Audience Profiling

Within any media industry, targeting the correct audience is critical to the success of the products sale values; a good media producer must know, represent and target the right group of people for a product to succeed.

There are two key ways of finding out key facts about your potential audience, one is primary research (such as surveys and focus groups) while the other is secondary research using existing theories. Key theories that are referred to include Maslow's Hierarchy of needs, NRS social value groups and NRS super profiles. . This research is very relevant to my main products because I am creating adverts. I believe that the target audience of These two charts below are used to explain what the different social groups are and also what the different super profiles are:

There are also several types of generalised target audiences. One of these is a 'mass' audience, which is a large mainstream type of audience. These audiences are usually very vast and can usually apply to specific social grades, such as the working class. For example, a company may aim a film they make more specifically at women. The second general type of audience is the 'niche' audience. This type of audience is usually much smaller than that of a mass audience, but can still be very influential. For example, white middle-class British males could be seen as a niche audience, as it is a lot more specific towards a certain type of person. Finding the best type of audience to aim for when making a product can be very stressful, as choosing the wrong target audience could dramatically affect the sales of that product.

Also in terms of theory, professionals refer to representation theory because the primary target audience need to see themselves and their needs reflecting in the product. One example of this is how the Uses and Gratifications theory (Katz & Blumer) can relate to target audience. In this theory, they stated reasons as to why audience members consume the media products, such as diversion/escapism, personal interactions, personal identity and surveillance.

Laura Mulvey is another media theorist who relates to audience profiling because of the way in which characters are represented. For example, a film may be much more male orientated if many of the female characters were very attractive and feminine. This relates to her 'Male Gaze' theory where the female audience would have to view the product from a male perspective. Stanley Hall is another theorist that relates to audience profiling, because he stated that young people had 'a lot of time on their hands'. This could mean that younger people would have more time to purchase and use my product. In addition, professional producers of media products use audience theory to guide them when tailoring their productions to specific groups.

In terms of primary research I conducted a Survey Monkey to find out if my initial thoughts based on my secondary research were correct and find out more specific details regarding what they would like to see in my adverts. To view the questions I put on my initial survey, here is a link to the blog post:

Survey Monkey Questionnaire

Based on my secondary and primary research I have developed the following audience profile for my target audience:

Age group: 15 - 21 years.

I made this choices because, through my research, I have found that video games in the side-scrolling beat 'em up style of genre are mostly played by teenagers. Therefore, I decided to follow this convention,  as I thought that the people who would be more likely to play a specific genre would be more likely to purchase the game.

Gender: Mostly male.

I also found through research that the gaming community seems to consist mostly of the male gender. I also found that the style of genre that my own game categorises into is mostly played by a male audience. This shows how I came to the decision of aiming my game mostly at a male audience.

Class: Lower class/working class.

I chose this class of people to aim my product at because these types of people are likely to have more time to play video games than much higher classes. This means that aiming the product at this class could mean a potentially better amount of sales, as this class of people would be able to spend time to enjoy the game.

Social Value Group: Most probably Traditionalists, as the game strays from the common conventions of modern games and more towards a much older style.

Through my research, people of a Traditionalist nature are more likely to follow common conventions of video games with a similar genre. This is a very good social value group to aim my product at, as I think that my product does follow a large majority of fantasy genre conventions.

Race: White/British (by default) as they would be the most common people to play my game.

As my product will be produced and released in the UK, it makes sense to aim the product at a British target audience, even if it is released abroad as well. I also decided to aim this product at white people because the majority of people living in Britain are white. This would be aiming my product at the mass audience, which can mean more potential customers.

Sexuality: Heterosexual.

Again, because the majority of people living in Britain are heterosexual, it makes sense to aim the product at the mass audience, as there can be a lot more potential customers from this.

