David Ward: Gaming Sub Cultures

Sub-culture

a cultural group within a larger culture, often having beliefs or interests at variance with those of the larger culture.

The question that confuses me is that "is gaming a sub-culture of the entertainment culture" or is

it culture in it's own right? For me I see it as culture in it's on right, games are games but I believe it's the genres within the games industry create these subcultures within it.

Keep fit Gaming

More than a few years ago Nintendo pioneered a new way forward for interactive gaming with the Nintendo Wii. The cutting edge new console allowed gamers to interact with games via the movement of the controller as opposed to the normal gaming pad. It was aimed at getting kids active and off the sofa to combat the growing number of cases of obesity in children which you could say games in the past have contributed towards theses cases. With this new way of interactivity of promoting a healthier life style, came the Wii fit which was kind of a virtual gym which acts like a personal trainer, keeping check on your weight and progress via a set of fun challenges which aided the lose of weight.

As a result a new genre or sub-culture was born which has grown from strength to strength to this day. A prime example of this is the new Xbox One Kinect camera which traces over 48 different body parts and even tracks your heart rate. This proves how games keep changing by going in new directions to fit within the type of culture that we live in today.

Looking at this image from a design point of view , the packaging has a clean and simple look to it. The "Fit" type has been chosen with active thoughts in mind looking as if it's on the move which has been achieved by simply slanting the type forward. The colour green makes me think of a healthy life overall, it makes me think of vegetables and green environment so that has got to have been chosen with this in mind

Information and Images sourced from:
www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2010/nov/16/fitness-video-games-at-home

Dancing games

Thinking along the lines of fitness, I haven't considered the many dancing simulators out there which started with 1999 Dance Revolution by Konami in Japan. I would say, it was arcades like these that helped pave the way forward for games and consoles like the Wii and Wii fit.

Task
As I have to look into subcultures and produce practical outcomes informed by them, I thought it would be good to combine the idea of keep fit gaming with dance to inform a designed piece of packaging.

The Korean Gaming Culture (sub-culture)

Gaming in South Korea is massive with over half of the countries population playing online gaming regularly. The difference with our culture and theirs is that they visit places called PC bangs which are public areas set up for online gaming instead of our culture which is mainly in our own homes. PC bangs are seen as the equivalent to bars in our culture which is very interesting how diverse gaming cultures can be. Massive tournaments are held as well and the countries top gamers are seen as A listed celebrities and heroes of the nation.

With this game centred culture comes issues. Video game addiction has become a major issue and recognised illness across South Korea. People have even died through cardiac arrest as a result of long stints of gaming. The government has even took steps imposing a curfew on online gaming between certain hours of the day for minors.