Genre
Types of Computer Games
Games can be referred to by genre, a genre is a way of categorising games by how the game is played, for example Command & Conquer is categorised as a RTS (Real time strategy) as it is often (but not always) played as an omnipresence, commanding an army and micromanaging resources to destroy the enemy. This is a sub-genre, the core genre would be Strategy. Some Main Genres: Adventure– Monkey island, Grim Fandango, these games focus mainly on giving the player a large and interesting world to explore. RTS– C&C, StarCraft, these games focus on building a base and maintaining an economy whilst fighting an enemy base. Sports games– Fifa, Punch out , these games focus on reproducing a sport in a realistic manor, these games mainly appeal only to fans of said sport. MMO’s– PlanetSide 2, massively multiplayer online games put massive amounts of humans against each other in often server based battles. FPS–CoD, First person shooters put the player in the perspective of who they are playing, often it is someone like a soldier.
Platform The platform of a game is what device it is played on devises or consoles are often categorised into generations, we are entering the eight gen with the PS4 and XBone, with these formats there has always been one that never really followed the trend as it was always there PC... There are a few ways to categorise these such as: Environments– Where people game, like bedroom or study. Actual Platform– What console/ Personal computer people use these may vary as people have different needs and preferences in platforms. Mobile platforms– Rapidly becoming one of the most used platforms due to price of games and convenience. Stand alone platforms– Like the Xbox 360 and N64, the individual consoles. Personal Computer– Argued for years as the ultimate gaming platform, with the right amount of money it can out way any console.
Educational Games– These are designed primarily to teach the player something new. Simulators– Flight sim, games that try and simulate a certain experience or profession. RPG– Mass Effect, heavily story and character progression led experiences.
Tech
Other
Over the course of the years gaming technology has come a remarkable distance the industry has gone from two blocks hitting a square back and forth to photo realistic graphical enhancing mods on games like Skyrim, it has gotten to the stage where some games look better than real life. We have gone form using less than 10 colours for a game to over 16 million.
There are of course other, less structured ways of categorising games, as gamers we are likely to do it daily without often realising, most if not all of us picked a side in the console wars of the 7th gen, that is still categorising.
Some ways to categorise this: Art style changes: 8bit, 16bit, 32bit etc… Allowing for use of higher resolutions and more colour. Uses of AI, allowing Human players to do battle with the computer that has a logic based thinking pattern similar to a human but like a step below. Introducing Physics in games, introducing physics into games allows the game devs to try some interesting ideas out with design aspects and flair.
Some of the other ways to categorise games are: Whether you like them or not, Art style, Price, Year released. We will always do this with most things as it helps us distinguish things and find what we want from something faster.