Similar Games in terms of Gameplay

The game-play style for the game that I have designed fits into the "side-scrolling/beat 'em up" genre. During my research into these, I have created a small checklist that contains the major:

• This style of game is almost always played within a 2D environment
• Players move their characters to the right so that they can progress to the next area
• The player must defeat all enemies in one area before moving to the next area of the level
• In most games, a flashing symbol appears to tell the players that they can advance
• The HUD (Heads Up Display) will always show the characters life bar, how many lives the character has and what the player's current score is
• The players will usually have to defeat a boss enemy before moving to the next level
• The characters will usually be able to use a variety of attacks (which may also include special attacks)

I have decided to implement these into my game, as it will make it more relative to the genre and also may mean that the target audience will be able to recognise the genre better. While researching into this genre, I found several real life examples and specific guidelines that they all seem to follow. The first example is a famous game created by the large gaming industry Sega in 1991. It was called 'Streets of Rage'.

Streets of Rage is a game that seemed to appeal to teenagers at the time of it's release because, at the time, 2D fighting games were one of the more popular styles of games. During my research, I found that the most popular games produced at the time of this game's release tended to be side-scrolling games and shooter games. Because these genres were popular among gamers at the time, this game caught on fairly quickly.

The second game that I looked into for similarity was a more recent game. 'Ragnarok Battle Offline' is an independently-made game created by the Japanese game company French-Bread in 2007.

It's characters, setting and style is based off of the famous Korean RPG called 'Ragnarok Online'. The game is also animated very smoothly, which makes the gameplay much smoother. Because of it's unique art and animation style, this game looks very colourful and gives the gameplay a generally happy mood. This is very uncommon in many other games of this genre, because the majority of the other games contain very dark colours. This in turn gives some games of this genre a more serious mood. Another important element about this game is that the characters can level up, in which the players can choose specific skills to make them stronger. This relates to the RPG style that the game was based off of, as lots of RPGs allow players to level up their characters.


The third game I looked into for similarity in conventions was a very recent game which was released in 2010. It is another independent game produced by the company Klei Entertainment called 'Shank'.

It is a very good looking game, as the animation is very smooth and it has a 'comic book' style of art, which can make the game look as if it's aimed at mainly teenagers. This is also the more violent of the three games that I analysed, but I decided that my game would not be as violent so that there will be a larger target audience. If a game contains large amounts of gore or harsh violence, the target audience could be much smaller. Usually, if a game contains a 'fantasy' style of violence (i.e. no blood), the game could be played by a slightly younger audience.

Sometimes within gaming, the characters can act as idols for young people. Many gamers have come to idolise a wide variety of video game characters, both good and evil, for many different qualities (i.e. the gamer can relate to the character, the character may have a lovable personality, etc.). One main example of this is Mario (the Super Mario series), who since his creation in 1981 has become a globally famous mascot to the video game company Nintendo. Another example could be that with these games, the target audience could come to idolise the main protagonists because they are trying to fight against evil. This is usually one quality of a main character that brings the target audience to like them. In comparison, one quality that usually brings the target audience to like the villains of games is if they have a comedic or have a funny personality. 

The influence of new technologies on the video game industry.

 

In my opinion, I believe that the game industry can be greatly affected and influenced by the increase of new technologies. This is mainly because the gaming industry requires technology in all of the areas of production, from manufacturing to advertisement. To put it simply, the gaming industry would not exist without technology. But when a new kind of technology is introduced into the gaming industry, many gaming companies may be affected.

An example of this is when the gaming company Nintendo created the Nintendo Wii (2006), which was one of the first video games console that utilised 'motion controls' as it's main form of functionality and user interface. Many other companies were affected by this, as this new form of technology made the other video game consoles of the time look very out-dated. Because of this, the other main video game companies (Microsoft and Sony) had to improve their own consoles so that they would not be outdated. This was so that the two companies, Microsoft and Sony, could try to avoid the Nintendo Wii becoming a much better console than the others. This can be shown as an example when Sony created a new motion controller for their games console, the PlayStation 3. This was their attempt to become equal to the new novelty of motion control that the Nintendo Wii was utilising. This also happened when Microsoft announced a new form of motion control for their console, the XBox 360, which used the players movements as controls. This was their attempt to make their console become better than the Nintendo Wii by having an product that was new, but worked with the current console.

