry

 Audience

Look at this YouGov blog on the console gaming audience and answer the following questions:

1) What statistics can you find for the number of male / female players for the major consoles?

2) What is the difference between 'hardcore' and 'casual' gamers - and which do you think would play Horizon Forbidden West?

Looking at how people play on each system shows that, among American gamers, the “hardcore” – those who say they take video games seriously, or play competitively – are a minority, and one with the highest representation on the PS5 (19%) and Xbox Series X|S (20%). Casual gamers are most common on the Nintendo Switch (45%), and the PC, where half of players identify as casual (51%). The PC is not always a dedicated gaming platform, and has other functions: while some will play graphically demanding titles like Red Dead Redemption 2 or Spider-Man: Miles Morales or Destiny, others may be interested in a more relaxing experience on their commute – or in between work projects or chores – such as Solitaire or Stardew Valley.

3) What are the different reasons YouGov researched for why players play games? Which of these would apply to Horizon Forbidden West?

This is borne out somewhat by the reasons current-gen gamers on each system give for playing video games. When asked, most gamers across every system say relaxing and winding down is a key motivation for playing video games – but especially for PC (77%) and Switch (78%) gamers compared to Xbox (56%) and PS5 (63%). This group are also more likely to say they play games “to pass the time” or “to escape from reality for a while”. Switch gamers are also especially likely to be creatively motivated: three in ten say they play games to “make a world of their own” (29%), next to a quarter of PC gamers (26%) and a fifth of PS5 (21%) and Xbox gamers (22%).

For their part, PS5 and Xbox gamers are more likely to say they play video games for social purposes: around a quarter of the former (24%) and nearly three in ten of the latter (28%) say they play video games “to interact with gamers from around the world”, next to just 16% of both Switch gamers and PC gamers. The greater multiplayer emphases of these consoles next to the Switch may partially account for this.

1) How is the game promoted to an audience?

This showed snippets from the game to intrigue the audience into buying the show.

2) What are the key features for the game listed on the site?

The trailer, gameplay, characters and news about the game.

3) What information does the website offer players about the game world and characters? Give a few examples.

The descriptions about the characters and the world. Explore distant lands, fight bigger and more awe-inspiring machines, and encounter astonishing new tribes as you return to the far-future, post-apocalyptic world of Horizon.

The land is dying. Vicious storms and an unstoppable blight ravage the scattered remnants of humanity, while fearsome new machines prowl their borders. Life on Earth is hurtling towards another extinction, and no one knows why.

It's up to Aloy to uncover the secrets behind these threats and restore order and balance to the world. Along the way, she must reunite with old friends, forge alliances with warring new factions and unravel the legacy of the ancient past – all the while trying to stay one step ahead of a seemingly undefeatable new enemy

4) What spin-offs and additional content are available as part of the Horizon franchise?  

The other game within the Horizon franchise, paper models of the machines and wallpapers.

5) Applying Henry Jenkins's work on fandom, what aspects of the website (you may need to scroll down) encourage fan activity and engagement with online Horizon communities?  

Audiences can involve themselves by cosplaying as the character, buying the different accessories and engaging online with social media. 

Read this Wired feature on Horizon Forbidden West's open world design. Answer the following questions: 

1) Why did the writer enjoy Horizon Forbidden West?

THERE is nothing more exciting—or daunting—than an open-world video game. Fire one up and you’re quickly faced with enough real estate to lose hours of your life happily exploring or an abyss in which to get frustratingly lost and bored. 

2) How is Horizon Forbidden West structured for players when they first start the game?

Horizon Forbidden West is the former, a game that tackles the concept of an open world incredibly well. To date, I’ve spent about 75 hours in the game, and even though I completed the main story a while ago, I’m still eager to spend time in its deliciously crafted world. Guerrilla Games’ follow-up to Horizon Zero Dawn is the kind of game that stays on its rails for the first five to 10 hours, pulling you into the narrative before releasing you to explore. It creates structure and a sense of the goals for gameplay—the ideal introduction to a game built around wide-open spaces.

3) Why does the writer feel HFW created a more successful open world game than The Witcher 3?

Even if we were comparing Zero Dawn and The Witcher 3, we’d still be having this same discussion because even when the Horizon world was brand-new, its structured style drew me in in a way that Witcher 3’s more feral gameplay does not.

Industries

Industry research

1) Research Sony PlayStation Studios. 

