Level 3 games design- understanding hardware technologies for game platforms
Unit 20
Task A

1. Introduce and explain what HCI(human computer interface) in the context of gaming is.

2. List and explain the following interface devices: controllers, joysticks, keyboard, mouse, wheel&pedals, motion sensing input device, motion controller, voice controller

. Include examples and references

1. gaming HCI's:
.keyboard&mouse- these are used for pc gaming and precise aiming in games. they can be used for other tasks on the computer aswell.

.xbox one controller&xbox 360 controller- althought each controller has a slightly different design from eachother they still do the same things to navigate you through each consoles menus and control you in the games you play

.ps3 controller&ps4 controller- these controllers follow the same concept as the xbox controllers, they have the same functions but have been slightly adapted through the years

.wii remote&wii u remote- the controllers for the Nintendo wii are actually motion sensor controllers and follow your movement through the motion sensors, the wii u has another controller with a built in screen to do extra activities following the main game

2. controllers- these are the way you move about menus and games for almost every console











Joysticks- A specialised controller designed for games like flight simulators and so-on, things that need 360 degree movement









mouse and keyboard- generally used for all computers whether it be browsing the web or playing games

wheel and pedals- specifically designed for driving or racing games so you can get the most realis
tic feeling








motion sensing input device- this device basically turns you into the controller, it senses your movements and uses that to browse the menus and play the games




motion controller- for this you need the controller and a sensor near the controller to detect your hand movements and so you have extra buttons on the controller to get more movement









voice controller- the xbox one for example has voice control built in to the headset to you can use it to turn it off/on, start games and so on







Task B- understanding hardware and technologies for game platforms



NES controller                                                                                                 PS4 controller

Unit 78: Digital Graphics for Computer Games

Aims: Understand theory and application of digital graphics used for computer games

Image resolution- If you take an image you can then transfer it over to Photoshop. From here you can look at the pixel dimensions and see how many pixels there are from top to bottom and left to right

Image quality- Basically the resolution of the image is the quality of the image. It's just the number of dots in any given space. the more pixels you have in an image the higher quality it will be. The image to the right is from the original mega-man. As you can see the individual pixels are quite easy to see compared to the game below (fez) which has much more pixels on the screen, creating a clearer image.

Intensity- Each pixel inside an image has a number that determines how bright it is and/or what colour it should be.









File Extensions- A file extension is what we use to identify and change the way we save files for different editing software and so on. For example a tiff file can be used for mobile games because it compresses images without losing the quality. I used this image because this is the standard icon to show jpeg file extensions and how you will be saving something.







Compression- Simply, this is when you make a file as small as possible while also trying to lose as little quality from it as possible. Going back to my previous example, tiff files will compress images but will keep the previous quality.










Image Capture- This is when you use different methods to capture an image whether it be with a photo, screen recording software, screenshot, scanning, etc. I used this image as an example of screenshotting, if you press the PrtScn button you can capture anything that is on the screen and then go on to save it to your computer.




Optimising- To make something as effective, perfect, or useful as possible. It can also be said that you write or re-write something to maximise efficiency and speed in the retrieval, storage or execution of it.



Storage of Image Assets- This is a very useful way to tore things like textures, graphics and text styles so you can easily access them. It is important to correctly name the file so you can find it at a later date, for example if you have the texture for a tree in a certain level then you could name it "tree level one" or something like that, this stops you getting confused between different textures for different levels. You also need to bare in mind the size of the file, if a file is too big it can cause problems when you try to transfer it. I used the image above because as you can see the person has got several different versions of thee same thing but each one has been named differently.