Another example of how new technologies can affect the gaming industry is when earlier this year, Nintendo announced their new product called the Wii U. This also affected the other two companies, as it meant that they would have to work on other new technologies to become equal to the new console that had been announced. This may include either making better adaptions to their current consoles, or making new ones altogether. The right choices will have to be made to keep the target audiences intent on buying their product over others.

Useful Media Links - Game Advertisement (The Design Stage)

During research into game advertising, I found a few very useful websites that could potentially help me in the design stage of my media production. I can refer to these websites to also aquire a more varied and general opinion on different aspects of design.

Codes and Conventions of Media: https://kohner.wikispaces.com/file/view/glossary_media_studies.pdf


Useful Tips on Storyboarding: http://www.ehow.com/how_5184299_design-game-storyboard.html


Independant Games within the Video Game Industry: http://www.gaslightgames.co.uk/?p=201

Video Game Synopsis

Steam, Swords and Sorcery is a forthcoming side-scrolling "beat 'em up" game that will be sure to wow all the nostalgic gaming fans, as it will be using a graphic style of the old animated sprite style. It will also please all the people who remember similar games like Double Dragon or Streets of Rage.

In the beginning, the main character, a young mage called 'Psy', starts off in a countryside field with his best friend, a young female knight called 'Trisha'. Everything is very calm and relaxing, but then a small town in the distance becomes covered in a layer of darkness. When they go to investigate, they find the town infested with mysterious monsters. The player then chooses to play as one of the two characters to play as (or if there are two players, they each select a character) and then they must fight through all the monsters to get to the center of the town. Here, they see the main antagonist, a man in a steam powered suit of armour calling himself 'Tekter'. He then escapes to the next area, leaving a strong boss monster for the player to fight.

Throughout the game, the player will gradually learn more about the three main characters of the game through cut-scenes. Firstly, the player learns that Psy was born in a small village in the mountains. He was an only child who was born with magic, making him to be considered a freak to everyone but his parents. Because of the ridicule, he became depressed and left home at only the age of eight. On his travels, he met a council of mages who took him in and train him more in the use of magic. When he learned all that he could, he left as a lone wanderer to help fight against the monsters that plagued the land.

Alongside this, we learn that Trisha was born into a rich family. For eleven years of her life, she lived in luxury with her parents and two older siblings, until a horde of dragons attack the city. Her mother died in a house fire, her father was carried away by one of the dragons and she was separated from her siblings. In her grief, she searched for shelter at a soldier training camp outside the ruined city, where they let her stay in return for cooking meals and helping to heal the wounded. A few years after, she requested to be trained in sword fighting, to which the training instructor agreed. Only half a year later, she became a near expert in swordsmanship. Because of this, she achieved the promotion to a Knight status.

At about the middle of the game, the player will see a cut-scene of how Psy and Trisha meet and become friends. In this cut-scene, it shows Psy traveling towards a city when he sees Trisha being cornered by monsters. He helps her to fight them off. After both of them return to this town, they become really good friends, to the joy of Psy, who has never had a friend before.

Just before the last level, a cut-scene will play which shows the origins of the mysterious Tekter. In this cut-scene, it turns out that Tekter is Trisha's father, a man originally called 'Carter' who was a famous engineer in steam powered technology. He was presumed dead after being taken away by one of the dragons who attacked his home city. However, when the dragon was flying low over a desert, he slipped from the dragon’s talons and landed on one of the sand dunes. He managed to escape the desert after several days, but both the grief of what he thought had happened to his family and the lack of food and water drove him near to insanity. Once he had crossed the desert, he stole food from a local town and hid away from civilization in a cave. Crazy as he was, he still had his knowledge of steam power. Using this knowledge, he built himself a suit of armour that would allow him to have incredible speed and strength. Also because of his crazed state, he attacked many different towns and cities under the alias of Tekter. His rampage was originally started as a search for his family, but turned once he discovered how powerful and feared he had become. He was also accompanied by steam powered monsters, which were designed to look like evil creatures. When confronted by Psy and Trisha, he does not recognize his own daughter by how much she had grown.

Survey Monkey - Gaming

This is a survey that I created. It will help me to build a general idea on what I should do for my project, as it will be influenced by the target audience.