This organisation has defined gaming for generations. Our collective of studios and teams span the globe – and together – advance gaming and the positive impact it has on people’s lives.

PlayStation Studios is the fabric that binds us together, with the boldness and spirit to explore, the passion to invent and reinvent, and the confidence to let imagination lead the way.

2) What studios are part of Sony PlayStation Studios?

Bend Studio, Bluepoint, Guerrilla, Haven and Firesprite.

3) What notable games have they produced? 

Spider Man Miles Morales Gran Turismo 7, God of War and The Last of Us.

4) Now research Guerrilla Games. Look at the 'Explore' page in particular. Who owns Guerrilla Games and how does it reflect the modern videogames industry? 

Guerrilla is one of Europe's leading game companies and a wholly-owned subsidiary of Sony Interactive Entertainment Europe. We started in 2003, and have pushed the boundaries of technical and artistic excellence in our games ever since.

Owned by Michiel Mol.

5) Choose one of the 'Guerrilla Spotlight' features and write three things you learn about the videogames industry and/or Guerrilla Games from the interview.

HOW GUERRILLA MADE A PLAYSTATION ICON

How do you make a PlayStation icon? PlayStation Access spoke to Guerrilla's former management team, Angie Smets, Jan Bart van Beek and Michiel van der Leeuw, as they share their memories of building landmark experiences for PlayStation across an incredible 20-year history for the studio.

It all started in 2003 with Killzone, before the team moved on to create the ground-breaking Horizon Zero Dawn in 2017. Horizon was something entirely new for the studio, and in Aloy introduced a protagonist that immediately cemented a place in not just PlayStation history but also the hearts of players worldwide. So just how did Guerrilla create this incredible PlayStation icon?

Read this USA Today feature on Guerrilla Games. Answer the following questions: 

1) Which three companies merged to become Guerrilla Games?

That collective of developers was formed by Orange Games, Digital Infinity, and Formula Game Development.

2) What other games and franchises were created by Guerrilla Games?

With the ink still drying on the company’s signs, it began work on its two most ambitious projects yet, a pair of shooters that would change the trajectory of Guerrilla and see Sony come knocking: Killzone and Shellshock: Nam ‘67.

3) How did Guerrilla maximise the Killzone franchise? 

Killzone, on the other hand, faced criticism more technical in nature. Graphics glitches, bugs and performance issues put a hurdle between players and an enjoyable, challenging and dark shooter. 

But it didn’t stop it. There’d been a huge amount of what we might now call hype for Killzone before release, and that tide of excitement overcame the bugbears.

4) What did Sony sign with Guerrilla in 2004? 

 Over a million copies were sold, and that was enough to get Sony to draw up a first-party contract for Guerrilla, ensuring that from 2004 onwards all the titles it developed would appear only on PlayStation consoles. The deal meant that when Horizon: Zero Dawn released on PC in the summer of 2020, it was the first Guerrilla title to make it to that platform since Shellshock: Nam ‘67 in 2004. 

5) How is Horizon Forbidden West described in the article and what is the next stage for the franchise?  

Horizon, on the other hand, has a different atmosphere entirely. It’s a world bearing the scars of a mysterious lost civilization, a far future that looks like a distant past, and it’s just about hospitable that you can exhale and take in the scenery now and then. This was never the case in Killzone. Nor were the latter’s characters especially memorable, despite some convoluted double-crossings and a series-long penchant for surprise protagonist killings that would have made the Call of Duty writers’ room proud. Aloy’s journey through Horizon showed a different side to Guerrilla – soft-touch storytellers and exceptional world-builders, as well as masters of squeezing the most out of PlayStation hardware and making a headshot feel just right.

Horizon: Forbidden West will be only the studio’s eighth game as Guerrilla Games, and only its third outside the Killzone franchise. Its next announced project, a VR title co-developed with Firesprite called Horizon: Call of the Mountain, is in many ways the perfect example of what the studio’s about: a deepening of a universe it created itself, making fortuitous use of a Sony hardware platform. Meanwhile, anyone waiting for that Shellshock sequel might have to be patient.

Regulation and PEGI

1) What is HFW's PEGI rating and what age rating do you feel would be appropriate? Why?

16 rated. I feel like this appropriate due to high levels of violence involved in the game.

2) Why is regulating videogames difficult in the digital age?

People have lots of different views on a particular videos and the ratings can vary person to person.

3) Are attitudes towards media content and regulation changing as a result of the internet? Explain your answer.

Yes because the internet has a high influence on regulation towards media content.