Create your free online surveys with SurveyMonkey, the world's leading questionnaire tool.

20 Iconic Video Game Characters

20 Iconic Video Game Characters (& date of creation) on Prezi

I may incorprate some of the base ideas used in the creation of these characters in my own work. For example, number eleven (Chell) in the presentation was a character made by scanning a woman's face into a computer, which is why she looks very realistic. Another example used a lot in video game character design is to get a real life animal/object and change it to give it different properties/abilities. For example, number 1 (Sonic) is a game character based on a hedgehog. However, he has been made so that he is anthromorphic, is coloured blue and has the ability to run at very fast speeds. Another example is number 15 (Spyro), who has been based on a fictional dragon, but been given a more 'child-friendly' cartoon look.

Analysing Game Adverts - 3

  

This is the final magazine advert that I analysed. The game advertised is a creative survival game called Spore.

This is another example of a game advert that favours visual aspects over raw text. This generally makes the advert more appealing to all target audiences, as not many people want to read a lot of information at once. However, this can make the advert appear too simplistic. This may also mean that the target audience might not be able to learn much about the product from this particular advertisement. This is why the imagery is so important towards the meaning of the advert, as the audience may have high expectations for a game that has promising imagery (i.e. pictures of gameplay with stunning graphics, etc.).

The different hands are holding different controllers from much older gaming consoles. This connotes to evolution of gaming, which is backed up with the flavour text "The Next Stage in Evolution". This can indicate that the new game is aimed to be much better than most other games. The connotation of the game controller growing out of a person's hand can indicate towards how important and large the gaming industry has become over the years. This can also show that this particular industry has become a big part of many people's lives.

Analysing Game Adverts - 2

This is the second advert I have analysed. This is advertising a Japanese fighting game called One Piece: Grand Battle.

This advert is also different from the first advert, as it favours to use imagery over information. This can make the advert look as if it is aimed at a younger audience. The use of bright colours and smooth edges on the pictures also makes the advert look like it is aimed at teenagers. The style of writing used is also less formal, with lines such as "Ahoy there mi' hearties!". This indicates towards a younger audience. This style of speech is also accosiated with pirates, which easily displays one of the game's aspects to the target audience.


In the background, there are two people fighting each other. This relates to the age rating of the game, as it would be unlikely to be aimed at younger children if it contained violence. The character at the front of the advert also has an angry expression, which again indicates that the violence would be aimed at an older audience. This is, however, counteracted by the cartoonish colours and art style. It shows that contrasting the two themes can display a very unique style, as not many games mix cartoonish art styles with a gritty gameplay style.

Analysing Game Adverts - 1

This is the first magazine advert I have analysed. This particular advert promotes a puzzle game for the Nintendo DS console called Brain Age.

First of all, the main thing that attracts the eye to this advert is the main picture, as the main text does not stand out much. The picture seems to denote intelligence, due to the fact that the man's head seems to be illuminated. This can symbolise the fact that he is thinking. Another aspect that backs up this idea is the title of the game. The title 'Brain Age' can also denote thinking, as a brain can be a symbol of intelligence. It can also denote the main age group, as the man in the picture shows that this can be a game adults will enjoy.

This advert also connotes a formal type of advertising, due to the text being plain and simple, as well as taking up the majority of the space. This can mean that the advert was aimed at older people. This advert also uses very dull colours, which also connotes formality. Another aspect is that the picture of the actual game packaging is very small and is not included in the main picture. This is not usually done, as most adverts show the game packaging as a main part. This is because the target audience can know what to expect by looking at the games cover (which may include game aspects like main characters, game scenery, enemies, etc).

“Can you use a video game to rewire your brain?” is not a catchphrase that is included in the game, but seems more like a headline of a newspaper article. This highly connotes that the advert is being formal, as most newspapers are written very formally for the general public. It could also be considered that the game is being addressed to the majority of people through this advert, as many people can relate the style of writing used in the advert to that of a newspaper article, which will be something familiar to them. This could greatly expand the target audience that the advert is aimed at.